Hope Podcast: Featuring Maya Lee, MDiv Candidate

ALBERT KARCHER: So to begin, it'd be great if you could introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself, where you're coming from. Are you part of a particular religious or spiritual tradition? 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. I'm from Brooklyn, New York, and I am in my third year here at HDS. I am coming from the Buddhist tradition, particularly Zen Buddhism. It was something I came to when I was in undergrad. I didn't really grow up with any particular religious tradition back home. 

But yeah, it was something that gave me a lot of comfort, a lot of strength, especially since I went to undergrad during the COVID pandemic. So it was a pretty intense time. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah, no. Thanks for sharing a little bit about yourself. And this leads into the next question, which is about your spiritual autobiography-- 

MAYA LEE: Sure. 

ALBERT KARCHER: --in brief. So you've already touched a little bit on how Buddhism has been a very important tradition in your life. It would be great to just hear a little bit more about that. How did you first encounter Buddhism? How has it shaped you and helped you come to this place at HDS? 

MAYA LEE: Yeah, absolutely. I sort of fell into it accidentally. I was recommended by my undergrad advisor to be an East Asian Studies major. It was not my intention. And within that course of that major, I took a class on religions of Japan. And the professor in that class was also the faculty advisor for the Buddhist student community. And he was basically like, oh, if you want to learn more, come to our meetings. We meet at this time. 

And I was like, oh, OK. I'm intrigued by this. I want to know more. This seems really interesting. And so I started going to the meditations, to the meetings. And this was in the spring semester, which was January, February of 2020. And so within a couple of weeks of that semester, we were sent home but then also had to do everything remotely. 

And it really became a touch point of just having community, having some practice together. We ended up talking a lot about what was going on during that period, obviously, What Was happening with the Black Lives Matter protests, the murder of George Floyd, the rise of anti-Asian hate crimes. And so we ended up talking a lot about that within this space of what does it mean to be Buddhist. When we're talking about suffering, when we're talking about alleviating suffering, what does that actually mean? 

And so it was through that space that I became introduced to other teachers, other books. I read a lot of Thich Nhat Han, Lama Rod Owens as well, who talks a lot about racial justice and Buddhism and how to make sense of everything that's happening. Also, queerness in Buddhism, which has become a very huge part of my life, I think Buddhist understandings of the self and of identity were very crucial to accepting what it meant to be a queer person also when I was trying to figure that out. 

And so, yeah, when I graduated from undergrad, I then went and lived in Cambodia for a year, which is also a very deeply Buddhist country. And the relationship with Buddhism and also healing from the Cambodian genocide, working very closely with monks, both in my role as a teacher of English, but also working with an animal rights organization in Cambodia as well, providing food and vaccinations. And many of these animals lived in the pagodas in Cambodia. So I became very close with many of the monks who were there. 

And so when I returned, I was really interested in merging my practice with also just, how do we--with healing, with social justice, with this activism that I also found to be quite important. And I think divinity school seemed like a place where I could merge those two things together. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. That's really wonderful to hear more about your story and your journey. Yeah. Well, so you've already touched on this a little bit, but I'm curious. How did-- was there a particular point when you decided that HDS was the right place to apply or the next step in your journey? 

MAYA LEE: You know, it was funny. Over the course of when I was still an undergrad, I had read Be the Refuge by Chenxing Han, where she talks a lot about the experiences of Asian-American Buddhists, particularly young Asian-American Buddhists. And she had wrote about being a chaplain. And I was like, what the heck is that? What does that mean? 

And so I looked a little bit into it, and I saw that she had also done this chaplaincy in a hospital setting and had done this form of spiritual care. And I was like, oh, that's really fascinating. That seems like something I'd be interested in. But I just graduated from undergrad. I don't want to go into grad school. So I took the time to be in Cambodia. And when I came back, I was like, I'm still thinking about this chaplaincy thing. I think that's a sign that I should apply. 

So I applied to a bunch of different schools. Many of them actually were particularly Buddhist Studies schools, Institute of Buddhist Studies, University of the West, Naropa, Maitripa. And HDS was the only one that was non-denominational and that had more of a focus outside of the scope of Buddhist Studies. And so I was intrigued by that, again, especially coming from not a religious background. What does it mean to do spiritual care and with a community that's larger than the Buddhist community? So that was why I applied to HDS. And then when I got in, it just felt like that was the place to be. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. It's really fascinating to hear about that process. You've mentioned about your journey with Buddhism and how that's shaped your trajectory toward HDS and chaplaincy. I'm curious if you had influences before your connection with Buddhism. Did you have other spiritual traditions that were inspiring you and maybe connected with chaplaincy? 

MAYA LEE: I think maybe not so much directly with chaplaincy, per se. But, I mean, when I was growing up, I think ancestor was a really-- was a big spiritual practice, even though I didn't really understand it that way when I was little. My grandparents immigrated from-- my great-grandparents immigrated from China to the United States, and so--and particularly, Hawaii. 

