Confession times: I didn't make up the heading on this post. A few weeks ago there was a daylong retreat up at Spirit Rock with that name. I couldn't make it to the retreat, and then of course the next day I felt bad about it and told myself I should have gone. I told that story to my dharma group and they all laughed. So if it's good enough for them, it's a good enough story for you, gentle reader.
Another quick story, courtesy of Vinny at Dharma Punx: many years ago, the Dalai Lama was visiting the United States for the first time in a while. One of the local (American) teachers had a question for him about the metta bhavana practice. For those who don't know, metta bhavana is a meditation exercise centered around extending loving kindness to the whole world. (If you don't like the phrase "loving kindness", just think about "wishing people well"). Because it's kind of hard to just wish everybody well all at once, the practice happens in stages. In the East (like Tibet), the practice goes as follows: first, you wish yourself well, then someone you care about, then a stranger, then, finally, someone you don't like. Easy to hard. Well, the American teacher asked the Dalai Lama about this. The teacher had been trying this practice with his students and found that they were stuck at the beginning - wishing themselves well. He asked the Lama why they had chosen to start with the most difficult part. His Holiness was confused at first. His translators struggled. Then he struggled. Finally, he came to understand, and a bewildered look crossed his face. "Are you saying," he said, "that your students are having more difficulty wishing themselves well, than wishing well to someone they barely know?"
"Well, yes," the teacher replied somewhat sheepishly.
"Then that," said the Lama, "is where you must begin."
Last week, my dharma circle discussed the topic of enlightenment. The leader that night, Tom, asked us all to briefly describe what we felt was holding us back from enlightenment. Out of 15-20 young adults, I would estimate only 2 or 3 did *not* explicitly mention self-criticism or dislike of the self as the main impediment to enlightenment or peace. That's astounding, really. There are so many things that can stop us from being at peace: desire, for one. Hunger. Hatred. Envy, Jealousy, Apathy, Greed. And out of all of these powerful forces, almost all of us chose self-criticism.
As I write this, I am on a diet. A "nutrition plan", if you will. I am also currently at a Japanese seafood buffet. The buffet is most emphatically not on my diet. This simple set of events would be enough, at times, to set me off on a series of self-hating angst. But this time, I did it on purpose. To celebrate a successful week on the diet.
It turns out, the food tastes better when you don't hate yourself as you eat it.
We - and by we I mean people our age, people in San Francisco, people in our income bracket, people in our country - have a lot of difficulty being at peace. And an inordinate amount of it seems to come from not being at peace with who we are. Im not going to talk about why - brighter minds that I have filled the internet with answers to that question: culture, the media, nutrition, ethics, history. I'm more concerned with practical matters - how do we stop? Maybe even more important: what do we do in the meantime? I don't know about you, but I'm not going to stop beating myself up overnight, so how do I enjoy things while still staying on the path towards self-acceptance? After all, any dieter will tell you that shooting for the moon all at once is a sure way to get disappointed and quit. So, okay, I just have to love myself *a little bit*. Maybe eat one less dumpling. Ruminate just a minute less about a meaningless decision. Reward myself a bit more for who I am.
It's a start.
--Adam
I think your last few sentences hit it on the head. Here are my long-form thoughts...
ReplyDeleteSelf-criticism isn't an obstacle, but a tool to drive us towards goals or to correct mis-steps. It's based on the assumption that future state is preferable to present state, and its purpose is to push us towards action. It's hard to be at peace when the heart feels there's more to be done.
The most direct way to manage self-criticism is to "do". If you feel bad about something you just said -- apologize. If you think you ate a bit too much -- jog for an additional 10 minutes. Self-criticism is the tool that makes people try to correct mistakes, and people tend to forgive themselves and move on if they've done their best.
When that's not enough, perhaps the goals need to be reviewed. If "our best" isn't good enough, is the goal realistic? Are we trying to be the best that we can be, or are we trying to be someone else? We don't live in a vacuum. Unrealistic goals -- and the relentless self-criticism that follows -- are often the result of carelessly basing our lives on other peoples' principles and desires.
Outside advice is great for ideas... but sometimes we too easily adopt other peoples' goals based on the perceived end, without first believing in the path.