Welcome to the Buddhist Boot Camp Podcast.
Our intention is to awaken, enlighten, enrich, and inspire a simple and uncomplicated life.
Discover the benefits of mindful living with your host, Timber Hawkeye.
When I receive an email, I either reply to it right away if it requires a response,
or I immediately archive the message if it doesn't. This keeps my inbox free of clutter,
which is also how I organize my thoughts. It's an efficient filing system of sorts
that keeps me from ever feeling overwhelmed or buried by
incoming messages or by intrusive thoughts.
But every once in a while, I get an email that requires a response from me, but I don't have
all the information yet, so I can't reply to the message right away.
Ignoring the message is not an option, so I can't just delete or archive it, but I don't want
it in my inbox taunting me, either. That's when the newish feature from Google to snooze
incoming messages comes in really handy.
I hit the snooze button, and the message disappears from my inbox
until a chosen day in the future when I will be better able to respond.
This snooze feature perfectly illustrates how I
also deal with worries and concerns that come up in my mind.
Whenever I'm worried about something, I first determine whether I have all the information
to address the concern right away, and then I either deal with it immediately,
dismiss it altogether, or I snooze my worries until more information becomes available.
I mean, it's pointless for me to worry about it in that moment anyway, right? So, I give
myself permission to worry about it later, knowing full well I probably won't need to.
It's kind of like saying, "We will cross that bridge when we get there,"
but many of us worry about bridges that may or may not even exist.
Turns out we can just snooze our concerns until we find out.
In my experience, the pause between the impulse to worry and actually worrying
ends up eliminating most worries.
I simply refuse to react without having all the data... So, I wait.
In my mind's eye, I visualize a
redacted document where key information has been crossed out.
There's no way to make sense of it without making assumptions or
jumping to conclusions, so I don't try to make sense of it until I get more data.
When I shared this technique with a friend who is regularly tormented by worries,
she laughed and she said she will still spend all night trying to find an answer.
But that can only happen if we think an answer CAN be found if only we
think about the problem hard enough.
But if we admit an answer CAN'T be found regardless of how hard we try,
then we don't lose any sleep trying to look for something that doesn't exist.
Think of it this way: a worry pops into your head like a call ringing your cell phone.
You don't know who it is. You can hit the red button and make the worry go away.
They will either leave a message and you will deal with it later, or they will hang up.
After enough practice, it can be that simple
to dismiss our worries the moment they come up. Either way, there's nothing to worry about.
For example, I'm about to embark on a
three-month book tour across New Zealand, Australia, and England.
It's completely pointless for me to worry
about what type of rental car I'll be assigned when I get there, because I won't
know until I land. So, I snooze that concern right out of my inbox.
When I shared this episode as a blog entry on the first of the month, I included a note at the
bottom that I still needed help arranging for a rental car for my book tour around England.
So many people sent in their donations that by the next day, it was all taken care of.
Another technique to never worrying about
things is trusting that everything will work out because it always has.
In the old days, monks would spend their days meditating and studying in the mountains or
caves, and in the evenings, they would walk into the nearby village with their Alms Bowl to
share their insights with the townspeople in exchange for their one meal a day.
Fast forward to today, and I don't exactly live
in a cave or show up at my author events with an empty bowl for rice,
but last year's book tour across the US was one-hundred-percent supported by
people helping with fuel expenses, meals, and hosting me in their homes between events.
All of my upcoming flights to New Zealand, Australia, and the UK were booked using
airline reward points that people have donated, and I will again be
couchsurfing in strangers' homes between speaking engagements.
After all, that's how I'm able to keep all of my events unticketed and free
for everybody to attend. It's also how I can donate the proceeds from books to
the Prison Library Project, to schools, and to non-profit organizations.
Instead of paying for hotels, many people
have a guest bedroom or a couch that sleeps alone in the dark every night, and that couch
can be somebody's bed; somebody who is traveling the world on a budget.
When I say Buddhist Boot Camp is not mine, it's ours... I mean it.
You make it possible for as little as $1/month through Patreon.com/BuddhistBootCamp
Someone recently asked me to explain Patreon, and I think of it like a
modern-day Alms Bowl, or.. you know how street musicians perform with
an open guitar case for tips? Well, Patreon is the online version of that guitar case.
It's a way for you to support what you find has value, even though it's only available
in digital format like online posts, podcast episodes, or YouTube videos.
If you find value in what I do,
please show your support at Patreon.com/BuddhistBootCamp
I truly could not do this without you.
Thanks to you, I'm not worried about my bowl of rice being empty.
We can snooze more than our email messages or morning alarms,
we can snooze our worries as well.
Give it a try next time a worry comes up.
Good luck!
Timber Hawkeye is the bestselling author of Buddhist Boot Camp, Faithfully Religionless,
and the Opposite of Namaste.
For additional information, please visit BuddhistBootCamp.com,
where you can order autographed books to support the Prison Library Project,
watch Timber's inspiring TED Talk, and join our monthly mailing list.
We hope you have enjoyed this episode,
and invite you to subscribe for more thought-provoking discussions.
Thank you for being a Soldier of Peace in the Army of Love. 🙏🏼