Moving to mindfulness with Coralee Hicks

 

HALLIE EPHRON: It’s always a lovely surprise and a pleasure to hear from one of our regular commenters (who feels like part of our family) is having a piece of their writing published. Today, it’s HATS OFF to Coralee Hicks, one of the “mindfulness practitioners” who contributed to an anthology coming on Amazon October 10, 2023: Tears Become Rain: Stories of Transformation and Healing Inspired by Thich Nhat Hanh, Zen master who passed away a year and a half ago.

The essays explore themes of coming home to ourselves, healing from grief and loss, facing fear, and building community and belonging. Coralee is one of 32 “mindfulness practitioners” who write about their encounter with the teachings of Zen master. I asked Coralee to share with us how her chapter (“Becoming alive: Finding a sensible way to live with food") came to be.

CORALEE HICKS: In 2014, I found a community of meditators nearby, and visited. I was hesitant, but did feel welcomed. When I told them of my disability, they made an effort on my behalf, providing an assisted hearing device. (In the photo below, Coralee is in the red shirt.)

It was a few months before I asked what tradition they followed. To my surprise, they told me: “We follow the teachings of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hahn”.

“Oh, not me, I thought. I could never understand Zen. Truth be told, I could never understand any Buddhist text.

This was frustrating for me. I grew up with Buddhists, and was very involved with Tibetan Buddhism when I was a teenager. However I did know of Thich Nhat Hahn. The poet, the activist, the scientist, the bodhisattva.

I began to settle down and listen.

I was amazed with the kindness, and strength of purpose I found in this group of people. One of the first things that convinced me of their sincerity, was being advised that I did not have to give up my core religion in order to become a member of this community.

I was lonely, adrift, and nothing was working. Maybe I could renew myself here. I discovered why Thich Nhat Hanh was so loved.

Often called Thay, Vietnamese for ‘teacher’, he saw that Buddhism needed to become more in touch with lay people. Monks chanting in refuge, no longer could solve problems of today. While in Viet Nam, and continuing in exile, he began to develop the principles of Socially Engaged Buddhism.

However, Thich Nhat Hahn is best known for his teachings on the practice of living in the present moment.

For me, his modification of the Bodhisattva precepts in the Mahayana tradition, which led to the development of the 14 Mindfulness Trainings was a revelation. Reading them I knew that this was the way I wanted to live.

Four years after Thay’s catastrophic stroke, a group from the Washington DC Sangha proposed to create a book as a fundraiser for Thay. Notices were sent to all monasteries and Saghas requesting submissions.

Hearing Hallie’s words of encouragement, I thought why not? I submitted a piece.

The journey from idea to book took 5 years. There were many editorial changes over this time. My chapter heading changed several times, and now is listed as “What is eating me”. My piece is found in the final section: Being Here Now: the Wonders of the Present Moment.

We came from all over the world to write and celebrate Thay. All of the proceeds from the book's purchase will go to The Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation. I am deeply honored to be included in this endeavor. I owe so much to my friends on Jungle Red Writers. Without your support I would not have my very own ISBN.

I bow to you in deep gratitude.

HALLIE: Oh, Coralee, we bow back to you!!

I am so delighted to have been one of the voices encouraging you! Yes, the book can be pre-ordered. Congratulations, Coralee! And congratulations to the other writers who contributed to the anthology who were fortunate enough to be touched by Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh.

Julia's Gratitude Journal

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Gratitude! It's everywhere! It was the cover theme on last month's Oprah magazine, and I listened to an jour-long show on NPR about how being grateful for the little things that give you pleasure has a measurable effect on lifting depression and calming anxiety.

Not the we're depressed or anxious! Ha ha! No! Not even about the manuscript for the next book STILL not being done! Hang on for a second while I shotgun a King-sized bag of M&Ms.

 Gratitude is also referred to as mindfulness, but gratitude doesn't sound so New Age-y. If mindfulness is your yoga instructor setting up an essential oil diffuser, Gratitude is your grandmother starching the linen napkins and reminding you to count your blessings. We did such a great job a couple month ago, let's all pitch in and think about what's lighting our candles (metaphorically speaking) as we walk into the darkest time of the year.

I'm going to put homemade chocolate chip cookies at the top of my list. I made a double batch the other day, and while I gave away about a third of them to the Smithie and her boyfriend Ishmael, I kept the rest of them for myself. All to myself! (Picture me laughing maniacally and rubbing my hands together.) They've last over a week so far - a major change from the days when the house was full and the cookies would vanish within 24 hours.

I'm also super grateful for Hallmark Christmas movies. You can fight me on this, artsy movie lovers. For me, there is nothing better after a long, busy day than stretching out beside the woodstove and watching a hard-charging corporate executive relocate to a small town, become a gingerbread-house baker, and fall in love with the boy next door who turns out to be a prince. It's like consuming McDonald's fries and a chocolate milkshake - you know it's not good for you, but it hits every pleasure center in your brain.


