THE GREAT LEAP TO FREEDOM
What a relief it is for the burdened man who has long walked through the world of suffering to lay down his heavy and useless load.
LONGCHEN RABJAM
To be free is to be master of oneself. For many people such mastery involves freedom of action, movement, and opinion, the opportunity to achieve the goals they have set themselves. This conviction locates freedom primarily outside oneself and overlooks the tyranny of thoughts. Indeed it is a commonplace in the West that freedom means being able to do whatever we want and to act on any of our impulses. It’s a strange idea, since in so doing we become the plaything of thoughts that disturb our mind, the way a mountaintop wind bends the grass in every direction.
“For me, happiness would be doing anything I want with no one having to say anything about it,” said one young Englishwoman interviewed by the BBC. Can anarchic freedom, in which the only goal is the immediate fulfillment of desires, bring happiness? There is every reason to doubt it. Spontaneity is a precious quality so long as it is not confused with mental chaos. If we let the hounds of craving, jealousy, arrogance, and resentment run amok in our mind, they will soon take over. Conversely, inner freedom is a vast, clear, and serene space that dispels pain and nourishes peace.
Inner freedom is above all freedom from the dictatorship of “me” and “mine,” of the ego that clashes with whatever it dislikes and seeks desperately to appropriate whatever it covets. So being free comes down to breaking the bonds of afflictions that dominate and cloud the mind. It means taking life into one’s own hand, instead of abandoning it to tendencies created by habit and mental confusion. If a sailor looses the tiller and lets the sails flap in the wind and the boat drift wherever the currents take it, it is not called freedom—it is called drifting. Freedom here means taking the helm and sailing toward the chosen destination.
In daily life this freedom allows us to be open and patient with others while remaining committed to the direction we have chosen to take in life. Indeed it is essential to have a sense of direction. When trekking in the Himalayas, you often have to walk for days or even weeks. You suffer from the cold, the altitude, snowstorms, but since every step brings you closer to your goal, there is joy in making the effort to attain it. If you get lost and find yourself without bearings in an unknown valley or forest, your courage instantly vanishes; the weight of exhaustion and solitude is suddenly crushing, anxiety mounts, and every step is an ordeal. You lose the will to walk; you want to sit down in despair. Perhaps the anxiety that some people feel likewise comes from a lack of direction in their lives, from having failed to grasp their own inner potential for change.
Understanding that we are neither perfect nor completely happy is not a weakness. It is a very healthy acknowledgment that has nothing to do with self-pity, pessimism, or a lack of self-confidence. Such understanding leads to a new appreciation of life’s priorities and a surge of energy that Buddhism calls renunciation—a word that is often misunderstood and that really expresses a profound desire for freedom.
THE PARADOX OF RENUNCIATION
For many people, the idea of renunciation and nonattachment implies a descent into a dank dungeon of asceticism and discipline. The depressing privation of life’s pleasures. A series of injunctions and bans that restrict one’s freedom to enjoy life. A Tibetan proverb says: “Speaking to someone about renunciation is like hitting a pig on the nose with a stick. He doesn’t like it at all.”
But true renunciation is more like a bird soaring into the sky when its cage is opened. Suddenly the endless concerns that had oppressed the mind are gone, allowing the free expression of inner potential. We are like weary marchers, carrying heavy bags filled with a combination of provisions and stones. Wouldn’t the smart thing be to set our bag down for a moment to sort it out and lighten our load?
Renunciation is not about depriving ourselves of that which brings us joy and happiness—that would be absurd; it is about abandoning what causes us inexhaustible and relentless distress. It is about having the courage to rid ourselves of dependency on the root causes of suffering. To do this, we first have to identify and recognize these causes and then become mindful of them in our daily life. If we do not take the time to do this, we can easily fool ourselves by overlooking the relevant causes.
Renunciation, then, does not come down to saying no to all that is pleasant, to giving up strawberry ice cream or a nice hot shower after a long walk in the hills. It comes down to asking ourselves, with respect to certain aspects of our lives: “Is this going to make me happier?” Genuine happiness—as opposed to contrived euphoria—endures through life’s ups and downs. To renounce is to have the daring and intelligence to scrutinize what we usually consider to be pleasures in order to determine if they really enhance our well-being. The renunciant is not a masochist who considers everything that is good to be bad. Who could put up with this? The renunciant has taken the time to look within herself and has found that she does not need to cling to certain aspects of her life.
