9 MINDFULNESS

Virgin Gorda to St. Martin // April 3, 2011

It’s 02:00. The night is magic-marker black. The stars and moon have abandoned Wild Hair and me and left us to grope in the dark. Bug-eyed, I scour the surroundings 360 degrees, but there’s only one light bobbing a half-mile ahead. It’s the stern bulb on a home-built tri-hull named Extreme. Our new friends Bob and Jillian are the crew. Together, we’re traveling across the deepest channel in the eastern Caribbean: the Anegada Passage.

Dave, Dinghy and I hit the cruiser’s jackpot these past few months. After flying to Phoenix to celebrate Christmas at my parents’ home and hopping to LA to visit with Eland and his new girlfriend, we returned to gunkhole aimlessly through the Virgin Islands (US, Spanish, and British). Wild Hair took off whichever way our whims dictated. My craving for green was satiated hiking forested trails that ended at waterfalls whose rocks were etched with ancient petroglyphs. Dave and I meandered hand-in-hand through historic towns where just below the surface of glitzy hotels and beach bars reverberated remnants of the brutal energy of pirates and slave masters. The two of us ogled over posh houses with delicious looking swimming pools dangling above drop-dead ocean views. We shopped at markets for avocados the size of my head and fruits and vegetables the likes of which I’d never seen. We toured plantations, visited an artist colony and the workshop of a mahogany craftsman. At dusk, we watched classic movies on the beach projected onto a canvas stretched between palm trees. We were flabbergasted by the energy of the equatorial plant kingdom in a botanical garden on Saint Croix—a climax of evolution I could not have fathomed while in the middle of the ocean.

And oh, the Caribbean water! Dave and I snorkeled one coral reef after another. We dropped anchor and swam in the company of endangered hawksbill turtles, spotted eagle rays, a battalion of squid, and even an octopus (who did her best to stay hidden from me by meticulously color-coordinating her outfit to the surroundings). We body surfed in breaking waves on a beach legendary for its natural beauty. On another day, the two of us swam in and out of caves with scores of Blue Tang Fish. When Maggie came to the Caribbean for her spring break vacation, she didn’t care too much about the details of sailing, but she was all about anything that had to do with the Caribbean and her creatures.

Dinghy loves this life. At least once a day she got shore leave to explore the latest island from her vantage at the end of a leash. Her chest swelled and she stepped into confrontations with small dogs and wild iguanas. (Who knows what she would have done if we didn’t keep her on the line.) Wherever we went, people snapped photos of a cat on a leash to send to their daughters or post on their Facebook pages. I believe images of Dinghy are wallpapering people’s cellphones around the world. Once, arriving to a new marina on the opposite side of the island we had been visiting, the fellow catching our lines said, “You’re the people with the cat who walks on a leash. I heard about you!”

Of course, our adventuring was regularly interrupted by the necessary repairs of the latest thing that broke on our dear ship.

Dave and I met Bob and Jillian aboard Extreme in the cozy harbor of Isla de Culebra in the Spanish Virgins months ago. Our paths crossed many times since. Actually, we’ve come to know them and the gaggle of boats and boaters they caravanned with down the island chain from the United States to here. (Rather than going offshore, the bunch took the slow route island hopping south and seemed to have a jolly good time doing it.) But tonight, our two boats are leaving the Virgin Islands and starting the trek south to arrive in Grenada (below the line of the hurricane zone) by May 30th—the end of the sailing season. Wild Hair’s mainsail is down and the motor hums. Our anchor let go of British Virgin Island sand at sunset and will dig into French earth later this afternoon in St. Martin. It’s an 18-hour, 75-mile journey to the French West Indies.

Mariners nicknamed this corner of the ocean the Cape Horn of the Caribbean. It’s rough going here, where the Atlantic slams into the Caribbean. Great ocean swells surge from the north, trade winds blow from the east, and currents push from the west. In the midst of these opposing forces, Wild Hair tips up and down and whirls right and left in erratic combinations. All this whiplashing and corkscrewing makes me queasy. I swallow hard to keep food in my stomach.

