Mindfulness in Waiting

I’m waiting for something to happen. Beyond the existential concept that says we’re all waiting for something, I am waiting right now for information about something very specific. The details of what I’m waiting for aren’t important. The experience of it is what I’m here to discuss.

Most of us can tolerate a certain amount of waiting without too much trouble. We wait in line. We wait in traffic. We wait for our loved ones to come home from a trip. Some kinds of waiting feel benign and others become suffering. This is the suffering kind of waiting. It’s the kind of waiting where I’ve done everything I possibly can to distract myself from obsessing over when I’m going to learn the outcome  and all that’s left is hyperawareness of not knowing.

After becoming bored with developing some killer skills in the game 2048, it finally occurred to me that this is exactly the kind of situation Buddhist practice is designed to address (light dawns on marble head, right?). Mindfulness is the answer! Yes, mindfulness. Be in the present moment. 

Unfortunately my present moment is fused with uncertainty. There is music playing in the coffee shop I’m sitting in right now. I can hear the sounds of the barista wiping the counters and her sneakers squeaking on the floor. I feel the smoothness of my laptop under the palms of my hands as I type. I’ve just eaten. So I feel well-sated. There is a lingering taste of chocolate on my tongue, since I decided to get a mocha today instead of a plain latte. And…there is an underlying discomfort in the background of not knowing this important information. 

It’s a common misunderstanding that the point of mindfulness is to make us feel better, to remove us from our discomfort. Turning back to Pema Chödrön I am reminded that the real instruction is simply to stay. Part of the point of mindfulness is to inoculate ourselves against suffering by practicing staying with the discomfort when it is present, to not distract ourselves or run away from it. Mindfulness in this case is to learn to be with what is, as it is. In learning this lesson, that is how the suffering is released, not by blissing out and just pretending everything feels okay.

Because I am a plan-ahead kind of person, this particular brand of waiting looks like it was special-ordered for me. In order to be relieved from my suffering, I need to stay with the feelings of insecurity and threat I get from not being able to make plans and from not having any kind of control over when or how I will finally get the information I need. I need to examine this suffering so I can become more informed about the result of being strongly attached to a particular outcome.

Having reoriented the purpose of my mindfulness exercise in this case, I bow to this teacher and hope to learn all I can from it before resolution comes.

Namasté. 

Worry - Would It Help?

Over the years, I've tried numerous strategies to quell my anxiety. Truly it remains an uphill battle. Just being a Buddhist has given me a stronger framework from which to understand the mental storms that plague me. It is usually some form of tanha (thirst or craving either for or especially against something) that gets me going. Recognizing that is always easier than putting the brakes on it.

A couple of weeks ago, I remembered a movie I saw late last year. It was called Bridge of Spies. In it Tom Hanks played a lawyer in the Cold War. He was called upon to arrange a prisoner exchange with the Russians for a spy he had defended. Mark Rylance played the spy, Rudoplh Abel. I liked the movie. What sticks with me though is Rylance's character. Whenever there was uncertainty about what would happen to him or when he was in overt danger, Tom Hank's character would comment that he didn't understand how he could remain so calm and ask him if he wasn't worried about the outcome. Rylance's character always simply replied "Would it help?" Of course, the answer was always no.

When I can remember, I've been trying to apply this question to situations that trigger my anxiety. I look at the circumstance I'm in and ask myself, "Is this worry helping?" As in the movie, the question is always a resounding no. What it does do is increase my dukkha (suffering) exponentially. 

I can't tell you that my new mantra is a magic pill that has solved the problem of overreacting to just about everything, but it is a fun variation on the the meditation response "thinking" when applied to an overactive mind. 

Practice, practice, practice. 

An Ordinary Being

Lately, I've been perusing some Buddhist books I have already read. Most interesting are the ones I read before I really understood anything about Buddhism in terms of how it relates to life practice. Currently, I'm looking at a little book called The Four Noble Truths by the Dalai Lama. 

I remember this being the first book that helped me understand the core practical tenets of Buddhism, in contrast to regional-cultural flavors of Buddhism or the theoretical-philosophical "World Religions 101" notion of what Buddhism is. It's compact, but thorough and it was way above me the first time I read it. 

