Busy

Tibetan Dzogchen master Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche describes the shock he experienced when he first came to the United States. Again and again, he heard a strange mantra: “I’m busy.” He came to realize that to say “I’m not busy” would be construed to mean there was something wrong. Something abnormal.

This rings true with my experience. When I resigned the Medical Director position of the Integrative Medicine program I developed in Corvallis, OR, I went through a prolonged period of distinct discomfort. Not because I had relinquished my role or responsibilities, but because there was no longer a succinct answer to the perpetual question of “what do you do?” Linking our identities to our functions is such a pervasive thing that the accompanying busyness associated has become a requisite to being defined as having value at all.

To “do nothing” is to BE nothing. A bum. A free-loader. A --- nothing.

Or so we think.

What if we unhinge that particular sequence, just for the folly of exploration? What if – just what if – we can BE, first? Just be. Try it now. See what happens. Notice your breathing, sensations, thoughts, feelings – all arising and then passing away. Notice the spaciousness within which all this happens. How peaceful, immense and grand it is.

What I‘ve noticed is that doing also arises from this spaciousness. Like every breath in inevitably leads to a breath out. Or vice versa. But the doing that arises from sequencing the dynamic in this way is ever so much more comfortable. Truer to self. Congruent with my inner state of happiness.

Lest you get the squeamies from the idea that you’ll never be functional again, I assure you that exactly the opposite is true. It’s even possible to accept a long-term job commitment under these conditions. But we won’t be confused, thinking that the ensuing busy-ness of our work is what defines our value. And, because the principles of a place chosen from inner awareness are more likely to be aligned with our values, it will not feel like a death sentence to our soul. It is possible to be settled with activities that are a cheerful alternative to mind-numbing, soul scorching work, if we choose from the inner state of peace and “yes” in the first place.

It’s taken me a few years to be comfortable with this. But I can honestly say that by focusing on my inner state as the central issue most needing attention, I’ve found such creative ideas of what to “do” with my time. I lOVE the experience of sharing from the heart. Whether that is to share my goods with a person who needs them, or my time for a cause. Whether to accept a position aligned with my values in a principled place, or to spend a weekend in silent meditation. The variability to the actions of my days still leaves me in a quandary as to how to answer the question: “What do you do?”, but I find myself more in tune with a river of peace by following this path in life.

We tend to choose our commitments more wisely when we rest first in the abiding peace of Being.
As we’ve so often heard: “Seek ye first the kingdom within”. Indeed, all things ARE aligned with that state when we do. Being in peace ensures that we peacefully respond to each situation that is best geared for the need of that moment, because we are not locked into a preformed idea of “who we are” as an external function. If we are busy, it is of this moment, and there may well be equally comfortable moments when we can say, with clear conscience: “I’m enjoying not being busy right now. And you?”