Fixation is Suffering
Wednesday, July 27th, 2005I came to spiritual practice after a life-long engagement with organizations and causes working to alleviate poverty, stop war, and get equal rights for everyone. My parents were classic liberals. Their idea of a nice family outing was taking us to anti-war marches in Washington. I started volunteering with non-profit organizations when I was 12.
I also grew up in communities where expressing outrage at “man’s inhumanity to man,” or especially man’s inhumanity was standard social currency. The world might indeed be outrageous, but being outraged was your progressive social membership card and a mark of your political identity.
As soon as I entered a Tantrik community, I learned that being outraged is nothing more than emotional reactivity: A sign of dualistic tension and lack of spiritual accomplishment. My teacher would laugh at me outright when I got all hot and bothered about some political issue or insensitivity.
A kula sister and I sat huddled together during these tirades of hilarity. We would whisper to each other: “He just doesn’t get it. He just doesn’t understand.” But he did.
At the same time, over the years, I have heard many statements that veer in the other direction, as far from outrage as possible. I now consider these to be just as reactive, just as much markers of contrived identity formations. I am talking about statements such as “What goes around comes around.” Or, “War happens.” Or, statements in which someone claims to know the karmic reason why horrible suffering was inflicted on a person or nation, and so shrugs off the whole event with a cool knowing smile.
Recently, I was in on a discussion about the situation between Tibet and China, the thrust of which seemed to be that it is no longer of concern because the Chinese are letting monks return to Tibet and some monasteries are being rebuilt. There was a general atmosphere of poo-pooing people who are still concerned about the fate of Tibet and the suffering of the Tibetan people.
While I am no longer running around waving my Banner of Outrage, I am not ready to trade it in for a Banner of Hip Indifference. I learned my lesson from my teacher, and I learned it all the way around: 360 degrees.
For myself, this stripping away over time has revealed one truth: there is no opinion worth having, no belief worth maintaining, and no story worth perpetuating.
The only thing we need to know is that people do suffer. Tibetan. Chinese. Whatever. We suffer in war. We suffer in peace from our own tensions. Any fixation is suffering. Our self-defining opinions, whether outraged or indifferent, are also suffering.
The more sadhana we do, the more we learn of our own suffering. The more courageous and thorough we are in facing and releasing our own suffering, the more capable we are of responding with compassion to the suffering of others. All others. There is nothing else to say about it.
Today I read something beautiful:
A tantric practitioner without fixation is deeply content.
I am very far from being without fixation, and very far from stabilization in this state of profound, abiding contentment. I have tasted it, though. And I know that it has a huge heart, big enough for worlds upon worlds and for the millions upon millions of beings of those worlds. It gathers everything compassionately to itself, without exception, without distinction, and without any comment at all.
OM Shanti, Shambhavi
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