The Blocks Sermon

The practice of non-attachment has long eluded me.  Dharma talks thus far have shed little light, not through fault of their own, but because I could not personalize the lessons to examples from my own life.  Mostly, the topics ranged from too-large to swallow (non-attachment to loss, for example) or too trivial (I’m not attached to designer brands).  So, while I gained knowledge of what others were able to accomplish by practicing non-attachment, I remained oblivious of how to practice myself.   

Now, this may not be news to you, but moving across the country with a two-year-old is, even with the best of them, slightly exhausting.  As it always goes, our upstairs bathroom at the “new HOUSE!” was not yet usable.  And, as my mother was remodeling her kitchen, we stayed at hertwo-bedroom, one main room cottage at the edge of Lake Ontario.

We were more comfortable than we deserved to be, but had little to do.  Because we were living out of our suitcases, we were limited, for weeks, to all that we could pack with us for the one-way airplane trip.  Thankfully, Grandma bought our son some magnetic blocks as a “Welcome to NY” present.  So, there we were, watching the waves change with the winds and playing blocks. 

 “Mama, blocks?  Mama, blocks?  Blocks, please, Mama!” Yes, let’s build castles and trucks and trains and… “No, Mama, not like that,” I get informed as my castle gets turned into someone else’s dream house.  “Mama, build it this way.” “Ready for Oopsies?”  “Oopsies,” in case you are unaware, is what happens when the blocks come crashing down.  Originally a word I used to get my son comfortable with rebuilding (versus getting upset), it morphed into a technique (ha!) for getting the blocks back on the floor to start over.  He never waited for an answer.  He knocked down the blocks, no matter what was in my hand, no matter what my building goals were, and there we were, starting over. 

At first, it was irritating.  This was my creation!  I was still building it! In my book, asking permission for total destruction isn’t rhetorical.  However, if I wanted to be alone and build exquisite block creations, I could sit alone in my room and build to my heart’s content after he went to bed.  But that wasn’t the point. 

The point was to play with my guy.  And, through doing so, I learned that my attachment to  expectations is my greatest Achilles heel.  I got annoyed playing with blocks because I expected to be able to build a certain way, instead of living in the moment.  How sensible this lesson was.  Finding peace and equanimity through non-attachment to expectations is a practice within my reach.  We’re not building castles with blocks, we’re playing with blocks and if a castle emerges, it gets knocked down by the sea of Oopsies that, in the end, will swallow all castles, whether composed of bricks or blocks or sand.