I’ve had more than a few episodes of sitting with emotional turmoil through my years of meditation practice. This sitting period, though, proved to be different from others. It was the first one where the insight of non-self directly reduced my suffering.
I had been struggling with making a decision in my relationship for a while, and the frustration around it sat heavy in my chest as soon as I woke up. I knew this was one of the more “stormy” meditation sessions as soon as I settled on top of my cushion. Thanks to years of painful experiences caused by running away from my emotions, though, I had a pretty good idea of what to do next: I closed my eyes and opened my heart to welcome whatever was present.
There in the midst of my experience was awareness: the white canvas on which the vivid paint blotches of my emotions bled. Knots of confusion, sadness, and frustration pulsed through my body, mixed with the momentary relief of peace whenever my mind found its way back to the featherlight touch of the breath. Every once in a while, a thought – some plan on what I would say or do, some analysis of the pros and cons of the decision that I had gone over hundreds of times before – pulled me into its vortex and I was lost.
Compassion also arose in response to the distress in my mind and body. I had made it a practice to cultivate compassion when facing difficult mind states, ever since I learned in therapy of my tendency to approach painful emotions through an analytical lens to avoid fully feeling them. Supported by the gentle strength of compassion, I came back to witness the present moment in all its messiness again and again.
I had done this before, and I thought I knew how this would unfold. Usually the pain would subside after being calmed by loving kindness, or an insight into my childhood conditioning would arise to shed light on the situation. This time, however, it was the insight of non-self that peeled back the curtain, revealing a new way of seeing that pacified the chaos.
For a few moments, I was thrust from the eye of the storm to a few feet away from the unfurling thoughts and feelings and sensations. My experience of the turmoil was relieved of the struggle of trying to fix it. I saw the problem and all of the emotions around it as a natural phenomenon, like water rushing over rocks in a river. It wasn’t personal any more – not “my” problem anymore. I felt free.
This lasted only for a few seconds before I was dropped back into the storm: the problem became “my” problem again, with the whole emotional struggle following suit. But it wasn’t exactly as it was. I had caught a glimpse of the sky that was previously obscured by dark swirling clouds.
The experience reminded me of a saying about the Buddhist teaching of non-self: “Yes, you are real, but you are not really real.” That was what the insight left me with: a quiet understanding that this was just phenomena unfolding – naturally, matter-of-factly, not about me. Sure, on some level, it was “my” problem, but ultimately, it wasn’t really “my”, and it wasn’t really “problem”, either. A momentary glimpse of truth made all the difference.
Does this mean I can just step back from all my difficulties from now on instead of engaging with love and compassion? No, of course not! Insight is also impermanent, and it is by courageously being present with the difficulties in life that new insights come. But, even by just a little, this experience has made it easier for my mind to let go. It was one more blockage removed, making it easier to touch that knowing, deep down, that the stories the mind so often gets caught up in are not “really real.” And, well, it’s such a lovely feeling of relief, isn’t it? To take a break from trying so hard to control the uncontrollable. To breathe a little more freely. Isn’t this lightening up – of delusion, of grasping onto and pushing away of constantly-changing phenomena – what the Path is all about?
