Marcia Rose reflects on “Ehi-passika” – come & see

A reflection on practice by Marcia Rose

What is it that enables us to move towards ‘being a Buddha?’ What makes one a true heir of the Buddha? A phrase that the Buddha often used – “ehi-passika,” come & see – is an invitation not to come & believe, but to come & see for ourselves what is true. To come & see in this way requires great interest, willingness & courage which includes a growing faith that blossoms out of our own direct experience, interest, willingness & courage to look with humility… directly, deeply, & honestly into the body, the heart & the mind… without relying on what others say is true via what we’ve heard or read. To come & see in this way requires that we don’t settle into the inertia of our habitual perceptions of, our relationships to, or our self-identifications with our inner & outer experience.

Some years ago, I went hiking with a long-time Dharma student friend up into the mountains of the Taos Ski Valley. We chose to hike in silence, walking alone though not far from each other, and to speak together only during rest breaks & lunch. As we took our time making our way up the trail, hiking in this manner provided a deeply connected relationship through each of the sense doors to the surrounding world, to our bodily sensations & movement, and to the various mental states & feelings that come & go in the mind & heart,

As wended our way up through this Rocky Mountain landscape, two young people came running up behind us. They each had a small yellow plastic object in their hand, which they were quite intently holding up & out in front of them. We exchanged cursory hellos and asked them what the yellow plastic object was. We were told it was a GPS. They were in such a hurry, there was no opportunity to ask what a GPS is. This was before GPS became so widely used. My friend knew a little about it & said that it’s a device that tells you where you are. As soon as she said this, we looked at each other with amazement & burst into laughter. As my friend & I were slowly making our way up the mountain that day, we were connecting with & knowing ‘where we were’ again & again in so many ways & on so many levels, that the intermediary of a Global Positioning System seemed absurd.

The qualities of interest, willingness & courage are what keeps our practice alive… from the very beginning & on-going through all the years of our practice. Investigation/discrimination of bodily & mental states is the activity of mindfulness… the discerning aspect of mindfulness. This active aspect of mindfulness is what clearly illuminates the object, lighting up all of our sense door & mental experiences right to their core, showing us both their individual characteristics & their universal essence… their nature/ultimate reality.

LOST by David Wagoner:

Stand still.

The trees ahead and bushes beside you are not lost.

Wherever you are is called Here.

And you must treat it as a powerful stranger.

Must ask permission to know it and be known.

The forest breathes.

Listen. It answers, I have made this place around you.

If you leave it, you may come back again,

Saying ‘Here’.

No two trees are the same to Raven.

No two branches are the same to Wren.