Dancing With Fear, And Other Paradoxes

It's Judy Cohen and this is Wake Up Call 337.

Welcome.

So yesterday I went to Berkeley,

Over to Berkeley to teach,

And it's not the first class of the semester,

But it's the first in-person class for me,

It's the first time I've been with a bunch of real live humans,

Other than family gatherings and a few backyard get togethers since before Omicron and really since in two years.

So it was glorious.

It was just wonderful seeing the students in person,

Seeing their faces or the upper half of their faces.

So I really realized how much I miss that.

And because most of them are just starting out meditating,

This is the mindfulness class,

They came in and they came in ready to complain about them.

Their concentration isn't good.

Their minds wander all over the place.

They have too much stress.

They want to learn how to banish their anxiety.

That's a quote.

And I get it.

For years,

My practice was about becoming a better person.

When I could finally learn to be less angry,

When I had no more greed,

When I was kinder,

When I was skinnier,

When I was taller,

Then I would be happy.

And my practice still trends in that direction when I'm not being vigilant.

There are things I've noticed in the last several years about this constellation that I call Judy,

Which I didn't even know floated around in there.

And when I discovered those,

I initially wanted to banish them all or if not banish,

Then heal,

Right?

But these days I notice a subtle aggression is lurking in my desire to heal.

And don't get me wrong,

I believe in healing.

I believe in my own personal healing and growth,

But healing on interpersonal and systemic levels is justice and that the gulf between justice and where we are right now as a profession,

As a nation,

As a world is big.

It's just that desire to heal doesn't feel different to me anymore from a desire to have a steadier mind or a smaller waist.

It's aspirational,

I can say that,

But underneath I notice it's still more or less a kind of complaint against the present moment.

So chapter 17 of the Dhammapada,

Which is where we are this week,

Is called anger.

And when someone says they're angry or when I'm angry,

The thought is they're angry or when I'm angry,

The first thing that comes to my mind is what can I do about this?

How can I,

Pardon me,

How can I shift this or heal it?

And there I am filing a complaint against the present moment,

Which is where my students started out yesterday.

Teachings don't seem to approach anger or any other afflictive emotions or states of mind that way.

Absolutely,

They say in no uncertain terms,

Give up anger.

And that's how chapter 17 actually starts.

It starts with those actual words.

But the how is what's so powerful to me,

The how,

According to chapter 17.

And what it says is conquer anger with non-anger,

Conquer wickedness with goodness,

Conquer stinginess with giving and a liar with truth.

So instead of saying fight fire with fire or file a complaint against fear or against the wandering mind,

The verse is saying overcome afflictive states using wholesome ones.

So instead of trying to heal,

Which means to me anyway,

To get rid of whatever states of mind I don't find useful or appealing,

Right,

The instructions are to take the opposite positive quality and conquer with that.

And to me,

This feels like a kind of incredible amount of generosity.

It feels like being willing to say whatever is here is welcome.

My fear,

My anger,

My discomfort,

All welcome.

It's like a dance.

I'm dressed up.

The bubbly is pouring.

The music is flowing.

And I walk out onto the dance floor and anger asks me to dance.

And this is not who I wanted to dance with.

And I could say no,

But I offer my hand and we do a slow kind of tango,

Keeping eye contact.

And I'm trying to pay attention.

I'm trying to pay kind attention and it's so hard.

I don't want to make time for this.

I don't want to be willing.

But there is also a kind of tenderness,

Enough to make me want to really to weep,

Seeing anger in this light of tenderness.

And as it turns out,

It's also enough to dissolve the anger right before,

Right before my eyes.

And then someone taps anger on the shoulder and it's like,

Oh,

I'm going to die.

I'm going to die.

And then someone taps anger on the shoulder and suddenly I'm dancing with fear.

And here I really do not want to be.

My body is shaking.

It looks like a dance maybe from the outside,

But it's not in time with the beat I want to be keeping.

And it scares me to death.

Roosevelt was right.

But finally,

There's this very deep breath and resolve.

