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 to talk about what is happening right now in the world, and more importantly talk about what is happening within us. Because we can maintain our inner peace regardless of what's going on around us. And so, that's what I'm hoping we can tap into: is how are you doing internally?
We talk a lot in our monthly groups about pain is inevitable suffering is optional. And the full equation, so to speak, is pain plus resistance equals suffering. Pain in life is inevitable: growing old, getting sick, dying, but if you resist change, if you resist what is happening, it's the resistance itself that causes the anguish, that create the turmoil within us, that makes it really hard to deal with what's happening.
I think it would be unfair to say there isn't some... I don't want to say the word struggle because this is not a struggle, per se, it's a shift. We're simply being asked to keep something from boiling over, so to speak. And perhaps patience is what we're asked for and maybe that's what's lacking? Would you say that's what makes this difficult? Mariann said "I'm using this time as a reset, and it's giving me an opportunity "to slow down and be intentional.
"I truly believe some changes will be made after the pandemic." You know, what changes are we going to implement in our lives once the quote-unquote "Ban" is lifted? Are we going to continue being mindful of Needs versus Wants? Or are we going to go right back to our old ways? Are we going to honor and celebrate how nature has thrived when we reduced the pollution? How is this going to change us?
Someone else said, "I was wondering how we could keep aware of the lessons "that we have learned during this period when we go back to everyday life?" Judy immediately responded, "How about journaling?" Journaling is one thing, I only have a hard time with that, because then you have stacks and stacks of journals and none that would actually be reminders, and so sticky notes are good for me, like putting a note that says, "Need or want?"
A friend of mine had a difficult time with always going online, and I would go as far as to use the word wasting a lot of his time surfing websites and whatnot, social media, and so he set his computer so that when he opens up a new browser, his home screen is an image that says, "What is the best use of your time?" And more often than not, as soon as he saw, "What is the best use of your time?" He'd be like, "Well it's not this." So he would close the laptop again and go do something else.
When he did log on to social media, he had one of those kitchen timers, those egg timers, and he would just set it for 15 minutes and that was how long he had to lookup Facebook, lookup people's profiles, lookup the news, and then when the timer goes off, that's it. Someone else said, Yeah, the sticky note idea works because they rarely go back through
and re-open a journal. Once you have sticky notes, once you have the encapsulated lesson that you've learned, that can become your new morning meditation. What am I grateful for? What do I need versus what do I want? What do I have in my life rather than what am I lacking? Et cetera.
That way, it's not just something you do one time, it's something you implement into your daily routine that it becomes a pattern for you to wake up, and instead of thinking, "I didn't get enough sleep, I'm not rich enough "I'm not pretty enough, I'm not skinny enough," whatever you're thinking. I have enough food, I have enough blankets, I have enough family and friends.
Then that becomes your new morning routine of just showering yourself with the abundance in your life rather than what's lacking. So journal, then go through the journal, do a CliffNotes version of the journal, then go through the CliffNotes and do bullet points of the journal, and then use those bullet points in your morning meditation; does that help? I hope so.
And now I would invite you to take this step further. When I ask people, "What are you grateful for?" I often append to that and say "What are you grateful for? "Not WHO, but WHAT?" So that you can't say, I'm grateful for my boyfriend, I'm grateful for my kids or I'm grateful for my parents. You have to tap deeper and go, "What is it I'm grateful for? Not who... WHAT?" And then you can say, "I'm grateful for the companionship, I'm grateful for the support."
Your gratitude is in a way more specific but in a way it's applicable to many more people than just the one. Get really in touch with your gratitude. I think that's something we often overlook because it's easier to say, "Oh I'm grateful for my job." Well, why? What is it about your job you're grateful for? Is it the opportunity to learn?
Is it the opportunity to give? Find out what it is. When we talk about what am I grateful for choices is often at the top of my list: options, a variety, flexibility, those of us who have functioning limbs and internal organs. We've talked about this before about what's called the complaint bracelet, it's a bracelet you put on your wrist, and every time you catch yourself complaining you move it from one wrist to the other.
The idea is you raise awareness to how many times you complain throughout the day, and if your intention is to complain less, this goes in steps: the first thing is to raise awareness to how often you're complaining because most of the time we're not aware of our own habitual tendencies unless someone points it out to us, and often if they point it out to us without being asked, then we get upset with them
when really all they're doing is holding up a mirror to us. In fact, strangers hold a mirror to us all the time, that which we don't like about someone else is oftentimes exactly what we don't like about ourselves. And it irritates us when we see someone else do it because it's something that we wish we would do less of; we're just not very honest with ourselves about that. So let's see I'm going to read some more of the notes.
Freeman said, "I'm grateful for Timber." Oh, thank you. "For taking the time to create "this live stream, for the opportunity to share with the community during this time." Someone else said, "I'm grateful for you Timber." Thank you. "I want you to know that finding you has really helped me transform myself. "You have helped me keep the awareness of staying mindful and grateful
"for everyday blessings." I appreciate that. What I really hope you guys see is that, you know, if you feel like I'm holding your hand and we're walking on this path together, just be very aware that someone else is holding my other hand, you know, and we're all helping each other up. The message has transformed my life, so it just seems like the most natural thing for me to do is to share it with other people.
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. 🙏🏼