Welcome to the Buddhist Boot Camp Podcast. Our intention is to awaken, enlighten, enrich, and inspire a simple and uncomplicated life. Discover the benefits of mindful living with your host, Timber Hawkeye. Over the years, we have talked about mindfulness as the gap between impulse and response. We know that a consistent meditation practice helps us lengthen the pause after we get triggered, and we also know that nobody but us is responsible for what we feel unless we give them that power.
The gap we need between impulse and response can be as brief as one deep breath, or as long as it takes for us to respond skilfully instead of reacting irrationally. We can use a long pause to figure out whether our impulse is rooted in love or fear, question if our urges are fueled by the ego or the goodness within, and reflect on any unmet needs behind our feelings so we can better understand and explain ourselves rather than act out.
We can take a rather long pause if the conversation is over email, for example, when it's easy to take a few deep breaths before writing back, and certainly count to ten before clicking the SEND button. But how do we practice mindfulness in the middle of a heated discussion, for example, when we feel the need to immediately say something?
Well, first and foremost, know that the so-called "need" you feel to immediately say something is just your ego trying to hijack the situation before you can formulate a skillful response. Unless you are on a game show, where you need to buzz your answer as quickly as possible, you have plenty of time, you can ask for more time, and you can take your time.
When we don't take our time, we tend to regret saying things out of anger, buying stuff on impulse, or storming out of a room like a child throwing a tantrum. For instances where there truly isn't enough time for deep contemplation, or even enough time to count to ten, however, we do need a very quick and easy filter to help us out. And this episode is about what I'm going to start doing in split-second pauses when it's all the time I have.
It all unraveled recently after I had a disagreement with my cousin. I called a friend to get another perspective on the situation, and after explaining what happened, I asked her, "Do you think this is a big deal?" And that's when she asked me the most important question of all: "Do you want it to be a big deal?" Boy, did I pause after that! Do I want to make it a big deal? That's a great question.
I have options! Until she asked me that, I didn't think there could be a perspective from which this wasn't a big deal, because, conveniently enough, I only saw the situation from my point of view, with me at the center of the universe. Assessed by someone else's perspective, however, what was happening could be made into a big deal, or it could be left well enough alone.
The ego gets involved quickly and makes everything a big deal, while the first thing the guru within each of us does is contemplate whether something even warrants a response, let alone a reaction. In game show terms, the ego is trigger-happy with the finger on the buzzer, while the guru waits patiently for the full question to be asked before speaking, formulating a skillful response that may not be instant, but will likely be meaningful.
Even if the pause between impulse and response is brief, a great question to ask yourself is, "Do I want to make a big deal out of this?" Or the shorter version, which I prefer because it works in every situation: simply pause and ask yourself, "What am I doing?" We are so good at looking back at situations and wondering, "What was I thinking?" But we're not so good at stopping in the middle of something and asking ourselves, "What am I doing?" Think about how many times you've sat
around food with friends and said, "Oh my God, I'm so full," but then took another bite. We don't have to finish everything on our plates despite how many of us have been raised by parents who told us we can't go anywhere until everything on the plate is
gone. We are adults now. We can box up the rest, save it for later, feed the homeless or the birds on our street, anything but feel and feed the false "need" to keep eating, keep drinking, keep arguing, staying in toxic relationships or bad jobs, living in cities we hate, all because we think we are too invested in what we are already doing to stop.
Don't wait until you look back years later and ask yourself, "What was I thinking?" Pause multiple times throughout the day, especially when you are smack down in the middle of a meal or a night out with friends, a movie, a conversation, anything... and ask yourself, "What am I doing?" And if you realize you are still eating even though you are full, or drinking even though you were done twenty minutes ago, or
if you decide within a half hour of a two-hour movie that you don't like it, it's okay to stop. Why is it such a big deal to stop in the middle of a meal or a conversation and say, "I don't want to do this anymore?" Well, is it a big deal, or do we make it so? We would first have to stop to ask ourselves, and find out.
So, when things don't go our way, or when plans change, people disappoint us, we lose money, or we waste time, effort, or energy, our mind either dismisses what is truly a big deal and brushes it aside, or it magnifies experiences and turns them into a big deal. Either way, even if the pause is only one-second long, use it to ask yourself, "What am I doing?" I bet you will find what you do after that pause will be very different than how you would respond if you don't ask yourself that question.
Your text messages will be different, your conversations will be different, your meals, heck, if you make it a habit to regularly ask yourself, "What am I doing?" then your entire life will be different, and I dare say that that's a pretty big deal! Timber Hawkeye is the bestselling author of Faithfully Religionless and Buddhist Boot Camp.
For additional information, please visit BuddhistBootCamp.com, where you can order autographed books to support the Prison Library Project, Watch Timber's inspiring TED Talk, and join our monthly mailing list. We hope you have enjoyed this episode, and invite you to subscribe for more thought-provoking discussions. Thank you for being a Soldier of Peace in the Army of Love. 🙏