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Dealing with one's Image change?
Hi everyone. I've been thinking and to be honest despite feeling I somewhere know the answer from a Buddhist perspective would like opinions on this.
Something that's been worrying me is the fact that I don't think my friends understand the change in who I am as a Buddhist. I've always been the comedic one around my friends, but my style of humor was based on picking on a few people in the group I was in, teasing but in a goodhearted sense. However I realized even back then that I felt guilty afterwords for picking out the flaws in people around me and exploiting them, but comforted myself my telling myself "hey, they're all laughing, they know I mean no harm so no big deal". Anyway, I fell into this pattern when I was less mature, and as the years progressed and I got to Jr and Sr year of HS I became depressed because I felt I was paying a part, and that this cruel humor wasn't who I was. Well, I finally broke that depression about half a year ago when I found Buddhism. I broke out of that idea of playing a character and decided to try just being kind because that's what I wanted to be all along, just couldn't because my humor had become my defense.
Here's the problem though. This was while I was away at college, I was not attached to anyone yet(I'm not a freshman, I just didn't make any ties with people, don't even keep in touch with my roommates), and so these people had no preconceived notions about my character. Now that I'm back home, I don't know how to be around my friends and family. They know me as one way, but it's not the way I am anymore, and worse still, I don't think they could understand. They're young in in that sort of partying and enjoying youth mentality, and I know if am how I am around them, a rift will grow between us, we were the type of people that would not to long ago laugh at the "religious freaks", and I don't think they would be comfortable having a practicing Buddhist amongst their group.
I know I should be saying, I shouldn't be getting so attached, or I should be able to love them as they are human like myself, or that if they cannot accept who I am I should find different company, but these are my friends since childhood, and I'm not yet so great a Buddhist that I can just walk away from my closest friends, and the same goes for my family to an extent. They know I'm into Buddhism, but changing my character seems odd so I pretend to be the same person I've always been, all the while feeling like I did in HS, like I'm hiding the person I really am.
Something that's been worrying me is the fact that I don't think my friends understand the change in who I am as a Buddhist. I've always been the comedic one around my friends, but my style of humor was based on picking on a few people in the group I was in, teasing but in a goodhearted sense. However I realized even back then that I felt guilty afterwords for picking out the flaws in people around me and exploiting them, but comforted myself my telling myself "hey, they're all laughing, they know I mean no harm so no big deal". Anyway, I fell into this pattern when I was less mature, and as the years progressed and I got to Jr and Sr year of HS I became depressed because I felt I was paying a part, and that this cruel humor wasn't who I was. Well, I finally broke that depression about half a year ago when I found Buddhism. I broke out of that idea of playing a character and decided to try just being kind because that's what I wanted to be all along, just couldn't because my humor had become my defense.
Here's the problem though. This was while I was away at college, I was not attached to anyone yet(I'm not a freshman, I just didn't make any ties with people, don't even keep in touch with my roommates), and so these people had no preconceived notions about my character. Now that I'm back home, I don't know how to be around my friends and family. They know me as one way, but it's not the way I am anymore, and worse still, I don't think they could understand. They're young in in that sort of partying and enjoying youth mentality, and I know if am how I am around them, a rift will grow between us, we were the type of people that would not to long ago laugh at the "religious freaks", and I don't think they would be comfortable having a practicing Buddhist amongst their group.
I know I should be saying, I shouldn't be getting so attached, or I should be able to love them as they are human like myself, or that if they cannot accept who I am I should find different company, but these are my friends since childhood, and I'm not yet so great a Buddhist that I can just walk away from my closest friends, and the same goes for my family to an extent. They know I'm into Buddhism, but changing my character seems odd so I pretend to be the same person I've always been, all the while feeling like I did in HS, like I'm hiding the person I really am.
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Comments
What you describe is not unusual, indeed it may be entirely usual. The change that occurs when we move from school to university often causes problems with both family and friends. This is particularly true if they stay 'at home' while we go away. In the 1960s there were a number of plays and stories exploring the conflicts between the child of a working-class family being the first ever to go away to college. The same conflicts occurred for me when I discovered a spiritual life whilst my family and friends were persuadedly rationalist.
