Who are we?

Buddhafield is a group of practising Buddhists, an off shoot of the Triratna Community, who, along with volunteers, aim to bring the Dharma to the wider community. Buddhafield consists of 3 main strands: Buddhafield Festival, Buddhafield Cafe and Buddhafield Retreats. This blog is written primarily by volunteers Louise and Ruth, tracking their experience of working and living in a right livelihood situation based at Trevince House, in Devon, and also features contributions from the other members of the Buddhafield family around the country.


Wednesday 15 June 2011

A Review of the Buddhafield Yatra by Lokubandhu



The highlight of last month was, for me, the Buddhafield Yatra.  I thought it was totally great, it’s unlike everything else we do in Triratna and I would like to share an account of it with you - if anyone wanted to organize one themselves I’d be more than happy to advise.

In essence a Yatra is a walking retreat; over 7 days 30 of us walked 60 miles, from Reading train station (an easy place to get to for the start) to Avebury (a vast megalithic complex dominated by the great stone circle: a fine place to finish).  It’s a walk, but with a distinctive etiquette: we walk in silence, in single file, each hour of walking beginning and ending in a circle, with any words from the leader (or others, who might, for instance, have a poem to share) followed by everyone bowing to one another.  The leader then leads off in a spiral, walking around the outside of the circle with everyone following.  Behind the leader is a map-reader; at the rear is a backstop who ensures no-one gets left behind.  Two vehicles, a van and a run-around car, stay with the day’s team of about 4 people; they tat-down the previous night’s camp, do the shopping, go ahead with the luggage and set up the next night stop, cook dinner, and welcome the weary walkers as they arrive.  The car is available to pick up anyone who can’t walk the full distance.  The roles all swap around, everyone plays their part.  Morning and evening there’s time for meditation, Dharma talks, reporting-in and Puja or other rituals; the silent walking is of course mindful and an excellent way to practice Bhante’s ‘Four Levels of Awareness’. 

All that alone would be great, but Yatras are much more too.  Five aspects especially struck me this time - the landscape, the elements, the rituals, the community, and the journey back in time.   The walk took us along the River Thames and up onto the Ridgeway, a 5000-year-old trackway across the high dry ground of the Wiltshire downs.  Water gave way to Earth, Fire warmed us at night, Air buffeted us as Consciousness walked though Space.  For me this was a delight, a week away from computers simply immersed in the present moment and our surroundings: big skies and big landscapes led effortlessly to ‘big mind’.  It wasn’t all easy: we were fully exposed to the elements, even by Buddhafield’s minimal standards.  At night, the only shelters were our tents and an awning hung off the side of the van.  While walking, the only refuge was to be mindful of (and hang loose to) our experience rather than resist it.  And we had weather in abundance - hot sun, strong wind, driving rain, blue skies, cold nights.  Happily none lasted too long - we could see for ourselves that all things passed, the Three Laksanas held true…

Almost every night we camped at one or another ancient monument or hillfort, giving a wonderful backdrop to a series of improvised rituals.  The first evening we started with the Dedication Ceremony, but thereafter took off into realms of creativity. Morning by the river, with rain threatening, saw a ‘baptism’ by Air and Water, based on a Biodanza exercise; that evening another by Fire and Earth - specifically, building and jumping a fire in the woods.  The next morning, finding ourselves next to Scutchamer Knob, an ancient collapsed burial mound, we surrounded it and one by one approached the shrine in the centre of the amphitheatre-like space holding a Vajra, shouting our names to the wind, declaring our intentions for the day’s walk - to “walk with confidence, sensitivity, etc”.  And off we went…  At Uffingdon, on Dragon’s Hill at sunset, in the howling wind, we recited the Ratana Sutta and met, tamed, and befriended our Demons, this time calling their names into the wind.  At Waylands Smithy, an ancient tomb in a beautiful beech-tree grove, we began what came to be several ceremonies connecting us with our Ancestors - those unknown people who first walked the Ridgeway and built (with stupendous labour) the many special places we were passing. 

We used verses and pujas by Dhiramati, to whom I’m profoundly grateful; he has such a gift with words and poetry.  We began with his verses ‘To the Ancestors’; that night, by a fire in a field under the starry sky, his beautiful puja to Tara and the Elements.  In the wide open space of Barbury Castle Akasaka led us in the Amoghasiddhi mantra and offering our intentions (symbolized by flower petals) to the wind.  By this time Reading train station seemed a million miles and several thousand years away!

Approaching Avebury, our destination, for two nights our only campsite and kitchen was the public car park and grass verge by the track: happily we were undisturbed.  We’d tried and failed to find a more orthodox campsite for this part of the walk; it was clear how we as Yatrikas had in a sense gone forth from the regular world and (rather like the Buddha and his followers) been forced to take our chances night by night. 

