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Learning to shut up
NomaDBuddha
Scalpel wielder :) Bucharest Veteran
Once again, a buddhist disciple needs help.
This is what happened : some girl wanted my permanent marker to doodle on some desk. I needed that thing first, to redraw my tag that had been erased from my desk. I remade it in the five minue break, I admired it , I put that marker in my pocket, and wihout a warning, that girl started to get angry, and destroyed my newly remade tag. For some reason I stated to say bad things at her ( what I said in Romanian has no sense in English, so I won't try to translate it), and at the end I asked her for what reason had ruined my tag.
Those bad things weren't that bad. Small insults with little to no moral harm , which made her swear at me.She used some really harsh words back there.
So what should I do. How should I avoid these things. I myself don't like to say these things, but the situations I go through everyday require my bad side to step in with verbal slur.
This is what happened : some girl wanted my permanent marker to doodle on some desk. I needed that thing first, to redraw my tag that had been erased from my desk. I remade it in the five minue break, I admired it , I put that marker in my pocket, and wihout a warning, that girl started to get angry, and destroyed my newly remade tag. For some reason I stated to say bad things at her ( what I said in Romanian has no sense in English, so I won't try to translate it), and at the end I asked her for what reason had ruined my tag.
Those bad things weren't that bad. Small insults with little to no moral harm , which made her swear at me.She used some really harsh words back there.
So what should I do. How should I avoid these things. I myself don't like to say these things, but the situations I go through everyday require my bad side to step in with verbal slur.
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Comments
The part is, that before I started throwing that slur , I thought for a moment, but , the slur came mostly from instinct. Now, I don't know what should I do...
Whatever you do, don't beat yourself up about it. All that stuff is the past and as such, it's only a memory.
I know that! ...Thanks for reminding me !:D
But don't expect the bumps in the road to go away.
Yeah, the wounds heal, the scars remain.
As opposed to the poor kid who's "asleep" and doesn't even realize his words are hurtful. It may take him many lifetimes to wake up to that fact, or maybe (like you) he'll be lucky enough to do it in this lifetime.
Therefore you are already on the road to enlightenment, my friend! Indeed, just by trying to practice Right Speech, you are behaving in an enlightened way.
Your next step is to try and catch yourself a little earlier every time. Instead of saying a hurtful thing and then realizing your error five minutes later, realize it three minutes later; or one minute if you can. Work your way up to realizing you're doing it as it's happening.
When you reach the point where you catch yourself right before it happens, and stop yourself just in the nick of time, you will accomplished a great work. That's your first major success, because you've stopped short of hurting another being.
In other words, you're training yourself. You're practicing. Each time, you're getting a little better, a little closer to being a Buddha. It's actually a very exciting process, because the closer you get to enlightenment, the stronger you become: and you will start to see yourself getting better and better in other areas of life, too.
You are doing a great job! Keep on being mindful my friend.
I guess the daily life coma I live in is starting to disappear bit by bit ! I'll keep practicing...But still, I need a good teacher (a Zen one please!)
Seek out Fa Ming Shakya, of the Zen Buddhist Order of Hsu Yun, who dwells in Bucharest near you.
If he cannot teach you himself, perhaps he can point you to someone who can.
dasmara@gmail.com
Best of luck to you!
How could I find him ?? That's ...that's something I should laugh about...
Scars are great!
You create your own reality.
Add some deluded fellow country-men who think in the so called "Attack against Christianity"(those Conspiracy Theories+New Age stuff), and you'll get the poorly promoted Buddhism. No wonder I couldn't find it.
Still laugh about it.
Buddhism is just a sign post, nothing more.
Maybe...but I don't laugh because..you know...it's the people's mentality here...it's like middle ages. To shut up the things that can be really good, and to voluntarely keep others in darkness...Well, sorry for the offtopic.
No worries, I recently discovered how attached I'd become to "Buddhism" and how much stress that caused. But that's was just because I thought it needed defending. Buddhism doesn't need defending. It'll be fine if you let people talk shit about it.
Learn as best as you can so you can explain it as best as you can to thoughs who ask though.
Noma,
Listen to them. They're giving you really good advice.
Isn't it wonderful that you can discuss these things with fellow Buddhists? What a precious resource this site is.
Oh, I know ... it just seems to come up out of nowhere, doesn't it? It takes a long time to change this habit into a habit of attentiveness, where you can look at this girl and see that she is hurting and that is why she is behaving this way. She responds out of habit, getting angry ... and we do, too, reacting with anger.
So we change these habits by doing our morning chants, visualizations, readings, and meditation ... all before we head out the door. Then throughout the day we repeatedly remind ourselves of our Buddhist intentions. Little by little, these actions change our habits. One day we are surprised when someone gets angry at us and we see their pain and don't get angry back. The day after that, we may get angry again. But little by little, we start reacting differently in life.
Be patient. Practice compassion for others, but also compassion for yourself too.
I still have a lot to uncover.
Yes it is really wonderful. I'm glad I have someone to discuss to.
Oops..sorry for the mistake. Actually it was my desk.
The excuse that they are already covered in grafitti is also inadequate. It is vandalism and saying that it was already vandalised doesn't change your action. If I found a wallet that had been stolen I would still not have the right to keep it!
Right action involves respect for our surroundings and for others' belongings.
Hold up a sec ! Let's forget about the vandalism thing.(still, after I made that tag, my desk looks more beautiful than ever...no kidding here)
The point is, that my speech was wrong and inadequate(I realised the thing) but not in a very harmful manner. And, instead, her speech, was more harmful than mine (get what I'm saying?).
It had a lot to do with my past struggles as a child with him and possibly also jealousy that he had a 'better' life than me. A lot of confusing content.
I got really angry but then I saw that there was more options to the situation than what I was really itching to do which was to throw a fit. I just dropped the anger like BAM. I just opened to a new possibility of reponding.
The point isn't that I let my brother have his way. [Edit which was actually a little painful and humiliating] The point is that I got outside of my comfort zone a little bit. Which in this case I happened to feel a relief that I did't 'have to' get angry.
I bet if I were buddha I could have thought of an even better possibility than dropping the anger and I would have known exactly what my brother and I needed from that instance of our relationship.
But what I did do felt a lot better than throwing a fit.
Does that make any sense? Imagine if when she destroyed your sign you had just said 'oh you don't like my sign?' or whatever.... Not to second guess you because sometimes to be compassionate to the pressures in ourself we blow up a bit and swear. A lot better than hitting.
I should add that my brother isn't a big bullying throwing my laundry all around. He had a time constraint and I was just 'set' in the idea that I had to do my laundry. In part because I was afraid if I didn't do it promptly 'I' or it would be blameworthy.
Well, about that , it wasn't her desk either, so she also had no right to do that...But she did and the war sparked .