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I still dont understand how to "accept what is"
banned_crab
Veteran
How am I supposed to accept the nagging feeling of negativity? How am I supposed to feel when accepting it? When I try to feel good during depressing times, I only end up returning to it. I can tell myself that 'it will pass' but waiting for it to pass is very painful. Wouldnt that be against the present moment? to only wait for something to pass?
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Thanissaro Bhikku often reminds people that there is no word for "acceptance" in Pali. However, I think the concept of acceptance is consistent with the Buddha's teaching, and is a logical extension of many of the principles he taught. The English word "acceptance" can be misleading, though, because it often has connotations of resignation or passivity or giving up, when this is not what is meant.
In terms of acceptance in Buddhism, the main point simply to avoid adding any unnecessary suffering to the unavoidable pain of life. There is the famous simile of the two arrows: the first arrow is the pain that we cannot avoid in life; the second arrow is the one with which we shoot ourselves through the way in which we react to that pain. We can avoid much of our suffering if we stop shooting ourselves with that second arrow. For example, say you are experiencing anger. You can actually make the anger ever worse by getting angry about being angry! Or getting ashamed that you are experiencing anger, when you're supposed to be a good, peaceful Buddhist. And then, you can get depressed about being ashamed of having gotten angry.
Layers upon layers of secondary, tertiary, quaternary, etc. emotional reactions can arise if we aren't mindful and stop adding more negativity to what's already an unpleasant state of mind. Instead of adding any more unnecessary reactivity to the anger/depression/anxiety/etc., you simply accept that, right now, you are experiencing this emotion, just as you would accept happiness or joy. in the end, both pleasant and unpleasant emotions are just emotions.
Short of inflicting brain damage on ourselves, there is no cure for emotions. Emotions are not problems to be solved, but simply programmed responses to events. Oftentimes, so-called "negative" emotions actually have some evolutionary benefit. Evolutionary psychologists, for example, regard depression as a possibly coping mechanism for conserving energy in adverse circumstances. Anxiety and fear alerted our ancestors to potential danger. You will experience anger, anxiety, depression, grief, etc. many times in your life. Regarding that as a problem is making an enemy of your mind-body, and that will cause you great suffering. Seeing emotions as simply emotions (combinations of thoughts/mind-images/memories and physical sensations in the body), rather than as something intolerable and _un_acceptable, will help prevent you from shooting yourself with that second arrow.
@heyimacrab "Waiting" is something altogether different from simply being present in-the-moment. What you want to be able to do is experience with clarity... so when you are experiencing a pleasant sensation, you recognize that it's not a lasting source of happiness and don't attach to it. There doesn't have to be any waiting; just remaining mindful.
There isn't really anyone who can tell you how you are supposed to feel. There is no right answer.
The idea of "this too shall pass" isn't so much waiting around for it to happen but just an acknowledgement that all states are impermanent. It doesn't mean to anticipate it passing or forcing it to pass, but just understanding that it truly won't last, because nothing does.
We've kind of been lead to believe that negative feelings should be done away with in favor of positive feelings. That isn't really the case. The positive ones aren't more valid or "better" than the negative ones. Each is just what they are.
Sometimes, if you just sit and let yourself feel, and then name the feelings as they arise, it helps them feel less strong, less important. Emotions tend to be a bit of a struggle, a tug of war between what you wish you were feeling and what you are feeling. We might realize we are feeling sad, or irritated, or angry, but we rarely fully acknowledge it, we try to push it away and fill the space with something else. But you aren't really making space when you push them away. It's like digging a hole, if you just push the dirt to the side of the hole, it just caves in again. Accepting what we are feeling is a process of being gentle with ourselves. We work to understand why someone else is angry, or upset, or frustrated or sad, but we too often don't give ourselves the same caring and understanding.
