The practice of 'no-esteem'
nakazcid
Somewhere in Dixie, y'all Veteran
I know the thread title sounds odd, so let me explain. In my readings (and unfortunately I don't have a sutra quote at the ready) it was mentioned that the Buddha admonished his followers to not compare themselves to others. You shouldn't say to yourself, oh I'm so much better than so and so at making doilies, or negatively either, as in so-and-so is so much smarter than I am. The reference I seem to remember also said one shouldn't even make, um, equal comparisons like: "I'm just as good as Bob at running a company." That's why I'm calling this sort of attitude/practice "no-esteem."
As someone with rather low self-esteem, this is really, really hard for me. I find myself pretty regularly comparing myself negatively to others. As a sort of antidote I guess, I also sometimes try to compare myself positively to others (I believe this is the usual Western prescription for self-criticism.)
I think somewhere else it is mentioned that this is self-serving in some manner, though the exact quote and meaning isn't coming to mind. While there may be some truth to this, I think it can also become an ingrained habit of mind.
Any tips or practices for making this approach easier?
Comments
If it was me…….I would have had the sutra quote on ready.
I kinda like the title. There’s a lot there to meditate on. My approach is really a few mantras I have taped up….like “I’m not going to compare myself today to anyone. I’m just trying to be/do better than myself from yesterday”. On the other hand, I try to equalize as oppose to compare…like “that person appears to be better than me at this, that, or the other…but they’ve gone thru things just like me and life can suck for them too bec of the human experience. Everyone puts on pants one leg at a time, and most importantly death meets us all, no matter how you might “compare” to me.
Disclosure: this wise approach works only about 2 days out of the week, haha…I’ll keep trying…
There are better tips out there but I have a practice of seeing others as collaborators working on the same project. It helps me to re-frame a negative view into something more beneficial and refreshes myself with a sense of togetherness and desire to help rather than separate from and desire to compete.
Figuring out why/if it matters to hold views like negative comparisons can also be beneficial. Or even reflecting deeply on how those negative comparisons impact you. Reflecting on some of my negative views helps me see how they lead to more problems rather than less problems which makes it easier to notice/reduce/stop.
I don't have any sutta reference but I might point toward Right View and Right Livelihood if you enjoy digging. Though I still don't understand Right Livelihood in this context.
I believe the Buddhist term is conceit. And unlike the western notion it does also concern itself with comparisons of equivalence.
My sort of thought on this as I was reading was pretty much identical to @Vastmind. Shift the focus of comparison to your past self. We're all dealt a certain hand in life and all we can really do is keep trying to do better today than we did yesterday. Someone else will always be better than you at some things and you'll always be better than someone else.
Something that just came to me is the shift is a sort of psychological shift from an externally focused social mindset to an inward focused spiritual one.
You cannot practice non-comparison. So long as you identify yourself as a person or Mr Xyz the comparison is automatic.
Once this identification stops, the comparison also stops for there is nothing to compare with anymore. It is not a practice but a realization that you are not a human being.
However, there are things that you can still practice to come to that realization. To realise your true nature.
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.002.than.html
When we are better at no esteem BUT in a detrimental or impeded way … we don't do it. We make better whatever we are better at. And if kind of kind, then we express that as best we can.
In other words now is not the right time for doing this as a 'practice'. Too hard.
This is spiritual friendship/equality. Everyone has something to offer, even the hell dwellers and the lower (so culled) can bring us higher.
In this sense we are a mess-age or message of our being. All beings welcome. Even those we kill, impede, stir up or ideally allow to unfold …
We are not nihilists or Annihilists not even for a spell …
https://studybuddhism.com/en/advanced-studies/science-of-mind#emotional-hygiene
For me, the key point was to realise that you are unique, an essential part of the tapestry of life, neither greater nor lesser nor even equal to others. This came to me when I was quite young, I think about fifteen, and I’ve lived without comparison since.
I learnt this lesson when I started running. When you are running, such as around a track, you very frequently either get overtaken by someone faster or overtake someone slower. And at first I would either feel elated or sad each time. 'Look at me go''. 'Woe is me'. But then I 'caught' these ideas and saw that I should compare myself only with myself yesterday. The race is only against myself. These days whenever I overtake someone or get overtaken by someone, I quietly root for them, I compare myself with myself yesterday, but see that we are all running our races together.
Comparison can be a force for good… how the pursuit of excellence and a competitive spirit led a man to become a monk, and lead his 500 followers to do likewise, see the Gavesin Sutra:
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an05/an05.180.than.html
Each Buddhist lineage or school can be delineated by how they each address this question.
