Many of us have the sense that there must be some meaning behind the ups and downs of our lives. Viktor Frankl, the holocaust survivor and famous psychologist, emphasised that the most powerful motivator for human beings is the search for meaning. Those who have a ‘why,’ he famously used to say, can bear to live with almost any ‘how’.
Perhaps it is in the search for this ‘why’ that some people come to believe that the life we live, with all its trials and triumphs, is one we have consciously chosen. That we make what is sometimes referred to as a ‘soul contract’ – essentially, a deal with ourselves – to go through whatever we have faced in order to learn. Develop. Evolve.
Although this is not one of the Buddha’s teachings, it is one that I am sometimes asked about. The last time was just a few days ago when the person I was talking to assumed I must hold this view myself. “If we don’t choose this life?” she asked me, astonished that I wasn’t a “conscious choicer”, ‘what is the point of it?”
For today’s post I thought it may be helpful to explore some of the common ground that the “conscious choice” idea shares with the Dharma – and where Buddha’s teachings diverge.
The idea that we’ve been around before is one obvious shared element. Our acquired personality may be unique to this life, but our subtle consciousness has existed before. Like a string threaded through a row of beads is a metaphor sometimes used to describe the relationship between the subtle consciousness that continues, and the separate, very different experiences of gross consciousness that we call ‘me,’ ‘myself,’ and ‘I’ in successive lives.
Another shared theme is the understanding that we don’t come into this life as a blank slate, or tabula rasa. The Buddhist view is that imprinted on our subtle consciousness are all manner of karmas that, if meeting certain conditions, will ripen with a specific effect. Those with an interest in evolutionary astrology suggest that our natal chart represents the karmas and propensities we bring into this lifetime, both positive and negative.
A third, shared element is that the true purpose of our life is inner growth. Whatever the carousel of activities whirling around us through our daily lives, true meaning is to be found in personal evolution, with the ultimate goal - according to Tibetan Buddhism - being enlightenment to help all others become enlightened too.
Where the Dharma parts company with the “conscious choice” view is the idea that, at any given time, we have the capacity to see what we most need to learn. One of the unenviable tasks of a guru is said to be having to point out this often-inconvenient truth to his or her students. Friends and loved ones, all too familiar with our personal failings, dare not point them out. At least, not too loudly or too often!
I have heard it said that it’s as if we walk around with a brightly coloured t-shirt on which our shortcomings are emblazoned in bullet points. Everyone can read what is on the t-shirt except for us!
Would we, for example, expect John Paul Getty, one of the richest tycoons in the 1970s, whose legendary meanness saw him install a pay phone in his home for visitors, to choose a rebirth focusing on cultivating generosity? For Pol Pot to decide it was time to develop his empathetic side?
And, when the time comes for us to choose a particular form of rebirth on earth, why would the most unlikely incarnations be so extraordinary popular? We share our planet with three times more chickens, for example, than humans. And millions of times more fruit flies.
Buddhism agrees that nothing happens by accident - but this is not to say that we knowingly choose the experiences. On the contrary. If we have a successful business or are doing well in our chosen career, before a lawsuit or something equally unexpected torpedoes us, this isn’t because we have consciously chosen to undergo devastating loss. It is, rather, caused by the ripening of karma arising from a previous non-virtue.
We could say that Buddhists agree that we choose our lives - just not deliberately. In previous lives we created specific causes. In this life we create the conditions for their effects to ripen. Or not, as the case may be.
Seen from such a vantage, you could say that the whole point of this life is to become conscious. To awaken from the dream of believing that what we experience is anything other than a reality we have created, often unknowingly, and to begin making conscious choices about the kind of reality we wish for ourselves as well as others.
We are told, after all, that when Buddha was asked how to describe his transcendent state of consciousness, he simply replied, “I am awake” - which is what the word Buddha means.
All this said, whether we feel that what we experience is voluntary or involuntary ultimately matters less than what we do with it. Broader still, even a God-centric view could lead us to a similar conclusion: that it is not our beliefs that make us a better person, but our actions. That what counts is not so much what happens to us in life, as how we respond to it.
When we’re able to live with increasingly conscious levels of equanimity, resilience, and a firm focus on virtue, no matter what the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, our experience of reality is inevitably one of increasing refinement, expansiveness and joy.
As we think, so we become.
My heartfelt thanks to those of you who responded to my post about Twala Trust Animal Sanctuary during the week by signing up as paying subscribers! Every new subscriber makes a difference.
To follow on, Caspar is a long-time resident of Twala who shows what’s possible when parrots are on the receiving end of love and compassion for many years. As soon as we arrived and sat with Sarah for tea, he flew over to where we were, and demanded his own cookie. “Just let him take one,” advised Sarah, “and he’ll be happy.”
We did, and he was - as you can see!
Taking a cookie in his beak from a plate full of them, he walked to the end of the table and angled himself so we wouldn’t try to steal it back from him.
Afterwards, he came over for a sip of tea - we poured some into a saucer for him, so that he wouldn’t burn his tongue.
What better way to follow a morning’s refreshment than with a cuddle? Caspar loves pressing himself against you as you massage his neck. His eyelids flutter shut and he is in heaven. A few Tara mantras don’t go amiss!
May all beings have happiness and its causes!
Those of you who missed my Twala post can find it here.
Good morning David!
This thoughtful post made me think of my absolute favourite mewsing from HHC, in her book 5 I think:
"The value of life depends far less on its length than on what you do with it. On whether you value each precious day which it is your privilege to witness, or take it for granted. On your capacity to make the very most of whatever abilities you have to give joy to others, without fear or discouragement.
THAT is what makes the difference between a meaningful life and one which passes by in an unexamined blur".
Thank you for the joy your books and weekly emails bring us all xxx
Thanks David. It’s actions that count. Casper is a real character and deserves tea and biscuits.