And my great-grandmother was Buddhist, but as they landed in the United States, assimilated to Christianity. But they maintained some of the practices, particularly Qingming, which is, like, grave-cleaning. And so we would go-- whenever I visited my grandparents out in Hawaii, we would go and do the grave-cleaning. And it was this very elaborate ceremony. And we had little altars in our house. We would do Chinese New Year. 

And so it was, I think, part of growing up. But it wasn't something that I necessarily understood as spiritual until I became older. And my mom as well, she grew up in Sweden and didn't really-- my grandmother is Korean. But we didn't really have any of connection to our Korean history or lineage or anything like that. And so I think also studying Buddhism and exploring that was also a return to something that had been a little bit lost through colonization and assimilation. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. Thank you. This is-- I'm learning so much about you through this conversation too, which is wonderful. Because we are friends in the Buddhist community. 

MAYA LEE: Yes. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Something I wanted to ask you about is you've had quite a lot of opportunities to work as a chaplain, to do field education. I know you've been doing quite a bit of volunteering or maybe working at Boston Medical Center. And over the summer, you were working in New York as a chaplain. 

Yeah. I'd be very curious to hear about what that experience was like for you. Given that you had the intention of possibly becoming a chaplain when you were thinking about coming to HDS, I'm curious what that experience has been like being a student and then taking this time to work at hospitals and to do field education, CPE, Clinical Pastoral Education. Yeah. How has that been for you? 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. It was definitely not necessarily what I intended. I had thought about--I had this thing of chaplaincy and, specifically, hospital chaplaincy on my mind. But I was like, I have no idea if I can cut it. This is a very intense environment. Being in a hospital is a very intense place. And I was like, I don't know that I can cope, that I can handle that degree of suffering. 

And so we're required to do these field education placements. And so my first one was at Boston Medical Center, which is a safety net hospital in the South End of Boston. And I was there for 11 weeks. It's 40 hours per week. And it's basically, yeah, you're there eight hours a day, really just being with people in a very, very intimate way. 

And I also--many of the patients who are there are not Buddhist. And so that was also having to reorient what does it mean to do prayer? What does it mean to pray with people? Also, as someone who is not Christian, I had a lot of anxiety around that as well about if I say that I'm Buddhist, are they going to kick me out of the room? 

But I think as I went through the process of shadowing the staff chaplains, developing the language and the way to talk about spirituality, faith, prayer, but also really to recognize that I think a lot of chaplaincy, especially in a hospital setting, is about non-judgmental presence, about presence itself as being its own form of ministry and about just really listening to what people are going through. 

I think at a place like Boston Medical Center--that's a safety net hospital--there's not only the physical things that are going on, but also just histories of racism, of capitalism, the consequences of what that means and how it affects predominantly Black and Brown bodies. And the patient population at Boston Medical Center tends to be people who are people of color, who live in neighborhoods on the outskirts of Boston, lower socioeconomic status. And it's also a place where people can come if they're uninsured, if they're experiencing homelessness or struggling with addiction. 

And so there was a lot of intensity around that experience, but also so much learning, particularly from the patients themselves and seeing how they were able to make sense of what was happening to them, in what ways their faith provided them with strength, with the capacity to endure, at the same time while seeing this immense injustice, both outside of the hospital system and within it. Because medical racism is still a very alive thing. 

So it was an incredible, incredible experience. And I think I came out of that being like, that was wild. And also, I want to do this again. I want more of this. And so, yeah, I did that over the summer and then began volunteering at BMC that fall semester and have been there ever since. 

And then, yeah, this summer, I did my first unit of clinical pastoral education at Bellevue Hospital in New York City, which is another major safety net public hospital. And similarly, I think the intensity of what you see at a hospital like that, the intensity of the need, but also the ways in which people survive and the ways that they make sense of their experiences. Yeah. The patients are the most incredible teachers. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. Thank you. I'm curious. I think you've taken some classes about spiritual care and counseling here at HDS. 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. 

ALBERT KARCHER: I'm curious to hear, have those helped you in this process of going into some very intense environments, it sounds like, to do this pastoral care work? 

MAYA LEE: Yeah, absolutely. I think that the classes that I found the most helpful, I took one with a professor here that took--looked at the specific experiences or looked at spiritual care from a Black feminist and womanist perspective to dig deeper into the specific challenges, both in terms of mental health, but also physically, that Black women face, either cis or transgender. 

And so I think that was really a helpful framework for thinking about there are some basic building block skills of chaplaincy and spiritual care that are really important. And also, there is some specificity that you need to be able to just attend to the different dimensions of experience that people face and how people--we're all unique people. And we're going to be relating to these issues in different ways, And we also face different issues in different ways. 

So that class was really--I took that right before I went to Boston Medical Center. And I think that was really, really helpful and just framing the experiences. I worked mostly with a lot of women, older Black women. And so to frame what they were going through and how to relate to those experiences that they were having, I think, was really, really helpful. 

