QUESTION
Precious Robina,
I take the liberty of writing to you to ask for your advice regarding my spiritual journey.
My problem is that I do not love myself. So how can I develop love for all sentient beings across the six realms of existence—truly and genuinely—without merely pretending?
How can I learn to love myself so that I may sincerely love others?
I know that I love all beings deeply—even those who act cruelly, for I see that they are merely suffering (a suffering they have not yet worked through).
My sincere desire is to help liberate them from this suffering and from the very causes of that suffering; indeed.
I feel as though this particular step is simply impossible for me.
Thank you for the time you will take to respond to me.
With all my unconditional love,
T
ANSWER
Dearest T:
I know that you are a devoted practitioner, but like most of us in the modern world, we simply don’t understand properly the implications of the structure of the practices as laid out in the path to enlightenment: in Tibetan, lamrim.
The very first level of teachings is where Buddha exhorts us to not harm others. Why would he do that? Without analysis we just assume the reason is because others will suffer.
But we miss the most important point here. Compassion is actually more advanced: it comes later in the teachings.
This first step is for our OWN benefit: given that whatever we think, say, and do is the very process that produces oneself – that’s what karma means – then the reason behind this first recommended practice of not harming others is because those very actions will harm oneself. We harm ourselves by doing these actions, now and in the future.
But we don’t hear that. We think that sounds selfish. No. It’s common sense. But we need to think clearly about the logic of karma, the very basis of Buddha’s world view.
Very simply, another way of phrasing this motivation – that you cannot bear the present suffering that your past actions are causing you and, therefore, you cannot STAND the thought of the unbearable future suffering – is that it is love for yourself.
THAT is love for yourself.
The second level of practice is to look into your mind and identify attachment, aversion, jealousy, low self-esteem and the other neurotic states of mind – which are what drive us to harm others and therefore ourselves – and learn to lessen them.
Why? Because you can’t stand the suffering that they are causing you now and can’t bear the thought of the future suffering they will cause you!
THAT is love for yourself.
Now you are ready to go to the next level, the most advanced: the teachings on compassion and love for others.
Now that you understand your own suffering and its causes you can see so clearly that everyone else is the same. So you have compassion for them because they, just like you, cause their own suffering. And you want to help them.
You say you have this, but you’ve missed the very first point. You see, compassion for others is TOTALLY based on your development of renunciation of your own suffering and the causes of your own suffering – in other words, love for yourself, compassion for yourself – which you gain in the lowest and middle scopes of teachings and practices.
Without this, your compassion is limited, it’s just sentimental compassion, compassion based on attachment.
Keep going, T!
Robina