There's a story about the Buddha talking with a musician who was struggling to meditate. I'm paraphrasing here but the Buddha said something like "When the strings of your instrument are too tight, can you play well?" The student said "No, not at all" "When the strings are too loose, can you play your instrument?" "Definitely not" "So just like that, your mind should be not too tight and not too loose when you meditate."
I bring that story up at the beginning of this presentation on the Paramita of Patience because to me this Paramita has that same dynamic tension, which sets it apart from many of the other ones we've talked about. When working with this paramita we have to be much more aware of going too far to the other side than, say, generosity or enthusiasm. It's possible to be too generous, but most of us are not even close to that extreme. But with patience, it's much more common to be out of tune in either direction.
As we've been noticing, Buddhism has numbered lists for everything, and this paramita is no exception. The three aspects of Patience are: patience with yourself, patience with others, and patience with your life. Let's look at the tension too tight and too loose in each of those three.
Patience with yourself: We are hard on ourselves. We are our own worst critic. No matter what others are saying of us, we still find discouraging things to say to ourselves. So one side of the practice of patience is being patient with where we are now. Accepting ourselves for who we are now. Our thoughts, our habits, our mistakes, our blind spots. Everything. Just as we are. We are not going anywhere. We are all we've got. We can just sit here with ourselves as we are.
The other side of patience with yourself is to not let yourself off too easy. "This is just how I am." "I just lose my temper sometimes." "This seat is uncomfortable. I should move. I will hurt myself if I don't move." Actually, we are stronger than we give ourselves credit for. Navy SEALs estimate that when the mind says it's time to quit, we are only at about 40% of the way to our capacity.
So we can sit still a little bit longer. We can sit like a rock in a snowstorm. We can sit with a painful memory or emotion a little bit longer. We can feel it a little more than we thought we could. When we do so, we realize it's not just our pain any more. Everyone feels pain. Everyone has overwhelming emotions. Everyone has made mistakes. Our touching in with our suffering, our patience with our discomfort actually connects us with other people in a way that nothing else does. Which brings me to the second part of patience:
Patience with others:
Remember that story Catherine told a couple of weeks ago about a dad walking with his daughter in the rain? She wants to splash in the puddles and he wants to hurry up and get home? We don't want to be that dad, right? Let the kid splash in the puddles. Give the kid, the friend, the co-worker, space. No only can you wait, but you can enjoy the space too. Let someone else's agenda take precedence over yours for once. Let the car next to you go first. Give the other person enough time to really finish what they were going to say before you jump in. Be patient. Give your world and the people in it a bit more space.
But be careful about just caving all the time. Patience does not mean bottling up your feelings and letting other people walk all over you. "Being Patient" is not an excuse for not standing up for yourself, for not being honest with others, for not having the difficult conversation. We have all, I imagine, been in relationship situations where waiting around for the other person to change their behavior is just taking too long. The kid can splash in the puddles for a while. But at some point, as in any relationship, the parent's needs have to be accounted for too.
Otherwise, we just lose it. The resentment and anger boils up and over and causes all kinds of mess. There is a lot about anger in the writings about the Paramita of Patience and I don't really have time to go into it, except to say that anger is a sign that we missed reality a few exits back and now we're hurt and embarrassed and frustrated and we lose our shit! It happens. We are human. We can be patient with ourselves. But we don't want to let ourselves off the hook too easily either.
The path part of this is to work it, kneed it, ponder it, write about it, talk about it. Examine your behavior and the behavior of those around you. Look into the shadows and reflect on the patterns.
Patience with our life has the same tension as the other two. Patience is often used like a hammer or a lid by people in power to put off change for justice. "Just be patient" is the constant go-to phrase for people in power.
Langston Hughes wrote a poem about what happens to us personally and societally when Patience is used as an excuse for status quo:
"What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore - and then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over - like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?"
But there are things about our life that we cannot change. Time is passing. We are getting older. Friends die. Fortunes rise and fall. There's a famous Buddhist slogan (we will have to get to the slogans at some point) "Whichever of the two occurs, be patient."
One last quote from another tradition that illustrates the practice and the tension of patience:
"God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.”
