Be Whatever You Already Are
In this episode, I explore the idea of "be whatever you already are," which serves as an invitation to embrace ourselves as we are, drawing parallels to Buddhist concepts of emptiness, aimlessness, and formlessness. I discuss how societal conditioning and the constant messaging to be different from who we are fuels unsatisfactoriness, or suffering, and how this is exploited by marketing. Drawing on the Jataka tale of the sticky hair monster and Abraham Lincoln's quote about making enemies friends, I suggest befriending our difficult thoughts and emotions rather than fighting them, leading to self-acceptance and joyful growth rather than self-rejection. This teaching is broken down into three reminders: "no one to be," emphasizing our lack of a fixed identity and the liberation of accepting ourselves as we are; "nothing to do," encouraging us to pause and observe strong emotions without immediate reaction, connecting to interdependent co-arising; and "nowhere to go," highlighting the importance of being present and accepting our current circumstances, akin to Ikkyū's quote about never being lost when having no destination. Ultimately, this practice allows us to experience the "suchness" of the present moment, like tasting the sweetest strawberry in a perilous situation, and to find contentment in simply being.
