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window on self-promotion

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An interesting concept: self-promotion.  Some of the events that stirred the dukkha pot over the last weeks have been encounters with the manifestation of self-promotion.  Actually it hasn’t been obvious, coming couched as self-compassion.  However, the language should have tipped me off.

“It’s really important to me to do this on my own.”

“I don’t want to be part of a group.”

OK, I take that back.  The language didn’t tip me off because it sounded very assertive in setting boundaries.  The only thing at hinted at something being fishy was a felt sense of the ground shifting, the subtext sliding from goodness to grasping.  And, I tend to give a lot of credit to the inherent goodness in the Other.  That is, I give credit forgetting that inherent goodness is not necessarily goodness manifest.

Am I being harsh?  I probably am.  My downfall always comes from looking at ways connection and community can be cultivated.  If we dug deep, it’s likely tied to losing culture and community at a young age.  Or maybe it’s having had a powerful family and community which trained a mind that knows there is safeness in numbers, that the work is easier when the aspirations are embodied by many.  Who knows.

Whatever the reason, I know community is critical and it’s always a shock to realize the Other may not share that vision.  I think getting through the koan window on this one is to stop assuming that building sangha is a common aspiration for all Buddhists.  The other part is to develop a discernment of self-compassion from self-promotion.  Paul Gilbert, author of Compassionate Mind, notes that self-compassion and compassion for others go hand-in-hand.  He also is very clear in pointing out the difference between self-compassion and self-promotion.  In fact, as I read it, the latter is a shadow side of the former, cultivating competitiveness, entitlement, and personal indulgence.

It’s hard to differentiate just by listening to the words.  Is it setting a boundary?  Or is it holding a possessive view?  Is it clarifying the nature of self?  Or is it clinging to Self?  It’s a tricky line we all cross over and over.  And I see myself caught in its sticky web when I blunder along assuming the other has not only the same aspiration for a mutual outcome but the same North Star to guide us there.

Thank you for practising,

Genju

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window on Burma

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The past week has offered a number of events worthy of comment and I admit to having been too caught up in dukkha of my own creation to make it to the blog window and write about them.  It’s not so much a callousness or numbness to the tragedies unfolding in the world – though I feel the ironic edge of numb creeping up – but rather a preoccupation with several emotional encounters that may or may not signal another koan window to leap through.

A Zen koan poses the question of why the tail of an ox can’t get through a window when the entire ox can.  Lately compassion (for all beings including myself) has this feel.  So much pours out as though the window is vast and boundless and then I get stuck.  Interestingly, I might be able to lay the blame at the feet of Western philosophers for this one.  According to Paul Gilbert, author of Compassionate Mind, our philosophical roots lead us to be more likely to feel compassion for those whose suffering we believe is undeserved.  That may explain why we donate freely for victims of disasters but hesitate for the homeless person in front of the liquor store.

Well, the world has no end of opportunity to show compassion for those who did nothing to deserve their suffering.

On 2011 March 24, an earthquake of 7.0 magnitude hit northeastern Burma in the Shan State.  The effects were felt in Bangkok and Hanoi.  The Irrawaddy (click on photo to the left) reported 150 dead and significant damage.  The government of Burma, of course, has a different story.  Apparently this isn’t enough of a photo-op for the generals so there hasn’t been any ego-feathers flapping as there was with Cyclone Nargis.  Likely as not, the generals aren’t expecting the same volume of Western goodies to be delivered that they can spirit away for themselves.

Ah, such cynicism.  It is expected, I suppose, and not just because of the lack of effort on the part of those in charge of Burma.  There is scant news available on the earthquake and its impact and even fewer calls for aid.  Perhaps we’re all too shaken by the intensity and danger of what is happening in Japan.  I know I am.  Perhaps the people in a mountain region of a country constantly beset by mind-boggling cruelty – natural and man-made – is too much for us to absorb.

But here it is.  One more tragedy in the long list of things happening at the end of the world.  I sadly point you again to the list of humanitarian agencies on the Ways to Engage page of this blog.  Please do what you can… again… and again.

Thank you for practising,

Genju