Hopelessness
Apr. 11th, 2025 08:57 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mickiI think I said I found the last chapter a little bit boring? Well, this chapter on hopelessness has so much stuff in it that I might have to break it up over several days to talk about. It's really interesting and quite challenging and I'm gonna quote a lot of it because I think it's pretty profound and interesting stuff.
“Turning your mind toward the Dharma does not bring security or confirmation. Turning your mind toward the Dharma does not bring any ground to stand on. In fact, when your mind turns towards the Dharma, you fearlessly acknowledge impermanence and change and begin to get the knack of hopelessness.”
But for Pema Chodron, hopelessness isn’t a bad thing! It is in fact “the beginning of the beginning. Without giving up hope- that there's somewhere better to be, that there's someone better to be- we will never relax with where we are or who we are.... To think that we can finally get it all together is unrealistic period to seek for some lasting security is futile period to undo our very ancient and very stuck habitual patterns of mind requires that we begin to turn around some of our most basic assumptions. Believing in a solid, separate self, continuing to seek pleasure and avoid pain, thinking that there's someone out there is to blame for our pain- one has to get totally fed up with these ways of thinking. One has to give up hope that this way of thinking bring us satisfaction. Suffering begins to dissolve when we can question the belief or the hope that those anywhere to hide.”
OK, this is pretty basic Buddhist stuff; the first noble truth of suffering, right? And yet it feels like it's taking it a step further by really embracing hopelessness as a starting point. “Hopelessness means that we no longer have the spirit for holding our trip together. We may still want to hold our trip together. We longed to have some reliable, comfortable ground under our feet, but we've tried 1000 ways to hide and 1000 ways to tie up all the loose ends, and the ground just keeps moving under us. Trying to get lasting security teaches us a lot, because if we never try to do it, we never notice that it can't be done. Turning our minds towards the Dharma speeds up the process of discovery period at every turn we realize once again that it's completely hopeless- we can't get any ground under our feet.”
So once again, this seems like basic Buddhism, though put in a really stark way. Embracing hopelessness just seems, well, like despair. But then she gets really interesting in the next bit:
“The difference between theism and nontheism is not whether one does or does not believe in God. It is an issue that applies to everyone, including Buddhists and non Buddhists. Theism is a deep seated conviction that there's some hand to hold: if we just do the right things, someone will appreciate us and take care of us. It means thinking there's always going to be a babysitter available when we need one period we are all inclined to abdicate our responsibilities and delegate our authority to something outside ourselves. Non theism is relaxing with the ambiguity and uncertainty of the present moment without reaching for anything to protect ourselves.
We sometimes think that Dharma is something outside of ourselves- something to believe in, something to measure up to. However, Dharma isn't a belief; It isn't dogma. It is total appreciation of impermanence and change period the teachings disintegrate when we try to grasp them. We have to experience them without hope. Many brave and compassionate people have experienced them and taught them. The message is fearless; Dharma was never meant to be a belief that we blindly follow. Dharma gives us nothing to hold on to at all. Nontheism is finally realizing that there's no babysitter that you can count on. You just get a good one and then he or she is gone. Nontheism is realizing that it's not just babysitters that come and go. The whole of life is like that. This is the truth and the truth is inconvenient. New line new line for those who want something to hold on to you, life is even more inconvenient. From this point of view, theism is an addiction. We're all addicted to hope- hope that the doubt and mystery will go away. This addiction has a painful effect on society: a society based on lots of people addicted to getting ground under their eat is not a very compassionate place.”
Dude. Dude. This is some pretty heavy stuff. Like, I get the point. Seeking security is part of the cause of suffering. But wow. Wow. This just seems such a stark way to put it. I mean in a sense, this teaching is still compatible with certain forms of theism that say God does not for example perform miracles. I feel like in a certain way this would be compatible with kushner's theism for example, but even he would say God is about giving hope, so maybe not.