For me, there was a bit of disbelief and sadness when I first started practicing. Not because I was figuring out that things weren't what I thought, but because I was angry that I wasted so much time of my life believing things that weren't what they really were. I was very glad to find the dharma and be able to change things in my life, but at the same time upset that it hadn't taken hold 10 years before when I had first discovered it. I think a lot of people, for various reasons, go through a lot of negative emotion as they start figuring things out. It's normal, but it's not pleasant for sure. But I can't say enough about how much having a teacher and real dharma friends, makes a difference. They can't hold you up while you go through it all, but they've been there, too, and just knowing that, helps. A teacher can help get you through it.
Jeesh, will you just ease up on yourself, for goodness' sake?
You are always on a downer, and always on your own back!
Just relax!
Everything - everything - that comes your way, watch it, observe it, as if you were watching a movie, and think@ "Yup. it is what it is. This too shall pass."
It doesn't matter whether you see it as 'good', 'bad', 'neutral', happy', 'sad', 'negative', 'positive'...it's all the same crud: Temporary, impermanent, part of life's rich tapestry and something you can just walk through.
You're trying too hard. Ease back, take it easy, and just let things ride.
it's really not that difficult.
You just keep making it difficult, or more complicated than it really is....
I think you are speaking of aggravation with a bit of depression mixed in. How to deal with it...I think that overall you realize that it's a waste of time to feel that way, and it may or may not be, but what is to stop you from finding something else to do and keep occupied?
Watch a movie, read a book, or meditate. It goes away regardless. As others have mentioned.
You accept that you are having a negative feeling. You don't accept the negativity itself. You acknowledge the feeling, and let it go.
Whatever way you hapen to be feeling. Acknowledge it and let it go.
That's probably because your trying.
It's hard for anyone in this envioronment to really know what you're doing, but it seems like you're not really letting go. You're clinging in the hope that whatever it is will somehow escape.
If this is a particularly burdensome problem, perhaps you should seek face-to-face counselling and/or instruction?
Being a twenty year old man is tough sometimes. I remember lots of fun with an equal measure of misery. I eventually noticed a cyclical nature to it all. It comes down to taking the good with the bad. Things should start to even out as time passes. If they don't you might want to see a doctor.
Evolution by natural selection has produced us with a complex brain that loves it when we feel good and dislikes it when we feel bad.
Mother nature wouldn't have favoured a species which just lazed around all day, didn't want to have sex or eat food. If this was the case, we'd have died out a long long time ago. In the words of George Carlin, Mother Nature doesn't give a shit about our happiness, all she's bothered about is Her grandkids.
So we have these drives; attachment and aversion, coupled with ignorance (called the three poisons - yet almost paradoxically, they're favoured by natural selection) and to be happy in the Buddhist sense means we have to go against nature.
That's not simple or easy I think. Or maybe it is simple, but it's definitely not easy?
I do agree that heyimacrab seems to be hard on himself. I think that feeling negative is a very human thing to feel (just ask yourself what being really happy all the time would look like? Crazy probably!). But some of us can still find peace in pretty much any emotions that we're experiencing, however, others can't.
I know with alcoholics that many can't just sit with negative mental afflictions; they've got to drink; our feelings/emotions grind us down to the point where we don't have any other options but the booze. But the skill seems to be not in never experiencing negative mental stuff (which I think would be close to impossible), but in how we relate to those feelings/emotions and how we manage them.
Indeed.
Face to face instruction is always best if possible..it can motivate, and clear up problems, like nothing else.
You don't have to accept anything.
Nor do you have to deny anything.
In any case you have a problem and you want a solution.
With that orientation there cannot be any acceptance because you hold a vision of freedom and the problem. So there is a journey you set up from X (problem) to Y (freedom).
Since you set this whole thing up for yourself then you must figure out how to get to X to Y and that is the path.
The problem with this is that it takes forever. And also starting to say end anxiety only leads to more anxiety. Anxiety as the beginning, middle and end.
So the teaching of accept what is arise out of this basic knowledge. Usually they are taught as nice little phrases to help people swallow deep spiritual concepts.
Then most people aggressively enact accepting what is. I will accept what is as my life falls apart. Accepting what is.
