A mind like Hurricane Gustav
“Confronting the self can be like walking into a raging storm” -Ajahn Chah
Often we are doing this Buddhist practice in search of peace, in search of ease for our lives. However when we really being going against our tendencies we find much unpleasantness arises. Anger, frustration, and stress are just some of the effects that arise when we try and break out of our old ways. Its like when you tell a child he cant go to the ice cream shop and he throws a temper tantrum. Although we are older then this child in reality, on the emotional level we are still very much still like infants.
The Buddha tells us a story of a calf who broke free from a farm and wandered into town. The calf saw many sights and tasted many tastes while away. Finally, the farmers caught up to the calf and brought him home. Upon arrival at the farm he refused to drink his mothers milk and would keep trying to run off when put to pasture. So the farmers tied the calf to a stake. The calf would pull and whine and refuse to eat and try all kinds of things to get loose from his bindings. Eventually as time wore on the calf wore down. He came to his senses and again would drink his mothers milk and be content to be a calf on a farm.
We, very much like the calf, will try our best to be freed from our practice. When I was still a layman living in America, I once told my Master that I wanted to go to a party because I liked the sense of adventure. He said to try staying home, that would be the real adventure. Why is that the real adventure? Because when we don’t satisfy ourselves for even a moment then something in us rebels. We feel tension and strain and feel all kinds of things. When we sit and have leg pain, sometimes we don’t move the leg and try to just experience the pain. Sometimes we even feel like we’re dying from this kind of discipline. But its not real.
To break through this stubborn part of ourselves we need to be all fired up to practice and really be resolute in our goals. Almost like before we go to the gym to exercise, It helps to be ready some discomfort but knowing that there are beneficial results. Then, like an amtrak train, we can speed along through all to our obstacles to the destination ahead.
by Hue Chuyen
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