The truth of the present moment can be painful. When we examine what’s here right now, as Buddhism asks us to do, it’s easy to find a mountain of problems. When we do find that needle of good in what feels like a haystack of horror, something swiftly comes along and takes it away. We wake up with a hopeful intention for the day ahead, grateful that the sun is shining, but when we turn on the morning news, things quickly change. Our heart aches, our stomach tightens, and our thoughts race as stories of suffering flash across the screen. Having seen the reality of the world, we are suddenly hopeless.
And yes, there are many Buddhist teachings that tell us not to hope. The lojong teachings instruct us to “abandon all hope of fruition.” When we hope, we are inevitably disappointed. But, if we become apathetic and simply give up, how can we expect anything to change?
As Roshi Joan Halifax writes, we don’t have to give up in the face of suffering. Abandoning hope does not mean being hopeless. We don’t have to be apathetic, paralyzed by fear. We can instead walk through the world with “wise hope.”
“Wise hope,” writes Halifax, “is not seeing things unrealistically but rather seeing things as they are, including the truth of suffering — both its existence and our capacity to transform it.”
The three teachings in this Weekend Reader look at hope and hopelessness. They each show us that we can give up our attachment to specific outcomes and simply make our best effort in each moment to do what feels right. We can be loving, good, and kind for the sake of being loving, good, and kind. We can practice for the sake of practice — not because we think it’s going to get us to a certain place. Step-by-step, and with a little wise hope, we can make change. There’s no need to know or control how it will all turn out. We can simply set the intention that it be for the benefit of all.
—Lilly Greenblatt, digital editor, LionsRoar.com |
No comments:
Post a Comment