Ajahn Chah writes in his book, A Still Forest Pool: The Insight Meditation, “In our practice, we think that noises, cars, voices, sights, are distractions that come and bother us when we want to be quiet. But who is bothering whom? Actually, we are the ones who go and bother them. The car, the sound, is just following its own nature. We bother things through some false idea that they are outside us and cling to the ideal of remaining quiet, undisturbed. Learn to see that is not things that bother us, that we go out to bother them. See the world as a mirror. It is all a reflection of the mind. When you know this, you can grow in every moment, and every experience reveals the truth and brings understanding.”
We all know moments where things drive us crazy, and others when the very same thing does not. Might be a neighbours fire alarm, car alarm, the kids fighting, someone listening to their iPad on a plane without their earphones so the entire plane has to endure their movie…oh wait, that particular one might just be me…hahaha. My point is there are things that grate. And we have to realise it’s not them, it’s our internal state that is being aggravated. Find an example of when something has driven you crazy and another time when it has not. Marley and Arran like to wrestle but it usually ends in tears. If I am exhausted, it’s late and I believe everyone should be calming down for bed, I am prone to getting furious about it. If I have just come back from a trip away teaching, and felt wildly homesick for them, there is no sweeter sound than the two people I love having a laugh together play wrestling, (even if it does end in tears).
Once we fully recognise and begin to work with the outer world being a reflection of our inner world, we can settle ourselves down, become more peaceful and observe and address what’s really going on, rather than blaming everyone and everything else. That’s just shirking an opportunity to find our own truth, and there are thankfully, tonnes of opportunities to do this. Every, single, day.
Written with love,
Jac x
L E T T E R from Jac – The World As Our Mirror
