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. Like most of us, I was not born into a life of mindfulness or meditation.
I'm not proud of it, but I spent my teenage years and most of my twenties mindlessly eating, drinking, smoking, numbing, escaping, lying, cheating, and running my mouth with no regard for possible consequences or how my actions might affect others. Needless to say, it has not been a seamless transition from that lifestyle to mindful living. It's not like the spiritual journey is only difficult in the beginning or that you reach a
certain point and it's all downhill from there. Even after many years of practice, we still sometimes take a tiny step forward, two giant steps back, climb up a steep cliff, only to fall halfway down a treacherous slope, and then start again. I used to think the word Relapse only applied for a setback in someone's recovery from addiction, for example, or the deterioration of someone's health after a period of improvement. But we can also experience a relapse in our mindfulness practice.
After making significant progress in certain aspects of our lives, it can be extremely discouraging and infuriating when we revert back to old behavior patterns that we thought we had already outgrown. Even with a well-established and diligently-cultivated meditation practice, everyone stumbles from time to time. For example, it doesn't matter how dedicated I may be to mindful eating, I still sometimes lose the battle against deep-fried, sugar-coated, or salty deliciousness.
In other words, we all relapse sometimes, but it's important to remember that a relapse is a bruise, not a tattoo. In sports terms, losing a point is not the same as losing the game, and we are all still in the game. Sometimes we make life changes and don't repeatedly slip back to old habits, but many of our behavior patterns are so deeply embedded in our personalities, mannerisms, and routines, yet even then, none of them are set in stone.
I decided to quit smoking many years ago, for example, and I haven't slipped once, but I've also vowed to be gentle with my words, and in all honesty, that is where I keep slipping. Mindful speech is where I often fall short. I do well for a while, but then I relapse back to harsh insensitivity and totally screw things up. Of course, and rather unfortunately, it tends to happen when mindful speech would matter most.
If it wasn't for a couple of amazing friends pointing out to me when my words are as sharp as darts or as damaging as daggers, I don't know if I would even be aware of the many opportunities to reflect on my tone of voice or choice of words, apologize, and self-correct. We are all a work-in-progress, and a change that comes easily to one person, may be someone else's lifelong battle. Good thing this is not a competition.
There is one commitment, however, that we can all make and even help each other keep, and that's the commitment to continue trying. Mindfulness is called a practice for a reason. When deciding on a new path in life, instead of focusing on breaking old habits, I have found that creating new habits inevitably replaces the old. Because if we just focus on the old habit we are trying to break, we just reinforce it. But to implement changes in the way we respond to the world around us,
I highly recommend you read Atomic Habits by James Clear. He offers practical strategies to master tiny behavior changes that lead to remarkable results. If you are having trouble changing your habits, it turns out the problem isn't you. According to James, bad habits repeat themselves, not because you don't want to change, necessarily, but because your system of implementing change is working against you. So, if Buddhist Boot Camp is the WHY, then Atomic Habits is the HOW TO.
I really wish the two books were sold together. We may not have been born into a life of mindfulness and meditation, but we can certainly choose that life from this moment forward. New beginnings start with each breath. So, get ready... set... change! Good luck! 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. 🙏