Watershed
Something important happened today that I just can't overlook or ignore, something I'm going to have to deal with and something I don't want to deal with. I can't talk about it except to say that my heart is kind of aching and I'm afraid, and I don't like it. I know it will be okay, but I don't like where I am right now.
So all day I've been trying to not to think about it, because today of all days I really have to focus on my work. But I got to a place this afternoon where what I was doing didn't require so much concentration, and so I decided that rather than let my mind go back to obsessing about the thing I don't know how to fix, I would listen to a podcast. I opened iTunes, and there at the very top of the list of new podcasts was this one by one of my favorite people at Insight Meditation Center, Shaila Catherine – titled "Judging: Who Knows Best." You can listen to it here – it's the one dated 2/19/07.
I really need to send those people a check or something, because even though I've never been to their center, I've gained so much from listening to these talks. Today I was reminded that when I find myself feeling angry and superior in my judgments of someone else, it's usually more about me than about them. She says, "We may be thinking that we're judging someone else, but really we are establishing who we are by comparing ourselves to others. Each time we express a judgment we're declaring ourselves and asserting a particular self position in the world, and usually we're judging from a very narrow and limited perspective...."
She makes the distinction between the kind of judging that Buddhists call "wise discernment" – meaning, the ability to identify what is skillful or unskillful, wholesome or unwholesome – and the kind that falls more into the category of contempt for someone or something that doesn't conform to my idea of how things should be. When I'm judging someone this way, I'm not really trying to see or understand them – I'm only looking for confirmation that my way really is the only right way. If I make the effort to look and listen deeply I may still come to that conclusion – but the point is to be willing to stay close enough to really see and connect with compassion, not to prove that I'm right and the other person is wrong, which usually only pushes the other person away.
Anyway, I'm not so interested lately in telling everyone else how I think they should behave. I have enough to do just trying to make good decisions for myself, about what I am going to do.
Augh. Sometimes my life feels totally surreal and out of control, even though to the outside eye it might not appear that much of anything at all is happening. These are the times when I want to just throw my dog and my pillows and a couple of really nice plates and bowls in the car and run away, run away, run away. But you can't run away from your own life.
Better to run toward it.
So all day I've been trying to not to think about it, because today of all days I really have to focus on my work. But I got to a place this afternoon where what I was doing didn't require so much concentration, and so I decided that rather than let my mind go back to obsessing about the thing I don't know how to fix, I would listen to a podcast. I opened iTunes, and there at the very top of the list of new podcasts was this one by one of my favorite people at Insight Meditation Center, Shaila Catherine – titled "Judging: Who Knows Best." You can listen to it here – it's the one dated 2/19/07.
I really need to send those people a check or something, because even though I've never been to their center, I've gained so much from listening to these talks. Today I was reminded that when I find myself feeling angry and superior in my judgments of someone else, it's usually more about me than about them. She says, "We may be thinking that we're judging someone else, but really we are establishing who we are by comparing ourselves to others. Each time we express a judgment we're declaring ourselves and asserting a particular self position in the world, and usually we're judging from a very narrow and limited perspective...."
She makes the distinction between the kind of judging that Buddhists call "wise discernment" – meaning, the ability to identify what is skillful or unskillful, wholesome or unwholesome – and the kind that falls more into the category of contempt for someone or something that doesn't conform to my idea of how things should be. When I'm judging someone this way, I'm not really trying to see or understand them – I'm only looking for confirmation that my way really is the only right way. If I make the effort to look and listen deeply I may still come to that conclusion – but the point is to be willing to stay close enough to really see and connect with compassion, not to prove that I'm right and the other person is wrong, which usually only pushes the other person away.
Anyway, I'm not so interested lately in telling everyone else how I think they should behave. I have enough to do just trying to make good decisions for myself, about what I am going to do.
Augh. Sometimes my life feels totally surreal and out of control, even though to the outside eye it might not appear that much of anything at all is happening. These are the times when I want to just throw my dog and my pillows and a couple of really nice plates and bowls in the car and run away, run away, run away. But you can't run away from your own life.
Better to run toward it.
Labels: stress
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home