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| Photo by David Ralph Johnson |
Pema Chodron, in her book Start Where You Are, has a chapter
entitled – Abandon Any Hope of Fruition. It touches on the subject of hope, and
how when it’s misused can become an obstacle to living in the present moment.
The understanding is that as long as we are continually wishing or “hoping” for
things to change, they never will. As long as we have an orientation toward the
future, we can never just relax and enjoy what we already have. The unspoken
deal we make with ourselves is that once we “get there” - then we will be happy. The problem is…we
never arrive.
“One of our deepest habitual patterns that we have is to feel that we are never good enough. We think back to the past a lot, which maybe was better than now, or perhaps worse. We also think ahead quite a bit to the future – which we may fear – always holding out our hope that in might be a little bit better thank now. Even if now is going really well – we have good health and we’ve met the person of our dreams, or we just had a child or got the job we wanted – nevertheless there’s a deep tendency always to think about how it’s going to be later. We don’t quite give ourselves full credit for who we are in the present moment.”
By letting go of our hope of “fruition” we give up the idea
that at some future time we will feel good. Instead, we enter into an
unconditional relationship with ourselves, having an open heart and an open
mind to whatever is – and whatever “is”, is what’s right here, right now.
There is often a misunderstanding in the teachings of
Buddhism. The Buddha is not someone to be worshipped. Buddha simply means
“awake”. When talking about the “Buddha in you”, one is simply talking about
our inherent nature – or Buddha nature – and what that implies is that
everything you need, you already have! By loving ourselves unconditionally, we
slowly uncover or awaken what is already there, instead of shielding it, protecting it or
keeping it buried out of fear.
Being afraid, feeling angry, feeling impatient, feeling
jealous, feeling depressed – these are all part of who we are. They are as much
a part of our nature as joy and compassion are. Entering into an unconditional
relationship with ourselves means that we agree to no longer run from
ourselves. Because in reality, no matter how hard we try – wherever we go,
there we are! The beauty of this for me is that once we understand this, there
is no more categorizing my feelings into “right” and “wrong”. This leaves no
room for guilt – and we can all use a little less of
that
in our days! Our
feelings are simply that - just our
feelings.
The dictionary states that the meaning of fruition is “The
enjoyment of something attained or realized. The state of bearing fruit.”
Unlike the beautiful fruit in the photo my husband took this weekend, there is
no waiting for the perfect moment of ripening within us. Who we are in this
moment is exactly who we are supposed to be – whether afraid, insecure,
jealous, lonely, confident, joyful or compassionate –
“It’s all juicy stuff!”
1 comment:
Hi its me Tweedles
I am back. I was reading your bloggy and see there is much that I need to think about and digest. I do that a lot with your blog. One day last weekend, my mommy and me were looking at your blog for 3 hours- feeding our souls with your words. You have words that touch us.
Just as I was going to say goodnite to you, I looked down and saw words that said "when sadness slips under the door" (or something like that),, i knew I still have more to read- then I knew.
Thank you for your words for all of us,
nitey nite
love
tweedles
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