Eightfold Path - Wise Livelihood

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Today, we are finishing up our series on Awakening the Buddha Within with the last Eightfold Path component to be covered:  Wise Livelihood.  How do we reconcile making a living with making a life?  The teaching at its simplest says we earn a living without harming others.  Ah, that it was that easy to be happy, make money, and do no harm!

I know some of you have jobs that you adore.  You wake up in the morning and can’t wait to get to work.  Others I know are less enthusiastic—you might think, meh, I’m okay with what I do.  There are also some that might have that Bataan death march feeling every day—where your brain toys with the idea of steering the car toward the highway going the opposite direction of work and running away from life.  Or maybe… you have a job that includes all three experiences in any given day or week or any given year.  No job is perfect.  Even if you are retired or working in the home, there is an opportunity to see whatever action we are taking in life to support ourselves as an opportunity to support our values, to live our values.   Wise livelihood is about living our values, living an ethical life, and exploring the possibility of joy in a myriad of places.

So, first we must be clear on what we value.   What is most important to you?  Take this moment to make a mental list. Now, think about how your work is supporting those values.

In Thich Nhat Hanh’s book, The Heart of the Buddha’s Teachings, he says "To practice Right Livelihood, you have to find a way to earn your living without trampling upon the values of love and compassion. The way you support yourself can be an expression of your innate Buddha nature, OR it can be a source of suffering for you and others. " ... We should be awake to the consequences, far and near, of the way we earn our living."  The way you earn your living is not merely about the product or service created.  It includes your attitude and actions in HOW you do your work, how you interact with yourself and others, day by day, moment by moment.

Work is an opportunity to put our spiritual beliefs into action.  One of the most practical applications I have found for enjoying my work are:

Miguel Ruiz  The Four Agreements

1.    Be Impeccable With Your Word.

2.    Don't Take Anything Personally.

3.    Don't Make Assumptions.

4.    Always Do Your Best.

See work as an opportunity to practice the four Agreements.  Sometimes, we spend too much time asking ourselves the big questions of what do I want to be when I grow up, that we miss the daily opportunities to show generosity and compassion.  And an critical component of these agreement is to let go of expectations!  We can do the right thing and not expect anyone to notice or thank us for it.  That is part of the Buddhist practice.  Do your best, do what is needed in each moment, be generous, help others, be grateful. 

I would add a five agreement:  Look for the good!  Many times, people sabotage their work by pro-actively looking for the negative in themselves and in others.  Catch yourself and your co-workers doing something good and praise it.

Officially, the Buddha is quoted as saying, "A householder should not engage in five types of business: Business in weapons, business in human beings, business in meat, business in intoxicants, and business in poison."   So, we can each evaluate whether we feel ethical about what we do to make a living.

A common misperception is that Buddha was against making money.  Not at all—he counsel Kings and businessman of his day.  He just encouraged it to be done in ethical and skillful ways.  But he knew that does not buy happiness in and of itself.  So we get to decide, how much money to we really need?  Matthieu Ricard’s story about Tahiti. 

How we relate to money?  Money comes with plenty of baggage from our parents and hard times or good times we might have had with it.  Only you can decide how much money you need to live a skillful life.  And each of us, we have the capability, if we have the willingness, to spend our money wisely.

There’s sometimes this fantasy that we will find the perfect job for our skills, our interests and our desired lifestyle.  And, it is worthwhile to explore what makes your heart sing.  But, don’t let the fantasizing cause you to miss the magic to be found in each moment.  Sometimes, we will miss many of them when we only fantasize about something in the future that is “better” than what we’ve got in the now.  In my own life, I began my corporate career in love with my job, fighting the good fight, feeling delighted by the competition.  But slowly, my perspective changed, and I found myself stuck in what we lovingly would call the golden handcuffs of a good paying job that no longer brought me any joy.  With family obligations at the time, I felt selfish wanting to simply walk away.  So, I decided to uphold the Four Agreements, and worked at infusing loving-kindness and compassion into every moment of every workday as best I could.  It got me through another seven years of working there and got my daughter through college. We each have these decisions to make in our lives, some big and some small.

Daily, we each make a decision to stay where we’re at or try something new.  There are a myriad of options to consider.  First, if you love what you do, don’t take it for granted.  And you might ask yourself how could you serve others by helping them along as well.   Second, if you don’t love what you do, how could you begin to explore other options without causing financial disaster?

Third, if you don’t have a job, how can you choose wisely for the next one.  Doreen is an excellent role model for going through the tough process of 100 interviews to find the job that she truly loves.  And the people you interact with, the places you hang out, the attitude about getting a job that you have, these are the critical components to enabling the right job to appear.

Fourth, how do you make the most of each moment regardless of whatever situation you currently find yourself in?  Regardless of our job, we always have the opportunity to bring spiritual energy in daily life. 

Dogen was a 13^th century Zen master who said:

“Those who see worldly life as an obstacle to

Seeking the spiritual truth see no spiritual truth in everyday actions;

They have not yet discovered that there are no

Everyday actions outside of the spiritual truth.”

So dream, but also be present in each moment and appreciate what we have.