Living Beautifully with Uncertainty and Change (5 page)

The first commitment works with the causes of suffering and brings about the cessation of suffering by allowing us to see clearly what our escape routes are and enabling us not to take them. Science is demonstrating that every time we refrain but don’t repress, new neural pathways open up in the brain. In not taking the old escape routes, we’re predisposing ourselves to a new way of seeing ourselves, a new way of relating to the mysteriously unpredictable world in which we live.

The Three Commitments aren’t moralistic—they have nothing to do with being a “good girl” or a “good boy.” They’re about opening ourselves to a vaster perspective and changing at the core. Understanding the first commitment and the basic premise of acknowledging our escape routes and not following them is the necessary foundation for understanding the succeeding commitments.

The first commitment is often called the narrow way because it’s comparable to walking down a very narrow corridor. If you lose your awareness, you’ll veer off course and bump into the wall, so you have to keep bringing your attention back to the path and walking straight ahead. At bottom, the commitment is very simple: we’re either speaking or acting in order to escape, or we’re not. The further commitments are more flexible and don’t have such clear—and comforting—boundaries. So it’s important to begin with this very straightforward approach: we don’t speak or act out. Period. The first commitment requires us to be diligent about interrupting the momentum of habit, the momentum of running away. Otherwise, as the commitments become more challenging and more groundless, the moment we get
a whiff of anxiety or uneasiness or dissatisfaction, we’ll automatically exit.

Many of our escapes are involuntary: addiction and dissociating from painful feelings are two examples. Anyone who has worked with a strong addiction—compulsive eating, compulsive sex, abuse of substances, explosive anger, or any other behavior that’s out of control—knows that when the urge comes on it’s irresistible. The seduction is too strong. So we train again and again in less highly charged situations in which the urge is present but not so overwhelming. By training with everyday irritations, we develop the knack of refraining when the going gets rough. It takes patience and an understanding of how we’re hurting ourselves not to continue taking the same old escape route of speaking or acting out.

I often hear people say, “Oh, I don’t need to make a commitment not to kill. I don’t kill anyway.” Or “I don’t steal, and I’m not a monk or a nun, but I’ve been celibate for twenty years, so what’s the point of committing to the precept against harmful sexual relations?” The point in keeping the precepts is that you’re getting at something deeper. At the level of everyday behavior, refraining from killing, lying, stealing, or harming others with your sexual activity is called outer renunciation, a sort of keeping to the list. On an outer level, you follow the rules. But outer renunciation puts you in touch with what’s happening
inside:
the clinging and fixating, the tendency to avoid the underlying queasy-feeling groundlessness. Refraining from harmful speech and action is outer renunciation; choosing not to escape the underlying feelings is inner renunciation. The precepts are a device to put us in touch with the underlying uneasiness, the fundamental dynamic quality of being alive. Working with this feeling and the neurosis it triggers is inner renunciation.

If I make a commitment to not slander or gossip or use harsh speech, but I’m living by myself in a cabin in the woods with no one to talk to, then it’s easy to keep the precept against harmful speech. But if the second I’m with other people, I start gossiping, then I didn’t learn much about the damaging effect of engaging in hurtful words. And I didn’t learn much about the emotions that are motivating my gossip. Keeping the precept, however, means I’ll think twice before engaging in that conversation. So, whether we commit to four precepts, five precepts, eight precepts, or hundreds of precepts, having made the commitment protects us when temptation comes.

As a practice, you can make a commitment to keep one or more of the precepts for one day a week or twice a month or the duration of a meditation retreat or a lifetime. The first four precepts are considered the most basic. The fifth, on refraining from drugs and alcohol, is often taken along with the other four. The wording of the five precepts as set out below is loosely based on a version by the Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh.

1. O
N
P
ROTECTING
L
IFE

Aware of the suffering brought about by the destruction of life, I vow to not kill any living being. I will do my best to cultivate nonaggression and compassion and to learn to protect life.

2. O
N
R
ESPECTING
W
HAT
B
ELONGS TO
O
THERS

Aware of the suffering caused by stealing or taking anything that belongs to others, I vow to not take what is
not offered. I will do my best to respect the property of others.