“Hey you out there. Ocean, my friend, please give me a break. Can you at least give me a view of the horizon?” It’s no use. My gut convulses and my dinner launches into a two-and-a-half-quart saucepan readied at my side. I wipe my mouth on the back of my hand, take a breath, and continue steering.

I’ve got on my sweatpants, t-shirt, and rain jacket to buffer the ocean breeze. A minor burst of fresh tropical air revives me a bit. My innards calm. It really is a lovely night; the waves are just so odd. I press on and let Dave and Dinghy sleep.

Chris Parker said tonight is the only decent night in the next several weeks to cross the Anegada. Air currents are topping off at fourteen knots; waves are piling to five feet. These conditions are not the six-knot breeze and one-foot seas I prefer to point straight into, but this is the Anegada. I’m willing to take what I can get, because ideal conditions just don’t exist this time of year.

Night blind, I cruise along feeling the soundness of Wild Hair as she moves through disorganized sea. A shooting star zips at the edge of my sight. I turn, but it’s gone. The glimpse strikes me as somehow a gift and a missed opportunity. I shake off my sentimentality before I turn melancholy.

Wild Hair’s VHF radio is crackling with conversation. From what I understand, a freighter carrying fragile produce lost power and the captain is desperate for refrigeration and a tow. For some reason the US Coast Guard in Puerto Rico can’t hear the distress call, so Bob and Jillian are taking turns relaying messages like old-time telephone operators. During a break, another voice—one thick with an accent—jumps in.

“All vessels, all vessels, all vessels, this is Breathless, Breathless, Breathless. We are looking to speak with any boats crossing the Anegada tonight. Come back.” I jump in.

“Breathless, Breathless, Breathless, this is Wild Hair, Wild Hair. Please answer and switch to channel 68.”

“Roger, 68,” the woman says. I change frequencies to a conversation channel. “Wild Hair, Wild Hair this is Breathless. I just wanted to say ‘hello’ and make you aware of our presence.” As the conversation unfolds, I learn Breathless is twelve miles behind Wild Hair—about two hours away, should there be trouble. The woman and her mate are from the north of England. But they bought their boat in the United States and sailed a route similar to our own. It’s funny that we’ve not crossed paths before.

“It’s dark out here, no?” she asks.

“Yes. It feels like sailing in a cave.”

“I can’t remember a night so black.”

“No.”

“Well, I just wanted to connect. Let’s carry on.”

“Keep in touch if anything comes up. Have a good sail. Wild Hair out.”

The autopilot is doing a good job, so I am an underemployed supervisor. I entertain myself by practicing mindfulness. Breathing in, I know I am breathing in. Breathing out, I know I am breathing out. In…Out. I take many mindful breaths, paying attention to the sensation of cool air passing through my nostrils. The bow vaults as Wild Hair’s stern shoves right. My mindfulness shifts to the sensations of my body—the way my spine absorbs the motion. Breathing in, I notice the sensations of my body. Breathing out, I notice my body. The boat whirls and my stomach lurches. Breathing in, I feel my body respond to the mixing sea. Breathing out, I smile to the ocean wilderness. In, mixing…Out, smiling….

All at once, the saltwater curling the port and starboard hull ignites in a Fourth of July sparkler display. The spectacle shocks my eyes—the glitter is like countless flashbulbs popping. We must have sailed into a red tide—a dense bloom of dinoflagellates or single-celled, plant-like creatures blinking with bioluminescence. As Wild Hair pushes and deforms their orange bodies, they complain by triggering a blue-white light that lasts a fraction of a second. Marine biologists suspect this reaction is a defense mechanism: flashing, they say, either startles predators away or attracts more to the area to threaten the first.

But it’s possible these aren’t dinoflagellates at all. 90 percent of marine life has the know-how and technical where-with-all to make blue-white light, so this spectacle could be bacteria, algae, worms, jellyfish, krill, shrimp, or any of a number of fish. The sparks continue. I sit in awe. I wonder if others sailed into the bloom.