FREE FROM THE PAST, FREE FROM THE FUTURE
One day a Tibetan came to see an old wise man whom I happened to be visiting with at the time, at Ghoom near Darjeeling in India. He began by telling him all about his past misfortunes, then went on to list everything he feared for the future. All this time the wise man calmly roasted potatoes in a little brazier on the floor before him. After a while he told his plaintive visitor: “What’s the point of worrying about things that no longer exist and things that do not yet exist?” Nonplussed, the visitor stopped talking and remained silent for quite some time alongside the sage, who occasionally handed him a hot, crusty potato.
Inner freedom allows us to savor the lucid simplicity of the present moment, free from the past and emancipated from the future. Freeing ourselves from the intrusion of memories of the past does not mean that we are unable to draw useful lessons from our experience. Freeing ourselves from fear of the future does not make us incapable of approaching it clearly, but saves us from getting bogged down by pointless fretting.
Such freedom has aspects of clearheadedness, and joy that allow us to accept things peacefully without sinking into passivity or weakness. It also allows us to use all life’s circumstances, favorable and adverse, as catalysts for personal change, and to avoid becoming arrogant when they are favorable and depressed when they are not.
THE INTELLIGENCE OF RENUNCIATION
Renunciation is a way of taking one’s life into one’s own hands, that is, of becoming fed up with being manipulated like a puppet by selfishness, the scramble for power and possessions, and the never-ending quest for pleasure. She who practices genuine renunciation is well informed of all that goes on around her. She does not flee the world because she’s unable to control it, but knowing how prejudicial pointless worries are, she has no interest in entertaining them. Her approach is eminently pragmatic. The renunciant shows no weakness, only daring.
Renunciation also conveys the delicious taste of simplicity and profound well-being. Once you have sampled it, it becomes easier and easier. But there is no question of forcing oneself into renunciation, which would be doomed to failure. First you must clearly see its advantages and aspire to free yourself from that which you want to renounce. Once you’ve done that, renunciation is experienced as an act of liberation.
While we must never neglect those with whom we share our lives, we can get off the endless roller coaster of happiness and suffering. In so doing, we reject nothing but simplify everything.
THE BALM OF SIMPLICITY
“Our life is frittered away by detail. . . . Simplify, simplify,” wrote the American moralist Henry David Thoreau. Renunciation involves simplifying our acts, our speech, and our thoughts to rid ourselves of the superfluous. Simplifying our activities doesn’t mean sinking into laziness; on the contrary, it means acquiring a growing freedom and counteracting the most subtle aspect of inertia—the impulse that, even when we know what really counts in life, prompts us instead to pursue a thousand trivial activities, one after the other, like ripples in the water.
To simplify our speech is to curtail the stream of pointless talk that continuously flows from our mouths. It is, above all, to abstain from directing hurtful remarks at others. Ordinary conversations, rued the hermit Patrul Rinpoche, are “echoes of echoes.” You need only turn on the TV or go to any social gathering to be engulfed in a torrent of words that not only are often useless, but also aggravate covetousness, hostility, and vanity. You don’t have to wrap yourself in aloof silence but simply be aware of what is appropriate speech and of the value of time. Appropriate speech avoids self-serving lies, cruel words, and the gossip whose only effect is to distract us and sow discord. It is always adapted to circumstance, gentle or firm as required, and the product of an altruistic and controlled mind.
Having a simple mind is not the same as being simpleminded. On the contrary, simplicity of mind is reflected in clarity of thought. Like clear water that lets us see all the way to the lake bottom, simplicity reveals the nature of the mind behind the veil of restless thought.