It's essentially just learning to bear with the situation. It's brave and honorable.
But it doesn't work.
What works is investigating why you have the anxiety or problem. We're so focused on just trying to get rid of it without actually trying to look for the specific causes of it. Very much like if people have cancer they just try and get rid of it without seeing the other causes and conditions involved. Like diet, lack of exercise, stress, habits of daily life, etc.
You have to sit with the natural intelligence of your body and mind telling you that something is up. And sometimes thats enough to get the juices flowing. Just to be seen is enough. And that is what acceptance is about. But at other times the issue is much deeper and desires to be seen in a deep way. You can't just accept it away. You have to tease you what and why its happening as you sit with it.
Don't distract yourself. Don't offload your feelings by repression or acting them out.
There is a nice middle way of vulnerability and kindness that you can learn and practice throughout your suffering.
And then teach yourself to be kind to yourself and to make relationships with these aspects that desire to be known.
Honor and respect the pain. They have gifts for you. Just be patient enough to receive them. And never will they align with your expectations.
thanks
I like the frank simplicity of these questions of yours lately @heyiamacrab, I wonder about things like this too. I'm almost 50, and all I wanted to do at age 20 was figure out a way to NOT feel the negative stuff. Not much has changed in the last 30 years except thanks to the Buddha's prescription.
My unpacking of 'what to do' while being inundated or inhabited by very negative emotions is to 'welcome' them. If I had to point to a place in the Pali Canon where this comes from I couldn't, I suspect it is a syncretic idea with modern psychology/psychodynamics and Buddhism. I listen a lot to teachers from the Insight Meditation Society-type sanghas . They are very very Western and derived from Theravada. I also get a ton from Thanissaro Bikkhu and Bikkhu Bodhi, talks and translations.
All that said, I get the impression the best way to RELATE to negative vedana (feelings or sensations) is to WELCOME them.
The Buddha was known to tell stories of WELCOMING Mara to tea, treating him as an important guest. Apparently, this drove Mara crazy and he left asap because his intention was to unhinge the Buddha (and you and me), NOT to sip tea and cuddle with us.
It works, for me. At first it's pretty ugly, aversion aplenty. It does take practice to REMEMBER to welcome and embrace negative vedana.
Not everyone has an issue with this. This might seem silly to those who don't get inundated by negative emotional states. But for those of us who do, for whatever reason, it makes a ton of sense.
What happens is, in the welcoming/embracing, the negative vedana just sits there and passes on. You don't clutch at it or recoil in aversion from it.
Negative emotion and feeling arise and pass on, and you can watch this happen with some practice. Then, there you are, having made no big deal out of it. It really was no big deal after all. The sun still rises and sets.
The hardest part of being 20 years old (or being young at all) is the relentless march of time, the sheer repetitive nature of things hasn't impacted you to the point that clearly, there is very little 'new' under the sun. The same shit happens over and over again, in slightly different disguise. This is not depressing, this is a key to freedom and the kind of happiness the Buddha promises.
Welcoming them is a better description than accepting them. thanks. Because accepting them implies that you do not overcome them but you allow the suffering to linger. Welcoming, its so much different I can already feel the change in state of mind thanks.
Yeah. My sort of tea party. Will there be cup cakes? Prostrations?
Get mara doing prostrations . . . another way to keep the mind off the fairy cakes . . .
http://www.providencezen.org/why-we-bow-108-prostrations
:wave:
@taiyaki the bold is easier for some of us than others. For example I am on meds that affect my bodies energies. People suffering from grief and depression also have to be unbelievably tolerant of feeling horrible. And chemo patients and those with severe pain.
From what I can gather if there are no attachments to thoughts, emotions, objects or people, then naturally you will be able to accept how things are.
Exactly so.
There’s a well known joke about a tourist in Ireland who asks one of the locals for directions to Dublin. The Irishman replies: ‘Well sir, if I were you, I wouldn’t start from here’.
