Some thoughtful criticism from Benjamin Steele regarding an old post of mine. An excerpt from his response:
I agree with much of Boucher’s ideas. In his thinking, he is analytical, imaginative, and curious. Also, he normally is fairly critical of anything New Agey and I can be similarly critical.
But then I came across his post What The Hell Happened To Me? which is different than his typical writing. This was shortly after a period (August 2005 to October 1007) when he had questioned deeply and had a difficult time, and I guess he had come to a new insight. My response to this post was a combination of surprise and irritation. In that post, he claims to have overcome suffering which is fine and dandy. But the damn post sounds like an advertisement for a New Age self-help program. I sensed no deep insight, no authenticity. I was disappointed that Boucher had turned to the light side. I’m not unhappy for his happiness. I just would hate for someone with such a great intellect to lose his edge.
I guess I define suffering as something like: an inability to accept what’s happening, such that it causes whatever pain, frustration, etc one is feeling to become accelerated or multiplied. So when I say you as a human being have the ability to end suffering, what I’m saying is that you have the ability to cut out the extra unnecessary self-reflexive layers that prevent you from fully feeling or experiencing given situations in life. Put another way, don’t shut yourself off from what you’re feeling. Don’t beat yourself up for how you are. The experiences available to us in this life are like a palette of colors. Use them all with passion, skill and spirit. And if you must suffer, suffer for your art. Use the pain as a refining process for the improvement of your immediate surroundings, environments and relationships. Suffer until you don’t need to suffer anymore, but don’t bother trying to define yourself by because suffering is a byproduct of “the Work” and not the fundamental purpose of why we’re here.
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10 Comments
Man, fuck that guy. I think most people commit suicide out of vindictiveness.
There is no way to win that argument. “You just don’t know how I’ve suffered! You never CAN know!”
I think its about control. People want control, self destructive people control others by hurting themselves. I once watched an episode of “intervention” about this annorexic. Her family was all upset and did an intervention with her, but she had this kind of smug look on her face. I knew she wasn’t going to change. Turned out she didn’t she got down to like 50 lbs and had to be put on life support.
Yeah, fuck that guy… oh wait, I am that guy. lol
Vindictiveness, control. I’m sure some people attempt suicide for these reasons and many other reasons as well.
When I attempted suicide, it was simply for feeling trapped and desparate, feeling as if there was no solution to my problems. I don’t think I was feeling vindictive, but I certainly was seeking control in my life… control in the sense of a desire for some action that would eliminate or at least lessen my suffering, a desire for a choice that would give my life meaning.
In my blog, I was partly just arguing against making generalized statements about suffering. Tim is free to speak of his own suffering, but I suspect there is a severe limit to the degree we can speak about the suffering of others. To me, human experience in general and suffering in particular is largely a mystery.
That said, I may have been overly critical of Tim. I more or less understand his view on suffering. I was raised in New Thought Christianity and so part of me is attracted to this attitude. However, decades of struggling with severe depression has dampened my New Age idealism. I don’t know what is true, but like Tim I can only go by my own experience.
I’ve had various spiritual practices (and spiritual experiences) over the years. I’ve attempted to have a positive attitude and be proactive in my life. I’ve done therapy and medications. I’ve volunteered and exercised. And yet my life has continued to be a struggle. So, I don’t know.
If whatever Tim has done works for him, then more power to him. I was only pointing out that his experience might not apply to everyone. But maybe I’m just being cynical and suffering really is unnecessary. I genuinely can say that I hope so.
Well said Tim, the only thing making us suffer is ourselves. Once you realise that, you are free to live your life.
One other thing I thought was worth bringing up: okay two other things. (1) Holding onto your suffering brings more suffering. (2) When you define yourself according to how much you’ve suffered, it becomes a contest to see who can hurt more and who can spew more blood on the next guy. It becomes a cycle of emotional violence at a certain point, where suffering must be offloaded and shared with everyone around you, (but what if they’ve suffered more than you can imagine?) - either that, or you can let it wither on the vine. Heaven on earth, I believe, is perceptually possible. It, however, requires great discipline and unbounded joy given away freely to others with no expectation of reciprocation.
That “wither on the vine” concept is definitely something I can agree with Tim on, as I’m currently discovering it myself in my own practice.
Not pushing the suffering away (cause it’ll come back) but also not holding on to it (cause that strengthens it), requires a pretty high level of paying-attention and, yes, discipline (which is something I have been having a lot of trouble with lately), but it is a learnable habit, in my experience.
Sometimes I hit a good patch and I can feel the thoughts/feelings fading on their own with nothing done on my part other than acknowledging them. And the more I watch this, the more I realize the same is true of all thoughts and feelings.
Every thought we have was put into our head by reality, so every new single moment of experience is actually equal to all of our past experiences. Life is a never ending sequence of all-and-everything after all-and-everything after all-and-everything…
I’ve struggled with depression, without realizing I was depressed. But what I think it is, is that I had kind of a “emotional set point” it was like a default setting.
We get in ruts and we are creatures of habit and so we tend to go along perpetuating the same behavior.
But, yeah, it really does look like you have an identity created around suffering Marmalade.
I am not saying I have my shit totally all together either. Creating a new identity and new habits is hard work. I also coming to realize that life entails real risk of failure. Mortality is 100% eventually for everyone and it is possible to waste your life.
Unbounded joy, seems to have a tendency of other people perceiving you as being a bit of a goody goody. You know? Overly enthusiastic and even naive.
Probably most people are somewhat depressed and negative, but not clinically depressed.
I think when I was a kid I was a lot like the Character “Butters” on South Park and got negative reactions from people and that kind of threw me off.
So to literally spread joy seems to require some serious work. Because being positive and curious about life really draws attention.
Tim,
Suffering is just an experience. Like any experience, you can hold onto it or deny it or any number of other possibilities. When in the right mindset, I prefer to simply witness it.
Sure, anything can be a contest. You can define yourself as being more together than others. Defining yourself according to any single experience can be problematic. We aren’t our experiences which includes the full spectrum from suffering to joy.
Or it can simply be experienced. Both repressed and projected suffering can be emotional violence, but there is nothing fundamentally violent about the experience of suffering in and of itself.
What if they’ve suffered more than you can imagine? Well, that is basically my point. You can only understand to a very limited degree the experience of others. This is why I was arguing against generalized statements.
As for withering on the vine, I can’t say I disagree. Experiences come and go. The attitude I strive for is acceptance which is based in a sense of faith. To me, the desire to make suffering go away seems to miss the heart of the issue. However, my ability to articulate this understanding is minimal.
Yes, this touches upon the heart of the issue. I guess it depends on what this means. I do sense something truly good in the world, but this deeper sense of goodness seems to me to be a goodness beyond the hopes and concepts of our normal experience. This goodness, as I intuit it, isn’t at odds with human suffering.
I’m not sure what to say to this. I’m not exactly sure what this means to you. And I don’t know your life experience. The words ‘discipline’ and ‘joy’ can mean many things to many people.
I tend to equate discipline with effort. Opposite of this, I tend to equate heaven on earth as an insight received through grace.
As for joy, I see it as just one extreme on a spectrum of emotions. I personally don’t find it helpful to say suffering isn’t real and joy is real. They’re both just emotions. On this issue, I’m attracted to a more Eastern attitude of neutral mindfulness combined with openminded curiosity.
Anyways, this is just what makes sense to me based on my own experience and study, my own experimentation and practice. If it doesn’t make sense to you, then that is just the way it is.
The best definition I’ve ever heard for discipline is “doing what you want to do, even when you don’t want to do it.”