“Extreme, Extreme, and Breathless, Breathless, this is Wild Hair, Check out your hull. Do you see bioluminescence? Over.”

“Wild Hair, this is Extreme. No—we’re dark over here.”

“Wild Hair, Breathless here. We’re not seeing anything either. But we’ll keep an eye out. Thanks for the head’s up. We’re standing by on one-six.”

I must be in the midst of millions of dinoflagellates, because they are the most common flashers on the ocean’s surface. The show blazes all around the boat. If I stood at a distance and looked down, I’ll bet Wild Hair would appear to ride on a stream of magic dust through the void of space. And who’s to say what’s really going on?

I think it is the mystery and wildness of the present moment that the Buddha wanted us to wholeheartedly embrace through mindful awareness. The Great Atlantic Teacher is driving home the Buddha’s point by sensitizing me, on and off the boat, to a limitless and divine wisdom permeating the world here and now. I practice being curious about the little intimacies of my own experience with organic processes. I look for lessons, moment-to-moment, on the natural order of things. I discover the Earth is teaching all the time in clear and precise ways, and she is revealing important truths I cannot reason my way toward.

When slivers of light launch from the sea and skip the tips of the waves for impossible distances, flying fish show me the how and why of liberating myself from everyday boundaries of misperception.

I notice compassion gripping my chest when, during the washing of the ship’s deck, a bulky manatee rolls in the fresh water pouring from my garden hose. I see scars striping her body, poorly healed cuts made by motorboat propellers. Open and unafraid of humans, the manatee teaches me a deep lesson on fearlessness and tolerance.

When seagulls circle in currents of wind, and splash headlong into the boat’s wake to feed on creatures stirred to the surface by our propeller, I am swept into the aerial acrobatics. Death is found in every life and life is found in every death. Life and death become one.

My silent inter-species conversations with dolphins when they come alongside the cockpit to look me steadily in the eye and say hello makes me understand that there is nothing unique or special about my human knowledge.

When sharks circle in the water in which Dave and I swim, I instantly see the most fundamental workings of ecological systems, experience what it is like to be demoted a notch on the food chain, and wake up to my own impermanent nature.

I am cultivating ecological mindfulness as I go. Everywhere I look, things animate and inanimate have something to teach. The Great Atlantic Teacher is showing me divine wisdom permeates the whole. This discovery is revolutionary to me.

“Dinoflagellates, I see you, and I’m sorry to be messing with you,” I say. I imagine a single dinoflagellate floating peacefully with its kin, when suddenly Wild Hair’s hull sends it spinning. Frightened, it jolts, spending precious energy in self-defense. I feel a little guilty disturbing the dinoflagellate society, but—honestly—I’m mostly happy to have discovered their talents in the night. I’m glad they’ve made themselves known.

“Hey, you are not alone, Bozo,” the creatures seem to say. “Be careful!” Now there’s a teaching for modern times.

After many minutes, the flashing ebbs and then stops. There’s nothing left to do but return my thoughts to meditation. I feel the sensation of my lungs breathing, my body sitting on the firm cushion, my hips, waist, back, and neck counter-balancing the motion of the boat’s rolling. My gut stays calm. My mind is at peace.

A blip appears on the radar. With every rotation of the arm, a yellow speck inches a little closer to the center of the black monitor. Something is drawing near. The Anegada Passage is clear of buoys and islands, and recreational boats travel in an east-west direction, so I suspect this south-to-north moving object is a container ship. The radar tells me it’s about nine nautical miles off. Is this the produce vessel I’ve been hearing so much about? Is it on the move again? I look in the general direction of the blip and, indeed, a cluster of red and white lights hover far away.

My instinct says I should let up on the throttle and slow Wild Hair down. I’m in no hurry to get to St. Martin. It’s no big deal to alter my speed and let whatever this is cross ahead of my path. And yet our buddy-boat Extreme has a sophisticated technology I’d like to check out: an Automatic Identification System, or AIS. It would be great to see the technology in action. Besides, I trust Bob and Jillian—they’re licensed captains who ran a charter business for years. Under the circumstances, I think I’ll follow their lead.

