| Subject: Re: Setting up of a reflection group/your vacation |
Author:
Sandra Alzona
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Date Posted: 01:38:15 10/31/04 Sun
In reply to:
Eric Chen
's message, "Re: Setting up of a reflection group" on 09:03:38 10/20/04 Wed
Hi Eric
Looks like a vacation is the order of the day. =)
Remember, a workshop is underway at my end, too.
No matter what we are presenting, we are still dealing with people. And people will be people. Sometimes we know exactly what it is we're going to present and all its angles and benefits, but if we forget that we are first and foremost dealing with all sorts of people, then we can feel a bit at a loss.
I was reminded of a people lesson during my Dhamma service at the 6th Vipassana Meditation Course in the Philippines recently while we were... cooking. I haven't prepared so much food for so many people in a long time since my dad died. Realistically, the last time was during his death anniversary a couple of years ago, but it was still related to him. So it was kind of hard because I had only vegetarian ingredients to work with. And there wasn't a place nearby for last-minute grocery. So I got possessed with just dessert, which was assigned to me. My dad was very hard to please since he was a hotel & resto manager in the US (the first Filipino to ever be a hotel manager, in Sheraton Manila then NY). You can just imagine what I went through eating and cooking for such a guy. So I had to put myself in his shoes once again, and that's not a very peaceful place to be in when you have to cook in zen mode and you're not working in your own kitchen. You just become terribly critical. And even if I tried not to be, I noticed that it could haunt me for days if there was something I wanted to add to a dish that I didn't. His voice is just one of the nastiest inner police and critics. But I'm glad that through this experience, I realized what it was that made me a workaholic, what made me beat up on myself, and through that meditation course, that changed. A lot.
The food not only had to be healthy, they had to be clean. They had to be presentable in their eyes. They had to be enticing - in their eyes. The food had to be eaten with perfectly polished spoons, forks and teaspoons. They shouldn't smell funny either. And they have to wipe their mouths with well-folded tissues. Or I'll just die, you know. Sometimes I catch myself standing in the middle of the dining hall, staring into space, trying to get a whiff of what would make them eat all their food. I even had this Freudian slip question about how many cups of bananas were left. Talk about obsessed!
It gives you both pleasure and pain, but it's a choice. It's much simpler if we're cooking for ourselves. 50-60 people is a totally different story, and you don't want food to be wasted on a short budget. I thought that kitchen job was a necessary hell I had to go through to do our workshop - to take my mind off what I wanted for a while. A person just performs differently, on a different level, when he's thinking of being accepted and there are possible criticisms coming his or her way. And there's nothing more fulfilling than a job you love well done. And I was glad to have done all that again - in the spirit of metta, as a service to strangers I already loved. I look back and thank my dad for those things he taught me which I was able to take this far and transform even the energies with which I used to work on food with.
Goodluck, and surely there will be a better time! =)
Namaste,
Sands
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