LA Times Interview with Lama Marut - Part III

Journalist Duke Helfand interviewed Venerable Sumati Marut for an article on the subject of retreats. In Part III, we’re happy to present the conclusion of this amazing conversation.

D: When you finish and come out of the retreat, what do want to communicate to others, what’s the message? What message do you want to be communicating coming out from nine months of silence?

LM: That perfection is possible. That reaching a state of deep and pure happiness is an attainable goal for ordinary Western people like us. That it isn’t some myth, that it isn’t something that was only viable 2,500 years ago in India, but that the goals of Buddhism can be realized by modern Americans. In our lineage, we are very serious about that. We take Buddhism seriously. We’re not watering it down. We’re trying to adapt it, of course, to our own sensibilities, our own lifestyles because that’s necessary.  We have to adapt it, we have to make it ours, but we can’t water it down and expect it to work. We’re very serious that what the Buddha said is possible – that we can end our suffering in this lifetime, in this very lifetime. That we can reach a state where we have perfected ourselves. That’s the whole intent… nothing less. We’re really encouraged in our lineage to think that we should go for the gold. There’s no one in a better position than us to do it. We have the structure in place to fulfill the goals of Buddhism… and we’re going for it.  

D: Where’s the retreat going to be, is there a compound with homes? Are there different places?

LM: There’s a major retreat site in Arizona called Diamond Mountain. Some of the students in my immediate group will be doing retreat there. The ones who are serious about the three-year, three-month and three-day retreat will gravitate there because the infrastructure is being set up nicely at Diamond Mountain.

Retreat cabin construction at Diamond MountainThe rest of us will be doing retreats in different places scattered around the U.S and the world. People are in the process now of trying to identify places that would work for them. We have a list of 10-30 kinds of places that could work, and people are going to gravitate to one or another of those places, or it may be a place that they find on their own.

The idea is that maybe once a year we will come out of solitary retreat and offer the possibility of coming together. We’ll spend four or five weeks in a group retreat, somewhere – we’re trying to find a place for that too. But that will be part of what I do when I come out of my own solitary retreat for those two to three months every year. I would spend at least some part of my year leading a group retreat with my advanced students. Then I would spend some of the time teaching to the public in more open environments, but still in a retreat-like setting, quiet.

We’re hoping as a group to help people financially, to help them find a place, somewhere in the country or even outside the country… and to help retreatants find people who will serve their retreats.

Our group has decided that those three things are things we can do for each other: we can help each other with the money, we can help each other with finding places where people can do retreat, and we can help each other with the service of each other’s retreats.

D: Do you have any questions for me?

LM: We would hope that as part of your story you could help us just bring awareness to people that there is a center here in Los Angeles, where these courses and these students who are being trained to do retreat, have been teaching. We’d appreciate it if you could mention the fact that the Mahasukha Center in Los Angeles exists and that there are ongoing teachings here in Buddhism and yoga and much more. We have a retreat fund to help people who have given up a lot of their lives to seriously pursue a spiritual path. Excluding me, these are all lay people. It’s very interesting. This is how it’s going to work in America. The serious practitioners of Buddhism in the West will not be monks and nuns primarily. They will be lay people. This is a very interesting kind of transition, where the real spiritual elite are just regular people, regular lay people. They’ve given up a lot to do this. We hope that people recognize that it would be a good thing for them to do, to support these people who are really serious about a religious path. To support them financially and otherwise.  

D: How many people do you anticipate going on retreat?

LM: 35 to 40.

D: And they come from Los Angeles and Massachusetts, and from…?

LM: Arizona, New York, Reno, Nevada, France, Singapore, around the nation and the world.