Ah Jing's Spiritual Journey and Growth Chronicle - Part 1

The very first month of my spiritual journey…..

Before embarking on this journey, I didn’t give much thoughts about how I’d survive and thrive in a spiritual haven I believe as the place of truth. But I certainly did not foresee how semi-deeply-rooted I am in an ordinary workplace/culture where I once spent almost 5 years in. 5 years of working life sounds like short, too short to really begin with anything real or impactful. Or so I thought. And of course, I did not just experience 5 years of working non-stop with zero life experiences. It is a long 5 years since the beginning of my adulthood while working life definitely stands out as the main course.

And as I enter the 2nd month of my spiritual journey, I slowly came to realize the impact of working -- with a typical secular mind, without much inner reviews of personal or spiritual growth as a human being – on my mind and spirit. I loved my job. I learnt tons of things. I respect my superiors wholeheartedly and I love spending time with colleagues. But I also neglected more. Much much more if it is viewed from a bigger picture. Of course, I am in the very beginning of searching on this very big picture on LIFE, aka ‘still standing outside of the door’, but these tiny steps has definitely taught me something about not just spiritual stuff, but working life instead.

Hmmm.. how do I begin.. Working to survive is what most people do. I consider myself extremely fortunate and blessed to be given a choice to switch path in my late 20s. It is definitely not something plausible for most people. So, given that working to live a life is a must, do we need to dive deeper into other aspects other than family and work? Well, I was raised in a devout Buddhist family since forever and I always considered myself doing a very good job balancing work and personal growth/mental health..etc. And of course, I was wrong. I did not fully comprehend or given much space to think on the picture on the ground. Working for merely 5 years has, to a certain extent, shaped me into who I am today. I am not implying working itself has created new traits in me, but surely it has ignited many of the existing traits deep inside of me, promoted them to a certain level and left a distinct mark. All of these has reflected in my instinct action/thoughts, mindset, judgement and so on while living and volunteering in the temple. I remember looking at my mom learning and meditating here, I could point to her on all of her ‘working styles’ she displayed– hers are definitely more obvious given her years of services devoted to Penfabric. But mine? I almost did not notice them at all.

Last week, I was told on how ‘slightly unnatural’ or tense I was in the past month. Some of my subtle traits has emerged day by day. These traits have more or less shrouded the real, natural me – easily seen by those who has gone through deeper purification and regained their natural abilities. The unnatural looking in me came from the additional protective and beautified layer I put on unknowingly. While accepting the truth was a little harsh, I came to accept who I am and decided to trace my thoughts, one by one.

Here are some of the traits I noticed so far:

Judgemental character // Lack of sincerity & honesty // Living under insecurity

Since I wasn’t allowed to do leisure talk for the sake of purification, I tried to trace my thoughts. What do I see in people and things I encounter each day? To not listen and digest was hard. And not to have any personal subjective thoughts on them. Man, it was hard, with all of the self-control effort I put into this, I couldn’t help but digested a lot of them, made personal judgements in my head, differentiating people and things here and there. Comparing this trait of mine in my early 20s and today, I could see it is greatly enhanced by the spices at work. Why so? The dealing with people and problems solving at work are definitely more intense. And in order to deal with all of the tasks on hand, we are obliged to do things efficiently – and to know the people around us sounds like unavoidable. It wasn’t just normal observing, for me at least. I judged and accumulated my experiences with people, applied it seamlessly at work and could even share with new colleagues! (ie. This person is incompetent, you should avoid working with him/learn under him.). We have trained to be unkind and uncompromising. We trusted our very first observation. Just to do things fast. Do things our own way. The sad truth? It is mostly unavoidable unless we have the wisdom and time to do more inner processing before taking actions.

And now at my new home, this trait is doing more harm and no good. Needless to mention I am spending a great deal of hard time talking and explaining to myself. I could rarely focus well during daily meditation and I feel sleepy easily. Not the exhaustion type of sleepy but the occasional dozing off as my mind is too occupied with my uncontrollable subjective thoughts. In the normal life we live, we might not notice this as something detrimental to our daily life, what’s the issue with being judgemental? Well, first of all, we could hardly feel the pain in us if we are in the situation ourselves. But with slightly clearer mind, we could feel the happiness and freedom easily achieved when we are willing to open up our heart. We could feel more at ease. And more secured. Oh yes, security!

Here comes the second point which I think is very relevant in my case --- our instinct always led us to believe that the way we treat others come back to us. We assume it is the way. So, the more we judge, the more we assume others returning the same level of judging to us. And therefore, the feeling of insecurity at workplace or any other unfamiliar places come from the phobia of being judged wrongly or negatively. We care about what others thought of us. But we are not willing to stop this from our end. And so, it becomes a vicious cycle. I have seen strong judging cultures in workplaces and even some household, with the latter being way too unimaginable for me. Today, I am living under the same roof with another 29 family members here in the temple. I could see it as a pretty close-knitted circle as people learning and working together 365 days a year (with ample of non-sleeping time!). The more I judge and care and digest internally, the more I assume reciprocity. And of course, I could not enjoy the same level of natural and comfort as if I were home. And so, this is the reason for closed heart. For all of the fakeness and dishonesty we put on. For the insincerity we have in us we never noticed. Here in my new home, I was constantly looking after my every action or word. Am I doing the chanting correctly? Will the teacher think of me as not good enough? Did people notice my this and that and the list goes on forever. This might be me being oversensitive, but the judging character in a lot of us are real. We might suffer differently in this case, but the source, I believe, is something amendable.

Well, I feel like more traits of mine to tell but …. Next time!!

Assuming I were to return to workplace, and I’d have known about all of the realization as above, what could be done differently?  Is practicing the good virtue I now know possible? Yes, I believe it is. I once encountered a colleague with whom I work with for 1 year plus. While working with him I could feel the strong insecurity in him -- with traceable family history and cultures – his reactions to things and people’s words. I knew it is suffering and stressful to possess traits like these, but with my limited wisdom and poor character I couldn’t do much. And with myself, I believe higher level of tolerance and mutual understanding shall be practiced. Also, work more and care less because being oversensitive like myself is bringing suffering to oneself for no cause. Treating the root cause is even much more important. Judge less and have more sympathy. Take time to understand the bigger picture. Is he doing this because of….. ? If she doesn’t look good today, what might be the cause? I now learnt I was never a kind person, not even slightly close. I judged fast and I decided the story based on assumptions, which was based on life experiences, but in a selective way. The so called ‘We chose to believe what we want to believe’ – we decided the angle of the story depending on how it benefits us in the story, how it portrays us and shows our image. Yes, image it is. I was (still am, improving in progress) a fan of my own’s good image & reputation. I took good care of it and prioritizes it over every other thing. Well, this might be the next topic to delve into!

Till we meet next time!!