Occupation:
Meditation teacher
Interviewer:
Berry Liberman
Location:
San Francisco
Date:
October 2022
This conversation was such a warm and tender walk through Sylvia Boorstein's incredible wisdom. I came into the conversation with a cold, feeling sub-par with a sore throat. You don't cancel on Sylvia Boorstein, that would be sacrilege. I had seen her give a Dharma talk once at Spirit Rock, the meditation and Buddhist retreat in Sonoma County, California. From the moment she arrived she made everyone chuckle and relax, easing us into what many of us take too seriously – ourselves. My strongest impression was that she reminded me of my grandmother, and every traditional Jewish grandmother I had known growing up, except here she was teaching the dharma. It was dissonant and brilliant all at the same time. An international treasure, Sylvia's self-effacing style, her uncomplicated wisdom, all stem from a well-examined lifetime of peaceful, loving inquiry. Cold or no cold, I was showing up for this conversation.
Aged well into her 80s, Sylvia continues to teach at Spirit Rock, which was established in the 1970s by some of the teachers who brought Tibetan Buddhist practice to the West. Her numerous books, with excellently reassuring titles like It's Easier Than You Think and That's Funny, You Don't Look Buddhist, render mindfulness meditation accessible for all. She articulates complex things with a kitchen-table accessibility that focuses on kindness and compassion: for oneself first, then for the world.
My grandparents are no longer alive and I don't belong to a synagogue or religious community. So I'm not often surrounded by wise elders who are also soaked in sacred texts, practice and teaching. During this conversation, I was bathed in her humour and wisdom and wished in my heart of hearts that I could speak to her all the time and feel that reassurance and loving kindness reflected back at me.
BERRY LIBERMAN: What did you teach today?
SYLVIA BOORSTEIN: I told a story about having taken a flight from San Diego to San Francisco last weekend. When we landed, we couldn't taxi up to the gate. They got on the public address and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, please excuse us. Someone didn't get out of the gate in time. It's going to take us a few minutes to get there. So we invite you to keep your seatbelt on and we'll move into our spot as soon as we can.” All very friendly and cordial. And it took quite a lot of time, maybe five, six, seven minutes. Then the plane turned on and drove into its spot. Then the voice of the flight attendant from up the front, said, “Get off the plane.”
[laughs]
[laughs] It's funny, isn't it?
Yes!
Nothing about, “Thank you very much for your patience.” Just, “Get off the plane!” [laughs] This is 10 days ago now. Every time I think about it, I chuckle. Cut all the frills, just get off the plane. So 1 thought, . Westerners in the Theravada tradition say things like, “I invite