At this particular moment, when I'm looking anywhere for hope given the current political situation, I don't know that this is a teaching I can embrace, but it is a really interesting way of finding hope in hopelessness, I guess?
“Turning your mind toward the Dharma does not bring security or confirmation. Turning your mind toward the Dharma does not bring any ground to stand on. In fact, when your mind turns towards the Dharma, you fearlessly acknowledge impermanence and change and begin to get the knack of hopelessness.”
But for Pema Chodron, hopelessness isn’t a bad thing! It is in fact “the beginning of the beginning. Without giving up hope- that there's somewhere better to be, that there's someone better to be- we will never relax with where we are or who we are.... To think that we can finally get it all together is unrealistic period to seek for some lasting security is futile period to undo our very ancient and very stuck habitual patterns of mind requires that we begin to turn around some of our most basic assumptions. Believing in a solid, separate self, continuing to seek pleasure and avoid pain, thinking that there's someone out there is to blame for our pain- one has to get totally fed up with these ways of thinking. One has to give up hope that this way of thinking bring us satisfaction. Suffering begins to dissolve when we can question the belief or the hope that those anywhere to hide.”
OK, this is pretty basic Buddhist stuff; the first noble truth of suffering, right? And yet it feels like it's taking it a step further by really embracing hopelessness as a starting point. “Hopelessness means that we no longer have the spirit for holding our trip together. We may still want to hold our trip together. We longed to have some reliable, comfortable ground under our feet, but we've tried 1000 ways to hide and 1000 ways to tie up all the loose ends, and the ground just keeps moving under us. Trying to get lasting security teaches us a lot, because if we never try to do it, we never notice that it can't be done. Turning our minds towards the Dharma speeds up the process of discovery period at every turn we realize once again that it's completely hopeless- we can't get any ground under our feet.”
So once again, this seems like basic Buddhism, though put in a really stark way. Embracing hopelessness just seems, well, like despair. But then she gets really interesting in the next bit:
“The difference between theism and nontheism is not whether one does or does not believe in God. It is an issue that applies to everyone, including Buddhists and non Buddhists. Theism is a deep seated conviction that there's some hand to hold: if we just do the right things, someone will appreciate us and take care of us. It means thinking there's always going to be a babysitter available when we need one period we are all inclined to abdicate our responsibilities and delegate our authority to something outside ourselves. Non theism is relaxing with the ambiguity and uncertainty of the present moment without reaching for anything to protect ourselves.
We sometimes think that Dharma is something outside of ourselves- something to believe in, something to measure up to. However, Dharma isn't a belief; It isn't dogma. It is total appreciation of impermanence and change period the teachings disintegrate when we try to grasp them. We have to experience them without hope. Many brave and compassionate people have experienced them and taught them. The message is fearless; Dharma was never meant to be a belief that we blindly follow. Dharma gives us nothing to hold on to at all. Nontheism is finally realizing that there's no babysitter that you can count on. You just get a good one and then he or she is gone. Nontheism is realizing that it's not just babysitters that come and go. The whole of life is like that. This is the truth and the truth is inconvenient. New line new line for those who want something to hold on to you, life is even more inconvenient. From this point of view, theism is an addiction. We're all addicted to hope- hope that the doubt and mystery will go away. This addiction has a painful effect on society: a society based on lots of people addicted to getting ground under their eat is not a very compassionate place.”
Dude. Dude. This is some pretty heavy stuff. Like, I get the point. Seeking security is part of the cause of suffering. But wow. Wow. This just seems such a stark way to put it. I mean in a sense, this teaching is still compatible with certain forms of theism that say God does not for example perform miracles. I feel like in a certain way this would be compatible with kushner's theism for example, but even he would say God is about giving hope, so maybe not.
At this particular moment, when I'm looking anywhere for hope given the current political situation, I don't know that this is a teaching I can embrace, but it is a really interesting way of finding hope in hopelessness, I guess?
