Freedom from Attachment: Viewing the Glass as if it’s Already Broken.

Via Brian Stanton

Once in a while, you hear a quote that splits you wide open.

Recently I was listening to an old talk from Joseph Goldstein, the distinguished meditation teacher. He was speaking about impermanence and attachment. If we realize things are constantly dissolving, he noted, we stop clinging to them.

(Imagine him holding a glass aloft.) “The best way to relate to this cup,” said Goldstein, “is as if it’s already broken. Because when we relate to it as if it’s already broken—we use it, we care for it, we wash it—we do all the things in proper relationship to it. But there’s no attachment, because we see that it’s already gone.” (1)

Because we see that it’s already gone. This fragment got my nerves tingling. I surveyed the old wooden deck beneath my feet. Good as gone. My mind raced through my past relationships. They didn’t last. In a flash, the insight expanded to my most personal things: my thoughts, my body, my mind. They were all impermanent. I wasn’t used to feeling this way.

Our minds play a clever trick on us. We are deceived into thinking ourselves permanent fixtures in a changing universe. The facts don’t seem to matter. Ninety-eight percent of our bodies’ atoms, for instance, are replaced each year. And the smallest particles that currently make up who we are interact at speeds that make an eye blink seem like an eternity. (2) What’s more, our tiny building blocks don’t appear to have fixed locations in space. (Just probabilities of being in one place or another.) At the smallest level—according to the science—we simply cannot be pinned down. (3)

The objects and people we see each day are perpetually changing. It’s our concepts—and our attachment to them—that creates fixity from fluid. “We take this world to be so real,” said Goldstein. “We create that sense of solidity through our wanting…through our desiring…through our reaching…through our holding.” (4)

What do we hold on to? Often some pretty trivial things. I remember the day some years ago when I noticed a new feature on the door of my parked Hyundai: a cavernous impression the size and shape of Zimbabwe. I guess the hit-and-run driver didn’t have a pen and paper handy—there was no note. For weeks, the mere sight of the dent would make me angry. It took me over a month to realize that parking on city streets just accelerates an inevitable fate: my car in the junkyard.

Concepts also hold us in their grasp. Attachment to the notion of enlightenment—the primary goal of many spiritual practices—puts undue pressure on those who seek it. The confused devotee might sit for hours, wondering when this glorious state will come. This is not a mental pattern we want to cultivate.

But our very deepest attachment—our identification with an internal self—is also the subtlest. Reality is, at base, impersonal. From moment to moment, thoughts, feelings, and sensations arise in consciousness. Then we tack on the self. A strong itch might develop on your left ear. My itch. You grow irritated that your neighbor has decided to chainsaw at 8:00 a.m. I’m pissed. When everything is linked to “I”, we blow our problems out of proportion.

And thoughts, if unnoticed, simply take over. We identify with this ceaseless internal dialogue as “me.” But the inner yammering, if we pay attention, is not really that interesting. For instance, I sometimes catch myself planning my next meal while I eat. I’ll contemplate, mid-chew, a spice profile that might pair well with tonight’s chicken skewer. Then, if I’m dining with a friend, I’ll raise the topic for discussion—effectively torpedoing their eating experience. I get so caught up in this self-talk that I forget to taste my food.

But if we can stand sentinel to these vicissitudes of thought, noting it for what it is—thinking, thinking, still thinking– the mind learns something. We stop identifying with thoughts. We become detached from the cycle. Thoughts still come, but—seeing them clearly—we let them go.

Viewing the world as transient doesn’t shatter our organized lives. We won’t vanish or spin off the planet. But when the car gets dinged up, we can shrug it off. When a relationship ends, we can move on. When we feel sad or lonely, we realize these feelings are just ephemeral appearances and will pass.

Goldstein’s quote gave me a glimpse at the truth: that there is nothing in life to cling to. Although it sounds grim, the insight had quite the opposite effect on me. I felt suffused with energy—alive and connected with the world around me—caught in the cosmic dance of changing conditions. Then, like everything does, the feeling passed.

Notes:

1)     Goldstein, Joseph. “The Power of Restraint.” Dharma Talk. Nov 23 1984. (Here, Goldstein is relating the teachings of Ajahn Cha.)
2)     Quarks emit gluons, for example, in one yoctosecond  (10-24 sec)
3)     According to quantum mechanics, particles travel in a wave that can only be measured in terms of probability
4)     Goldstein, Joseph. “The Power of Restraint.” Dharma Talk. Nov 23 1984.