Soon after our arrival we embarked upon an all-night vigil inside West Kennett Long Barrow; some 25 of us crowding in with almost 20 staying till dawn. Akasaka and I had drafted a seven-round ritual, recapping and building on the many ceremonies already performed.  Each round had several stages, for instance the first, ‘Connecting with the Ancestors’ consisting of a welcome talk by Sean (a Druid as well as a Buddhist); entering the Barrow; creating a shrine and finding our places; Dhiramati’s 'Verses to the Ancestors' and 'Spirit Song'; the Ratana Sutta and an offering of one sunflower seed each inside the chamber; and finally the Aksobhya mantra and earth-touching mudra. The other rounds were ‘Setting our intentions for the night’; ‘Evoking our potential’ (verses and mantras to Amoghasiddhi and Tara, ending with extinguishing all lights and holding hands in the total darkness); ‘Confession and Acknowledgement of Regrets and Limitations’; ‘Aspirations and Next Steps’; ‘Rebirth and Re-emergence’ (in the first light of dawn); a ‘Retreat Metta and Transference of Merits’ and finally the recitation of Kalidasa’s wonderful 'Exhortation to the Dawn' at sunrise at 5.06am.  Followed by the long walk back to our camp and sleep!  The next day saw us end the Yatra by walking the mile-long Avenue into Avebury and reporting-out among the stones - and meeting Terry Dobney, Arch-Druid of Avebury and Keeper of the Stones, for a formal welcome into and most fascinating tour of the site.

Probably not surprisingly, we were a pretty strong community by this time, even though we’d all spent many hours in silence, simply walking together.  Certainly we’d all lived though an adventure together, ably facilitated by the excellent Buddhafield team.  For me, it was a great combination of a simple and elemental life, a whacky adventure, and a serious contribution to our great shared enterprise of bringing Buddhism to the West, even, to re-imagining the Buddha.  I’m over my word count so can’t say more; but there’s photos at http://tinyurl.com/684hpdl.

Saturday 4 June 2011

A Moment of Peace Amongst the Joyful Chaos.

The wondrous, glorious, amazing, life affirming Buddhafield festival is almost upon us!!

The preparations are stepping up a gear espeically for the cafe crew who only have one week left to get any last mintue things done before we head off to Glastonbury Festival (they are all at Sunrise Festival this week making our third cafe gig of the season a spectacular success!).

I have just come back off retreat and my inspiration is flowing out of me. I learnt some valuable lessons whilst there. These lessons are about giving myself the time to do those things that bring me joy. I have learnt to cultivate more love for myself and more strength in my abilities; knowing that I am capable.

This has left me feeling so abundant in my skills and in seeing the abundance in nature that is all around me. Now whilst I am pottering around in an empty house, a moment (or couple of days) of peace amongst festival chaos, I have a contiuation of this space to expand my feelings of abundance, what that means to me and how to bring this feeling with me into the festival.

The theme doesn't refer to material wealth or material possessions. It is not about that craving we all get for something shiny that costs an arm and a leg. It refers to celebrating the bountiful world around us, thanking the earth for her treasures, thanking each other for the love and support that we all receive in one form or another. It refers to the warm fuzzy feeling we get when we make someone laugh. Its about our inner goldness and not about desire for a lump of yellow rock!

We conducted a survey at the beginning of the year to get your opinions of the festival and one of the points that came up was that Buddhism had got lost inamongst everything else so this year we are putting more focus back onto our rituals. We are turning sound systems off in the Owl field during the main rituals which are: Opening Ceremony: Wednesday 6 – 6.45 pm, Saturday Ritual: 9.30 – 10.30 pm and the Closing Ceremony: Sunday 2 – 3.15 pm. Dayajoti is leading the Rituals team this year and is keen for us all to come together as one big community, to explore the festival theme as an expression of our shared values. To express our inner goldness the main symbol this year is gold, so the team are encouraging everyone, and you, to bring gold clothes to wear at any time during the festival but particularly during the rituals. If you have gold clothes then gold body paint will do!


So for this years festival, give up those material cravings, give up listening to the stories that go round and round about someone being better then you and come to Buddhafield festival, to explore and express yourself in a supportive community of wonderful people and where every person, tree, bee, blade of grass, bird and string of bunting is amazing!

I come with my raggedly loves dragging 
into the sphere of your clear regard.
I praise our common fight.
I praise friendship embarked on suddenly as a bus that arrives.
I praise friendship maturing like a tall beech tree.
I praise the differences that define us.
I love what I cannot be
as well as what I am.
From 'The Homely War' by Marge Piercy