Discouraged by Comparison
How should I work with discouragement when I compare my current practice with how it used to be?
A Meditator’s Question:
I am returning to Buddhist practice after a long period away, and I find myself discouraged when I remember earlier insights and attainments.
I started meditating as a teenager, and in my twenties, I experienced several moments in which my sense of being a separate self seemed to dissolve, along with many worries and fears. My day-to-day perception changed significantly: my sense of self became looser, compassion arose more naturally, and mindfulness became much more immediate.
I could often see mental states arising in response to internal or external stimuli, which helped me avoid following unwholesome trains of thought or acting on unwholesome impulses.
After that, I gradually fell out of practice and became absorbed in ordinary life again. Now, as a middle-aged man, I find myself drawn back to the Dharma, with a much more consistent meditation practice than I had before.
I still remember those earlier experiences vividly, and they gave me deep confidence in the Dharma and in the effectiveness of practice. However, I am not currently experiencing the same widening of perception or loosening of ego.
I suspect this may be partly because the novelty of those earlier experiences has worn off. It may also be because my life is more peaceful and stable now. In the past, difficult circumstances pushed me to practice with an urgency I do not seem to have now.
Phone use has also become a serious hindrance. In some ways, my current conditions are almost retreat-like, and I have the opportunity to practice deeply. Still, the Dharma does not seem to be clicking or sinking in the way it once did.
Many of my earlier insights arose while reading Dharma teachings or reflecting on impermanence and no-self. Recently, I have been trying The Mind Illuminated, but I notice that it can lead me into excessive monitoring and analysis.
How should I work with the discouragement that comes from remembering past insights or attainments?
Oded’s Answer:
It’s wonderful that you had a direct experience of no-self, and of the liberating effects such an experience can have in dissolving fears and worries. It’s a valuable supporting factor in alleviating doubt: you know this to be true and possible, not just a spiritual promise.
It’s also fine that you had a decade back in Samsara - mundane worldly existence. Just as we have daily sleep cycles, Awakening also has a cyclical quality. It’s not a switch you flip on once. We wake up to our true nature, then fall asleep into automatic behaviors, then wake up and correct course. With practice, the mindful, awakened state becomes a new baseline, and moments of ignorance and unwholesomeness become relatively rare.
The differences you notice in your meditative experience now, as an adult, compared to the novelty it had in your twenties, are both real and natural. You are going back to the gym as a more mature person than you were when you first entered it with youthful excitement. The meditative journey is all about a gradual transformation from turbulence and storminess to tranquility and steadiness. Your current state is a feature - not a bug.
They say that “comparison is the robber of joy,” and it’s a cliché because it holds a deep truth at its core. The more you let go of aspiring to restore past experiences, the likelier you are to unlock sublime new states that will put them in the shade.
As for the practice “not clicking or sinking in,” the solution could be in refining the technique. Just as some people gravitate toward calisthenics over CrossFit, and vice versa, one meditative practice can suit you better than another. When you find the one that’s right for you, your drive is likely to increase. It could also reduce the pull of distractions, such as your smartphone, by being rewarding enough to hold the competition.
Speaking of practices, I can understand how working with TMI led you to feel you’re excessively monitoring and analyzing; that’s recurring feedback from many practitioners who pick it up. However, it’s still one of the best maps out there to lead to Awakening, assuming that is your goal. My approach to TMI is to let go of the fixed concern with stages on The Elephant Path, and instead focus on the actions to perform in every practice, and the observable effects they yield. I see its techniques as Meditative Games, which invite playfulness into the frame. That might be the element you feel is missing.
With Metta,
Oded