I resolve to have this dance with fear.

And now it's like,

What can I do?

But look into the face of fear and do that with curiosity.

Then maybe with love.

And if I do that same thing as with anger,

Fear also dissolves.

And of course,

Anger and fear don't dissolve forever.

They'll both be back.

I know that.

But maybe not so boldly or maybe not so often.

And then wickedness cuts in,

Right?

Steps on my toes,

Shoves me into the other dancers.

And for sure,

I did not invite wickedness to this dance,

To this party.

And I would love to be able to walk away.

But somehow I know that wickedness will follow me because,

Right,

Wickedness is wicked.

So I decide to be utterly good to wickedness.

I look into her face.

I listen to what she has to say.

I find some tiny dusty corner of my heart that's willing to love her too.

Or I don't know,

Maybe that's an overstatement.

Maybe it's not love.

But that's willing to make space for her too.

That's willing to be generous enough to make space for wickedness.

And it turns out that here the verse is also right.

Wickedness met with goodness turns out to be soluble as well.

Not solid,

But soluble.

And now it's the last dance and Liar grabs my hand and twirls me around the room.

I'm dizzy,

I'm uncomfortable,

Things aren't going my way,

Which is the way I had planned.

And so I find fault with the situation and with everyone at the dance.

And then it occurs to me that this is not what's true.

That my discomfort isn't their fault.

Because here they are at the dance and they've met their own matches out on the dance floor.

And their wickedness,

Their anger,

Their fear is leading them the same way mine lead me.

We're just the same.

And with that moment,

That flash of realization that by the way will also be gone soon.

Liar stops turning and stops spinning and finally out on the dance floor.

Finally,

There's a moment or two of peace.

If one speaks the truth and is not angry and gives when asked,

Even when one has little,

Then one comes into the presence of the gods.

That's the next verse in chapter 17.

And that presence of the gods,

To me that's the parts of ourselves that are good and generous and truthful.

My job isn't to convince anyone.

That's not why Berkeley Law is paying me the big bucks,

Right?

I just have to take them out onto the dance floor.

So I show them some basic walking meditation and then all 28 of us file out of the classroom.

And we occupy the main corridor of the law school.

And we're walking back and forth the short way.

So that anyone coming down the hall has to do their own dance.

And dodge us,

Dodge this big group strung all the way out down to the end of the hall of silent walking students.

And this slow silence descends on the whole hallway.

And the people navigating our practice space stop speaking as well or they lower their voices to whispers.

There's some sense of something,

The dharma,

The community that invites them into the dance.

There's no convincing,

There's no need to convince.

And also there's no more complaining about the wandering mind or about anxiety or about anything else that's arising.

At least for that moment.

There's only the gentle walking back and forth and eventually there's quiet slow talking.

And in that process,

The gentle conquering of anger with non-anger.

Conquering of wickedness with goodness,

Conquering of stinginess with giving and liars with truth.

Really begins to happen.

So let's sit.

Yeah and so you can take whatever posture is most supportive for you for the sit and you could even stand up and dance for this one if you wanted.

And just taking a few breaths to settle in.

Come to the present moment,

Whatever is here in the present moment for you,

Whoever is taking your hand,

Tapping your shoulder.

Because the truth of it is that we may bring a certain person to the dance with us but always gets a chance to decide who it is that we're going to dance with.

So just see who shows up and just keep dancing.

And yes,

What else can we do?

Yeah.

And just in the act of dancing with whatever is here.

The willingness.

Just notice if there's that generosity to be willing to be with whatever is here and really see that as this deep goodness.

That resides within you that is accessible.

And maybe let that quality be who is dancing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Conquer anger with non-anger.

Conquer wickedness with goodness.

Conquer stinginess with giving.

And liars with truth.

You take that with you today.

Take with you all that goodness that you've discovered.

Inside,

Lead with it if you can.

If that feels supportive.

And yeah,

See how it goes.

Thank you,

Everyone,

For being on the wake up call today.

Take good care.

Be well.

Be good.

See you next week.