Let the Fairy Tale Go

There is a myth we can sometimes bring into our practice: that if we practice long enough and hard enough, we will eventually be good enough to offer something of value.

If we could just be calmer under pressure, less timid, more generous. If we could stop getting caught in the same old reactions and know what to do, then how to do it without hesitation.

This story in our heads gives us something to work toward. It gets us onto the cushion, brings us to teachings, and helps us keep going when life gets difficult. Perhaps we have followed it for years.

But somewhere inside that far-off promise a judgment has already been made: the person we are now is insufficient. Our practice will redeem us though. One day, we will finally have something of value to offer.

The person we are trying to become

Wanting to wake up and be of benefit to others is understandable. That's the heart of the bodhisattva vow after all. We see our own suffering and the suffering we create. We lose our temper with someone we love and see them pull away. We want to respond differently, and practice can help us do that.

The difficulty begins when we take our shortcomings to mean we have nothing of value to offer yet. We make becoming an ideal version of ourselves a prerequisite for benefiting others, and overlook the opportunity we are capable of meeting right in front of us.

With that mistaken view, every experience becomes further evidence in a case we are building against ourselves. A great meditation session means we are getting somewhere. An anxious morning means we have lost our way. We speak sharply and wonder how, after all these years, we can still be this much of a prick.

We may even become more skillful with others while remaining just as harsh toward ourselves. We dismiss the help we have offered because we can still see where we fall short. The standard keeps moving as we approach it. There is always something else to overcome before we can trust that we have anything meaningful to share.

The imagined ideal is always waiting on the far side of our actual life. We never let ourselves meet the circumstances we are in. We imagine a life without the exhaustion that tests us daily. Meanwhile, someone here in this moment could use our attention and our willingness to help.

Practice can become a way of keeping us preoccupied with waiting for the perfect moment, even as it develops the very capacities we hesitate to use.

The life we think we need

The same myth can shape how we imagine liberation. We picture a freedom so perfect that it seems to belong somewhere else, beyond the uncertainty and difficulty of the life we have. Awakening begins to seem possible only for someone different, living a different life.

Then the conditions of our life begin to look unfit for practice. We may spend years waiting for our responsibilities to ease or a difficult relationship to settle so that our real work can begin.

There may be changes we need to make. Even while we work to change those circumstances, we can practice with what they bring up in us.

But what can we transform if we do not use our present circumstances? What else is there to liberate?

When we reject our present experience as evidence of our failure to practice, we reject the very material of our practice.

We already experience suffering. Becoming willing to acknowledge it allows us to investigate how we are caught and what releases that grip. Our present circumstances become the fuel for awakening when we are willing to work with what is here.

A practice that makes us human

Our practice gives us room to experience our life without having to turn every difficulty into a verdict.

We begin to notice what happens when we feel threatened. We learn to stay present long enough to hear another person. We recognize an impulse to defend ourselves and sometimes let it pass. When we have caused harm, we become more willing to acknowledge it and make amends.

This takes training. Our habits have consequences, and those consequences deserve our attention.

As we become more able to meet our own experience, we may find more room for the experience of others. We can stay with their uncertainty without rushing to provide an answer. We may acknowledge something we would once have brushed past.

The practice you need is the one that makes you more human. The one that enables you to walk with pain, to sit with uncertainty, and to dance with fear. Practice so that you might be kinder to others, that you might extend your hand because you are able.

Let the fairy tale go. Let the masquerade come to an end. The myth may have brought you here, but you don’t need to keep believing it.

A true practice opens your heart and your mind. You can experience that for yourself.