Episode #294: Ripples of Dhamma
“I really feel that the early 1970s was the beginning of Burmese meditation practices coming to the West, through that group of people who were living in Bodhgaya,” Grahame White says. “I often think about it as something like being in Montmartre, in Paris, where all the artists used to be together. And this was a sort of spiritual hippie trip that ended up in Bodhgaya! And then from Bodhgaya, it spread, like spokes of the wheel around the world, from people who came from that period of time.”
In the previous talk with Grahame, he described his experiences being a monk as well as a lay practitioner, spending time with such figures as Mahasi Sayadaw, Mother Sayama, S.N. Goenka, Munindra, Sayadaw U Pandita, Barry Lapping, and Joseph Goldstein, among others. In this discussion, he picks up where he left off, and describes how he endeavored to bring the teachings back to Australia.
So that odd confluence of events made the alternative-seeking, hippy generation the vehicle that brought traditional Buddhist meditation to the West; that was unusual enough. But Grahame stresses how it was all the more remarkable that it happened at a time when Burma was controlled by a xenophobic military dictatorship that severely limited access to foreign visitors. Still, dedicated disciples of teachers like Sayagyi U Ba Khin and Mahasi Sayadaw found a way to learn enough to disseminate the teachings beyond Burma’s borders.
Upon his return from Asia, Grahame moved to Sydney's vibrant Chinatown district with his girlfriend. There, they started to organize group sittings, which swiftly gained popularity. Driven by the growing demand, Grahame sought out accomplished teachers who could further expand the practice, and so he extended invitations to Jack Kornfield, Steve Smith, and Alan Clements. However, the true turning point arrived with the arrival of Joseph Goldstein, who conducted the country's inaugural ten-day course in Australia‘s enchanting Byron Bay region.
After the remarkable interest generated by Goldstein's visit, Grahame composed a letter to the Mahasi organization in Yangon expressing his earnest desire to host a Burmese teacher in Australia. They accepted, and remarkably, they managed to navigate the intricate web of Burmese and Australian travel regulations, leading to the arrival of an esteemed, 85-year-old monk. This momentous occasion elicited great joy within the local Burmese diaspora community, forging an unlikely alliance between traditional Burmese Buddhists of the diaspora, and the young, Western practitioners attending Grahame’s group sittings. Together, they secured the rental of a secluded retreat center owned by a Christian missionary organization, laying the foundation for ongoing courses featuring esteemed visiting teachers.
In 1981, they were finally able to purchase land near Blackheath, in the Blue Mountains. Grahame and his friends renovated their new property into a functioning meditation center, which still runs courses under the name Blue Mountains Insight Meditation Centre. They were even able to construct a Burmese style pagoda, and Sayadaw U Lakkhana brought over relics to be enshrined. (Ironically, this center is just down the road from where Goenka students set up the inaugural center in Australia in their tradition, Dhamma Bhumi.)
Over time, however, the diaspora became less involved in the Blue Mountain center, organizing retreats for their own community in the Burmese language. This growing separation hit Grahame hard, as it meant that more traditional forms of the practice were disappearing from his center. At the same time, Goenka was growing in popularity in Australia. His presentation of the teachings was packaged as secular and scientific, and that attracted many young, modern-day Australians who harbored skepticism toward religious traditions yet still sought a spiritual practice.
“That's why everyone knew about vipassana, but only in the Goenka tradition, and the Mahasi style and other styles started to slip, so people would not be coming so much,” he notes. As the center continued to try and find its way forward, Grahame found himself in the middle of a tug-of-war between opposing poles of appealing to traditional, cultural forms of practice on the one hand, and a stripped-down emphasis of technique alone on the other. Although Grahame much favored the former in some manner, the center’s board chose the latter.
In those days, there were fairly limited opportunities for Buddhist practice outside of Burma and other Southeast Asian countries. This greatly contrasts with the scene today, where there are a great many, varied possibilities. Grahame has no problem with this. “When I read and see and hear things about the current way things are done, it doesn't really faze me at all, because look, as long as the message of mindfulness is getting out there in whatever sense, I think that's a good thing! It can't be bad,” he says. “It's up to the next generation to see if those seeds can sprout and become beautiful.” For his part, Grahame has clearly defined his own role in this dissemination. “What I try to do personally is to present the Mahasi technique as best as I can, according to the Burmese Sayadaw’s teachings. But that doesn’t mean that I feel fundamental about it!”
Still, the one reservation that Grahame does express is when contemporary mindfulness teachings are watered down to the extent that practitioners cannot go deep enough to achieve transformative insights. “In [order to achieve] clear comprehension, you need suitable conditions and suitable environments and suitable food and suitable this and that! And what I liked about the Asian context was the conditions were suitable.” In this regard, Grahame is especially appreciative of the Goenka’s emphasis on establishing serious meditation centers in the West that develop a supportive vibrational environment over time. He prefers this to some of the ways mindfulness is now taught as an isolated technique apart from its Buddhist context, so it is more like therapy than a development of wisdom. “I think these days, the idea of full liberation is really a thing of the past for the general public [at least in Australia].” In Grahame’s view, this has resulted in a loss of saddhā (faith) in the Buddha’s teachings, which further inhibit progress on the Path. However, he also acknowledges the significance of planting seeds for future lives, and that the mere awareness of arising and passing away can have profound implications for practitioners at any level.
Circling back to differences between Western and Burmese students, Grahame recalls asking Mahasi Sayadaw in 1979 this very question. “He said it's the ability to concentrate,” Grahame recalls. “Westerners have a harder time concentrating, because they've been brought up in an individualistic, individual society. They don't pay attention or follow the instructions properly.”
At the same time, Grahame realizes that similar to the young hippies who unexpectedly assumed the mantle of imparting the profound teachings of the Dhamma to a Western audience, the present generation is trying to formulate and disseminate the practice within their own distinct context and society. Nowadays, in a rapidly changing world, there are new challenges and opportunities; for example, some teachers intentionally cultivate a message that is more inclusive of previously marginalized communities . “The young people, it doesn’t matter what age, it depends on conditions, it depends on so much. I guess we all have that in us, but it doesn't mean that the young person doesn't know,” he says. “I think it's important that the people like myself and the older people, we have to encourage the younger people. If you want the Dharma to keep going, you shouldn't have these cliques. You should be encouraging to help more people! But they need to have faith, that saddhā is the important part, and that's hard to generate.”
In closing, Grahame, returns to the current horror that has overtaken Myanmar, the land which has given him so much. “There's been certain emotions going on in my mind, like shock and horror, and real sadness that the Dharma is no longer there in the sense that it was for many, many years,” he says. “I keep referring to this over and over again, and I hope it's not boring, but their saddhā is really good! And they'll come through, and they will go through this phase, because they understand impermanence. As these situations arise, they've been living with it for a thousand years, and up to the present day, and this one will pass as well. But they'll need a lot of help from a lot of people.”