May/June 2009 Spirituality
Hire Your Problems as Bodyguards

by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

When I was 11 years old, I was sent from my father's hermitage in Nepal to Sherab Ling monastery in India - a journey of more than 3,000 miles - to begin a rigorous course of study in Buddhist philosophy and practice.

I felt an especially close connection with Saljay Rinpoche, a very wise lama with a squarish head and gray hair, and despite being in his 80s, a face almost unwrinkled by age. In my mind's eye, I can still see him with his prayer wheel in one hand and his mala - a set of beads used to count repetitions of mantras, special combinations of ancient syllables that form a sort of prayer to support meditation - in the other. His kindness and patience were so great that I came to view him almost as a second father, to whom I could bring problems both great and small.

His responses invariably wound up as profound lessons. For instance, one morning while washing my hair, a little bit of water got trapped in my ear. I tried everything to get rid of it: wiping the inside of my ear with a towel, shaking my head, twisting little bits of tissue paper inside my ear. Nothing helped. When I told Saljay Rinpoche about it, he advised me to pour more water in my ear then tip my head to let it all drain out. To my surprise, it worked.

This, Rinpoche explained, was an example of the principle, taught long ago by the Buddha, of using the problem as the antidote. Timidly, I asked if the same approach could be used to deal with thoughts and feelings.

He looked at me quizzically, and soon I found myself pouring out the whole story of how anxious I'd been most of my life - the fear that sometimes attacked with such violence I could hardly breathe, how I'd tried to watch my mind in a friendly, nonjudgmental way as my father had taught me, my small successes back in Nepal where everything was familiar, and how all the old problems had resurfaced even more forcefully in this new, strange environment.

He listened until I ran out of words and then replied with the following story.

"Tibet," he said, "is full of long and lonely roads, especially in the mountains, where there aren't many towns or villages. Traveling is always dangerous, because there are almost always bandits hiding in caves or behind rocks along the sides of the road, waiting to jump out and attack even the most watchful travelers. But what can people do? To get from one place to another, they have to take those roads. They can travel in groups, of course, and if the groups are big enough maybe the bandits won't attack. But that doesn't always work, because the bandits will usually see an opportunity to steal more from a larger group. Sometimes people try to protect themselves by hiring bodyguards. But that doesn't work very well either."

"Why not?" I asked.

He laughed. "The bandits are always more fierce and they have better weapons. Besides, if fighting breaks out, there's more of a chance that people will get hurt."

His eyes closed, his head drooped, and I thought maybe he'd fallen asleep. But before I could think of any way to wake him, he opened his eyes and continued.

"The clever travelers, when attacked by bandits, make a deal with them. 'Why don't we hire you to be our bodyguards? We can pay you something now and more when we reach the end of our journey. That way, there won't be any fighting, no one will get hurt, and you'll get more from us than you would by simply robbing us on the trail. And if you keep us safe along the road, we can recommend you to other people and soon you'll be earning more than you could ever hope to gain by robbing people. Everybody benefits.'"

He paused, waiting to see if I understood the lesson. My expression must have given away that I hadn't, so he continued.

"Your mind is the long and lonely road, and the all the problems you described are the bandits. Knowing that they're there, you're afraid to travel. Or you use mindfulness like a hired bodyguard, mixing it with hope and fear, thinking, 'If I watch my thoughts, they'll disappear.' Either way, your problems have the upper hand. They'll always seem bigger and stronger than you are.

"A third choice is to be like a clever traveler and invite your problems to come with you. When you're afraid, don't try to fight the fear or run from it. Make a deal with it. 'Hey fear, stick around. Be my bodyguard. Show me how big and strong you are.' If you do that often enough, eventually fear becomes just another part of your experience, something that comes and goes. You become comfortable with it, maybe even come to rely on it as an opportunity to appreciate the power of your mind. Your mind must be very powerful to produce such big problems, yes?"

I nodded. It seemed logical.

"When you no longer resist a powerful emotion like fear," he continued, "you're free to channel that energy in a more constructive direction. When you hire your problems as bodyguards, they show you how powerful your mind is. Their very fierceness makes you aware of how strong you are."

Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, author of Joyful Wisdom, is a celebrated Tibetan Buddhist master, deeply versed in the practical and philosophical disciplines of the ancient tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. Visit www.mingyur.org.