I got some delightful news a couple days ago that makes me very grateful: the Sailor is getting two weeks' leave and will be home over Christmas! I haven't sen him since his little sister's graduation in May. I may even let him have some of my chocolate chip cookies.

This definitely counts as a small thing that give me great pleasure: nail polish. Think about it - what else can you buy for around eight to ten bucks that lasts for months and lifts your spirits every time you put it on? Okay, a box of condoms, but what else besides that?

I've been mindful of polite drivers lately, as the summer construction season which tore up approximately 85% of the streets in Portland continues into the winter. It's nerve-frying to be stuck in stop-and-go lanes with weird merges and people trying to pull in and out to get to stores and offices. It's made even worse with snow and slush on the streets. which is why kindly drivers who wait their turn, gesture for you to go ahead, and signal their intentions well in advance make me smile. My friends in Massachusetts, I'm sorry you'll never know this kind of happiness.

In the "grateful for the absence of" category, I'm thankful for the continued good health of my kitty Neko. There's no reason for her not to be healthy - she eats moderate amounts of a balanced diet,
stays strictly indoors and is in the prime of life at eight-going-on-nine. It just that for several years the other pets were constantly going to the vets for skin allergies, hawk attacks (not even kidding) getting hit by a pickup and, of course, doggy cancer. I'm pretty sure my bills alone paid the salary and benefits of one full-time vet assistant. Now dear Louie has gone to the Great Dog Park in the sky, and Juno and her allergies are living with the Smithie. One yearly visit for feline leukemia shots is a pretty sweet deal.

Speaking of health, I'm deeply grateful for the ACA. I've just been reviewing my application for 2019, and I'm getting a BIGGER subsidy to help pay for good-quality health care for me and Youngest. Just for kicks and giggles I went on the insurance company's website and priced the same policy off the Marketplace. Oy vey. If it weren't for the ACA, my health insurance would probably be a bottle of vitamin C and some Band-Aids. Thanks, Obama!

So, I couldn't afford the non-marketplace insurance, but I did spring for some really nice sheets, and I'm so grateful when I snuggle down in them with my disease-free cat at my side. Higher thread count and better cotton is totally worth it, guys.

I'm grateful that the Smithie has done so well as a columnist for the Portland Press Herald that she and I will be doing our first mother daughter appearance together next Tuesday, December 11! It's a twice yearly program put on by the newspaper called "Maine Voices." It continues to amuse us to no end that people will be paying good money to hear us talk to each other. Hopefully, it won't sound like the third act of The Glass Menagerie.

Finally, as the holiday season gets into its full swing, I'm always grateful for Mariah Carey singing "All I Want for Christmas is You." Most modern Christmas songs drive me screaming up the chimney after I've heard them for the 100th time. (I actually heard the beginning of "Do They Know It's Christmas At All" yesterday and broke land speed records racing across the living room to change the station.) Not Mariah's classic. I could listen to her warm up her pipes every day for the next ten years, and it still makes me want to dance across the floor, waving my hands in the air and admiring my nail polish.

 

On Creativity

JAN: After studying the "structure" of writing for so long, I've turned my attention to something I used to think was simply innate, but have since learned can be enhanced. And that's creativity. And I've learned something really about being creative.

To be more creative, you have to shut up.

I'm pretty sure it is an occupational hazard of writers that we never shut up. At least not me, and not internally. Often when I'm in a room, I'm not in a room at all. My mind is automatically talking to itself about how I'd describe the room, or what I'd say about the people in the room, or about the event that's taking place. It's as if I'm always writing a letter about whatever I'm doing, instead of actually doing it.

Along the same lines as when you are TALKING, you can't LISTEN, when you are internally WRITING, its impossible to take in all the available sights, sounds, textures, experiences. If you think you know something well enough to write a letter about it, you've stopped really learning anything new.

So in the ULTIMATE paradox, it appears that I have to learn to stop processing all my thoughts in words to be a better writer.

EXPERIMENT: Since I had time to kill anyway, I tried this on the train ride home from NYC Thursday. I looked like just your average passenger, but really I was trying like hell to process all the sights, textures, smells and sounds (mostly sounds because a train is incredibly noisy) without naming anything, without letting the analytical part of my brain talk too much. (Shutting it up completely is impossible.) I managed this for three separate 15 minute intervals.

RESULT: I'm guessing that it takes more than one train ride experiment to have any kind of impact on my writing -- and how will I know exactly, unless I'm writing a train scene? But I did have an unusual side effect. I arrived home in an incredibly good mood that won't seem to go away. And I was also unusually efficient and productive yesterday -- on a Saturday no less.

Has anyone else ever tried an experiment in creativity? Mindfulness? Any tips to share?

Come back tomorrow when we talk about acts of grace

On True Crime Tuesday, I offer a scenario for a thriller and hope to hear some brainstorming.

Wednesday, I interview Leslie Wheeler on the latest in her living history series -- Murder at Spouters Point.

On Thursday, our own Roberta Isleib talks about her new mystery series set in Key West

and Friday (which I always think of as green for some reason)-- well I'll have to figure out SOMETHING good for Friday.