And then, also, this was less a spiritual class--spiritual care class, particularly. But I also took a class on just mental health psychiatry in Indigenous communities, particularly in Canada, the US, New Zealand, and Australia. And that class was also very much thinking about spirituality within mental health spaces and healing, what that looks like, particularly for Indigenous communities. And I think also shifting the paradigm from looking at What are these communities lacking? In what ways are they struggling? to How are they--What are the strengths? 

What are the ways in which these people are not just--they're not just still here, but they're surviving. They're thriving. They're flourishing. And how can we continue to promote that flourishing? So I think even though that wasn't necessarily a spiritual care class, I think it really was helpful in and thinking about just alternative ways of looking at healing, of wellbeing, of health, and what that looks like within this particular marginalized community. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. It sounds like you've had a lot of opportunities for both diversity and depth in your studies and potentially preparation for this kind of work. This is the Hope Podcast. 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. 

ALBERT KARCHER: I think you've already been alluding to this in what you've been sharing with us. But to ask you specifically, are there practices that help you to generate hope in difficult times and difficult moments? You've shared how in the hospital can be a very, very intense atmosphere and situations with a lot at stake. Are there practices you lean on to help you in those conditions? 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. I mean, I think, honestly, the patients themselves, as difficult as the situations that they are in, they--for me--and this may sound crazy. It's very rejuvenating for me to be in the hospital, I think, to see the ways in which love and hope still are able to flourish under the most difficult circumstances. I think also just--it's a little bit cliché. But self-care, I think, leaning on practice, particularly meditation, ritualizing certain elements of also being in the hospital because it's not as easy to take the time to meditate while you're on call. 

But I think really ritualizing my commutes home, my commute to work. Once I get home, being able to light incense, I think, is a very spiritual practice for me and meditate. And I'm also a huge reader, and so I think reading different books and also about how other people make sense of just the world writ large is really helpful for thinking through how I navigate these really complex situations and the intensity of those experiences, be it anger, grief, fear. Hearing the words of other people as well to buoy you through that. Yeah. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. Thank you for sharing. And in the Harvard Buddhist community, a couple weeks ago, offered origami. 

MAYA LEE: Yes. Yeah. Origami crane-making, which has been a practice that I've done for--how old am I? Like, 14 years now, almost 15 years, which is kind of crazy. But yeah, that's a very also meditative practice for me. The art, creating something with your hands, but also, specifically, origami cranes as a symbol of hope and longevity and good wishes. 

Yeah. It's something I've done with the Harvard Buddhist community. But also, I taught the chaplains at Boston Medical Center to also fold these cranes. I try and teach patients, when I can, to be able to fold them, although depending on their ability, just how they're doing, it's a little bit more difficult. But I'll give them cranes sometimes. And I taught my cohort mates also at Bellevue Hospital how to fold cranes. So I think, yeah, that's definitely another thing that is, yeah, very meditative and healing for me. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. That's beautiful. Our group in the Buddhist community really enjoyed that practice together, including myself. 

MAYA LEE: And I would say one other thing that both gives me hope but is also just, like, a self-care rejuvenating, maybe, practice is just spending time with my cat. His name is Lucky, and he is orange. And I adopted him while I was living in Cambodia. But yeah, he's also really a huge part of just, like, I think, my wellbeing and ability to show up for my patients and for work in other spaces. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. That's wonderful. Thank you for sharing that. I'm taking a class right now on animals in the post-human world. Animals are amazing. 

MAYA LEE: Yeah, they are. 

ALBERT KARCHER: They help us practice. Yeah. So we're coming toward the end of our conversation. I wanted to ask if you have any recommendations that you might have for our listeners in terms of books or sources of hope for you. 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. I actually--when I wrote my application for Harvard Divinity School, I titled it "Time Given to Us," which is a quote from Lord of the Rings, where Frodo is like, I wish that the ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had ever happened. And Gandalf, who is his mentor, is like, so do all who wish to see these times, but that's not for us to decide. All that we decide is what to do with the time given to us. 

And so, yeah, Lord of the Rings, I think, is a huge-- I love those films. I watch those movies every year. But yeah, Lord of the Rings for sure. And then also anything by Lama Rod Owens. Especially, Love and Rage, which is one of his books, is a really good one for, I think, just how to navigate, I think, anger as an emotion and as a response to really intense, experiences in our life or in society. 

And then as part of the Indigenous Solidarity Collective, which I also co-lead with a couple folks, we're reading Theory of Water, which is a book by an Indigenous author, Leanne Simpson. And she very much talks about how do we-- leaning about on her own Anishinaabe heritage and identity to-- and cultural values to map a future of hope and also of growth, of community, and of mutual aid. And I read that over the summer, and it was a really lovely book. So I recommend all of those books and movies. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Yeah. Thank you so much. 

MAYA LEE: Thank you. 

ALBERT KARCHER: This is--we have plenty to read. 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. These are your homework assignments now. 

ALBERT KARCHER: Exactly. Yeah. Thank you so much, Maya, for joining us. 

MAYA LEE: Yeah. 

ALBERT KARCHER: And wonderful to learn more about you today.

MAYA LEE: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. It was great to have this conversation.