Rejoicing
"How has your life changed?" - one of my best friends after I went to the abbey
Outline
Preamble
One of the first lessons we learnt at the abbey was how to meditate. It was emblematic of the rest of the retreat, as well as the spiritual journey I'm now on.
The Tibetan word for meditation is "gom", associated with the concept of familiarizing and habituating. Meditation is to habituate your mind to positive states.
All suffering arises from the mind. If I can train my mind to be without the causes of suffering, then I can find happiness and peace. I will explain more about theoretical Buddhist worldviews in Part 2.2. Here, I give practical applications.
Rejoicing
One of my biggest takeaways from the retreat was rejoicing. Rejoicing is feeling happy when others are doing well.1
I used to feel insecure when I saw others succeeding.2 I often experienced this in areas where I was already grappling with self-doubt or being overly critical of myself. For instance, when my roommate told me she was being put up for promotion, I smiled and congratulated her, but joy couldn't reach my eyes. I fought back an ugly twisting feeling–I'd been trying for a promotion too. Seeing others do well, especially in areas I was striving in, only emphasized my deficiency. In those moments, I slipped unconsciously into an uncomfortable, poisonous headspace. Some call it envy.
At the abbey, I also experienced envy. I was envious of my peers who seemed naturally kind, considerate and happy. I was envious of how they did all the considerate acts, like holding the door and distributing cutlery, such that by the time I wanted to do it, there was no opportunity for me to be kind and considerate anymore!3 It was interesting to note how frequently I felt envy after I became aware it.
What is the "antidote" to envy?4 Rejoicing. Why rejoice? In a world where there's so much suffering, and things are so hard, aren't you happy that someone is doing well?
It's a complete mental shift. Adopting joy instead of jealousy makes a whole world of a difference to my mental state. My whole being feels better.
When I saw my peers being kind, generous and warm at the retreat, I thought to myself how amazing it was that they developed such virtues. When my roommate told me that she actually got her promotion (after being put up for promotion), I screamed and congratulated her, as I knew how hard it was to get promoted.
Try rejoicing next time you feel envious. I highly recommend it. Notice the difference in your mental state. It's mind-changing, and world-changing.
As I did more reading after leaving the abbey, I realized this antidote has close connections to one of the "four immeasurable abodes" (a.k.a. four immeasurable minds, four immeasurables, four divine abodes, brahmaviharas, etc.). These are mental states considered to be blameless and healthful for your mind to reside in. One of the four immeasurables you've probably heard of–metta, or loving-kindness. Another immeasurable is is empathetic joy, mudita. Doesn't that sound a lot like rejoicing?
(See part 2.1b)
It honestly feels like such an obvious thing to do (once you overcome those sneaky ego-driven insecurities that hold you back!).↩
This reminded me of when people said "spoil market" or "suan" in high school, though back then I was usually on the receiving end of envy. I feel envy when I feel competitive or perceive scarcity. It's no wonder that the antidote to envy makes you feel good–cooperative and abundant–and feels good for all involved too!↩
The irony was that I only felt envy when people did what in my mind were "easy" considerate acts, and not at all envious of the people who dedicated time and energy to do dishes and wipe down tables.↩
In Tibetan Buddhism, there's a lot of talk of "antidotes" to poisonous mental states, like anger and attachment. I highly recommend doing more research on this if you're keen.↩