By Jon Landaw

As reported elsewhere in this issue, the third annual Buddhist Children’s Camp was recently held at Vajrapani Institute in California and once again I participated as meditation instructor. My job was made somewhat easier this year by a change in the schedule. In the two previous years we had let all the campers attend each meditation session, which meant that the squirmy five- and six-year-olds sat in with the (supposedly) more mature and better disciplined ten- to twelve-year-olds. At the earlier camps, realizing that the younger kids could not be expected to sit still nearly as long as the older ones, we had placed the little ones near the door of the gompa and instructed their counselors to remove them when it seemed they were becoming too restless to continue. This system worked to some extent, but the departure of one third or more of the group partway through meditation, no matter how noiselessly accomplished, often proved distracting to those who remained behind.

So this year we decided that, except for the opening and closing sessions, the meditation groups would be divided according to age. This way I could concentrate on teaching the older children without having to worry about how antsy the younger kids were getting. This plan may have been fool-proof but, alas, as the saying goes, it was not idiot-proof. As I should have known, a clique of ten-year-old boys can be even more prone to fits of the giggles than the younger children. For example, whenever we recited Manjushri’s seed-syllable – in the practice where dhih is repeated as many times as possible without taking a breath – one boy was sure to crack up, and soon his buddies would also be convulsed. Since some of the more wrathful ways of restoring order – for example, threatening the children with rebirth in hell – were clearly contraindicated, I tried to subdue them with a withering glance. Although they probably thought I was merely suffering from indigestion, they did try as hard as they could to control themselves and somehow we managed to muddle through our sessions together with reasonable success.

But there was something else that occurred during camp that was, in many ways, harder to deal with than such disciplinary concerns. During discussions that I and the other group leaders had with the children on various Dharma-related topics, it became clear how adept these children were in giving us the responses they figured we wanted to hear. For instance, if at the conclusion of a meditation session I asked them to report if there were any differences between the way they felt now and the way they did when the session began, they would happily volunteer such testimonials as, “I feel a lot calmer now,” or “My mind is more peaceful.” Sometimes their answers were so pat it was as if they had just looked them up in How to Meditate. I am not implying that the kids were faking it, for they often did seem genuinely to experience the soothing effects of even the briefest practice. I am merely reporting what every teacher knows: students have an uncanny ability of saying what they think is expected of them.

But if we so-called leaders ever let ourselves be overly impressed by what the kids said about their Dharma experiences, our observation of what they did, especially between sessions, would quickly bring us back to earth. The child who, one moment, was detailing the detrimental effects of self-cherishing with the eloquence of an inspired bodhisattva might, during the next lunch break, be the one most bitterly complaining: “Your dessert is bigger than mine!” And the one who, in the Dorje Khadro fire puja, was so eagerly throwing the seeds of delusion into the flames of purification might be the one most tenaciously and self-righteously holding onto anger when, soon afterwards, he or she felt frustrated in the pursuit of some momentary and exquisitely inconsequential desire. This brings me face to face with the greatest danger in teaching Dharma to children: through the undisguised expression of their feelings they serve as mirrors, forcing me to realize just how much my own Dharma understanding is in my mouth and how little is in my heart.

And now, indulgent reader, let me tell you of another frustration of mine. Every other month, just as the deadline for submitting this column is upon me, I spend several hours in front of my computer screen rearranging words of often unnecessary length – “exquisitely inconsequential” takes up quite a bit of space, but I myself am not exactly sure what it means – without the slightest inkling whether anyone other than the Mandala editor ever glances at them. Although you have no obligation to comment on what you read, I would be curious to know if these words are doing anything other than fill out this page. Although the hot iron ball of praise is always welcome – “Those of you in the expensive seats can rattle your jewelry,” John Lennon once said while acknowledging applause – even disparaging criticism would be better than no response at all.

Who am I kidding?