Deer Park Monastery, Escondido, CA

I have to be careful not to get too comfortable with my stay at the monastery and settle into the rhythm of life here. I need to remember I'm here for a reason, that there is a purpose to this. I woke up this morning thinking that I'm at the monastery, this is not my bed, this is not my room, this is not normal, and every day needs to be walked in single-pointed mindfulness that I'm figuring out if I really, really, really, really, really, really, really want to be a monk. Really.

There's a movie I like called Bagdad Cafe. There's a character who has only one line in the entire movie. In the third act of the movie, she's standing outside the door of her room with her bags all packed to leave. The rest of the characters gather around wondering what's going on, why is she leaving? She says, "Too much harmony".

I've never fit into a group. And almost every group I've been a part of eventually fell to pieces. Point being I'm just not a group-oriented personality.

On Sunday evening, the community gathered to watch a two-hour video of the community's visit to Sequoia/Kings Canyon National Park this past August. They went for five days at the invitation of the YMCA, who donated their facilities for the visit. The video was edited down from six hours of digital video they shot with one camera, and one of the monks skillfully and tastefully added music.

I was prepared to watch maybe 30 minutes of it, thinking it would be like a home video type of thing, but I ended up staying for the whole thing. It could have been shorter, and the editing did get sloppy towards the end, and personally I would have slam-dunked the ending with abbreviated shots of the entire trip to recap the experience to leave the viewer with the warm and fuzzies.

It was really moving, and it led me to feel that there really is something magical about this community and the joy that they generate and bring. There was a moving scene in the video where the monks and nuns formed a ring around one of the Giant Sequoias in a mass hug. The editor humorously cut to a shot of one of the nuns hugging a tiny little sapling.

And these monks have fun, too. At one of the waterfalls, one of the monks climbed up a precipice and was sitting cross-legged like a mountain sage, and the camera caught another monk reverently going up to him and performing prostrations, both of them ending up chuckling. And another shot of two monks getting into heated martial arts posturing at each other and then ending in a spontaneous hug.

The end sequence was the final meal and the YMCA director who invited the community and donated the facilities for five days (at an estimated cost in the thousands, more than you think), and she was crying through the speeches and the singing because she was so moved and touched by their visit. It's a strong community. And I'm not sure I'm ready for it.

I can't envision myself being a part of something this special. If it's magic, I'm more on the witnessing, interpreting end, not the generating of it. (The children in the film Hook, Maggie and Jack = magic = Peter Pan's happy thought). But it's a real possibility that if I start down this path, I will be accepted and supported to succeed. I just need to take the first step, and I'm still balking while the community waits and watches.

People talk of wanting enlightenment, not realizing that if they're shown what it takes to be enlightened, they'd probably pass. Even if it's distinctly possible. People talk of heaven as if they had any idea what heaven is, but if they stood at the gates of heaven and were given the option to come back to earth, they'd probably choose earth.

I look around me at this great community. I recall my path getting here, my life, why I'm here, what my life was, my identity, my desires, my attachments, my death. I look ahead at going to France for ordination and training, eventually hoping to be sent back here after the two years required stay at Plum Village (sometimes one). And that would be it. My new identity, my new name, I'd be a part of this. So what's stopping me? Too much harmony.