With palms together,
Good Morning All,
How many of us can make a mistake without fear? Do we feel comfortable out of our comfort zone? Can we hear criticism and allow it to just lay there?
Most of us, perhaps all of us, cannot. We each have a strong need to be valued, appreciated, esteemed. Interaction with others (and sometimes even ourselves) makes this a challenge. Our culture is habituated toward critique.
Valuation is our livelihood. Discrimination our currency.
A statement suggesting what we say is off base or inaccurate invite rebuttal. If the rebuttal comes from fear, big problem. Fer creates defensive posturing. Fear closes us off from even looking at the merits of the suggestion: so strong is our need not to be wrong.
Why?
I am wrong often. I speak before I have the facts. I believe I know what someone is thinking or saying as they are speaking and formulate replies before they have finished their thought. I guess I think I'm a mind-reader or something. My father always charged me with being stupid and incompetent. I filter through his judgment. And just as surely as he is dead, so am I if I continue in this way.
Our practice is to be in this moment. Being in this moment requires courage as it demands we are open. Being open is a challenge when we are afraid. Yet our practice teaches us there is nothing to fear. There is no self to be abused, no feeling that will last forever (unless we keep it tightly stored and ready to use, and even then, it will die with us sometime).
It is a good practice to just be present without acting. In this practice allow yourself the luxury of not responding. Make a concerted effort to free your thoughts and let them float away. Those around you might be mystified, this behavior will be a small challenge for them, but I believe at some point this practice will bear fruit.
Be well.
3 comments:
I have found, that at those times when I am able to catch myself from an emotional outburst in response to someone else's actions or words (and this is of course always easier to do in a professional setting, as you, and everyone else, expect yourself to be in more control within those settings [what a difference proper conditioning makes]) simply by not understanding. Yes, not understanding; I am very good at this and can literaly not understand what's being said almost at will, but I've noticed that just acting as if you don't understand works equally as well.
When someone has unreasonable demands, harsh criticisms or other words that you find yourself offended by or angered with, keep a calm relaxed stance, vacate your stare a bit, nod confusedly, and repeat small highlights of what you are being told, as if you cannot quite see how what's been said actually applies.
Remarkably, when practiced, this method will diffuse most altercations, and often with astounding effects. Once I had a man tell me I was the most patient and attentive person he had ever met and thanked me for my attention--I felt good about the encounter later for two reasons; one, because I felt better for not having shouted at him in anger when he became unreasonable in his demands, and two, that he left the encounter feeling good too. That's a best case scenario of course of course, but this method at its worse usually sees your aggressor simply walking off in disgust at your stupidity and with you amused by the encounter, thus saving yourself and your nemesis from a more harmful and angry meeting.
Strangely enough this will never arouse suspicion even among your closest of co-workers and friends, as surprisingly almost everyone is willing to believe that the person they are talking to is less intelligent than they are. Even people who have acknowledged you as a genius are more than willing to believe that you are an idiot at any given moment if it means that they perceive that they are not.
I don't know if this is what the roshi had in mind, Jeff, but it may be a suitable subsitute.
-S
Well, I'm not actually advocating acting dumb either, but I suppose that might be a lesser of two evils option if you can't actually achieve a state of non- understanding--which itself is the lesser exercise of simply being and accepting in silence--which you said you feared would not have beneficial effects.
I would suggest that perhaps diffusing an unhealthy confrontation, by whatever means you have available, is at times the most helpful thing that can be done to promote further growth and learning (at a later date) for all parties concerned.
The truly enlightened will be able to preach the Dharma to a nest of wasps with no harm to himself, and great merit to the wasps--but the rest of us are advised not to try this at home.
You're absolutely right, Jeff. The correct action, and the best action, must both be in step for the dance to come off. But what I was getting at, is that sometimes people approach you demanding a response that will aid them in propogating an unhealthy state, and will seek to bring you into that state with them; fuel for their fire, a chip on their shoulder, looking for a fight.
Experience and training must be your guide then, and each circumstance will dictate the proper method of approach. Silence as a direct response if performed incorrectly is just as confrontational as harsh words, as you pointed out yourself.
Chuang Tzu said that a man in a boat on a river will become angry if another man in a boat carelessly drifts into him, but that there is little or little lasting anger if the same thing occurs when the boat that bumps him is empty and unmanned.
Also, if someone sees you standing at the bottom of a hill and rolls a boulder at you and you notice this, is it disingenuous for you to stop what you are ernestly doing and move out of the way causing him to miss?
It's late and I think I'm all over the place here, much like an empty boat adrift myself. The one thing I do know is that practicing alone is a piece of cake when compared to taking that same practice into the arena with other people. Especially angry, grumpy people.
-S
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