Advice for a World in Turmoil

Just Don’t Make your suffering Worse

I woke up exhausted this morning. After 3 years of watching the horror called American Politics, I am looking for sustenance to continue. What is the truth, and how can I help. I remember my Zen sister and mentor Maylie Scott repeating the words of Myoon Maurine Stuart Roshi: “Just don’t avert.”  Her teaching is deep, wide and subtle. Continuing to take in traumatic events is not in itself healing. I’m sure Myoon Maurine did not issue this advice as a method to increase suffering. But how do we use this practice as remedy? How do we keep looking, taking in the suffering, and continuing to help and support one another? The practice of being willing to be present, rather than fleeing pain, can open awareness. And you won’t make your suffering worse with layers of cover-up stories and resistance.

This reminds me of the myofascial treatments I get for chronic pain. Steady pressure on the most painful knot results in its release. Yes, the muscle is in spasm, but even a muscle spasm is impermanent. Rather than reacting to the knot with tightness in surrounding tissue, why not turn towards it? What happens when we turn towards our pain?

When I face toward the pain I recognize that the world has not been otherwise, it has always been one tribe hunting another. Part of my current suffering is waking up to the understanding that this suffering will not go away. Ever. But I can make it worse. Part of my suffering is WITBOW—Wishing it to be otherwise. Part of my suffering is resenting the #@%* people that are hurting others. Part of my suffering is wanting to live in my own world. But like the Buddha and all teachers, we need to leave the dream world. And we don’t have the strength to suffer unnecessarily. So why add layers of longing for the impossible to our current burden? Not averting allows us to see how we add to our suffering.

So what can I do? What can we do about our current suffering? First, we must nourish ourselves, we need strength; we need endurance. What does that mean for you? Healthy eating, exercise, loving relationships, enjoying any moment you can and using your health resources wisely. Bubble baths? Massage? Walks in nature? Second, we must reach out to help each other. When I go on Facebook, I give as many likes as I can; likes raise serotonin and/or dopamine in our brain. We are connected and we need to support each other as resources. Have you noticed when you are sinking, one of your friends is rallying? Third, as the survivors of Franco’s Spain have told me, “Your job is to survive this regime; the dictators will come and go.” The Spaniards should know; they endured Franco’s fascism for forty years; people were shot in the streets—gunned down for opposing views. When in Madrid, my Spanish daughter-in-law pointed out to me where her paternal grandmother had been jailed for 10 years. Ouch! Finally, when we don’t avert, we settle into the reality of this moment. This moment of acceptance is always available. Our work is to find our true self, settle and find peace. Thich Nhat Hanh described this process as seeing and hearing our True Names.

PLEASE CALL ME BY MY TRUE NAMES

Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow— even today I am still arriving.

Look deeply: every second I am arriving to be a bud on a Spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings, learning to sing in my new nest, 

to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry, to fear and to hope.
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and 

death
of all that are alive. 

I am the mayfly metamorphosing
on the surface of the river.
And I am the bird
that swoops down to swallow the mayfly. 

I am the frog swimming happily
in the clear water of pond.
And I am also the grass-snake
that silently feeds itself on the frog. 

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,

my legs as thin as bamboo sticks. And I am the arms merchant selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat.
who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea pirate. And I am the pirate,

my heart not yet capable of seeing and loving.

I am a member of the politburo, with plenty of power in my hands, And I am the man who has to pay his “debt of blood” to my people dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

My joy is like Spring, so warm
it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth. My pain is like a river of tears,
so vast it fills the four oceans. 

Please call me by my true names,
so I can hear all my cries and laughs at 

once,
so I can see that my joy and pain are one. 

Please call me by my true names, so I can wake up,
and the door of my heart
could be left open, 

the door of compassion.
—Thich Nhat Hanh 

This poem was written in 1978, during the time of helping the boat people. It was first read at a retreat in Kosmos Center in Amsterdam, Holland, organized by Niko Tideman. Daniel Berrigan was there.

(Reprint courtesy of the Parallax Press.)

Posted by

Grace Schireson