{"id":9377,"date":"2014-10-18T18:27:09","date_gmt":"2014-10-18T22:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/?p=9377"},"modified":"2014-10-18T18:41:25","modified_gmt":"2014-10-18T22:41:25","slug":"sitting-with-suffering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2014\/10\/sitting-with-suffering.html","title":{"rendered":"sitting with suffering"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"via<\/a>
via google<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“Instead of asking ourselves, \u201cHow can I find security and happiness?\u201d we could ask ourselves, \u201cCan I touch the center of my pain? Can I sit with suffering, both yours and mine, without trying to make it go away? Can I stay present to the ache of loss or disgrace\u2014disappointment in all its many forms\u2014and let it open me?\u201d This is the trick. ~ Pema Chodron<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Pain is so subjective. There’s the ongoing pain of my arthritic hands — which can wake me up. But I don’t obsess over it. It just hurts. Then there’s the pain of loss — I miss my mother, my father, my elders, almost every day. That doesn’t ever completely disappear. And don’t forget pain of the moment: a stubbed toe, a cut finger. Which is as short-term as pain seems to get. The buzzy pain of annoyance, the thrum of to-do lists, the papercuts of everyday disappointments.<\/p>\n

More painful — at least to me \ud83d\ude42 — than any of these is the pain of dukkha<\/em><\/a>, the Buddhist term for suffering. All the other kinds of pain are subsumed in dukkha<\/em>: physical & mental pain\/suffering; trying to hold on to what must always change, and the infinitely difficult ‘unsatisfactoriness,’ where life is just… well, hard sometimes. Not enough, in & of itself. ‘Lacking substance,’ the definition notes.<\/p>\n

\"via<\/a>
via toolbelts.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This is where the Buddhist tool belt comes in handy. The tools are less, well, less physical. But no less effective. Tonglen<\/em><\/a>, metta<\/em>, or maitri<\/em><\/a>, meditation. The ability, as my beloved teacher (even though I have never met her) Pema Chodron says, to ‘sit with suffering.’ Stay present to the pain of loss, grief, disappointment, change.<\/p>\n

That is soooo HARD! Something more active — like metta<\/em>, (lovingkindness), or tonglen <\/em>(compassion for self & others)? I’m better w\/ those. If I can feel like I’m DOING something — breathing in & out through the pain, trying to turn it to good use, offering it up for your pain? Well, that’s proactive. It’s this whole ‘sitting through’ it that’s so very difficult.<\/p>\n

But I know the wise Pema Chodron is correct: suffering opens me. IF I can get past the anger that almost always accompanies it. IF we can come through the haze to the ‘other side’ of the pain.<\/p>\n

\"the<\/a>
the author’s<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Often pain is twinned w\/ anger. And I’m verrry good at anger — a veritable dragon. Appropriate, since I’m year of the dragon. I’m fast to blow fire, and even faster to judge, sadly. So learning to sit w\/ my anger (a kind of pain — that of wanting things to be different, to either change back, or change forward), to just sit through it? Wow. Of course<\/em> that will open me up. I’ll have to just sit there<\/em>. And I’m no good at this, at all.<\/p>\n

That’s my goal these next days: to learn to sit through, breathe through, my pain\/my anger. To ‘just sit there,’ & see what happens on the other side. I know my pain(s) will blow away — just like the clouds in big sky mind. But it seems to take an incredibly l-o-o-o-o-n-g time for pain to dissipate, while joy is as ephemeral as smoke.<\/p>\n

Still, the dragon isn’t only a fire-breather. The dragon is also a being with wings. And surely, if I learn how to control my internal combustion engine, If I learn how to bank that judgmental fire, I can learn to fly. We’ll see.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/address>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Instead of asking ourselves, \u201cHow can I find security and happiness?\u201d we could ask ourselves, \u201cCan I touch the center of my pain? Can I sit with suffering, both yours and mine, without trying to make it go away? Can I stay present to the ache of loss or disgrace\u2014disappointment in all its many forms\u2014and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":398,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[335,113,898],"tags":[11,1181,1187,262,900,1289,1216,899,1225],"class_list":["post-9377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anger","category-metta","category-pain","tag-beginners-heart","tag-britton-gildersleeve","tag-buddhism","tag-buddhist-blogs","tag-dragons","tag-dukkha","tag-metta","tag-suffering","tag-tonglen"],"yoast_head":"\nsitting with suffering - Beginner's Heart<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\""Instead of asking ourselves, \u201cHow can I find security and happiness?\u201d we could ask ourselves, \u201cCan I touch the center of my pain? 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