“Therefore, Ananda, be islands unto yourselves, refuges unto yourselves….” As he lay dying, the Buddha is said to have given this advice to his beloved disciple Ananda. Many of us have heard or read a translation of this teaching that encourages us to be a “lamp” or a “light” unto ourselves–verifying the truth in the light of our own experience. In recent years, however, a more ancient layer of the earliest teachings of the Buddha has come to light, leading some scholars to come down on the side of “island” not “lamp.” (Apparently both were signified by the Pali word “dipa,” which probably isn’t any stranger than “knot” and “not” or “bear” and “bare” in English, when you think about it).
In either case, the Buddha did not mean be cut off, to be isolated and self-sufficient. He didn’t mean be an island in the sense of that long-ago Simon and Garfunkel song about being a rock, an island…”and a rock feels no pain and an island never cries”. Just the opposite. The Buddha was probably speaking to people who were seeking the inviolate little islands of Atman. Using a word in use at that time, he gave it a new spin, he sought to convey how being an island could mean being something not cut off but open to the world inside and out, a peaceful, grounded state, non-grasping, non-afraid.
This is how I think of it. During Christmas week, I saw an incomparable “Twelfth Night” on Broadway. Featuring the great Mark Rylance, Stephen Fry, and many other amazing actors from the Globe in England, candle-lit and Elizabethan in dress and every other possible detail, it was magic. During the snowy ride home, I talked with my daughter about how the characters in the play travelled from the surface to the depths of their experience, from drama queen showy emotion to true love, from fake identities to true fates. I asked Alex, who has a freshly minted masters degree in medieval and renaissance studies, if Illyria was an island (it turns our to be a land on a Balkan coast). Alex told me that it is taught that Shakespeare set many of his plays on islands or island-like faraway lands or in Pagan times or imaginary times because in his own time feeling and expressing grief showed a lack of faith (In fact, Olivia’s fool makes a joke about her grief in Twelfth Night), jibing that she must think her brother in hell or else she is a fool).
What if we became islands unto ourselves in the spirit of Shakespeare? What if we allowed ourselves to inhabit our full human experience without judgement? What if we allowed ourselves to stop and land right in the midst of the rushing stream of this internet-driven experience, giving our attention to our full experience, welcoming in all the orphans and outlaws and fools, judging nothing.
I think then we would see that attention itself is an extraordinary gift, a means of purification, transformation, and freedom. Stopping and bringing attention is a way to land, to be grounded in the midst of it all, a way of being an island and refuge.
To move forward with a great resolution we must first fall back. Recently, I read this bit of New Year’s Resolution wisdom on Facebook (our endless forward-rushing stream of adages and quotes and clips and quips). It struck me that there was deeper truth here, beneath the well-worn nuggets about regrouping for a great battle or backing up for a running start.
Hearts can change. Given enough time and the right conditions, even the most battle-hardened heart can learn to take off the armor, stop contracting into a fist, dare to be soft and exposed. This process of opening can take a long, long time–a big piece of lifetime or even many lifetimes according to the Buddhists. Knowing this can bring an easing in itself, a sense that it is alright to take time, to take off the armor and let the wounds heal.
I am just back from London and Oxford and the huge and very happy event of my daughter Alexandra’s marriage. As often with great things, it’s best to ease in by way of a few seemingly minor or even unrelated observations–and not just the expected ones, that at moments this Mother of the Bride (or M.O.B.) felt brashly, heart-on-my-sleeve American in the English setting. As I rose to make several longish narrative toasts, I felt how true it is, that placing ourselves in new surroundings gives us fresh impressions of how we are–that what we take to be true is really just our small perspective. What rises to the top this morning is a detail heard and glimpsed the day before we went up to Oxford for the great event. Alex and her now-husband Anthony took her parents for a bit of London sight-seeing, a walk over London Bridge, a trip to Borough Market (
Tracy Cochran 