Wise Endurance

We’re approaching the end of the year. It’s a time when people wish one another a happy new year. You have to think about what that realistically means. It can’t mean, “May all situations in the new year be happy.” After all, we’re in the human realm. Last year, everyone was wishing everybody a happy new year, and did all the situations in the world turn out well? Well, no. We’ve had some good things here at the monastery, some bad things. The world at large has had good things and a lot of bad things.

The wish for a happy new year realistically means, “May you be able to find happiness whatever the situation.” That requires discernment. You may think that there are some situations in which happiness would be impossible, but remember: Arahants can live with anything and not suffer. So it’s a skill that can be developed. There is a way to find happiness in any situation.

One of the foundations for that skill, of course, is endurance. The Buddha emphasizes its importance at the very beginning of the Ovāda-pāṭimokkha: “Khantī paramaṃ tapo titikkhā—Patient endurance is the highest austerity”—the burning away of defilements—but it has to be endurance with wisdom. We’re not talking about the endurance of a water buffalo. Water buffalos just put up with anything. They’re standing out in the sun; shelter is nearby, but they still stand out in the sun. That’s not what we want. The Buddha’s first principle of determination is not to neglect discernment. We have to think about how the messages of the Buddha’s teachings on discernment aid in putting up with difficult situations.

The important thing they all emphasize is the fact that you can do something to make sure you don’t suffer. In some cases, this involves thinking of new ways to change the situation. In other cases, it deals more directly with your own mind: The situation outside can’t be changed, but you can change your attitude in such a way that you don’t suffer. The emphasis here is always on the principle of agency: You can act.

One of the most depressing things about a difficult situation is the feeling that there’s nothing you can do. You’re hemmed in on all sides. But the Buddha is there to say, No, there is something you can do.

Look at his teachings on kamma. He says we have many seeds sprouting in our kamma field. It’s not just one kamma account. Lots of different seeds are getting ready to sprout. We have our choice as to which ones we’re going to irrigate, which ones we’re going to encourage.

What this means in practical terms is that if you’re in a bad situation—say, at work or in the family—you can look at what you’re focusing on. Try to focus on the areas where there’s a potential for well-being, where there’s a potential for strength. Don’t focus on the things that make you weak. Don’t keep telling yourself that you can’t stand something, because you’re not totally on the receiving end of things. That’s the other lesson of kamma: Some of the things you’re experiencing right now are the results of past kamma, but to experience them, you have to create some present-moment kamma, some present-moment intentions.

So: What are your intentions right now? The situation may thwart some of your intentions, but there are other intentions you could develop that would actually open some space for well-being in the situation. We can see this with situations outside, and with situations in your own body where there’s pain. You can focus on a pain in such a way as to make yourself miserable, or you can focus on it in a way where you can separate yourself out from the it. That’s a skill you can develop.

The situation at work may be such that you don’t get your way, but you can use the opportunity to develop other perfections in addition to endurance. You can develop your generosity. You can take some initiative. There’s always something that can be done.

The same when you apply the teachings of the four noble truths: Being with what is unpleasant, being with what is unloved, is one of the examples of suffering listed in the first noble truth. But remember: All the forms of suffering that are listed there boil down to the five clinging-aggregates: clinging to form, feeling, perception, thought fabrications, or consciousness.

In particular, what are your perceptions, what are your thought fabrications about a particular issue? Remember that even with the aggregates, there’s an element that comes in from the past and an element of fabrication in the present. The way you breathe, the way you talk to yourself, the perceptions and feelings you focus on that take whatever potential there is for a particular aggregate, a particular perception or thought fabrication, and turn it into your actual present-moment experience.

So, how are you breathing right now that’s adding unnecessary stress or suffering to the situation? How are you talking to yourself? Where are you directing your thoughts? How are you evaluating things? Can you focus on something else? Can you look at the issue from another angle? What are the perceptions you hold in mind? How do you portray this situation to yourself? Can you look at it in a different way? Analyze it in a different way? Try to see some openings.

Even dependent co-arising is a useful teaching to apply, particularly with the factors that come before sensory contact—the things you see, hear, smell, taste, touch, think about. The thoughts that come unbidden into the mind are all past kamma. But prior to that, you have the factor of fabrication, but also name-and-form—particularly intentions and “attentions,” acts of attention.

Again, what are the intentions you have with regard to this situation you find so difficult? Can you change your intentions? If you’re dealing with pain in the body and your intention is to make the pain go away and yet it doesn’t go away, you’re going to get frustrated. But as the Buddha said, it is possible to be with pain and not have it invade the mind or remain there. Make that your intention. Then based on that intention, figure out what perceptions, what acts of attention, what questions you’re asking are getting in the way, and how you can change them.

With any situation, look at how you’re paying attention to it. What questions are you asking? The primary question should be: “If there’s suffering here, what am I doing that’s contributing to it? What can I do to stop contributing in that way?” It may sound like you’re placing the blame on yourself for what’s wrong with the situation, but that’s not the case. There can be plenty of things wrong, but there are times when you can’t change the wrong situation outside, yet you can change the fact that you’re suffering from it. You have power there.

That’s what the Buddha is focusing on: the power you have to act, the power you have not to suffer. Focus on questions that would orient you in that direction.

This is what it means not to neglect discernment, to be wise in your endurance. You don’t just stand out in the sun when it’s hot. There’s shelter, and you’re capable of moving into that shelter. Go there. You have agency.

That’s a large part of the Buddha’s message. We’re suffering but we don’t have to—and he’s showing us how. So try to take his teachings, some of which may seem abstract, and realize that they pertain directly to your problem of having to be with the unloved, be with the unpleasant. There may be things you have to tolerate, but there are a lot of things you don’t have to tolerate. The things you shouldn’t tolerate, the Buddha said, are any unskillful thoughts coming up in the mind.

So ask yourself: How are you contributing to the suffering through your unskillful thoughts? Focus on that question. You’ll realize there’s a lot you can do. There are a lot of openings. Take advantage of them.