I just got back from a Buddhist retreat at Spirit Rock. Now I know that the essence of Buddhism comes from the 4 Noble Truths. The first Noble Truth is that all humans suffer. Now I don’t know about you, but I didn’t need to sit on my ass for 7 days to learn that! I mean I could get a Ph.D in angst. Malcolm Gladwell’s new book, “The Outliers,” says among other cool things, that it takes 10,000 hours to get good at anything. Well I’ve been suffering for most of my life so I’m an expert. I mean isn’t suffering the essence of life? If we didn’t have things to complain about, what would we do? I especially like it when something terrible happens. The Buddhists also say it always will and the Jews say, “You can’t be too careful”. The Buddhists also say great things also happen, but the Jews know that must mean something scary is just around the corner. Actually I’m a recovering complaining addict. I’ve been in a twelve step program to get over my whining, but I fall off the wagon several thousand times a day.
And now that the world has been handed a collective whoopee cushion in the form of the recent economic meltdown, we can all breathe a sigh of relief. Everything got a just a little too comfortable. I actually thought I could stop worrying about the future. But now I, and millions of foreclosed, 401k-less, unemployed, Ponzi-schemed or otherwise financially devastated individuals have to deal with the true uncertainties of life. Seems to me that the whole financial system is one big Ponzi scheme. I think Paul Krugman made this comment also: we’re all banking on new money coming in from China to pay off the loans we floated on the “full faith & credit” of our great land. So if the whole thing is a mirage what are we supposed to do?
Jack Kornfield summarized the essence of Buddhism this way, “No self, no problem.” Or another way of putting it, I guess is “shit happens, then it doesn’t, then it does, then it doesn’t until we finally realize that we have not control over anything, except our attitude.” Now this is very unJewish, so I guess the Buddha wasn’t a Member of the Tribe after all. I mean we’ve held it together all these centuries because we considered ourselves (let alone were considered) outsiders. There was always me, us, & them. Now there’s no separation between Bernie Madoff’s victims, the former Wall Street tycoons, and Joe Smith. We’re left with the stark realization that all we can control is our attitude. The shit hit the fan, we can’t change that.
So I’ve come up with the 5 Not So Noble Truths: Slow Down, Pay Attention, Breathe, Relax, and Lighten Up. It’s calisthenics for the soul. Try them the next time you realize how scary your economic plight is these days. They wont fix the problem you’re trying to solve but they may just help when it all seems too overwhelming.
Tags: Buddhism, Gladwell, Jack Kornfield, jewish humor, jews, jobs, madoff, Paul Krugman, Spirit Rock, unemployed
