Everything you crave might already be tucked beneath your skin.
That is the initial thought that spurred this piece. What do I mean by it?
In the west, when we feel like we are lacking something, we turn to the world, outside the skin, for answers.
We buy a course, join a gym, hire a therapist, or swap jobs. There’s a reason to that rationale. So let’s look at it.
As always, we should study history to understand why things are the way they are. Not to memorise facts and dates, but to realise that the situation we find ourselves in today is of no random coincidence.
For example: the Renaissance and the Industrial revolution both celebrated reshaping the physical world. Our ancestors built monumental cathedrals, invented new forms of transportation and studied the night sky and its infinite unknown space. We built stupendous marvels, and mastered external matter, in hope of progress. Heck, modern-day western phycology was born in Vienna where a patient would sit on a sofa, tell stories, and wait for Freud or Adler to interrupt them and interpret them from the outside in. An external expert gives internal insight….which sounds like an oxymoron to me. How is a stranger going to find ultimate understanding in someone they have never met before? My overarching point here is that, in the West, solutions are found from the outside-in.
And now I’m back in South East Asia, I’m reminded that there is another approach.
Across much of East and South-East Asia, if something is wrong, the solution is found in disciplined attention, not better equipment. You start by tuning the instrument, rather than changing the stage and environment.
I’m perfectly aware that I’m generalising a region home to billions of people…but bare with me! People in the east practice daily rituals that put the microscope on bodily signals. The body is listened to; whether that’s via meditation, yoga or any other of the thousands introspective arts practiced in the eastern hemisphere.
A core Buddhist concept is that desire is the root of suffering. Therefore, the solution is most often found in cultivating mindful awareness…to get more intune with the source of the issue. Let’s draw some examples:
Not happy with your life?
In West: Seek more money, to pay for more luxuries
In East: Look within to fix your sense of ‘lacking’
Got a headache?
In West: Take a painkiller.
In East: Why headache? Fix with intention.
Low energy?
In West: Double espresso
In East: 5 minutes of qi-gong
Arguing with your partner?
In West: Speak to a therapist or listen to a podcast
In East: Journal and reflect
Can’t fall asleep?
In West: Buy blackout curtains
In East: Scan the body for tension and accept the swirl of thoughts until it loses force
Want to be fit?
In West: Bench until muscle failure; in seek of muscle growth
In East: Meditate, fix posture and practice radio taisō; a set of gentle exercises to enhance mobility
The Eastern approach is: what happens inside is more important than what happens outside.
While the Western approach is: Something is lacking, let me look to the world to get it.
“The most important thing is to find out what is the most important thing,”
— Shunryu Suzuki (a Japanese Zen Teacher)
But of course, there are two sides to every coin.
The West’s fix-the-world impulse has given birth to some of the most powerful and liberating technologies in medicine and human rights. The obsession to alter the outside world brought an end to polio, allowed us to reach the untouchable heights of the moon (so they say) and fix our once rotten, littered cities, into clean sparkling metropolises (i prefer metropoli, but grammarly wasn’t having it). None of these feats required a deep search within before action. I guess that’s the benefit of the Western instinct to meet a problem in its physical habitat, rather than solely in the body.
Likewise, the Eastern focus on the internal self empowers ideas like karma - where people see setbacks as pre-ordained. It’s a slippery slope from self-reflection, into self-blame. That might explain why South Korea ranks #1 in suicide rates among the developed world.
So the next time you feel as though something is wrong, consider that there are 2 potential solutions: looking within, and looking beyond. What if the next upgrade isn’t your phone but your awareness?
ps: this rag used to include a ‘song recommendation of the week’ and i’ve been jamming to a lot of Ray Charles over the past 48hrs. what a guy. So here is my song recommendation to you today. Enjoy and speak to you soon.