Traveling with AIS is a sweet deal. It’s like having a telepathic mathematician as a copilot. The instrument sends and receives the names, positions, origins, destinations, speeds, and bearings of neighboring ships. It anticipates collisions, sets off cautionary alarms, and calculates time and distance until impact. The big boys—vessels traveling internationally and weighing three hundred tons or more—are required to have AIS technology, but very few recreational boaters install it because of the price tag. The problem is, commercial vessels sometimes ignore recreational boats like hogs ignore fleas, even when we radio them with something important to talk about (like a plan to avoid collision). With AIS, a small boat can hail a commercial carrier by name. The larger ship is legally bound to respond when someone—anyone—hails them by name. This is how AIS technology can increase safety at sea.

“Generate, Generate, Generate, this is Extreme, Extreme, Extreme,” Bob calls the ship’s radio operator. “We are a small sailboat traveling east-bound across your path in tandem with a second sailing vessel one mile to our south and west. Do you pick up two vessels on your radar? Over.”

“Roger that Extreme, this is Generate.” The man’s voice grates with tobacco undertones. “I see two boats traveling zero-nine-five degrees at approximately five knots. We will be monitoring your course and speed. Over.”

“Wild Hair, Wild Hair, Wild Hair, this is Extreme, Extreme. We picked up a commercial freighter on our AIS traveling from Antigua to San Juan, Puerto Rico with a bearing of three-three-zero degrees and a speed of eighteen knots. They will cross our path forward of our bows.”

“Roger, Extreme. Wild Hair is standing by on one-six.” This is so cool. No longer are we anonymous strangers, the proverbial ships passing in the night. I wonder, should I establish contact with Generate myself? No. They’ve got us in their sights and that’s enough.

The radar blip closes in and my fingers twitch to let up on the throttle.

“Extreme, Extreme, Extreme, this is Wild Hair. What is our closest point of approach to Generate?”

“Uh, hold on,” Bob mutters. Instantly, an alarm onboard Extreme starts buzzing caution, and the sound reaches me across radio waves. “That’s a very good question, Wild Hair,” Bob laughs. “Let’s reduce our speed to three knots and give Generate some room to pass.”

“Roger that, Extreme, Wild Hair is slowing to three knots, over.” I reduce power and look to the right, but I can’t even see Generate’s lights any more. Where did they go?

“Extreme, Extreme, Extreme, this is Generate. We are maintaining our course and speed but are concerned with your movements. What are your intentions? Generate, over.” The yellow blip continues to near the center screen of the radar.

“Generate, Generate, this is Extreme. The two boats you are tracking slowed to three knots to accommodate your course. Over.”

“Uh, yeah. Extreme. This is Generate. Would you like us to take evasive action and change course to avoid collision?”

At once, daylight explodes from above. A spotlight mounted ten stories overhead illuminates not only Wild Hair but also an impenetrable curtain of red steel fifty yards ahead. Sailing vessel Extreme splits the difference between Wild Hair and the wall.

“Shit!” I’m on my feet, spinning the wheel hard to port; Wild Hair’s bow swings. I yank the throttle into neutral and check on Extreme. It too is coming to a standstill and avoiding collision. My heartbeat thuds in my ears as I watch a wall of rivets, rust, and peeling paint glide past my view. The mass has no beginning, top, or end—there is only an endless, red middle. Generate is solid, escalator-smooth. She is a dry bulk cargo ship as long as a city block and weighing nearly two-hundred-thousand metric tons. Her spotlight remains concentrated on our smaller boats, an effective command to stay put.

Dave climbs halfway up the companionway ladder and looks forward. No doubt the change in engine pitch and sudden daylight woke him.

“Huh,” he says.

“Yup,” I say. Without another word, he goes downstairs and back to bed.

