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giving and getting advice
genkaku
Northampton, Mass. U.S.A. Veteran
What do you think of advice -- whether giving or receiving?
One of the interesting aspects to me occurs right here on this Internet forum where, on occasion, someone may post a longish descriptive of some aspect of Buddhist practice. Often these descriptions are written at arm's length, as if the writer were capable of dispensing an understanding without being party to the difficulties presented. "Buddhism says..." or "Buddhists do..." one thing or another and by implication, the reader should follow in the writer's carefully-distanced directives.
And perhaps such directives are right on target. But what I find myself doing when reading such essays is wondering why the writer felt compelled to disgorge in the first place. And my perhaps-incorrect conclusion is that all advice is just what people are giving themselves ... under cover of giving it to someone else and concealed behind a 'Buddhist' label.
I don't see anything wrong with giving myself advice. I do it all the time ... as often as not with little effect. But I wondered what anyone else might think. How much of the advice dispensed to others is just a bit of advice to yourself? How much of the certainty is just a fig leaf for uncertainty? How much of a cover-up is involved in something called "Buddhism?"
Just chewing my cud here. Any thoughts?
One of the interesting aspects to me occurs right here on this Internet forum where, on occasion, someone may post a longish descriptive of some aspect of Buddhist practice. Often these descriptions are written at arm's length, as if the writer were capable of dispensing an understanding without being party to the difficulties presented. "Buddhism says..." or "Buddhists do..." one thing or another and by implication, the reader should follow in the writer's carefully-distanced directives.
And perhaps such directives are right on target. But what I find myself doing when reading such essays is wondering why the writer felt compelled to disgorge in the first place. And my perhaps-incorrect conclusion is that all advice is just what people are giving themselves ... under cover of giving it to someone else and concealed behind a 'Buddhist' label.
I don't see anything wrong with giving myself advice. I do it all the time ... as often as not with little effect. But I wondered what anyone else might think. How much of the advice dispensed to others is just a bit of advice to yourself? How much of the certainty is just a fig leaf for uncertainty? How much of a cover-up is involved in something called "Buddhism?"
Just chewing my cud here. Any thoughts?
3
Comments
I was once stopped in the street and asked directions by a lost motorist looking for a particular hotel. When I told him the way he proceeded to argue with me that it couldn't be where I said because he'd just come from there! I think a lot of people react to advice the same way.
Do I want to try to offer compassion and my best answer
to this person? Can I be of benefit because of my experience?
Can I listen deeply?
A really good question.
For me most of any advise i give is really just my re examination of my experience.
Is it really still true and how am I practicing it?
The lines between ourselves and others gets pretty blurry the closer you look.
I think it is important that you can advise a person according to the individual, and that is what makes it so difficult on a forum. That is why it is always carefully-distanced directives or advice. The best counsel comes from ourselves though. We typically know what we need to do or what we should do. We just need someone else to say it.
Advice does not naturally come as question and answer. It comes in the form of conversation. And... conversations are quite difficult on a forum because the format is more like everyone-write-an-essay-at-each-other.
It is okay to have differing opinions and differing thoughts and to draw a line in the sand somewhere. Without other "unlike" minds, we would not know exactly where we stood. That should be appreciated.
My mind is a mess this morning.
The more ways to see something, the better the view...
Indeed.
The only useful advise, is that which is heard and makes a difference. Most of the time we are not in a condition to hear or give advice. We are full of opinions, partial digestions, need for attention, unloading our wisdom/insight etc.
Then we (usual story) slow down, we have learned to listen to our arisings, so we recognise them in others. However . . . just reflecting back is not sufficient. We have to really listen to what our dharma brothers and sisters are saying and need to hear. This relates to something @Jeffrey mentioned about 'button pushing'. To give advice that is not heard, to provoke without the impact being gained from is wasted effort.
Most of us are too often heedless of the dharma all around but gradually we begin to listen, this in time enables the capacity of right speech . . . :wave:
In the same vein, could it be asked, 'How much of any certainty is just a fig leaf for uncertainty?'.
They exist because of a point of view which seems to lead back to the personal condition.
I think therefore there's an overriding 'cover up', which may or may not excuse other employed fictions.
This is where those of us being strongly opinionated, finding fault and generally sounding off are . . .
This sort of behaviour is the certainty of the 'impeded by self'. There is limited knowledge because fluidity is only partially present. This is where we have, 'thus have I heard' Buddhism.
Then we come to internal experience, based on what we know. This is increasingly very little we can be sure of. It relates very much to another thread about 'letting go'.
Eventually we start to say, 'this is how I experience or understand what you are saying'. This is still not genuine advice but is the capacity of the advanced practitioner and may therefore be taken as advise by those enabling their ability to listen . . . :wave:
So if someone asks how to stop drinking, we wouldn't tell them 'a process', we'd share with them what we did to stop drinking.
It's an effective method for 'giving advice'. I even use the same technique with my teenage daughter. If I give her advice, she can end up on the defensive, but if I say, "Look, I've made mistakes and this was my experience of X, Y and Z...", she's more receptive to what I've got to say.