The Perfection of Discipline

Ugh. Discipline? Really? I wonder how many unpleasant notions that word brings up. However, yes, it is a necessary ingredient of our path to enlightenment. So let's look at this perfection, and see if along the way we might dispel some of those unpleasant notions.

A monk named Thogme composed the words I shall be using, which are from the 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva, which verses are also the ones used by Dilgo Khyentse in his book, Heart Of Compassion. The verse in particular that I will be looking at is as follows:

If lack of discipline prevents you from benefiting yourself,
than your wish to benefit others is just a joke.
Therefore, to guard discipline
with no longing for worldly existence
is the practice of a Bodhisattva. (v. 26)

Ah yes, the lack of discipline. Have we ever heard or stated ourselves that we lack the discipline to read more, write more, eat better, exercise more, play an instrument more? I know I have. Around that we might feel a bit of shame. There's the rub. Then we jump in with both feet and for a brief while feel good, until the things we are ignoring to attend to the emotional squeaky wheel are now screaming, and we drop them. Methinks that really the problem isn't discipline, it's priorities at this level. Which will become apparent as we breathe through the feelings of shame.

So let's make that step one. I myself can get too busy. Lately I was involved with a play, and it collided with the times of a retreat that I would rather have been involved in. So I have made the decision to end my volunteer acting career, such as it was, with a Shakespeare. Then I will have pared down my hobby priorities to writing and playing my drums. My living priorities are my family and my practice. Attending to those relationships and my meditation practice require as much discipline as anything else. Plans even. 

Now, let's get selfish. Hehehe. You'll see how it's so not selfish soon enough. But the point of the first phrase is this: if you aren't walking it, you will be sounding like a cracked bell when you talk it. Everyone knows the voice of an expert when they hear one. Not schooled expertise, but hands on expertise. People who have experience because they "do it." They practiced. So to be a benefit to others, you need to be a benefit to yourself. And that means you will get to be an expert on what Pema Chodron calls the "klesha" of yourself. The messy stuff. The shit. Which means that you need to spend the time, the discipline, to get to know your own mind. Otherwise,

"your wish to benefit others is just a joke."

And not a very funny one at that. In fact, the joke will be on you, and at the worst possible time. And who of us really want to be in that position?

So the instruction says we need to guard discipline with no longing for worldly existence. Whoa. Sometimes I feel like I haven't got any to guard. Ther4e's issues of what goes in the mouth as well as what comes out, what we do or don't with our bodies, and then the mind. So how do we get there? The first step we already covered; it's by determining our priorities. The second step is in re-directing already existing discipline into those priorities. Yes, you read that correctly. We already have the discipline to do things, we are simply expending that energy into other activities than what we know we really need to be attending to.

So when I engage in a play, I know that it will impact other areas of life. Notably, the time I spend working out. That is an example of re-directed discipline. I rehearse, and memorize lines and go to rehearsals, rather than work out. It's all about priorities. It also affects time that I might be home with my beloved. That in itself takes discipline, in making time to be with one another, when my weekend isn't hers. And for short whiles, maybe that's okay. Yet, maybe not.

The discipline is there for the most part. We need to direct it to beneficial activities, like reflection, studying, and meditation. And then guard it, because the distractions will come. If you build it, they will come. Oh yes, they will. We need to guard it with no longing for worldly existence. Wha?

Consider what you cannot avoid: death. Can you take your possessions with you? So why spend the energy? Can you take relatives? Spouses, partners, businesses, children, pets, anything?

No.

The only thing that follows you into the bardo after your body dies is your karma. It isn't that we necessarily cut off our relatives and relationships. There is plenty of opportunity there to develop good karma, and relationships are wonderful teachers. But they will never do the work for us, and can distract us from benefiting ourselves so that we can in turn be actually beneficial for those in whom we are in relationships with. Knowing that the next breath may be your last will help you re-direct your priorities and energies, I assure you. So think about it until you know it. It might not take that long is my guess.

So discipline really isn't that unpleasant is it? It's actually something we likely already have, just maybe not spent in the most beneficial way. It will allow us to master things that make us beneficial to ourselves and others. Which means we won't be burning out. It is indeed the practice of something that we really are, if we indeed want to see all sentient beings liberated from samsara:

a Bodhisattva.