After many minutes, Generate clears our path and extinguishes daylight. The yellow blip on my radar is left of center now. My hands shake as I go about putting Wild Hair back on course.

“Rule one,” I remember my dad saying, teaching me how to drive when I was a teen. “Never get in anybody’s way. No one should ever have to step on their brake or speed up because of you. Drive like that and you won’t crash.”

I nearly violated the first rule of driving tonight.

After several moments, Bob calls: “Generate, Generate, Generate, this is Extreme, Extreme, Extreme. Thank you for your assistance. It has been a pleasure speaking with you tonight. Have a safe passage. Over.”

“Extreme, this is Generate. Roger that. You have good night and a safe passage as well. Over.”

I feel heat flushing my face. Pitting my twelve-ton fiberglass sloop against a steel ship fourteen thousand times larger was a damn fool thing to do. I want to make light of our brush with disaster. Maybe I should radio, “Generate, this is Wild Hair traveling in tandem with Extreme. Thank you for shining a light on the situation. Our close inspection of your portside hull is now complete. You are clear to go. Good night.”

Ugh—that may be cute, but it’s not funny. Under the circumstances, I think I’ll just keep quiet.

How could a near-collision happen under my mindful watch? I wasn’t zoned out or not paying attention. I knew full well that the ship was there. Why didn’t I follow my instincts and slow down Wild Hair when I knew it was the right thing to do? Did I put too much faith in Bob? Did I fail to act because he was unconcerned? Maybe Bob and I suffered from groupthink—did each of us assume the other was responsible for a judgment call when in fact no one was leading? Or maybe I put too much stock in advertisers’ promises that AIS would keep me safe. I knew better than to let this happen. Did I disregard my own knowing—abdicate my personal responsibility—because my faith in technology was stronger than my awareness of reality?

Frankly. I don’t like my answers to any of these questions.

“Heather,” I mutter aloud, “have you learned nothing from all these years of mindfulness practice?” My brow is knit, my mind bewildered.

REFLECTIONS ON MINDFULNESS

Thich Nhat Hanh declares mindfulness not a religion, but a miracle. Practicing mindfulness—he says—is the most important thing we can do. We do it “to know what’s going on, not only here, but there.”³⁰

Mindfulness is a tool to connect our mind with our body. This in turn builds powers of concentration and insight. When we practice mindfulness, we experience the world more deeply. Time slows. Life grows richer. Sometimes the experience is pleasant. Sometimes, when we are troubled or hurting, it takes courage to mindfully look into the roots of our pain. And, now and then, the practice of mindfulness is neutral and we feel neither pleasant nor unpleasant feelings. Mindfulness is being aware and accepting of what is.

Mindfulness is a way of life. We are invited to practice it not only in peaceful solitude, but in every moment of daily living. We are aware of our sitting, standing, walking, talking, and eating. A red traffic light, ringing telephone, crying baby, or bird in flight are “bells” of mindfulness inviting us to come back to our awareness and reconnect our mind and body in order to pay attention to what is happening in the reality of the present moment.

When I practice mindfulness, my body and thoughts come alive in my consciousness and my understanding about what’s actually going on deepens. When I shine the light of awareness on my environment, I expand my field of consciousness to take in not only what’s going on in here but also what’s happening out there. In doing so, I witness Earth as a dynamic, living organism. The Great Atlantic Teacher becomes my blood and tears. Earth’s atmosphere fills my lungs and blood vessels. The planet’s radiant heat becomes my warmth and energy. Earth’s harvest stuffs my belly and turns into my muscles.

There’s something more to the art of being mindful about the environment that the Great Atlantic Teacher made clear the night I crossed the Anegada Passage. It’s not enough for me to just sit in a bubble and be deeply mindful of my interconnection with Earth when I know that danger is on the horizon, barreling down, about to strike. There’s a name for the behavior of staying peaceful when urgent and decisive action is what’s called for: it’s called taking a “spiritual bypass” (taking the road that skirts the heart of the matter). That kind of behavior is dangerous. The lesson I heard loud and clear from the Great Atlantic Teacher was that I need to keep track of what’s happening in here and out there and apply what I know in order to stay safe.

