Q & A with Robina

The Kopan Monastery stupa garden at night. Photo: Ven. Katy Cole.

QUESTION My life has turned into me simply attempting to avoid emotional pain. Many things that folks tolerate, I walk away from.

It has gotten to the point where if someone is nice to me, I am waiting for "the ball to drop". Part of this viewpoint is due to personal experience; part me being reasonable and accepting impermanence. 

I no longer talk to my parents, my siblings, many friends, and ex partners. I keep my circle extremely small and am largely closed off despite a natural inclination to connect to others. This, of course, causes pain, although I do not feel loneliness.

There are a few phrases/teachings I frequently run through my head such as:

"I will take defeat upon myself,
And give the victory to others."

I rely on this when I am tempted to advocate for myself when I know another person is controlling the narrative and spreading misinformation. I just "let them win.” I would love to say this solely comes from a lack of attachment to ego, but it is partly due to me "cutting my losses" just so I can escape additional pain. “Believe/Say whatever you want. Just leave me alone."

Oftentimes, I just want to crawl in a hole and disappear.

How do I stop caring? This is really starting to affect me. Some days I struggle having compassion for others. 

You said my problem is that I want to be seen to be good person. It causes me suffering. So how do I stop? Patience? Forgiveness? I have no idea.

VEN. ROBINA Happy Tibetan New Year’s Day! Think of it as a new start – that’s how Tibetans think. They clean out their house, their things, wear their best clothes. Why don’t you do that?

Thank you for telling me about your mind. You have a great mind. I truly appreciate it. 

You’ve clearly got a strong karmic connection with this bodhisattva path, the wish to help others. Never doubt that. But, like all of us, you have delusions as well, the neuroses, the “mental afflictions,” as Buddhist psychology refers to attachment, anger, jealousy, pride and the rest.

Therefore, the reason we have problems, difficulties, suffering, etc., etc. is not because of love, compassion, the wish to be of benefit – all the virtues, our goodness, our saving grace.

Our job is to cultivate the clarity to distinguish between these two: delusions and virtues. They’re all running together, like a big soup, and we normally can’t tell one bit from another, because that’s not our way of seeing the mind in the West.

It’s a very special approach. We have to be clinical about it. It’s like when you first learn botany, it’s really hard to distinguish the weeds from the herbs, especially when they’re all growing together. Recently I was walking in the bush (as we Australians call the countryside) in what was, for me, a fairly flat, boring, sparse piece of land. All the things growing looked like all the other bits. In other words, knowing no botany, I had zero discrimination. But my nephew Justin, who’s a horticulturist, was in awe, so delighted at all the wonderful things. He could discriminate so clearly all the bits. Crucially, he could tell what would be harmful to eat, for example, and what would be nutritious.

That’s what we have to do with our minds. 

So, what is the main delusion that might be at the root of your problems?

First of all, we’ve all got all of them, but in different quantities. Attachment’s the main one for everyone, it’s our default, it runs the show. It’s this deep craving, at the level of assumption, that only the nice things should happen; attachment can only bear the nice things. The moment it doesn’t get what it wants, which is a thousand times a day, aversion/irritation/annoyance/anger arises, in various degrees of intensity. Again often quite subtle.

Another major one, often not identified in our culture unless it’s very blatant, is pride. Interestingly, its flip side is low-self esteem. They’re very much together.

This makes us kind of fragile. As soon as we reach out to someone and then the problems start, we instantly pull back, afraid of being hurt. 

In other words, it’s pride that makes us get hurt so easily. 

The voice of attachment is to always want something more, never satisfied.

The voice of anger/aversion is to find fault, criticize, blame.

The voice of pride is the yearning to be seen, to be heard, and when we’re not, we feel injured, pained, and we run away, close up.

Pride and anger are brothers. 

Atisha said “the best patience is humility” – or it could be the other way around, “the best humility is patience.”

The opposite of attachment is contentment, satisfaction.

The opposite of anger/aversion is patience, and therefore kindness.

The opposite of pride is humility.

The opposite of low-self esteem is self-confidence.

Just some thoughts for you.

Never give up!