3. O
N
N
OT
H
ARMING
O
THERS WITH
O
UR
S
EXUAL
E
NERGY

Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful or aggressive sexual energy, I vow to be faithful to my current partner and not harm others with my sexual energy. I will do my best to be aware of what harms myself and others and to nurture true love and respect, free from attachment. I aspire to serve and protect all beings.

4. O
N
M
INDFUL
S
PEECH

Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful speech, I vow to cultivate right speech. Knowing that words can create happiness or suffering, I will do my best to not lie, to not gossip or slander, to not use harsh or idle speech, and to not say things that bring about division or hatred. I aspire always to speak the truth.

5. O
N
P
ROTECTING THE
B
ODY AND
M
IND

Aware of the suffering caused by alcohol, drugs, and other intoxicants, I vow to not drink liquor or use drugs. I will do my best to live my life in a way that will increase my inner strength and flexibility as well as my openness to all beings and to life itself.

It’s not enough, however, just to follow the rules—follow the precepts to the letter. Sticking to the outer form can be
just another way of strengthening my fixed identity, a way of shoring up my self-image as a virtuous person, as someone who’s purer than others. In other words, it may only strengthen pride. Unless I also include inner renunciation and admit to the ways I’m propping myself up by building this virtuous identity, then simply following the rules can be almost as damaging as breaking them.

In
The Way of the Bodhisattva,
Shantideva lists all the ways he can think of to express being on the verge of speaking or acting neurotically. And in every case, he advises us not to do it. When feelings of desire or craving arise, or the urge to speak or act out of aggression arises, “Do not act!” he warns. “Be silent, do not speak!” That’s the basic instruction of the first commitment:
Don’t act, don’t speak.
That’s the outer work. And then there’s also the inner work of exploring what happens next when you don’t act and don’t speak. Shantideva’s advice is:

When the mind is wild with mockery

And filled with pride and haughty arrogance,

And when you want to show the hidden faults of others,

To bring up old dissensions or to act deceitfully,

And when you want to fish for praise

Or criticize and spoil another’s name

Or use harsh language, sparring for a fight,

It’s then that like a log you should remain.

If there’s no temptation to act out, then the commitment to not harm won’t be as transformative as when we want to speak or act out—when we yearn for wealth, attention, fame, honors, recognition, and “a circle of admirers,” as Shantideva puts it—but we don’t follow through
on our desire. Maybe you want everyone to like you. Or you want to put someone down and cultivate advantage for yourself. Or you want to gossip. Or you’re impatient. Or you’re “sparring for a fight.” Maybe you’re tempted to engage in what Shantideva calls “haughty speech and insolence” or in cynicism, sarcasm, or condescension. If you acknowledge what’s happening and refrain from acting, that opens up some space in your mind. Clinging to views and opinions, thinking you’re always right and lording it over others, keeps you endlessly stuck. You continue to make people feel angry or inferior and keep landing in unnecessary battles. What’s the remedy? Examine yourself, Shantideva tells us. See exactly what you’re doing. “Note harmful thoughts and every futile striving,” he says. “Apply the remedies to keep a steady mind.”

When you’re refraining—when you’re feeling the pull of habitual thoughts and emotions but you’re not escaping by acting or speaking out—you can try this inner renunciation exercise:

Notice how you feel: What does it feel like in the body to have these cravings or aggressive urges?

Notice your thinking: What sort of thoughts do these feelings give birth to?

Notice your actions: How do you treat yourself and other people when you feel this way?

This is what living by commitment means. Once when Chögyam Trungpa was asked, “Commitment to what?” he replied, “Commitment to sanity.” We could also say
commitment to courage, commitment to developing unconditional friendship with yourself.

To further get at what inner renunciation means, you could try the following practice of
renouncing one thing:

For one day (or one day a week), refrain from something you habitually do to run away, to escape. Pick something concrete, such as overeating or excessive sleeping or overworking or spending too much time texting or checking e-mails. Make a commitment to yourself to gently and compassionately work with refraining from this habit for this one day. Really commit to it. Do this with the intention that it will put you in touch with the underlying anxiety or uncertainty that you’ve been avoiding. Do it and see what you discover.