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. I want you to imagine a 50-pound bag dirt on the floor. It is in the middle of your path between the front door and the bathroom, forcing you to walk around it or step over it multiple times a day.
That obstacle is 25 kilograms at which you frequently curse, regularly trip over, sometimes stub your toe against, or twist your ankle, yet you refuse to pick it up and move it because you claim it would either require too work, it's just too heavy, or the excuse I hear most often, "That's easier said than done." All over the world, people would rather learn to live with the dirt and their bruised ankles than do whatever it takes to clear their path.
Walking around the dirt seems like the easier choice because it involves no heavy lifting, but it's a passive and sometimes subconscious contribution to our own suffering that manifests itself in other areas of our lives as well. Depending on the household in which we were raised, many of us took our very first steps on egg shells, so we may not even be aware that a life without landmines is even an option.
And if we don't do whatever it takes to smooth out our path as adults, life can quickly turn into an obstacle course, especially if you have multiple piles of dirt to navigate around.
Of course, we're not actually talking about dirt, egg shells, or landmines, we're talking about real-world obstacles, such as miserable jobs that we refuse to quit, failed relationships we can't seem to abandon, dietary or fitness indecisions that affect our overall health, uncomfortable living situations from which we can move but don't, and so on... All too often, making big changes seems like too much work, so we just keep on keeping on.
Is this phenomenon a simple case of us not trusting ourselves, or are we the human equivalent of the terrible urban legend about the frog-in-hot-water myth, where a frog will immediately jump out of boiling water to save itself, but if the water is very gradually heated, the frog will remain in the pot until it boils to death. What are we waiting for? Growth is uncomfortable, that's true, but so is staying in a situation you have outgrown.
Are we waiting for someone else to save us? Why are we so afraid to rescue ourselves? Do we feel undeserving of better circumstances? Are we looking for permission to make a change? I ask because a good friend just told me she literally needed to hear her therapist's approval before taking the first steps to ending her unhealthy marriage, even though she is a well-educated, intelligent, and smart woman herself. Indecision is a decision in-and-of itself.
Would it encourage you to hear that more people tell me they got fired, for example, and it ended up being the best thing that ever happened to them, not the worst? Or personal accounts of people moving to a new city, state, or country, scary as it was, kickstarting a wonderful new life? Even the pandemic practically forced many of us to finally do what we've been meaning to do for decades. These success stories are not rare, tragedy is. What will it take for us to trust our ability to thrive?
When I say our behavior patterns manifest themselves in different ways, or that the way you do one thing is the way you do all things, here is what I mean: Imagine there are certain topics that you are uncomfortable discussing with anyone, not your spouse, doctor, or best friend. You are more likely to spend your entire life avoiding those conversations than you are to
invest a month or two overcoming the discomfort itself. That's exactly like walking around the piles of dirt on the floor instead of picking them up, essentially allowing fear to stop you from living. A fear of heights, for example, would leave you looking at the Eiffel Tower from the ground instead of seeing Paris from the top. Fear will run and ruin your life if you let it.
I am personally terrified of public speaking, for example, but I do it multiple times a month and it never gets easier, I still sweat bullets every time, but you know what? I am less afraid of fear than I used to be. That's the shift: seeing fear as a speed bump, not a dead-end street. Once you do that, you realize that even a hundred piles of dirt can be removed with some diligence, determination, and patience, which is why we work on building those skills
in the first place, isn't it? Go slow, of course, but go forward nonetheless. Doing it once makes the next time more manageable, and the time after that, and the time after that. It all boils down to this: When you love yourself, you make better decisions, and the reverse is also true. So, if you were waiting for permission to give yourself some compassion, consider this podcast episode your green light. We're not just products of our past, we're the sum of our tomorrows as well, so start now.
And if you find value in these podcast episodes, please show your support with as little as $1 a month through patreon.com/buddhistbootcamp Thank you for your commitment to growth. You are my distant but ever-present accountability buddy, and I appreciate you. Namaste. 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. 🙏