André Comte-Sponville has found an inspiring way of describing it:
The simple person lives the way he breathes, with no more effort or glory, with no more affectation and without shame. . . . Simplicity is freedom, buoyancy, transparency. As simple as the air, as free as the air. . . . The simple person does not take himself too seriously or too tragically. He goes on his merry way, his heart light, his soul at peace, without a goal, without nostalgia, without impatience. The world is his kingdom, and suffices him. The present is his eternity, and delights him. He has nothing to prove, since he has no appearances to keep up, and nothing to seek, since everything is before him. What is more simple than simplicity? What lighter? It is the virtue of wise men and the wisdom of saints.1
A WANDERER UNLIKE ANY OTHER
I cannot resist the pleasure of relating an episode from the life of Patrul Rinpoche, a Tibetan hermit of the nineteenth century. At first sight, no outward sign distinguished him as a great spiritual master. All his worldly possessions consisted of a walking stick; a little cloth bag containing an earthenware pot for boiling his tea and a copy of Way of the Bodhisattva, a classic text on love and compassion; and the clothes on his back. He stopped wherever he pleased—caves, forests, huts—and stayed however long he liked. Whenever he stopped at a monastery, he came unannounced so as to avoid any preparations being made in honor of his arrival. During his stay, he slept in a monk’s cell or camped outdoors.
One day Patrul Rinpoche was sharing his learning with several thousand people near the Dzamthang monastery in eastern Tibet. Instead of sitting in a temple or on a throne, he sat on a grass-covered mound in a meadow. Although everyone knew that he never accepted gifts, at the end of the lesson an old man insisted on presenting him with a silver ingot, which he placed in the grass at the hermit’s feet before he left.
Patrul slung his bundle over his shoulder, grabbed his stick, and went on his way. A thief who had been watching the scene followed him with the intention of stealing the silver. Patrul walked alone, with no specific destination, and spent a peaceful night under the stars. Once he was asleep, the thief crept up under cover of darkness. Patrul had laid down his little cloth bag and pot nearby. Finding nothing therein, the thief began searching through the hermit’s loose-fitting sheepskin mantle.
Patrul was awakened by the bandit’s fumbling. “Why are you rummaging through my clothes?” he cried out. The thief grumbled: “Someone gave you a silver ingot. I want it!”
“Oh dear,” the hermit exclaimed. “What a hard life you lead, scurrying about like a madman! You’ve come all this way for a lump of silver! Poor man! Listen to me now. Retrace your steps and at dawn you’ll reach the mound where I was sitting. You’ll find the silver there.”
The thief was rather skeptical but had spent enough time searching the hermit’s things to know that he didn’t have the ingot with him. Although he thought it unlikely that he’d find the money where Patrul had sent him, he went back and searched the slopes of the mound. The ingot was there, shining in the grass.
The bandit got to thinking: “That Patrul is no ordinary lama. He’s freed himself of all attachment. I’ve earned myself some very bad karma trying to rob him.” Filled with remorse, he went off to find the hermit again. When he finally caught up with him, Patrul berated him: “You again! Always on the run, aren’t you? I told you I didn’t have the silver. What do you want now?”
The criminal prostrated himself before Patrul to make his confession, his eyes filled with tears. “I haven’t come to take anything from you. I found the silver. When I think that I was going to beat you and take everything you have! You are a true wise man. I beg your pardon and wish to become your disciple.”
Patrul soothed him. “You don’t need to confess to me or beg my pardon. Be generous, invoke the Buddha, and practice his teaching. That will do.” Some time later, people found out what had happened and set out to thrash the thief. When Patrul Rinpoche heard of this, he scolded them sharply. “To mistreat this man is to hurt me. Leave him alone.”
FREE FOR OTHERS
What good is freedom if it benefits only oneself? In order to better help others, we must begin by changing ourselves.
Being free also means being able to follow the path of inner transformation. To achieve that, we have to overcome not only external adversity but also our innermost enemies: laziness, lack of focus, and the habits that constantly distract us from or defer spiritual practice.
As we have seen, pleasures, at first attractive, more often than not turn into their opposites. The effort demanded by the spiritual path and by the process of freeing oneself from suffering follows an inverse progression. Sometimes arduous to start with, it gradually becomes easier and inspiring, and little by little imparts a sense of fulfillment that nothing can replace. Its difficulties give way to a profound satisfaction that states of dependency cannot secure. Sukha is a kind of armor, as supple as it is invulnerable. Says one Tibetan sage: “It is easy for a bird to hurt a horse whose back is wounded; it is easy for circumstances to hurt one who is fearful, but they have no power over one who is stable.” Such an accomplishment fully deserves the name of freedom.