Books: When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron (part 1)

I was talking to a friend several days ago, and the topic of Hard Times came up in conversation. Hard Times include my cancer, but it also includes the other difficult things that life throws at us.

In American society, there is so much of this idea that if we work hard and have a good attitude, then everything will work out the way it's supposed to. As a result, when people are going through a particularly difficult time, whether it's chronic or terminal illness, whether it's death or divorce, whether it's mental illness or heartbreak, we feel compelled to grin and bear it. Be strong. Don't air your dirty laundry. Think about that stigma around mental illness, for example. We don't tend to talk about depression or anxiety disorders, as if they were shameful, yet we are not ashamed to admit that we caught a cold or flu. This idea that a positive attitude and a go-get-'em spirit will prevail can be so problematic, especially when considering what that means if you don't have a positive attitude. Does that mean that we deserve whatever life throws at us if we aren't positive enough?

This book is by an American Buddhist nun, which immediately piqued my interest because I can remember reading the Dalai Lama's The Art of Happiness about fifteen or twenty years ago. It fundamentally changed how I view and interact with people, and so far, I am finding When Things Fall Apart changing how I view myself.

Amazon has this to say:

How can we live our lives when everything seems to fall apart—when we are continually overcome by fear, anxiety, and pain? The answer, Pema Chödrön suggests, might be just the opposite of what you expect. Here, in her most beloved and acclaimed work, Pema shows that moving toward painful situations and becoming intimate with them can open up our hearts in ways we never before imagined. Drawing from traditional Buddhist wisdom, she offers life-changing tools for transforming suffering and negative patterns into habitual ease and boundless joy.

I haven't finished this book yet, but I have so many thoughts and feelings that I decided to just jump right in and start doing my thing. You may have followed along while I was responding to and discussing Everything Happens for a Reason and Other Lies I've Loved by Kate Bowler. I plan to follow a similar format where I talk about this book for multiple posts.

This is only the introductory post for this book, if any of you would like to get your hands on it to read with me.

The Venerable Pema Chodron  says this in the first chapter:

"It's not a terrible thing that we feel fear when faced with the unknown. It is part of being alive, something we all share. We react against the possibility of loneliness, of death, of not having anything to hold on to. Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth. If we commit ourselves to staying right where we are, then our experience becomes very vivid. Things become clear when there is nowhere to escape" (Chodron 2).

Another dear friend of mine once told me that sometimes you have to "embrace the suck." In fairness, this was my Badass Marine friend, so his version is a little less poetic, but the sentiment remains the same.

I will be the first to admit that I am afraid of a lot of things, including but not limited to my cancer, heights, snakes, catching the flu, and the dark.

The truth is that somehow, at some point, I became the kind of person who enjoys doing frightening things. Skydiving. Ziplining. Swimming with manatees*.

When I went skydiving, and I jumped was pushed out of that plane, even though I am afraid of falling, afraid of flying, and afraid of heights, I suddenly realized one key fundamental point: No matter how scared I was, no matter how hard I screamed, the outcome was inevitable: I would hit the ground.

Of course, it was important to trust that the parachute would work, and we would have a nice soft landing, but even if it didn't, fear is not stronger than gravity, and no matter how frightened I was, fear would not allow me to spontaneously grow wings. I had to accept that mind-numbing terror and sit with it. That gave me the opportunity to just be in the moment, where I was, 13,500 feet in the air.

Being unable to escape the pull of gravity, I realized how big the world is, and how tiny I am. This was unexpectedly comforting for me, because it made me realize that I was just a tiny little scared blip. In reality, we are all tiny little scared blips. Some hide it with arrogance, some with vanity, some with emotional walls built to keep people away.

What happens when we embrace that fear? What happens when we stop trying to run from that fear?




*I know that manatees won't hurt anyone, and they are super cute, but I am still afraid they might be secret carnivores. Don't judge me.