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I have recovered from the disease of Alcoholism. I believe there is only one person really,.. everybody. And that peace of mind is everything. -So treat your neighbor as you would treat yourself, because your neighbor IS yourself. I think most of recovery is what I would call common sense, but that learning to be ordinary is a true gift very few people acquire. My ambition is to accept everything unflinchingly, with compassion, and therefore be intrinsically comfortable in my own skin, no matter what. I am comfortable being uncomfortable and am willing to go to any lengths to improve my life. I believe the Big Book was divinely inspired, and is extraordinarily powerful. Unfortunately AA's best kept secret a lot of the time. (In my opinion). I just try to do what works, no matter what it is.

Monday, March 05, 2007

For procrastinators! (like me!): the Lazy Lama's thoughts on overcoming resistance.

I procrastinate, so I was listening to some questions with the lazy lama, and typed out the jist of his answers so I can remember them better.

Here is some stuff the Lazy Lama (Ringu Tulku) said about dealing with resistance. I've put down the whole answer, but my favorite 'bits' are:

By discipline I do not mean that kind of 'forcing yourself to do things'

Like if I really DEEPLY see that this is good for me,
Then I say "OK, this is REALLY good. I need to let it happen."

Diligence is about inspiring yourself. Inspiring means: A DEEP understanding / learning / seeing things CLEARLY, that its REALLY useful, REALLY beneficial. THAT inspires you.

Its not good to push too much. To push too hard.

I tell myself, "You can NOT practice more than (so many) hours"
It makes you feel as though 'you are not doing enough.' The idea is to create the feeling that you are not doing enough.
You want to do more, but you do not allow yourself. "I will only do so much"
When you have the feeling 'I want to do more, but due to many reasons I cannot", then my interest in doing it is maintained.

Maintaining this 'kind of feeling' 'I am not doing enough'.
Creating that situation, is I think, very important, whatever it is.

You have to deal with the mind pretty skillfully, you cannot push too hard.

..Ok, here's the WHOLE answer:
(In response to the question 'How do you deal with resistance?)
I call it laziness. I don't know what it is!, but I call it laziness.

Maybe A bit of discipline?
But by discipline I do not mean that kind of 'forcing yourself doing things' That kind of discipline is not good. It is not good for me. Maybe not good for you.

The discipline that I prefer to use is that .
I ALLOW myself to do what I know is REALLY good for me.
THAT kind of discipline is good.
Like if I really DEEPLY see that this is good for me,
Then I say "OK, this is REALLY good. I need to let it happen."
(I don't need to do ANYTHING that I don't know is REALLY good for me.)
If I DEEPLY say that, sometimes I do it.

Its not good to push too much. To push too hard.

It is said in the dharma that diligence is about inspiring yourself.
Inspiring means: A DEEP understanding / learning / seeing things clearly,
that its REALLY useful, REALLY beneficial.
THAT inspires you.

Diligence is about inspiring yourself
Sometimes the best thing to do is rest.
The best way to generate diligence is to rest. Having a break.
Having a break is not stopping the practice but rejuvenating yourself.
So therefore having a break is recommended in the chapter of diligence.
So also that's another way.

This seems to work sometimes:
I tell myself, "You can NOT practice more than (so many) hours"
It makes you feel as though 'you are not doing enough.' The idea is to create the feeling that you are not doing enough.
You want to do more, but you do not allow yourself. "I will only do so much"
When you have the feeling 'I want to do more, but due to many reasons I cannot", then my interest in doing it is maintained.
But if you feel you are doing too much, then its very bad. Because then very quickly the reaction goes the other way, "Im doing too much" "I don't want to do that'

Maintaining this kind of feeling 'I am not doing enough'.
Creating that situation, is I think, very important, whatever it is.

We have to be skilful with this because the mind is very 'stubborn'. You push one way, the mind goes in the other direction!
You have to deal with the mind pretty skillfully, you cannot push too hard.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thank you very much for posting this, I needed to make a Spanish translation of the Ringu Tulku's advice :)

Best wishes!!!