‘I want a life!’ Freedom from dependency on the prison of roles and duty

There is no point in living in your personal myths of wanting to make a fresh start if it agitates your discontent and your daily rumblings of dissatisfaction. Your torment then only robs you of your natural freedom of being, a birthright of our species.

            I had a lengthy conversation with a woman amid her discontent which rumbled through her daily life with a monotonous regularity. Her anguish went something like this: “I’m a prisoner to my mind. I live in a jail called roles, namely wife, mother and office worker. My women friends tell me I have nothing to worry about. Nice husband, nice kids, nice job, Some of these women tell me they envy me. I keep telling them being a mother is not what it’s talked up to be.

“I want a life. Help!”

            She said she dreams of making a fresh start rather than resigning herself to a daily cycle from waking up to sleep with little change at weekends, but she can’t see any real alternatives.

            “I hate these celebrities who boast of their glamorous existence. I hate Hello magazine, even though I know it distorts the reality of their lives. I want a different life? What can I do?”

            It is not too far outstretched to call such inner turmoil as abiding in a crisis, where the unhappy condition of mind rebels against the familiar, and equally yearns for something fresh where passion, vitality and initiatives emerge daily to reawaken the emotional and creative life.

            Such deep matters are the stuff of Dharma, a teaching cutting to the bone issues about daily life. The teachings demand, rather than invite, us to throw our life wide open, through everything up in the air, and see what lands.

Dharma teachings challenge our glib existence and tedium of routine, where it becomes hard to distinguish one week from the next. Layers of bored familiarity numbs our five senses, namely eyes, ears, nose, tongue and touch

.Photo shows seat for meditation/reflection up from Seminar Haus Engl Buddhist meditation centre, 90 minutes from Munich, Germany.

A fearless aspect of the teachings hinge around the word “attachment” or specifically “non-attachment.” It is not a peaceful, contented life at the heart of the Buddha’s teachings, nor a calm, non-judgemental mind, nor a religion that fulfils personal needs for security, nor a philosophy to satisfy yearnings for a system of knowledge making intellectual sense. The Buddha proclaimed, “I teach liberation through non-clinging.”

This kind of statement can send minor shock waves through the chattering classes, who see Dharma as a meditation practice to be applied once or twice a day. ‘I teach liberation through non-clinging.’ Love? Yes. Passion? Yes. Clinging? Unhelpful. Blind attachment? Unhelpful. Clinging, grasping and holding onto need to be thrown off our back like a sack of potatoes.We forget what we hold on to, identify with and tie ourselves dow to, stops freedom of the heart. So, the Buddha spent 45 years in north India, making this message the core of his teachings. It is still as relevant today.

What does all this mean for the good woman, who for years has fulfilled her duties as wife, mother and office worker? Dharma encourages her to look at her options, no matter how uncomfortable they appear, take on the challenge of change. The wife/mother/office worker must take responsibility for the outcome of whatever takes place whether a major change, no change or a luke warm change.

Her choices might boil down to four possibilities., and a willingness to keep open all four, despite remonstrations from friends and family.

1. She can resign herself to her way of life. Isn’t it a fact that one meaning of the word “Dharma” is ‘duty?'  the dissatisfied woman asked. I replied “Yes. Your primary duty means to wake up from sleeping walking through the field of existence. Will you carry on doing what you are doing regardless of the torment and merciless thoughts? What will enable you to move on from this troublesome state of mind so you can see daily life with fresh eyes.”

2. She can explore her daily life outside the roles. Wife, mother and office worker lack the capacity to be totally time consuming, no matter what she thinks. Her resistance to the roles generates ongoing tiredness and irritation rather than empowerment to initiate a change.

3. She can step out of one, two or three roles. The Buddha strongly protected the rights of (and often actively encouraged) men and women to make a radical change to their life, such as going from home to the life of spiritual nomad or living in community. A man went to Jesus telling him he wanted to follow his teachings but first he had to return home to bury his father. In his usual straightforward manner, Jesus said: “Let the dead bury the dead.” This means following the teachings matters more than being an obedient son. (No wonder Buddhists prefer chanting and Christians prefer singing hymns. It is easier than to applying the teachings to daily life). The third option often triggers the classic ‘how could she?’ from others who lack the spirit to take such leaps from the known to the unknown.

4. She fulfils her duty, her roles AND expands her entire relationship to life so she realises her roles do not function as the bars of a personal prison.

The ‘self’ of human beings lacks the capacity to shape and organise our life, as we would wish. The unhappy woman cannot persuade herself tell to wake up happy every day and go to bed happy. The popular concept of making a fresh start means taking steps in this process of causes (major factors) and conditions (supportive factors) to liberate our short-lived existence.

‘           A fresh starts require a ruthless honesty to initiate changes in our life. These include:

Four Pointers to a Fresh Start

1. Stop complaining (a denial of the wish to change)

2. Do I want to change? (make this question a mantra for recitation more often than  the Tibetan mantra, om mani padme hung.

3. Am I prepared to step into the unknown or stay stuck in the known, the land of the living dead?

4. What risks am I prepared to take?

Some weeks later, I received an e-mail from the woman. I loved her spirit. She remained determined not to submit to the familiar forces of numbness – television, tablets and pilgrimages to the refrigerator. ‘I’m in a period of major transition,” she said.

 Every moment is a moment of transition, but it seems like some transitions are bigger than others. I enjoyed listening to her distinct voice, empowered, bold and enlivened. “I want to live and I’m going to live.” My husband, kids and office will have to get used to me,’ she said with a tremendous burst of laughter.

      The woman took to heart the four pointers leading to fresh beginnings. It is these kinds of changes we deliberately thrust upon ourselves through the awareness of dissatisfaction of what is present. We either change our present, we change our attitude to what is present or  we move on. There is no justification for clinging, for remaining attached to roles, structures and, especially, states of mind.

I reminded her an awakened mind never feels stuck with the past, nor with the present nor with the future, neither resists what is, nor blindly imagines things will naturally improve in the future. Forms (roles) are Emptiness. Sometimes change thrusts itself upon us. A loved one dies. Our partner walks out. Kids leave home. The business dispenses with our service. Do we fall into the pit of self-pity? Do we beg to be taken back? Do we brush ourselves down immediately and walk on abiding in a free and noble way despite the events, which arise through the variety of causes and conditions?

A friend quoted a Zen master who said the length of our life was as long as a flash of lightning. I said: “It’s not that long.”

Let’s not drift along in a swamp of inertia from one day to the next, masquerading as appearing to be self-important and busy. Unless we are exceptionally aware and awake, routine will kill the spirit whether at home, in the office or sunbathing besides a swimming pool in the Caribbean.

The last I heard, the woman in ‘crisis’ was on her way by herself to Vietnam for a few weeks. She had some time and space to reflect on her unfolding life. Having weathered criticisms of being ‘irresponsible,’ she took steps to look deeply into herself and the constructions of her mind. There are many ways to change our view of life.

Her kids were proud of her. I applauded her. So would the Buddha.

Make a big leap or one step at a time if you want a fulfilling life.