The Wisdom of No Escape: And the Path of Loving-Kindness
By: Pema Chödrön / Narrated By: Joanna Rotte
Length: 4 hrs and 37 mins
Probably difficult for Western intellectuals to hear; but oh is it necessary!
I freak out.
At the drop of a hat.
M’ husband always rants about the world, how dismal everything 20-years in the future will be, and he closes with, “That’s assuming the planet will even be here in 20-years…”
I’m assuming that the shoe I’m waiting for to drop WILL be The Apocalypse …sans Rapture… (Which I don’t believe in, but Nuclear Holocaust? Oh dear friend, I’m THERE…). So imagine how, forgive the unfortunate pun: rapturous I was to have listened to The Buddhist on Death Row whereby a man with the WORST childhood, in the WORST place could find peace.
Look up his “Moms”, as he called her, Buddhist nun Pema Chödrön to get some of her words straight from one of her own works? Yesssss, like, imMEDiately cuz have I mentioned that I wake up stressed out?
This Wisdom of No Escape would appear to be a retreat with teachings and practices for each of several days. She opens with, take your time, absorb things, but heck. Me? Of COURSE I deVOURed the entire short audiobook in one day, and I was putting into practice SEVeral of the teachings from Minute-One all the way up to and including now (Hunched shoulders? Breeeeathe. Pay attention to my out-breath, and I’ll get into more in a second…).
We’re not here to be comfortable; we’re not here to hope valiantly, yet wrongly, that EVERYthing has to turn out juuuust the way we neeeed it to. I dunno exactly WHY we’re here at all, as I said: I’ll listen to it, one section per day again. But seriously, I’m just learning, I’ll get to the bigger bites as I travel along with m’ fellow visitors in this Life (By the way: I do believe energy goes on after we die, but I’m kinda sorta iffy on reincarnation/heaven etc. Dunno, ain’t gonna preach).
First takeaway: The beginning. Breathe in, breathe out and watch your focus on the out-breath, naturally, feel it. You catch a stray thought (Or racing ones)? Simply label it as: Thinking. Do NOT acknowledge this with a further: Dammit, doin’ that whole THINKING Thing again. Acknowledge gently, like you’re okay with this aspect of being human with a human brain living a human experience. Yeh yeh yeh, gotta lot on your plate. Yeh yeh yeh, whazzis whole Meditation crud anyway? Yeh yeh blah blah yeh.
Just do it. And after the out-breath, notice the pause before the next in-breath, and? Let Go.
I’ve tried it, like, a million times throughout the day cuz see, I have a big ol’ anxiety disorder (Have the paperwork to prove it). It works. Just that, that simple. A million times a day, tho’ sitting straight and a bit of devotion will probably work better, but currently? There’s no brain-space for that, no bit scheduled in. This is just me saying that walking to the post office and nearly getting into a standoff with a guy who’s glaring at me for being A Dumb Sheep for wearing a kn95 mask had me really going. Until I breathed out, caught some reeeeeally NEGative: Thinking. Pause.
Let Go.
>PHEW<
I have a few other audiobooks in my Library that are of Pema’s speaking. And tho’, at this time, I can’t say that I exactly FINISHED any of them? I CAN say that this one is easy for even my Hamsters-on-a-Wheel Brain to grasp. Also, I can say that here, with Joanna Rotte’s narration, I truly felt she had the soft voice, the pauses, the emphasis that Pema might give in one of her own lectures. Soooo soothing, which is esPECially wonderful when listening to thoughts on dealing with anger (Guilty) and attachment (Ooooh sooo guilty!). Seriously, one could feel a trifle hopeless, but if one listens very carefully, one might see past the sense that one is helpless with these teachings. I read one person who wrote a very popular review that this was about weakness and passivity. One other person also found it deeply offensive to her religious beliefs.
-BUT-
At no time does Pema pontificate; at no time does this come off as sounding preachy. Dude! it’s just breathing and making friends with yourself and seeing a connection between yourself and other creatures, with everything on the planet, with the whole Universe. Uhm? Kindness as passivity? To one who wallows in the Western embrace of An Eye for an Eye, yup. Uhm? A Universal connection as being BLASphemous? Uhm, yeah, if your world, your sense of Soul is limited to four walls and some dude telling you whom to vote for.
Am I digressing? Am I getting ticked off?
Hmmm…. Breathe in, breathe out, what an AWEsome out-breath, sooo many thoughts: Thinking. Pause.
Now?
Letting Go.
As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.