Not always so - what to do when things don't go our way.

(this article is about 3 or 4 mins read)

Sometimes it’s a chance remark that provides me with a theme for meditation or yoga. Last week someone said: “I don't know how that will come out", and I've had the opportunity to consider "outcome". Thinking about results. Expectations. How do we deal with things when the outcome isn’t what we expect? What now? What do we do? How do we react? How should we approach these situations from a Zen perspective?

When events don’t unfold as we expect, as we would like them to, we often say “it’s all going wrong.” When we think something’s going wrong, has it in fact gone wrong? Reading Shunryu Suzuki’s book, Not Always So, reminds me that the problem might be that we look at our life in the wrong way to begin with.

Perhaps it’s not ‘wrong’; perhaps it’s the conflict between the nature of how things are and the disposition of our mind which is the problem. We are inclined to want to control things. No matter how determined we are and how much we plan, the bottom line is we can’t control every outcome because we can’t know what will happen. We simply don’t know what will happen in the next moment. The world and everything in it is subject to constant change. We know this, but we are not always mindful of it. There are probably multiple outcomes that are also ok, but in the heat of the moment, we get stuck with that one outcome we have been planning for, anticipating, expecting.

When things don’t behave in the way we have planned, this only becomes a problem if we can’t let go of clinging to our attachment of the outcome.

And the outcome is important to us, especially because we live in such a results orientated society: performance is all; achievement a measure of success. How well we do, in the classroom, at the office, on the sports field, in life: cooking, running, creating a home, dating, marriage, our likes on social media. Maybe even on our meditation cushion! Many people can’t even imagine what it means “not to cling to an outcome", and get quite anxious about the idea of it.

In Zen we learn not to cling or be attached to an outcome because we know the teaching: “it may be so, but it is not always so” and we are reminded by Shunryu Suzuki’s famous words in his book Zen mind; Beginners mind that we should keep an open, flexible mind: “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert's there are few.” he says. Meaning we should keep an open mind like a beginner, not make the mistake of approaching things with the mind of an expert. A mind of already knowing: we are experts at how things should be. It is about our mind being tight, inflexible, closed to possibilities, while when we are new at something, we don't know what to expect and we are open to anything that may happen.

This applies to problems at work: I 'know' how this task is meant to be done. We 'know' in our relationship: I know him, he always does this, it makes me mad. I 'know' myself, I'm not like that. Or I am like that. Problems with traffic: I 'know' this road, I always turn here; I 'know' how long it takes me to get there, it always takes X minutes. Notice the knowing, expectation, the assumptions? The first time we travel somewhere, we leave 'plenty early', giving ourself enough time in case of unexpected traffic, taking a wrong turn, getting lost. But once we make the journey a few times, we don't approach the journey in the same way anymore.

This doesn’t mean we should live without expectations altogether or not plan things properly. Not clinging to awareness is not an invitation to total abandonment of responsibility or awareness. It means we should be open to the possibility that it may not happen exactly as we want, and there are multiple outcomes that might be ok, as good as, or sometimes even better.

What’s often a bit sad about clinging to the outcome we want is that that there's no joy in being like that. We’re often not there, not in the present moment at all. We miss all the beauty, all the magic because we're so irritated, angry, stressed out. So busy knowing, focussing on the outcome we want, that we push, shove and grind, determined to ensure the desired results are obtained. Which causes us such stress.

When things go wrong, when next we feel angry, irritated, anxious or upset, perhaps we can let go of how we want things to turn out, and instead focus on how we are being, what quality of person we bring to the problem. Focus on the people we are interacting with, and be courageous enough to open our heart, our mind, to compassion (for our self too!) and to alternative possibilities. It transforms the situation entirely, every time.

In Buddhist scriptures there is a famous parable about this; the parable of water:

"For human beings water is water,

but for celestial beings it is a jewel.

For fish it is their home.

And for people in hell or hungry ghosts it is blood, or maybe fire.

If they want to drink it, the water changes into fire and they cannot drink it, the same water looks very different to various beings."

When we say water is water, we may understand it materially. We say water is H2O. But actually this is a very limited understanding.

Under some conditions H2O may be ice or vapour or mist.

Or a human body.

Water is only water, as we usually see it, under certain circumstances.

For convenience we may say that water is water, but we should appreciate water in the true sense.

Water is more than just water.

It means when we do things we may see it from our point of view only, think “this is the right way” or “if I do this, I will achieve something correct and perfect.” But if you ask a Zen master, he may say this view is “not quite right”: this point is a good koan for us to study.

We get caught up in our way of seeing, our way of knowing, our expectations. But perhaps it isn’t always so. It isn’t quite right.

For the meditation today, I invite you to reflect on this koan:

You can use “It isn’t always so."

or "Not quite right.”

Any comments or insights are very welcome.

Have a wonderful week.

Metta

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