What I learned was that I had to tread with the greatest care and avoid any appearance of being 'preachy' or 'prudish'. It is worth recalling that "a prophet is without honour in his own country" and that "no man is a hero to his valet". Our family and childhood friends have seen us at our worst, our silliest, our grubbiest - and any changes are derided as mere hypocrisy.
This attitude arises, in the main, from a deep need, the need of the ego to believe that it is stable and seamless, the same today as yesterday and still the same tomorrow. This, as we discover in our practice of Buddhism, is a delusion, and clinging to it in our 'invincible ignorance' is the primary cause of our dukkha.
There is no easy way out of this dilemma with family and friends - it is often at the root of some people's erroneous attempts to go for ordination: "If I get ordained, they'll all know I'm serious and they'll leave me alone." Another delusion, I fear.
It is probable that, torn between your new practice and your old friendships. you are also experiencing being the butt of a cynical 'humour' that you practised yourself: that which went around is coming around perhaps. It is material for meditative reflection and understanding.
This will be a hard time, a time of testing: derision is much more difficult to bear than actual persecution. I would suggest that you need to find friends of a like mind to yourself. This site may help; it has in some cases. Look around: if you hold fast to your intention to lead your life according to the Noble Eightfold Path, you may be surprised to find others, Buddhist or not, who will support you.
Good luck, my friend, "the best is yet to be".
First of all, thank you, both for your response, and for your support. I'm trying not to be preachy, and remain silent if I get the urge to comment on someones ways. I've always taken a "do what you will" mentality to people, and I hope this is not something that will change, as I am a rationalist, and use Buddhism not as a spiritual practice so much as a mental practice, seeing it as a means to better myself as a living being, and better the lives of those that I may come into contact with. I believe in the validity of the fold path and the 4 noble truths, but have no desire at this point to attain the last truth, I do not need enlightenment, I just want to reach my human potential, if enlightenment is the result then so be it. But if I became enlightened at the cost of the happiness of those around me I'd rather suffer. This may not fall in line with all Buddhist teachings, but I don't yet have the capacity to believe whole heatedly in something I have not experienced. Therefor I have no more right to preach to anyone else than anyone of any other religion has the right to tell me my beliefs are wrong.
I quoted the above because it struck me, something I've read before and understood but forgot somewhere along the way, "Change is the inevitable nature of existence". Now I feel downright foolish for clinging when I should have remembered this, suppose there's nothing I can do but move forward and keep myself in the present, not fearing the future or dwelling on the past... easier said than done I know, but I may as well try. Thank you for making me remember.
It doesn't evoke the same responses. In fact don't call yourself a Buddhist, if that helps; just say that you use Buddhist methods to keep yourself sane.
Namaste
I think it's great when we can name our fears in such a blunt and direct manner. I remember not too long ago being in my apartment, a few weeks before graduating from college, pacing around the room and sobbing, saying to myself, "things are different than they once were! I thought they'd stay like that forever and now they are all different!" And even though I was in pain, a small part of me looked on from the back of my mind, smiling and nodding, like everything was going to be all right. Which of course it always is.
And yeah, you're right. Things are always changing. I barely keep in touch with all of my really good friends from high school. And your personality was bound to change, whether from Buddhism or something else. Just remember to always be yourself. And accept yourself. If you want other people to accept you, you must first accept yourself. And then it won't even matter if others accept you! But they probably will. Don't even worry about it.
Don't put up a facade. Be who you are. But don't ostracize yourself out of fear of becoming "attached" or attempt to apprehend some perceived rejection that may or may not occur. Ask yourself, on what level have you connected with these friends? Are they only your friend because they like your sarcastic comments? I suspect this isn't the case. Why would they even put up with your sarcastic comments if they didn't appreciate you otherwise? And what do you appreciate about these friends? What is it you are afraid to lose? You may find you have a connection there that goes beyond the games you play for their entertainment.
Glow, thanks for your response and I agree. I don't plan to alienate them, but worrying about it isn't worth doing. To be honest I don't know why they're my friends, we have nothing in common, and I think it's more their fear of change that holds us together. Still, I have no intention of abandoning my relationships, but should it come to pass I can at least understand that that change is natural. I need to meditate, I feel myself getting a little nervous, when really I shouldn't be worrying about the future at all.
Good luck through this!