Now I understand more, but how far have I really come? In his chapter "The Truth of Suffering", His Holiness illuminates three "realms of suffering". The closer to enlightenment one is, the more formless one becomes and one becomes an Arya being.

In his words, "Anyone who has gained direct intuitive realization of emptiness, or the ultimate nature of reality, is said to be an Arya according to Mahayana and anyone who had not gained that realization is called an ordinary being."

Ordinary, huh? I guess so. In spite my reading and my earnest attempt to apply a Buddhist mindset to my daily life I can't say that I have ever had "direct intuitive realization of emptiness." I get it at an intellectual level. I can see the logic of it, so to speak, but I haven't truly experienced it.

And that makes me ordinary.

At first I was taken aback by the term. It seemed pejorative to me. Now that I've thought about it though. It seems kind of cozy. To be ordinary implies that a person has many people around them who are thinking about and going through the same thing. There is a solidarity in "ordinary" that peels away as a person achieves Arya.

I've suddenly got this image of all of us ordinary beings kind of scrabbling around, doing the work, having the vision. Then every so often one of us pops up like the bubbles in boiling water and poof. At that level, it's not really relevant whether you are the water or the resulting steam.

The Squirrel Master

Tom over at Homeless Tom wrote a quite pertinent and interesting post entitled "Is hatefulness outside the realm of Buddhism?" Over the last few weeks I have seen myself, on both sides of the fence, how ignorance, anger and hate have and do propagate through the internet, from Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike.

Tom writes;

"But we Buddhists know better than others that America's chutzpah is its Achilles' heel. The arrogance and creaturely neediness of Americans dams the way to happiness" then suggests "The easiest of it ought to be to embrace what seems hateful: to understand it and engage it."

I think Tom definitely hit the mark about conquering hate by embracing it to understand it. Hate is unfortunately inevitable, and we will all at some point in our lives experience both being on the receiving side of it or on the initiating side of it. It can even be argued that hate is the pinnacle expression of destructive human emotions; however, I don't see this as an entirely bad thing. Indeed, if we are mindful of ourselves, and how these types of negative and harmful emotions arise within our own minds, I think it can actually benefit our practice.

Carrying around hate is much like trying to physically hold an angry squirrel in your hand. Ok, yea thats silly, but hear me out....I know first hand that actually trying to hold an angry squirrel is one of the most unpleasant yet hilarious experiences a person can endure. It was brutally hot that Sunday afternoon in July 18 years ago, and the squirrel looked so cute, furry and innocent, so being the teenager I was I took the unfortunate decision that I wanted to hold him. In not one of my more brilliant moments as a member of an advanced animal species I reached down and picked him up like I was picking a flower from a plant. The squirrel obviously startled, proceeded to immediately chomp down into my hand and violently flail about with his claws, trying desperately to get away. My brother, both amused and worried, shouted at me, "Why are you holding that squirrel?" In the chaos of the moment, with the blood and the fur and the squirrel teeth and the little mini claws flashing about me like some slow motion epic battle scene, all I could utter were the words "Fucker bit me!" Despite his unrelenting assault on my arms, hands and face, I sensed I was engaged in a mortal struggle of man vs. squirrel and for some egotistical (i.e. stupid) reason I just wouldn't let go. When I finally had enough and let him go, my brother said I looked like I was attacked by an army of extremely aggressive kittens.

Although extremely humorous now, I had let my pride and ego speak louder than my good judgment and common sense, hence I got my ass kicked by a squirrel. Many times I think we fail to make the connection between hate or other powerful emotions and our own suffering; preoccupying our thoughts and mind with this protection of ego and pride. This is where our knowledge and practice of Buddhism can help us identify the root of hate and understand the nature of attaching to such painful thoughts and emotions. When we make an effort to understand how confusion and suffering arise within ourselves, we can begin to see the beauty of the practice of mindfulness and meditation. It is in this moment, this magical and beautiful moment, when we bring ourselves back to this moment that we can fully understand the connection between mind and suffering, self and dukkha. While we shouldn't celebrate such destructive thoughts, when they do occur they can certainly be embraced to enhance the understanding of ourselves and our place within this world. In that moment of understanding we may be able to finally see the significance of non-attachment and find true freedom of mind.

(And freedom of squirrel of course.)

"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one getting burned."~Buddha