However that is usually exactly were we have to start. It is why we often have to sort out as much as possible, make positive if you will, our attitude to our position. We cannot run from part of it. Then what?
The path, we are always starting from here . . .
:wave:
Also try death meditation.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/painhelp.html
Hi again, @heyimacrab!
By not "learning to accept," you are depriving yourself of the single most important weapon that you'll ever have to wade your way through a life of affliction. Life is not what you want it to be. No matter how much "law of attraction" mantras you put into it, things will not always go your way and you won't be able to control other people's reactions.
When the Buddha promised us that he only taught of "Suffering and the end of suffering," he did not mean by it that we have to escape suffering, that we have to repress it or go into denial. He said "Affliction is there and you have to learn to cope with it." That won't change. The First Noble Truth is about what you cannot change.
But then again, how empowering for us to discover in the Third and Fourth Noble Truths what it is that depends of us. We discover a self-help method that puts us in charge, in control of our reactions, our perceptions, our point of view on life despite the afflictions.
I've said that before in other posts, I'm sure, because that's the mantra I live by: the affliction of life when it does not go your way, you won't be able to change, but how you choose to stand up to fate and remain unscathed, THAT depends on you.
The Buddha tried every method available to escape suffering, only to find that they did not work. When he sat down quietly under the bodhi tree on the night before his Enlightenment, facing all his demons, learning to accept things as they were, only then did he become enlightened.
I know that other people's tragedies seem petty compared to our own problems when we're immersed in them, but I'll put it bluntly to you. Almost two years ago I lost a child. Believe me, that's the biggest blow life can deal you. And yet, you won't find me whining away in the corners, railing at the injustice of it all. Every day I find an excuse to keep me going, my other son and my husband being the most important ones, of course.
I said it to you before: avoid navel-gazing. Don't live so much in your head. LIVE, go out into the world and get immersed in it. Don't think but do. Put all the theory to work. The theory of Buddhism is totally useless without the practice. Look around you and see who you could help. Watch a funny movie. Call someone you love and tell them you love them. Read a good Sherlock book. Be of use, be of service! Stop rationalizing everything. Stop labelling everything. Who cares how you say "rain" in Pali?: go into the rain and get soaked!
@dharmamom: sorry to hear about your loss.
metta to you, your family and all sentient beings.
Studying Buddhism has been an exercise is discovering that some words have a lot more meanings than I originally thought. "Acceptance" is one of those words.
I can sort of see how the word 'acceptance' does NOT mean liking something at all. I live in the Pacific NW and altho born and raised here, I don't enjoy rain and clouds all the time. I accept it, though. In this way, acceptance is 'I can't change the weather'.
Feelings come and go beyond our control, a lot like weather. Or maybe exactly like weather. The problem is experiencing a feeling and THEN going "Oh, I'm angry because xxxxx" instead of the more truthful "Oh dear, there goes some anger."
It gets a bit into the 'not self' issue. Anger, extreme joy (the conditional sort), irritation, etc, are part of the mind but are not the self. It's about realizing a different relationship with bits of the mind as they go by. It is more truthful to realize the anger or joy going by is a lot more like the weather here in WA state than something that belongs to ME or is caused by ME (or some situation impacting me). Mind generated mind stuff.
Anyway, if I squint and hold my mouth just right, the word 'acceptance' kind of does fit in with a proper relationship to mind states, whether they are enjoyable or not. But I too like the word "welcome" much better. When certain unpleasant family members show up, I 'welcome' them in, fully aware of my ick-factor and in the process, welcoming that too. This is a work in progress lol. Aversion keeps me as honest as craving.
...You have to sit with the natural intelligence of your body and mind telling you that something is up. And sometimes thats enough to get the juices flowing. Just to be seen is enough. And that is what acceptance is about. But at other times the issue is much deeper and desires to be seen in a deep way. You can't just accept it away. You have to tease you what and why its happening as you sit with it.
This is beautifully expressed. Thanks Taiyaki :-)