Trouble and Joy

TROUBLE

The Individualist’s Viewpoint

Trouble is as trouble does. We earn hard times as paybacks for wrongdoing. And we sometimes invite difficulties into our lives. A weak-willed victim grants a vampire permission to enter. The patsy greases the downfall skids.

Decisions have consequences: one thing leads to another in a chain of causality. If your life becomes hell, you made it that way through direct actions or by losing control of your affairs.

The Random Luck Viewpoint

Things just happen. Those born into easy circumstances receive love, support, and an economic starting point well ahead of the unfortunate. The sun shines brightly for the lucky, and occasional dark clouds pass swiftly. The happy few, for no knowable reason, receive an exclusive deal.

Those born into shaky situations can count on neither love nor money. The hard knocks tend to multiply. And when things begin to look better, unexpected trials undermine any progress made. Life sucks, and then you die.

Those in the middle hope to join the elect while fearing a descent. Good and bad things come and go, and the middles become gamblers hoping for a lucky streak.

The Believer’s Viewpoint

All periods of suffering and joy have purposes. Life provides opportunities for growth and for finding communion with God. We are here to follow a true path regardless of current conditions. God doesn’t give us more than we can handle and stands ready to offer assistance. Even those who die young and miserable, through no fault of their own, serve as divine messengers. God’s mercy, if not apparent in this life, triumphs in the next.

JOY

More theories abound about trouble than about joy. We seek strategies to avoid, explain, and defend against trouble. But some have a greater talent for finding joy. They walk on a clearer path with fewer twists and dead ends.

I’m not gifted in that manner. Best moments are like finding a new spring burbling out of a rocky outcrop. I realize as I eagerly drink that I hadn’t known how deep my thirst was.

Some say that abiding joy can be cultivated through meditation and prayer, through communion with God. Minds tuned to the right frequency receive the voices of angels. Moments come when the fog of daily strife lifts to reveal a shining landscape. Even a pile of garbage glows with inner light.

Peaked Shadow, Catherine Murphy, oil on canvas.

Some artists have an ability to capture these transformation moments. Catherine Murphy finds hidden delights in mundane subjects. Paintings of a pile of leaves, of a blanket, and of a nightstand crowded with medicine bottles evoke a state of heightened awareness. Under the treatment of Murphy’s brush, ordinary scenes exult in their existence. The painter honors the idea that merely being here is cause for celebration.

Memories: The Changeable Past

A mystic came up to Captain Kirk and said, “Let me remove your pain.” Kirk declined and responded, “My pain makes me who I am.” (I’m paraphrasing.) This scene, a pivotal moment in the worst movie in the original cast Star Trek movie series, has stuck with me. It underlines the idea that our memories, our joys and pains, become our self-images. We identify with the personal history narratives we tell ourselves.

A couple of problems arise with this process of identification. 1. Our memories are changeable. Every time we recall an event, we slightly alter the neural connections that previously recorded the memory. That bit of stored data loses clarity and develops flaws like an overplayed phonograph record. After a while, when we think about a wedding day or the birth of a child, we’re looking at degraded artifacts instead of accurate records. 2. The brain evolved to enhance our chances of survival. Survival partially involves claiming status within a social group. Our minds tend to weed out the negative parts of our actions and to emphasize the bits that support our sense of self-worth. We remember versions of events that put us in the best light. If we convince ourselves and others that we remain worthy despite recent difficulties, then we can maintain our standing within a group. An example: a man justifies his infidelity to a circle of friends by recounting the many times his wife belittled him but fails to mention that his selfishness spurred her criticism.

Personal narrative-based identities become unstable once we understand that our recollections contain biased information that acquires additional flaws over time. We realize that a trip down memory lane is a journey through a shifting landscape dotted with delusions.

Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, an author and Buddhist meditation instructor, teaches that the way out of memory delusion is to turn attention toward the present. We can focus on sensory inputs whenever we drift back into our customary mental routines. We can even stay in the present by watching the mind as it churns out a series of faulty memories, justifications, and associated negative feelings.

He states that clarity and peace spontaneously arise when we stop identifying with memory. Our sense of self, paradoxically, expands once we give up the protective bubbles that currently enclose (imprison) us.

Filters

The optometrist flips lenses and asks, “Does it look better with this…or with that?” One view looks wavy, a second out of focus, a third clearer but still a bit blurry. The doctor narrows the selection until she arrives at a proper prescription.

That’s how it works in theory, but the last time I got new glasses something went wrong. I drove home struggling to see the instrument panel on the dashboard. A headache began to arise before I’d driven two miles. I wondered whether I’d get used to the glasses, but after an hour at home I knew that I’d have to go back.

The optometrist got it right the second time, thank God. However, the experience of trying to function with maladjusted lenses made me wonder whether other sorts of filters distort my vision. I know that past experiences color my outlook, make me suspicious when witnessing behavior that appears, at first glance, to be unpleasantly familiar. A word, a gesture can trigger alarms. If I’m clear-headed, I wait to see how a situation plays out before reacting inappropriately. A recent example: a new preacher’s chiding sermon doesn’t mean that he’s the reincarnation of the grumpy, judgmental priest who served the church I attended as a boy.

I’ve also experienced the reverse. My appearance and manner have triggered negative reactions in some of my students. I say a few words at the beginning of the first class and notice someone glaring at me. Everything I do or say from that point on confirms his or her initial impression. It doesn’t matter how vigilantly I maintain an attitude of helpful patience. I’ve gradually learned that the less I engage with a hostile student, the better. A diplomatically neutral tone must be sustained, if possible, even in the presence of snarky rebellion.

I no longer try to fix what’s irreparably broken. But I’ve found that some eventually notice I mean them no harm, that the instruction is actually useful. Some are capable of seeing their own biases if I refuse to respond in kind to their defensive incivility. I function best when giving them a chance to notice the distortions in their vision.

Anthony De Mello preaches the virtues of awareness. I believe that he wants us to observe the world carefully with fresh eyes. And he wants us to watch our mental filters in action as we look and react. I’m not anywhere near clearness, but sometimes I can hear a click as another lens flips into place.