more 'Being' with the Homeless

Can you describe any 'success' stories...

"When we were doing the meditation group inside the Emergency Shelter, there was a man named 'Dino.' He was reclusive and angry when he first started coming to group. Little by little, he started opening up. He would share a little more about his life and what he was feeling in group each time. After several months of these weekly meditation groups, he was a very different person. Dino told us, that he would use these meditation techniques to keep his mind tranquil and calm throughout the long nights at the shelter. He offend spoke about his daughter, and their relationship that had disintegrated. We gave him a Tonglen practice to help with this. It was a visualization of taking in the negative energy between him and his daughter, and releasing it back as light, love, and healing. One day, Dino came up and gave me a big hug. He said that he had called his daughter after years of not speaking to her. They both cried and spoke for hours. She sent him a bus ticket, and as far as I know, he is living with her somewhere in Oregon."


What about dangers you might face...any antagonism from the homeless?

"Well, when we were in the Shelter, it was a group situation. There was a day and a time to be there. The Homeless that weren't interested, just didn't come to group. But now that we are working with the Chronically Homeless, the ones that won't go inside the shelter, it's different. Our job is just 'being' there, on the street with them. What we are doing is simple. We are going under the bridge to make friends. We want to listen, learn, interact, and maybe give them some meditation techniques that can help with alcoholism, depression, bi-polar disorder, and stress. And you asked about the dangers we might face? It has been my experience, that there is very little violence among the homeless community. They often have fights amongst themselves, but rarely, if ever, is that violence focused at people outside their peer group."

Do you just go sit there in a group, and the homeless just watch?

"The Homeless people that live under the bridges at Medina St. are very communal. We are just going down there and interacting with them. We may stay eight hours one day, and six hours the next, but it will be three or four days a week. So, by doing individual meditation, and teaching one person at a time, it soon becomes a communal thing. Let say, me and johnny are doing a ten minute meditation, and then Lucy wants to join us, and bob wants to know whats going on, and yeah....it's like that. Simple. No microphones or loud guitars, just us, living, learning, and practicing together."


Can you give us a quote? Or tell us what a homeless person said to you once?


"If you want to be sad, think only of yourself. If you want to be happy, think only of others"-Tibetan Proverb.

"I wish my wife was here, she would have really enjoyed this meditation group. She taught yoga for years before the cancer took her. thank you, for this."

"Better than a thousand years of bowing to the Buddha, is one day lived as the BOW-become a Buddhist Outreach Worker."
-Jon Clark (HMP)


How has meditation helped you? You have been in a pit before, are you gainfully employed now?

"After I had been meditating for awhile, I suddenly realized that my mind was constantly in a state of flux---frustration, annoyance, anxiousness, anger, and unhappiness. Now, my life still fluctuates from the 'pit' to the 'penhouse' but my mind remains, on the most part, tranquil.

I'm I 'gainfully employed?' Well, I just stepped out into full-time ministry. My Lama commissioned us to start a Meditation Center in my hometown of Floresville, Texas. As a YTDR Dharma Center, we are responsible for not only serving our community, but also raising awareness for the Tibetan Refugee children that are under his care in Mainpat, India.

The Dharma Center in Floresville is also the headquarters for Homeless Meditation Practitioners. HMP is trying to educate and encourage 1.6 billion Buddhists around the World to get engaged in 'Being' with the Homeless. I'm not sure how all this is going to pay out in dollars, but I know how it pays out in Merit and Karma."

Homeless Meditation Practitioners(HMP)
http://homelessmeditationpractitioners.blogspot.com/

YTDR Dharma Center floresville, Texas
http://ytdrfloresville.wordpress.com
Jon Clark
PO Box 71
Floresville, Texas 78114
830-484-7403