Dharma/Arte

spokes in the wheel

Drawings by Jeff Wigman; text by John Pappas

Three potent images spinning: the rooster, the snake and the pig, each represent greed, hate and ignorance respectively. These poisons bleed and blend into each other. A rooster sprouts scales; wings erupt from the snake; both clatter along on the hooves of the pig. The resulting chimera is difficult to tame and horrible to behold. Is the rooster already melding with the snake?

The Buddha presented a causal chain of activity spurred on by greed, hate and ignorance that is responsible for the endless cycle of suffering. Once realized and understood, this chain was capable of being broken and the cycle ended. Each of the nidanas is causally linked to the next, with one step laying the groundwork for the following in the chain. Whether starting at the beginning of the chain, in the middle or end; the result is the same, rebirth and suffering.

A sapling in the woods didn’t come into being without certain antecedent factors that led to its current state. The sapling required water from the sky, nourishment from the earth, sunlight to warm it and a seed from which to sprout. All these factors led to the sapling’s growth and its current state. In turn, each of the precipitating factors also did not simply spring forth from nowhere. The soil is filled with nutrients from decaying organic matter and minerals leeched from older rocks. The sunlight is filtered through our atmosphere and results from chemical reactions within the sun. The rain is due to weather patterns alternating atmospheric conditions. Each of these things led, in part, to the seed being dropped from a tree. Everything is due to the causal factors that preceded them.

Buddhists are more concerned with the seeds of rebirth and how to sever those causal events that lead to continued suffering through endless cycles of birth and death. Our goal is to prevent the sapling of rebirth from ever taking seed or, at least, to take an axe to the tree of suffering. But in order to take these actions the Buddha taught that a key to liberation is first understanding.

Each of the twelve nidanas — ignorance, mental formation, consciousness, name and form, the six senses, contact, feeling craving, clinging, becoming, birth and finally old age and death — represent a link in a causal chain that leads to rebirth and suffering. They also represent hope that cessation of any point of the chain breaks the cycle and leads to liberation.

Car Keys in Hand — Groping in darkness for a vehicle that was never seen before, the blind woman fumbles through life encased in complete ignorance. Reality is unrealized and the formation of the ego begins sending the woman adrift on the ocean of confusion and pain. Even if the blind woman was fortunate and stumbled upon the vehicle for which she searches the resulting crash would leave her dazed and on her awkward quest once again.

A Potter at the Wheel — The creation of our ability and character is typified by this nidana in the form of a potter at his wheel. Carefully crafting clay walls and barriers within his meager understanding, the potter separates the known from the unknowable. Surprisingly resilient, these clay walls are heated by the kiln of ignorance and harden over time and experience. Can the forceful blow of introspection and contemplation shatter these walls? The potter is left to ponder why he even bothered to create this vessel in the first place.

A Monkey in a Cage — Our senses run loose in the cage of our consciousness. We collect and thus become a collector of sense-information. Eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body and mind are wild and untamed one moment and then confined and refined the next. Is the potter still at his wheel? The vessel has become a cage that contains both creator and created. Can one create himself at the wheel?

Skimming the Surface — Labels and forms now embody the categorization of our experience. Upon viewing and collecting our sensory input and forming our vessel; we now plant our feet firmly upon the surface of our reality and declare it our own. Our consciousness arises from this stance but it makes only small ripples and the surface remains largely unbroken. Do the passengers seem worried to you? Do they guess the depth of the water below?

The House with Six Windows — The six senses — sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste and mental formations — form the foundation and structure of the house we build. Each of these senses provides us the raw input that describes the world and eventually what we will consider our consciousness. In Western terms mental formation is not included, however the mind is an integral sense that interacts and incorporates the other five senses. The result is what was once a small, clay vessel created by our potter has now grown into a fortified estate. The separation between our senses and the objects of our senses diminishes and becomes more disparate. In the case of mental formations do we mistaken our own mental processes with reality? Do the inhabitants of our estate actually experience their senses or are they squinting from between wooden slats that board the windows?

Tie-Dye in the Window — The colors in the picture on the wall blend into each other as do the bodies beneath the blankets. With the union of senses and the object of the senses, an experience is born! The interaction is fleeting and momentary with a small seed of experience that will pepper all future interactions. Things are now experienced and tinged with meaning and significance. Beneath the layers of color and experience, do we even recall the blank canvas or clean sheets?

Arrow in the Eye — Sharp, deep and penetrating; the experience of contact can be too much for us to handle. The memory and significance associated with the contact lingers and the feeling of the moment remains with the meaning that we attached to it. Barbed and swift, the arrow lands with great accuracy. Break the shaft and the arrow’s head remains lodged firmly. Blind from the beginning and brining with emotion do we consider our memory to be accurate?

Drinking Milk from the Bottle — After our initial tryst with the contact between senses and the external world we are constantly attaching to the pleasant while avoiding the unpleasant. This leads to habitual action. With the initial positive sensation no longer apparent we chug it directly from the bottle in order to secure the reaffirmation of the memory of the experience. Motivated by insecurity and a lack of understanding of the truths of our existence, we crave for spiritual meaning but never break loose from the bounds of suffering.

Climbing the Fence — Desires seek to be fulfilled and we take tangible, purposeful steps to achieve and obtain that which we seek. Peeking over the fence we mistakenly think we are witnessing the Absolute but it just winks at us and closes the blinds. We don’t worry and continue to chew on apples. Juice is staining our shirt. Chewing slowly, we are caught in an addiction as we teeter between heaven and hell. Not realizing that we create those distinctions ourselves, we swallow. As arbitrary as marks on a map or delineations between national borders, the conceptualizations of heaven and hell blur and distort.

Card is Swiped — Our buy-in is complete. The account is full of intentional activity and we are ripe for the birth of the self — of a unique identity consisting of decaying heaps of senses, memories and thoughts. We identify with the fruits of our sensory copulation and continue to consume the phenomenological world, designer pants and cute bibs.

Birth on the Table — We created, built and strengthened our vessels in the earlier nidanas. Now the ego has blossomed to a force that interacts with the world directly. Here we see the birth of a self that cries and hungers. Unlike a child though, this birth is not celebrated since it represents the creation of more illusions.

Sickness, Old Age and Death — Those things that we were blind to in the beginning we now carry with us. Hefting the corpse of our child on our back we see the death of the ego only to be replaced by another. Our constant ignorance, cravings, feelings and sensations all cease to be only to be reborn again. Why do we continue to carry the corpse? What must the puppy be thinking…?

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Please: make your comments in the Portuguese version of this page: http://blog.dharma.art.br/2010/03/travas-na-roda/#respond

Jeff Wigman first encountered the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa in 1996 and has since become a student of Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche. He is an artist and designer and lives in New York State with his wife. Feel free to contact him.

John Pappas is a struggling Zen practitioner teetering between the relative and absolute in the Great Plains of South Dakota.  Emerging writer, librarian and aspiring hungry ghost John spews the dharma all over his personal blog, the irreverent Sweep the Dust Push the Dirt as well as on the ephemeral Elephant Journal.

Drawings © 2010 Jeff Wigman. All rights reserved.
Text © 2010 John Pappas. All rights reserved.
Drawings and text published by Dharma/Arte by arrangement with the authors.