It’s no wonder Thay has said time and again that mindfulness is a constant practice and not a permanent state of being, something I am to do all through my waking hours. The safety and quality of my life and the lives of those around me depends upon my broad and penetrating awareness—at sea and on land. It also depends upon my being aware of the consequences of my own inaction. No longer can I take my lead from those who appear unconcerned or indiscriminately assume people with expertise will keep me safe. I cannot abdicate my personal responsibility to others, especially when I know there are simple things I can do to keep myself and others safe. Becoming mindful of my environment means I can no longer put absolute faith in anyone (scientists, politicians, commercial interests, or technology—especially technology). I have to be mindful of my personal responsibility—both to myself and to my environment.

In the Anegada Passage, the Great Atlantic Teacher gave me a lesson that will make me a better skipper, but the teaching also resonates with the central question I carry with me as I sail: how am I to live in a suffering world? The answer arising from this lesson: pay diligent attention and apply what I know as I sail and as I engage with a world in trouble.

I think there’s such a thing too as Ecological Mindfulness—an intentional consciousness raising about the dangers and suffering of Earth’s systems and life forms. To my mind, Ecological Mindfulness is climate action because it seamlessly connects my human mind, heart, and environment, so that I might have the insight to know how to be and what to do to protect the planet.

One spiritual leader—the Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi—practiced Ecological Mindfulness when he peeled away layers of reality to see the underlying causes and conditions of suffering that once were hidden. He identified Earth’s most pressing global threats as: overpopulation, poverty, climate change, and biodiversity loss.³¹ Then, looking beneath these dangers, he named societal actions perpetuating the global threats—actions like our consumption of fossil fuels, the domination of corporations and their demand for short-term profits, eating meat, and society’s overconsumption of material goods. Underlying these harmful actions, Bhikkhu Bodhi shined a light on dangerous feelings and ideas: greed, fear, arrogance, ignorance, belief in discrete self-identities, misguided ethics, and the pursuit of infinite growth above other values.

Practicing Ecological Mindfulness, I consciously carry the planet with me as I sit, stand, and lie down. During mindful walking, I know I am Earth walking. Broadening my focus and putting my awareness on the difficulties of Earth and the ways I respond to Earth’s challenges (or not), I can wake myself up to the moments when I hand off my autonomy or convince myself that others are either unconcerned or more competent in dealing with the problem. I can begin to understand the mechanisms at work that tip me into the semi-conscious groupthink.

None of us will practice mindfulness perfectly, but it is becoming more and more accessible, and there are so many opportunities to learn and practice. Already mindfulness is finding its way into schools, the halls of medicine, prisons, and businesses. It’s time to apply the time-tested tools of mindfulness practice to consciousness raising about the difficulties of Earth. If each of us could cultivate Ecological Mindfulness and apply inner knowing and divine wisdom to the simple, direct, and compassionate actions within our reach, we would likely transform the world. Earth could heal and flourish.

It is in this spirit that I offer the following meditation as a training in Ecological Mindfulness.

Breathing in, I see the reality of ecological suffering on Earth.

Breathing out, I extend compassion to ease suffering.

In, ecological reality.

Out, compassion.

(Ten breaths)

Breathing in, I look deeply into the roots of ecological suffering (greed, fear, ignorance).

Breathing out, I smile to the roots of ecological suffering.

In, roots of ecological suffering.

Out, smiling.

(Ten breaths)

Breathing in, I see a path leading away from suffering (a path of insight, love, compassion, ethics, justice, moderation, and simplicity).

Breathing out, I see my actions contributing to the path of healing.

In, a way out of suffering.

Out, I contribute to healing.

(Ten breaths)

Breathing in, I cultivate reverence for both Earth and earthlings—without discrimination.

Breathing out, I free myself from fear.

In, reverence for Earth and earthlings.

Out, fearlessness.

(Ten breaths)