Don't Be So Predictable

(For Podcast, click here.  For ITunes version, click here)

This morning I want to talk about the Lojong or Mind training teachings again, as I did last week.  They include 59 pithy slogans divided up into seven main categories.  These teachings were written 1000 years ago by a Buddhist monk named Atisha, but I would advocate that they are just was valuable and applicable to life in the 21 century as there were way be then!

Pema Chodron, an American who is a Buddhist nun and has been practicing for over 50 years, has an excellent commentary on these teachings entitled, Start Where You Are.  Wherever your life may be in this moment, these teachings are available to help guide us to higher levels of awareness, awareness of ourselves and of our world.  We can use these teachings right now to start fresh in our lives, as if every moment were a brand new year.

In the sixth point, of mind training, Slogan #30 is “Don't be so predictable”.  How is it that we respond predictably?   Imagine a time when someone made you angry or frustrated—what was it about them or their actions that caused anger or frustration to arise in you?   And how did you respond?  Often, we feel our buttons pushed, as it is said, and we react in a way that we’ve always reacted with the person or in that situation.  These times are opportunities to not be so predictable.

This slogan is included up a broader category which states, “DON’T KEEP TAKING THE WRONG MEDICINE FOR THE SAME ILLNESS”

·       Don’t run away:  Don’t continue reinforcing bad habits (running away from your problems is a race that no one ever wins)

·       Don’t be consistent:  when consistency means living according to the past

·       Don’t  live in a small space: when there is a whole big wide world of possibilities just waiting for you to try new things, be willing to risk failure

Marshmallows!

FORTY years ago Walter Mischel, an American psychologist, conducted a famous experiment. He left a series of four-year-olds alone in a room with a marshmallow on the table. He told them that they could eat the marshmallow at once, or wait until he came back and get two marshmallows. Some ate the marshmallow immediately. Others tried all kinds of strategies to leave the tempting treat alone and were able to wait until he returned.

Nothing surprising there, but here’s the astonishing part:  whether the four-year-olds’ were able to defer gratification was reflected over time in their lives. Those who waited longest scored higher in academic tests at school, were much less likely to drop out of university and earned substantially higher incomes than those who gobbled up the sweet straight away. Those who could not wait at all were far more likely, in later life, to have problems with drugs or alcohol.

Ken McLeod also has a commentary on these teachings, and he uses the translation, Don’t rely on a sense of duty, a preconceived idea about what is right, to make decisions in your life.  I was raised Methodist, but we have many people here who were raised Catholic, and I have been intrigued by learning about the various experiences that people have had with their Catholic upbringing.  Someone shared with me that in her church, the priest and her parents warned her regularly not to question ANY of the church doctrines, and in fact, if you even doubted in your mind, that God would know that you have doubted and would punish you!  I have to tell you my perspective on that—that is really messed up! 

One of the great transformations in human evolution is the arising of critical thinking.  We each get to determine, based on facts, based on reflection, and based on our own experience, what is real, what is true for us, what is worth believing and practicing and what is not. 

This person who shared this “fear of doubt” with me was shocked when they came to the Temple here, because not only is there no dogma or doctrine to adhere to, we are actively encouraging you to question everything you are told.  Don’t believe a word I’m saying!  Go out and try for yourself to see what works for you.  This is what the Buddha taught, and this is also what Charles and Myrtle Fillmore, the co-founders of the Unity movement, taught. 

I know it’s much easier to just have someone tell you what to do, this is right and this is wrong, then go and do that consistently every single day.  But, from my perspective, life is far too complicated for a cookie cutter solution to each problem.  We as human being are far too complicated.   We may share 98% or more of each other’s DNA, but you, each and every single one of you, are as unique as a snowflake.  Doing things because we have a sense of duty will not always ease the most suffering or create the most good. 

The new year is always a good time to start fresh, but in our Buddhist practices, every moment is like a new year, every moment an opportunity to start anew.  We can practice seeing ourselves and the world from a fresh perspective.  We can practice not limiting ourselves to our past experiences.  We have each moment like a precious gift to begin again. 

In Buddhism, this is much like the idea of grace in Christianity.  No matter what you did up until this exact moment in your life, you get a new chance to begin again.  You may still have to live with the consequences of your past actions, but you can begin anew and create a different future for yourself.  The future is being created in the exact moment.  What shall your future be?

So, I encourage you to try this wacky idea of not being so consistent, of no longer consistently running away from problems that scare you, from no longer playing small, in a limited space created by your past experiences.  Play life in this new way, with courage and wonder, with curiosity and playfulness, with less fear of failure and more love for the joy of just trying.