Buddhism, Getting Older, and not getting the stall you want
Posted on July 20, 2006 - Filed Under Uncategorized
This is something I wrote several months ago which I thought was worth putting up here.
Ok, this is going to start off a little wierd…
A couple of weeks ago, I was at work and I needed to go to the bathroom (the type that takes a few minutes). I prefer to use the handicapped stall for three reasons: 1. If I use one of the other two and someone else uses another and allows the door to slam when they are finished, the door of the one I am using shakes unlocked and that just ain’t good. 2. The regular sized stalls are pretty narrow; although I don’t really mind small spaces, I don’t prefer them during this activity. 3. To my knowledge, there aren’t any handicapped men on my floor, so I can use this stall without my conscience bothering me.
Well, on this day, as I walked in and checked the mirror for feet in ‘my’ stall, I was disappointed to find that there was indeed someone already in there. After the initial slice of irritation, something very profound occurred to me: I could not change the fact that there was in fact someone in there. It’s not like I could crawl underneath the door, unlock it, and throw the person out. I had to select another option; I had to adapt. I could either: 1. Wait for that stall to empty–not a good option because men do not just stand around the bathroom without VERY good reason (it’s in the Male Restroom Code); 2. Use a different stall–unappealing for the above reasons; or 3. I could come back later–unappealing because I like to go when my body tells me I need to go (TMI, I know). I selected option two and it gave me time to contemplate my mini-revelation. The reality of the situation was that someone else was in there, thereby precluding me from using that stall. As I have been flirting with Buddhism lately and one of the tenets of Buddhism is that reality is neither good or bad, it just is, it began to sink in that many, many things are outside of my control and that once I accept that, I will be a much more content person. Things are only bad because of the constraints we place upon the world and our experience in it (obviously, there are exceptions…if someone brutally murders your loved one, you are going to be upset…in fact, it would be inappropriate if you weren’t…but this isn’t about the exceptions…this is about being upset, at some deep core, because I did not get what I wanted). Conversely, things are good because of the parameters we place upon the same. Another way of looking at this is to take yourself out of the center of the universe for a moment and realize that things often just happen, not to you, because of you, or in spite of you. Just as that guy in my stall does not crap according to my schedule, so the world does not spin in the fashion I demand.
Now, before you call me a fatalist, know that I also believe in the very real power of one person’s influence. I have found in my life that it’s often that one person who makes all the difference. And it might not even be the totality of that person but rather one person’s one decision at one point in one day. I guess a good way to phrase it might be a person’s sphere of influence. I do not influence when someone decides to use the bathroom but I do decide to get a college degree and therefore better myself. I don’t decide whether Iran develops nuclear weapons but I do exercise control over whether I eat a banana or a candy bar. A final way of stating it, and I think this hits it right on the head, is the Serenity Prayer (common at A.A., etc. meetings): God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change…Courage to change the things I can…And the wisdom to know the difference.
Now, a really good example of this is my turning 32 tomorrow. I don’t like getting older. I think about loss of physical and mental ability, diseases, and obviously death. I think about the fact that there’s so much I would like to do, see, taste, hear, experience and that, at some point, no matter what I do, my ability to do all that will cease forever (excepting the possibility that reincarnation is reality). Regardless of all this, there is absolutely NOTHING I can do about it. Through reading On the Wild Edge by David Petersen last year, I realized what Neil Young meant when he sings about rust never sleeping. As human beings, we age; in fact, the first day we are alive begins our journey to death. Many would say that I am being very morbid, to the point of being concerned for my emotional state. I would say to them that to not think this way on occasion, to purposefully ignore the absolute truth of what I just said, is indication of a much more serious emotional problem. Anyway, rust never sleeps…you can’t turn it off…every day, day in and day out, we continue our journey to the end. There is absolutely nothing you can do to stop it. Sure, we try but hopefully we will never succeed.
I am getting to a place where I can be comfortable with the limits of my sphere of influence and I really think this is one of the surest paths to true happiness.
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Jason
Have a very Happy Birthday
i realize more and more how our life on this earth is short and we need to make the best of it while we are here and to tell each other how much we love them i was blessed with wonderful children and a wonderful husband and i regret the hard times i caused them but i hope they know how very much i love them and now i have a little blessing maggie and i hope as she grows older how much grandma loves her