the thoughts “thinking” and joyfully, without judgment, bring your attention back to the breath.
Over time, as the thinking mind begins to settle, we’ll start to see our patterns and habits far more clearly. This can be a painful experience. I can’t overestimate the importance of accepting ourselves exactly as we are right now, not as we wish we were or think we ought to be. By cultivating nonjudgmental openness to ourselves and to whatever arises, to our surprise and delight we will find ourselves genuinely welcoming the never-pin-downable quality of life, experiencing it as a friend, a teacher, and a support, and no longer as an enemy.
5
Staying in the Middle
A MEAN WORD or a snide remark, a disdainful or disapproving facial expression, aggressive body language—these are all ways that we can cause harm. The first commitment allows us to slow down enough to become very intimate with how we feel when we’re pushed to the limit, very intimate with the urge to strike out or withdraw, become a bully or go numb. We become very mindful of the feeling of craving, the feeling of aversion, the feeling of wanting to speak or act out.
Not acting on our habitual patterns is only the first step toward not harming others or ourselves. The transformative process begins at a deeper level when we contact the rawness we’re left with whenever we refrain. As a way of working with our aggressive tendencies, Dzigar Kongtrül teaches the nonviolent practice of simmering. He says that rather than “boil in our aggression like a piece of meat cooking in a soup,” we simmer in it. We allow ourselves to wait, to sit patiently with the urge to act or speak in our usual ways and feel the full force of that urge without turning away or giving in. Neither repressing nor rejecting, we stay in the middle between the two extremes, in the middle between yes and no, right and wrong, true and false. This is the journey of developing a kindhearted and courageous tolerance for our pain. Simmering is a way of gaining inner strength.It helps us develop trust in ourselves—trust that we can experience the edginess, the groundlessness, the fundamental uncertainty of life and work with our mind, without acting in ways that are harmful to ourselves or others.
Before making the first commitment, we need to ask ourselves if we’re ready to do something different. Are we sick to death of our same old repetitive patterns? Do we want to allow the space for new possibilities to emerge? The habit of escape is very strong, but are we ready to acknowledge when we’re hooked? Are we willing to know our triggers and not respond habitually? Are we ready to open to uncertainty—or at least to give it a wholehearted try? If we can answer yes to any of these, then we’re ready to take this vow.
With the commitment to not cause harm, we move away from reacting in ways that cause us to suffer, but we haven’t yet arrived at a place that feels entirely relaxed and free. We first have to go through a growing-up process, a getting-used-to process. That process, that transition, is one of becoming comfortable with exactly what we’re feeling as we feel it. The key practice to support us in this is mindfulness—being fully present right here, right now. Meditation is one form of mindfulness, but mindfulness is called by many names: attentiveness, nowness, and presence are just a few. Essentially, mindfulness means wakefulness—fully present wakefulness. Chögyam Trungpa called it paying attention to all the details of your life.
The specific details of our lives will, of course, differ, but for all of us, wakefulness concerns everything from how we make dinner to how we speak to one another to how we take care of our clothes, our floors, our forks and spoons. Just as with the other aspects of this commitment, we’re eitherpresent when putting on our sweater or tying our shoes or brushing our teeth, or we’re not. We’re either awake or asleep,
Over time, as the thinking mind begins to settle, we’ll start to see our patterns and habits far more clearly. This can be a painful experience. I can’t overestimate the importance of accepting ourselves exactly as we are right now, not as we wish we were or think we ought to be. By cultivating nonjudgmental openness to ourselves and to whatever arises, to our surprise and delight we will find ourselves genuinely welcoming the never-pin-downable quality of life, experiencing it as a friend, a teacher, and a support, and no longer as an enemy.
5
Staying in the Middle
A MEAN WORD or a snide remark, a disdainful or disapproving facial expression, aggressive body language—these are all ways that we can cause harm. The first commitment allows us to slow down enough to become very intimate with how we feel when we’re pushed to the limit, very intimate with the urge to strike out or withdraw, become a bully or go numb. We become very mindful of the feeling of craving, the feeling of aversion, the feeling of wanting to speak or act out.
Not acting on our habitual patterns is only the first step toward not harming others or ourselves. The transformative process begins at a deeper level when we contact the rawness we’re left with whenever we refrain. As a way of working with our aggressive tendencies, Dzigar Kongtrül teaches the nonviolent practice of simmering. He says that rather than “boil in our aggression like a piece of meat cooking in a soup,” we simmer in it. We allow ourselves to wait, to sit patiently with the urge to act or speak in our usual ways and feel the full force of that urge without turning away or giving in. Neither repressing nor rejecting, we stay in the middle between the two extremes, in the middle between yes and no, right and wrong, true and false. This is the journey of developing a kindhearted and courageous tolerance for our pain. Simmering is a way of gaining inner strength.It helps us develop trust in ourselves—trust that we can experience the edginess, the groundlessness, the fundamental uncertainty of life and work with our mind, without acting in ways that are harmful to ourselves or others.
Before making the first commitment, we need to ask ourselves if we’re ready to do something different. Are we sick to death of our same old repetitive patterns? Do we want to allow the space for new possibilities to emerge? The habit of escape is very strong, but are we ready to acknowledge when we’re hooked? Are we willing to know our triggers and not respond habitually? Are we ready to open to uncertainty—or at least to give it a wholehearted try? If we can answer yes to any of these, then we’re ready to take this vow.
With the commitment to not cause harm, we move away from reacting in ways that cause us to suffer, but we haven’t yet arrived at a place that feels entirely relaxed and free. We first have to go through a growing-up process, a getting-used-to process. That process, that transition, is one of becoming comfortable with exactly what we’re feeling as we feel it. The key practice to support us in this is mindfulness—being fully present right here, right now. Meditation is one form of mindfulness, but mindfulness is called by many names: attentiveness, nowness, and presence are just a few. Essentially, mindfulness means wakefulness—fully present wakefulness. Chögyam Trungpa called it paying attention to all the details of your life.
The specific details of our lives will, of course, differ, but for all of us, wakefulness concerns everything from how we make dinner to how we speak to one another to how we take care of our clothes, our floors, our forks and spoons. Just as with the other aspects of this commitment, we’re eitherpresent when putting on our sweater or tying our shoes or brushing our teeth, or we’re not. We’re either awake or asleep,
Similar Books
