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Shambhala Sun The Secret
 I
really didn’t want to write this editorial. I couldn’t think of a way
to write it that wouldn’t reveal my secret—my secret regarding the
greatest source of stress in my life.
My
life is pretty good. No, better than pretty good. Beyond just having a
job, I have right livelihood, and on Monday mornings I look forward to
getting to the office. Not only do I have enough food to eat, I
frequently have avocadoes, mangos, and even fancy cheese. I have a roof
over my head, too, and though it’s not exactly my dream house, we’re
painting and fixing up. Best of all, I have people who love me—a warm,
wonderful husband, an incredible mother, intimate friends. Nonetheless,
in the midst of all of these people, things, and situations I am so
grateful for, I still experience stress. As Kathleen Dean Moore so
succinctly puts it in this issue, “What I experience is the ironic
stress of the privileged, which is stress nonetheless.”
So
now for the secret I didn’t want to tell you: the greatest source of
stress in my life is the gap between what I think I should be and what I
think I am. Niceness, productivity, smarts—the truth is I always fall
wildly short of my expectations.
Of
course, I didn’t want to admit any of this because, with the cat out of
the bag, I feel a little vulnerable, a little naked. But I’m admitting
my secret to you now—to the thousands of you—because I managed to admit
it to one coworker. “Yeah,” he told me, “that’s my source of stress,
too.” I believe he said it with a shrug. As if to imply, no surprise. As if to imply, that’s most people’s secret.
And come to think of it, that makes sense. After all, the core of my
problem is ego, and the buddhadharma clearly points out that ego is the
core of everyone’s problem. And one thing we know about ego is, it
always feels bad about itself. It’s always stressed.
In
her teaching “The Middle Way of Stress,” Judy Lief unpacks the workings
of ego through the lens of four self-involved and stress-generating
couplings, which are traditionally known as the eight worldly
preoccupations: hope for happiness and fear of suffering; hope for fame
and fear of insignificance; hope for praise and fear of blame; and hope
for gain and fear of loss. According to Lief, we tend to cycle through
these styles of hope and fear and “basically spend our lives trying to
hold onto some things and get rid of others in an endless and stressful
struggle.”
Yet
Lief teaches that there is real hope for relief and that it lies in
practice. Her basic suggestion is getting to know our own mind by
following the breath— by repeatedly bringing our attention back to our
inhalations and exhalations and thereby discovering that there is
something steady and reliable about our mind. Then when life gets
stressful, we can draw on that inner strength.
Following
Lief ’s teaching, you’ll find ten additional practices and techniques
for working with stress in a variety of ways and in a variety of
situations. On the surface, some of these practices and techniques may
seem like they don’t apply to you. For instance, you may look at Jessica
Morey’s piece, “Chilling Out, Naturally,” and see that it’s geared
toward teens. But if you look more deeply at the practice Morey
suggests—and give it a try—you may find that it’s helpful no matter what
stage in life you find yourself.
Whether
you’re suffering “the ironic stress of the privileged” or are up
against truly tougher issues, my hope is that you find some relief in
the Shambhala Sun’s
special section on stress. I know I have. For me, the biggest relief
I’ve taken from these pages is the acknowledgement that we’re not
failures or deficient for feeling stressed out. Stress is simply a
natural response to an uncertain future, to juggling too many
responsibilities, and to the sky-high expectations we place upon
ourselves.
Life
is stressful and, no matter what we do, that blunt fact will never
change. Yet we’re not powerless. The way we think about stress and the
way we react to it—that is always up to us.
—Andrea Miller, Deputy Editor
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