You cannot be rid of problems without abandoning illusions. — Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
We’ve been talking for a month now about how capitalism gives us the feeling of never being enough. In FF1, we talked about lagom, the delight of having just enough, and not more. Remember: the desire for more is the addiction of capitalism and the antidote is voluntary simplicity. What if we extended the concept of lagom to ourselves on a personal level?
The mind tends to say that you’ll be allowed to have bliss once you get everything—once you’re finally fit, financially secure, romantically adored, etc. etc… The mind tends to say that you’ll be acceptable if you finally do that thing, accomplish that goal and crucially, if you do not, you are not. Or at least I’ve found that true for me. True for you?
Realize that capitalism tells you the same thing! The mind and capitalism are working in cahoots with each other.
What if we chose to voluntarily simplify ourselves too?
This week’s walk and talk will be focused on this song. Read it ahead of time and savor it. It’s beautiful! When you get together, tell your partner about the one stanza that resonated with you most. Pick out a few individual words that really popped out for you. What did you get out of this song?
Free and Easy by Ven. Lama Gendun Rinpoche
Douglas’s thoughts:
Remember this course is about non-self-improvement! Does “doing the work” of self-improvement when we examine the idea of “self?”
Are you a self-improvement “junkie?” But what if “self improvement” itself creates an addictive sense of never being enough? Richard Rohr says: “Over time, the addict is forced to “up the ante” when the fix does not work. You need more and more of anything that does not work. If something is really working for you, then less and less will satisfy you.” Do you keep wanting more self-improvement?
Contrast the idea of “doing the work” to the Taoist saying: “when spring comes, the grass grows by itself.” The Chinese use the idea of self-cultivation, a gardening metaphor for human development. You can’t pull plants into growing faster. You can’t make a child mature faster; it happens on its own time, organically and naturally, That’s the concept of wu-wei, the central idea in all of Chinese philosophy.
Speaking of self-cultivation, “Every blade of grass has its Angel that bends over it and whispers, “Grow, grow.” - The Talmud. The angels are watching and whispering, but letting the growth happen to you. You don’t have to do anything!
We have a subconscious idea that if things are not perfect, something is wrong. Think about where you have found wrongness in yourself and in society, because it is not perfect.“Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane.” —Anne Lamott. Really take that in. Where has life treated you so well yet you’ve found yourself so dissatisfied? How much of it is you wanting it faster than it will happen?
We talked about lagom in FF1 in terms of consumption. but what about lagom in your emotional life? what if you did have sufficiency in love and belonging and connection? And all you had to do was recognize it, instead of needing more?
We’ll really hit this in the last lesson, so I’ll whisper it now: the turn is inward. If you are waiting for capitalism to be overthrown or for the world to be just (or “just so”) in order to feel emotionally satisfied, well, you see the problem. Put it another way, when was the world ever perfected? Was there a time in history where people did not have to work hard or experience suffering? We all have subconscious ideas of some by-gone era when “everything was perfect.” (conservativism) And we all have some imagined future, if we do the right things, everything will be perfect. (progressivism, utopianism, or “no place” in Latin). Both are simply manifestations of the same impulse: the inability to accept and love the world as it currently is. And ourselves too. The turn is inward. The only place emotional sufficiency and well-being happens is inside. The only time it happens is now.
Read what Black Buddhist nun the Reverend angel Kyodo Williams says about true liberation:
It’s all important to be free independent of political or economic equality. To be liberated not defined by causes and conditions. It’s more essential to do that that I can say. If we wait for the land back or the power back, we will never be free. Instead of the hand that binds, go to the place that the hand has never known. It’s a spiritual power, that communicates into the material world.
I am freer then the causes and conditions that contain me. It’s one thing to say and another thing to know it to be true. If we are only real and true based on the causes and conditions, we can not be free.
The way I translate it, angel Kyodo Williams is saying there is a difference between recognizing the emotional consequences of capitalism and being a victim of it. Despite of whatever capitalism does to us, and maybe radically, because of what capitalism does us, we still have the responsibility to claim our own well-being. Before capitalism, during capitalism or after it, your sense of peace, delight, and joy cannot come from anywhere but within. Always. What an opportunity!
DEEPER STUFF: Within your desire and its fulfillment is a seed of suffering. Achieve your desire, and what then? What if your deepest longing has been actually fulfilled already? Has always been fulfilled, within you? And all you had to do re-cognize (“to see again”) the elephant already resting quietly at home in front of your own hearth.?
“The revolution in society must begin with the inner, psychological transformation [and healing] of the individual.” - Krishnamurti
We typically think of voluntary simplicity on a material level. What would voluntary simplicity look like on an emotional-spiritual level? What is a sense of enoughness in your heart?
Looking forward to your reflections.