This is just as much an issue for beginners as it is for senior practitioners.
For me, self-esteem is neither good nor bad but is just a mind's habituated attempt at establishing dominance over any the other incoming data of all that we see, hear, smell, taste and feel.
This dominance requires some or all of these sense gate data streams to either be actively excluded or enhanced at any moment to allow the space for our mind's fiefdom to establish itself.
Suffering results to the degree that we allow this dominance to occur. A path towards a cessation of this suffering occurs when a more equaling balancing of the data flows of all the sense gates is fostered so that our mind's own habituated empire building has little choice other than to become a more collegial expression of a wider equanimity.
One sutra of this can be the meditative understanding of the 4NT & the 8FP.
Here, self-esteem can simply be worked with as a warning signpost in our practice that some imbalance in our sense gate data flows is now being detected and where to look to address it.
This makes sense to me too. You don't have to be the best or the worst to be a valuable and contributing member of society.
I've been thinking about some of the suggestions and practices here, but I'm not sure they address another angle of the problem: the so-called inner critic. Suppose you make a mistake, and the voice in your head screams at you "You f**king idiot, how could you do something so utterly clueless and stupid!! You're a complete waste of space!"
This doesn't seem to be a problem of comparing oneself to others, but something else entirely - at least on the face of it. Any tips for countering that tendency?
My internal critic is very keen on saying things like "Ah man...You ruined such n such!" and then I get all mopey reflecting on the thought and feeling. Three things that help me and compliment each other...
First is I just stop the inner dialogue. Like @how mentions, send resources from the mind thinky-feely sense to the other five senses. Just like it's hard to daydream while driving a car well on a busy street, I stop the mind from doing its thinky-feely thing and give that attention to the eyes and others. I look through my eyes more intently, I hear with my ears more acutely, smell through the nose more particularly... For me this quiets my mind in a sort of selective-attention kind of way. I select to give attention to my five senses and revoke it from the mind sense. The longer I can do this, the nicer things seem all around and it can be quite relaxing.
When I include and keep my breath in my sphere of attention while I do this, I can usually do it better and for longer. However I get lazy and distracted and eventually lose the breath from my attention, lose the selective-attention keeping my mind in check, and again start thinking "Ah man...You ruined such n such!" So it has become a reoccurring practice for me. Negative thoughts and feelings arise, I become fixated on them, I notice I'm fixated on them, I do something about it by giving attention elsewhere and letting go of the fixation, and they sort of dissolve for a little while til I forget and get lazy.
Second is I try to examine the connection around what I'm thinking/feeling and how it came to be. This helps resolve those sticky places my mind goes to from my past. To me this looks like a lot of self-reflective questions until things make more sense. Understanding dependent arising can help with this but I'm not doing it very well at the moment so I won't muck it up trying to explain it.
This was particularly helpful for learning about dependent arising.
How to See Yourself as You Really Are - H.H.D.L.
Third is I try to live virtuously and blamelessly so to prevent creating any new situations to berate myself over. This requires quite a bit of effort monitoring my thoughts/feelings/intentions/actions/etc.
It all seems to go a lot better when I'm practicing good compassion and have an abundance of gratitude and interconnectedness. It seems nature is a great way of tapping into compassion..which is seriously some advice I need to start taking for myself.
Anyway, that's what I try to do.
Exactly what use is an inner dialogue? One can very well do without inner critics to cheer you on, but then you have to “pull the wagon” towards virtue yourself.
LOL
You and me both (and perhaps others?)
However nobuddy is perfect. Even the inner prefect/anger demons/Budding Imaginary Bodhi. [Truth warning: Nothing Is] We are just tantrum baby buddhas needing a BIB …
As I don't have a Zen master or mistress on standby, a good self slap on the face is very good. Yes really. Anger against other or self is a manifestation of fear …
and so:
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https://vividness.live/wrathful-practice
Self compassion practice is aimed at this sort of internal dialogue. The "critic" is intended to help motivate us into improving but often it serves to demoralize. My understanding of self compassion is that rather than demotivating us by thinking we're already fine, the basis of motivation shifts to doing good for oneself because one wants good things for yourself rather than wanting to avoid bad things. This is a longer term practice.
In the shorter term, a quite effective short hand thought to keep in mind is to imagine your self talk as if you were talking to a loved one. Like if you went around talking to other people like you talk to yourself people would consider you a monster. That simple shift can often be a good practice by itself.
this is the way forward …
Dharma backed up by science …
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