"You Can't Always Get What You Wa-ant..."

For the past two nights, I have been reading Jon Kabat Zinn's 2005 Opus, Coming to Our Senses: Healing Ourselves and the World Through Mindfulness.

What I'm learning:

1. When I'm not practicing mindFULness, I am practicing mindLESSness--and that is 99% of the time. I have been practicing anger for quite some time and am becoming quite proficient at it. (Think about that next time you are stuck in rush hour traffic, curse the spilt milk or the broken dish. What exactly are you "practicing"?)

Anger brings me to my next point.

2. David Richo, has written a book called The Five Things We Cannot Change...and the happiness We Find by Embracing Them. One of the eternals:

#2 Things Do Not Always Go According to Plan

Many sages have realized this:

"The best laid schemes of mice and men, Go often askew," -- Robert Burns

Or

Murphy's Law: What ever can go wrong, will go wrong.

Or even

the pithy action hero retort's "fate's a B@$$^!"

Personally, I believe there is no plan.
Any attempt to prove that fate exists or that the creator has a master plan is just an example of humans needs for constructs. Our human mind has a need to conceptualize everything. It's a bad habit* ( It's also a very necessary one. Without "concepts" we couldn't make sense of our world and would probably go mad or just behave like animals.) Concepts lead us astray. For as soon as we make a concept such as 'circle' , 'success', or 'goodness' we are bound to to find something that breaks the rules for that concept or defies easy categorization. In short, there are no absolutes.

Kabat-Zinn points out that some of us may enjoy the illusion of control but sooner or later life will kick you in the A$$.

I am living that a$$ kicking right about now and it's all a result of my own clinging. As the buddha once summarized his entire worldview (see Coming To Our Senses) :

"Do not cling to any concept of I, me, or mine."

I have clung to this dream of mine, of being a school teacher, since about the age of 8. I have worked as a teacher for the past 10 years. And then for the past two, I have been unable to find a job as a classroom teacher. Adjusting to a new role has been difficult for me because I want this one thing SO MUCH. And, as we know from basic zen buddhist philosophy, "desire" or "clinging" is the root of all suffering.

But, I have other goals too. For just as long, I have wanted to be a good father, husband, and writer. I've been married for about 6 months now and for the past 2 years I've had ample time to write.

Oscar Wilde once wrote:

"There are only two tragedies in life: One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it."

I live THERE now. I've longed for the time and support to write. Now that I've got it, I'm miserable. And if I had a classroom right now, I'd be be so stressed out that I'd barely have time to eat and sleep let alone breath, enjoy life with my lovely wife, or write--I'd be miserable.

So there's no winning here, in my current emotional outlook, only losing.
Where exactly is here? The realm of "Getting What We Want." There is no happiness or satisfaction in "Getting What We Want" because:
a) We think we know what we want, but usually don't
b) If we actually DO get what we want, we seldom enjoy it. It's the "wanting" that drives us really.
c) We have very little control over what happens to us in life.

It's that last part that I'm struggling with the most. I've lived most of my life deluded into thinking that I could get what I want. I thought that if I went to the right schools, got good grades, tried real hard (or sometimes not at all) that I would be "successful" and be happy. There is really very little truth in that belief.

Or perhaps I just haven't been patient.

So here's the good news: I'm getting better at figuring stuff out.

Like the daily crossword, standardized tests, or my favorite video games, the landscape of life if familiar and the pitfalls predictable.

I may not always solve the puzzle or win the game but I can learn from it.
I don't have multiple lives but I do have unlimited hit points and +5 charisma. Or at the very least, there is no limit to the number of mistakes or failures that I am allowed.

I just have to keep playing the game.