"This very moment is the perfect teacher, and it's always with us" – lessons from Pema Chödrön
I’m waiting a lot at the moment.
in the hospital waiting room, waiting for my daily radiotherapy.
in the radiotherapy suite, waiting for the machine to rotate over me.
waiting for all this to be over.
I am now two thirds (hurrah!) through my 33 sessions of radiotherapy. It’s a bit grueling. And, I’ll be honest, ‘waiting’ is not one of my key skills. In my working life things usually happen at pace. When you run your own business there are few obstacles between having an idea and making it happen. Most things are in my control. And I don’t tend to sit around.
Getting my cancer diagnosis has forced me to get comfortable with those things out of my control. Especially right now. Because there is no shortcut, no hack to fix this, I can’t hit the fast forward button. I have to make peace with my new daily Groundhog Day routine. Going to the hospital every day.
I’ve just finished reading 'When Things Fall Apart' by Buddhist nun Pema Chödrön. Here are five lessons from her book that I wrote down in the waiting room, to help us when things fall apart:
Everything is a learning opportunity. Life is a good teacher. Pema says that when our whole world falls apart, we’re given a learning opportunity. “Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It's just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.”
Running away is not the answer. Pema invites us to lean towards the discomfort of life rather than run away. Trying to run away is never the answer to being a fully human being. “To stay with that shakiness-to stay with a broken heart, with a rumbling stomach, with the feeling of hopelessness and wanting to get revenge—that is the path of true awakening.” She asks us to stick with that uncertainty, to relax in the midst of chaos, and learn not to panic. Yeah, I’m trying!
Get up close with our feelings. Pema says that rather than resist what’s going on, we can meet our feelings face-to-face. “We might feel that somehow we should try to eradicate these (difficult) feelings. A more practical approach would be to get to know them… we could acknowledge that right now we feel like a piece of shit and not be squeamish about taking a good look. That's the compassionate thing to do. That's the brave thing to do.” She says no matter what the size, colour, or shape is, the point is still to lean toward the discomfort of life and see it clearly rather than to protect ourselves from it.
Allow yourself to experience fully whatever you encounter. Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know, she says. “If we run a hundred miles an hour to the other end of the continent in order to get away from the obstacle, we find the very same problem waiting for us when we arrive. It just keeps returning with new names, forms, and manifestations until we learn whatever it has to teach us about where we are separating ourselves from reality, how we are pulling back instead of opening up, closing down instead of allowing ourselves to experience fully whatever we encounter, without hesitating or retreating into ourselves.”
Seeking security or perfection is not the answer. Pema reminds us that sooner or later, we're going to have an experience we can't control. “Our house is going to burn down, someone we love is going to die, we're going to find out we have cancer, a brick is going to fall out of the sky and hit us on the head, somebody's going to spill tomato juice all over our white suit. The essence of life is that it's challenging. Sometimes it is sweet, and sometimes it is bitter. Sometimes your body tenses, and sometimes it relaxes or opens. Sometimes you have a headache, and sometimes you feel 100 percent healthy. To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest.”
So that’s what I’m trying to get comfortable with - being thrown out of the nest. Some days are better than others. Some days I feel upbeat and on top of the world. Other days I might feel a bit teary and find the weight of all this too much. And on those difficult days, I’ll just be kind to myself and remember we’re all human ;)
So thank you, Pema Chödrön. "This very moment is the perfect teacher, and it's always with us.”