Usually we regard loneliness as an enemy. It's restless and pregnant and hot witht the desire to escape and find something or someone to keep us company. When we rest in the middle of it, we begin to have a nonthreatening relationship with loneliness, a cooling loneliness that turns our usual fearful patterns upside down. There are six ways of describing this kind of loneliness:
1. Less desire is willingness to be lonely without resolution when everything in us yearns for something to change our mood.
2. Contentment means that we no longer believe that escaping our loneliness is going to bring happiness or courage or strength.
3. Avoiding unnecessary activities means that we stop looking for something to entertain us or to save us.
4. Complete discipline means that at every oppurtunity, we're willing to come back to the present moment with compassionate attention.
5. Not wandering in the world of desire is about relating directly with how things are, without trying to make them okay.
6. Not seeking security from one's discursive thoughts means no longer seeking the companionship of constant conversation with ourselves.
-Pema Chödrön, Comfortable with uncertainty
This is a great passage, and a great book. Very few authors have the capacity to make so much sense. Every time I read it, I feel like she's talking about something that makes pefect sense, even if I never consciously realized it, and even if I had unconsciously thought the exact opposite. This passage is a case in point. Like other human animals, I have the desire to not be lonely. On the other hand, like other unpleasant emotions, loneliness can be transcended through acceptance. The six things mentioned here are about practicing being comfortable with loneliness. (Loneliness is a poweful emotion. Even now, thinking about it, it is bringing forth some sadness.) All six practices mentioned here strike a chord with me. I fail to practice Number 3 an awful lot. In some sense, our consumer culture is about not practicing number 3. If you feel unhappy, a constant barrage of advertising subtly informs us, then buying a certain product will alleviate that unhappiness. Numbers 4 and 5 are also good ones. I have noticed a tendency of my mind to shrink back from certain uncomfortable areas, many of which are rather banal. Training my mind to not shrink away is a good way to expose these problem areas and get rid of their subconscious influence. Similarly, I have a tendency, when things don't seem exactly the way I want them, to wistfully think about how I can make them right in thr future, thereby ignoring what's happening at the moment. However, only by living completely in the moment can I ever make real decisions, and not let my brain's autopilot make the decisions for me. Finally this issue of discursive thoughts is something I've dealt with quite a bit. When walking to and from school, I very often get caught up in a pointless internal dialogue with myself. I used to set up arguments with straw men about various political issues I felt strongly about. This gave me the oppurtunoty to berate the straw man, and make myself feel better. (Wait, did that make me feel better?) Other times, I would play over an incident in my mind analyzing it from every angle until I could see how it made me look good. Obviously this sort of dialogue is not only pointless but actually harmful. It is a form of not living completely in the moment, a form of self-delusion. Not only am I not seeing reality the way it is, but I am working hard to edit it to my liking. It's hard sometimes for me not to get caught up in this sort of thing, but hopefully my awareness of what's going on will be a powerful tool to reduce its frequency.
I feel like I need to end with a poem:
The screen is before me
The floor is below me
My wife in the kitchen
Walking around
A cardinal on branch
In the backyard
Snow, partially melted,
Lies on the ground
The floor is below me
The screen is before me
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