Ok let's practice.
take seat
aspiration to benefit others
awareness sinks down into your body
Patience with self. Suzuki Roshi said "You are perfect just the way you are. And you could use a lot of work"
Sit with discomfort a little bit longer than you normally would.
Everyone feels discomfort. This is not just your discomfort. You are not alone actually. We all have different stories, but we are all in this together.
Is there someone in your life that you could be more patient with?
Is there someone or some situation where you are being too patient?
If you find yourself spinning out into thoughts of what you are going to do or not do, just come back. Come back to your body, your feelings, how you feel right now. Be with yourself now.
If there is one thing that's true about all these paramitas, it's that each of their meanings is richer and more nuanced than their title.
The paramita of patience does have an aspect of staying with discomfort longer than we might want to. But it's not just a grin and bear it approach to life.
And the paramita of patience doesn't disappear at some point and let you off the hook to fly off the handle, to lose your patience, when someone is taking advantage of you or the pain of holding back becomes too much.
So there is this tension with this paramita. This wonderful, rich, tension that we are going to explore.
As we've been noticing, Buddhism has numbered lists for everything, and this paramita is no exception. The three aspects of Patience are: patience with yourself, patience with others, and patience with your life. Let's look at the tension of patience in each of those three.
Patience with yourself: We are hard on ourselves. We are our own worst critic. No matter what others are saying of us, we still find discouraging things to say to ourselves. So one side of the tension of patience is being patient with where we are now. Accepting ourselves for who we are now. Our thoughts, our habits, our mistakes, our blind spots. Everything. Just as we are. We are not going anywhere. We are all we've got.
The other side of patience with yourself is to not let yourself off too easy. "This is just how I am." "I just lose my temper sometimes." "This is uncomfortable. I should move. I will hurt myself if I don't move." Actually, we are stronger than we give ourselves credit for. Navy SEALs estimate that when the mind says it's time to quit, we are only at about 40% of the way to our capacity.
So we can sit still a little bit longer. We can sit with a painful memory or emotion a little bit longer. We can feel it a little more than we thought we could. And here's the genius part - when we do so, we realize it's not just our pain any more. Everyone feels pain. Everyone has overwhelming emotions. Everyone has made mistakes. Our touching in with our suffering, our patience with our discomfort actually connects us with other people in a way that nothing else does. Which brings me to the second part of patience:
Patience with others: Being all alone with yourself or being in relationship, being committed or married, being stuck in quarantine for a year... oh we've seen both sides of this patience thing this year.
Remember that story Catherine told a couple of weeks ago about a dad walking with his daughter in the rain? She wants to splash in the puddles and he wanted to hurry up and get home? We don't want to be that dad, right? Let the kid splash in the puddles. Give the kid, the friend, the co-worker space. No only can you wait, but you can enjoy the space too. Let someone else's agenda take precedence over yours for once. Let the car next to you go first. Give the other person enough time to really finish what they were going to say before you jump in.
But be careful about just caving all the time. Patience does not mean bottling up your feelings and letting other people walk all over you. "Being Patient" is not an excuse for not standing up for yourself, for not being honest with others, for not having the difficult conversation. We have all, I imagine, been in relationship situations where waiting around for the other person to change their behavior is just taking too long. The kid can splash in the puddles for a while. For a long time. But at some point, the dad's needs have to be accounted for too.
Otherwise, we just lose it. The resentment and anger boils up and over and causes all kinds of mess. There is a lot about anger in the writings about this paramita and I don't really have time to go into it, except to say that it's a sign that we missed reality a few exits back and now we're hurt and embarrassed and frustrated and it's all just too much! It happens. We are human. We can be patient with ourselves. But we don't want to let ourselves off the hook too easily either.
The path part of this is to work it, kneed it, ponder it, write about it, talk about it. Examine your behavior and the behavior of those around you. Look into the shadows and reflect on the patterns.
Patience with our life has the same tension as the other two. Patience is often used like a hammer or a lid by people in power to put off change and justice. Two quick quotes by people with much more experience than me in this area.
Fredrick Douglas: "“Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them."
Langston Hughes: "What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up/like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore - and then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over - like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags like a heavy load. Or does it explode?"
One last quote to illustrate the other side of this coin and the tension between them: "Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.”