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.
Buried deep under many layers of shame, embarrassment, disgust, and anger,
there was a repressed experience from my past that only recently resurfaced.
I was not raised by alcoholic parents, and of all the things to which
anyone can be addicted, alcohol was never my poison of choice.
I've been working with people in recovery for over a decade, so on the one hand,
I am understanding, patient, loving, and gentle with anyone regardless of their
challenges in life, but on the other hand, I have avoided being around alcohol the way
someone who is terrified of drowning stays far from bodies of water.
Even after years of therapy and meditation, I couldn't figure out the logic behind my
strong aversion and rigidity around drinking.
That is, until a few weeks ago when a buried memory was triggered.
And now, I finally understand.
Whenever I'm on a book tour like the one I recently finished, I stay with different host
families in each city instead of paying for hotels, because that money can go towards
donating books to prisons, schools, rehab centers, support groups, and so on.
Most people have a guest bedroom, a couch, or an air mattress for me in the living room,
with a setup each night that ranges
anywhere from the slightly uncomfortable, all the way to plush luxury.
At one of my stops on this last tour, however, I found myself in a situation
that set off warning alarms in my body as if it was under attack.
I immediately contacted my best friend and I said: I don't think I can stay here.
Sleeping on a bathroom floor that reeks of
urine would be more appealing to me than staying where I am right now.
And that got me thinking...
When did I ever sleep on a bathroom floor that reeked of urine?
Surprisingly, that's the moment a repressed memory broke through the layers of shame,
embarrassment, disgust, and anger, and I physically felt myself reliving an incident
that I buried years ago.
From the time I was 20 until my early 30s, my good friend Colin stood by my side through
everything, whether I was working at coffee shops or law firms. When I left the
corporate world and moved to Hawaii, through life's ups, downs, and all arounds,
Colin was there, celebrating my every decision, from buying a condo to taking the
monastic vows; he never judged. In fact, he admired and respected
my spiritual journey, which he called The continuous rebuilding of the temple.
Colin was the kind of friend who lived in an apartment the size of a shoebox,
yet always welcomed anyone who needed a place to stay.
And so it came to be that I was between monasteries, unsure whether it would make
more sense for me to fly back home to Hawaii, or to stay on the mainland
for a few more days. And there was Colin, supportive as ever,
with a spare key to his apartment until I figure things out.
Sadly and unfortunately, on my second night there, Colin came home drunk
in the middle of the night, and tried to rape me in my sleep.
I remember waking up pinned-down and having to fight him off,
which wasn't too difficult because he was so inebriated, with slurred speech,
his alcohol breath forever associated with that incident.
When I pushed him off of me, he appeared to immediately pass out on the floor.
So, I locked myself in the bathroom, curled up in the fetal position on the mat next to the
toilet, shocked, and unsure how long before it would be safe for me to sneak out.
After a couple of hours on the bathroom floor, I opened the door and
heard him snoring, so I grabbed my backpack, which is all I had, and I left.
It was 5 o'clock in the morning.
I walked around the city until I found an open coffee shop, took out my laptop,
where, for the first time ever, and the only time since, my cousin's name appeared in the
Instant Messaging window, which is how we all used to chat on the Internet a
decade and a half ago. We hadn't kept in touch over the years, but it turns out she was
only a few blocks away, and she immediately invited me over.
It was from her apartment, a few days later, that instead of booking a flight home,
I applied to stay at another monastery,
which turned out to be the best platform from which to start anew.
Alcohol wasn't part of my life for many years before the incident.
I started drinking at 16 and was pretty much done with it in less than a decade.
But it was only after this incident that I developed an arguably unreasonable aversion
to being around it, smelling it, condoning it, or even accepting it in any way.
For the life of me, I couldn't figure out why or how I can simultaneously be
so understanding with everyone about almost anything, yet my views on alcohol remained
rigid, absolute, and concrete, especially in intimate relationships.
I have set such strict boundaries around drinking that I have lost people in my life
because I left no allowance for even a celebratory toast of champagne.
And now, all these years later, I finally know why: there was an unhealed wound that
I didn't even know was there, and the smell of alcohol on someone's breath would unearth it
I doubt it's a coincidence that while I was on tour specifically discussing how
trauma does not decompose when you bury it, that my own trauma finally resurfaced.
And I'm glad it did, because we can't heal what we refuse to confront.
It happened. It wasn't my fault. And as Maya Angelou said:
I can be changed by what happens to me, but I refuse to be reduced by it.
Giving someone the power to ruin my night is one thing, but I am taking that power back by
not letting them ruin the rest of my life.
It wouldn't be fair to me, and it wouldn't be fair to anyone who tries to get close to me
only to be crucified for someone else's mistakes.
The Greek root of the word Trauma means Wound, and we are all wounded in ways we
don't always understand or even know about.
You sometimes can't even see the wound, but you still experience its symptoms.
Your reactions, aversions, opinions,
preferences, and biases, are often indicators of trauma, so don't ignore, escape, deny,
or try to numb the symptoms. Pay attention to them. Awareness is the first key to healing.
Imagine one of the lights in the corner of your living room starts to flicker.
One way to deal with the problem is to stop using that lamp.
Another way is to try changing the light bulb.
If the new light bulb also flickers, you might assume the problem is the lamp itself
and simply avoid that corner of the room until you get around to buying a new lamp.
Either way, the issue is not resolved when it is merely ignored.
There might faulty wiring behind the wall causing the flickering.
So, failing to further investigate the seemingly small problem can potentially lead
to much bigger problems down the road, like your house burning down in an electrical fire.
Everything is indicative of something else.
My aversion to alcohol was indicative of a wound I didn't recall,
just like my aversion to children for so many years had nothing to do with kids or their
parents, I just kept my distance from anything that reminded me of my childhood.
Buddhism calls this Cause and Effect,
and mindfulness helps us get to the root of our behavior patterns,
because nothing is rarely what it seems.
It's even been said that you are never upset for the reasons you think you are upset,
just like sometimes your fingers hurt because
of an issue with your shoulder or spine, not with your hand.
I thought logical reasoning was the only thing fueling my strong opinions about liquor,
but it turns out my rigidity was
a trauma-response to a betrayal by a friend many years ago.
When I shared this story in writing, which was difficult, but nowhere near as difficult as it is
to record, I received an overwhelming number of letters from people wanting to
know if I have forgiven Colin for his betrayal.
And since I can't possibly respond to each message individually, here is what I
understand about forgiveness.
The betrayal felt similar to finding out your friend had stolen money out of your wallet
when you weren't looking. What Colin did was different, of course, but I'm saying
if a friend steals from you, the pain of losing a trusted friend is greater than losing $20.
People whose homes are broken into often say feeling violated and losing their sense of
security hurts more than losing their personal belongings.
And for me, it was easier to blame alcohol for
his actions than to emotionally accept the betrayal of a friend.
It was only when I was asked if I have ever
forgiven Colin that I realized it had never even occurred to me that I
needed to forgive him, because I had never blamed him. Isn't that fascinating?!
Colin had written me a letter a few weeks after the incident acknowledging we could
never go back to being friends after what
he had done, just like you can't put toothpaste back in the tube.
So, I guess I had intellectually considered the matter closed, but the wound was still open.
In other words, I may have replaced the
light bulb, but I've been living in fear of turning on the light.
Many of us avoid the pain of disappointment or abandonment, for example,
by avoiding getting close to people.
And like I said before, an issue is not resolved when it is merely ignored.
And since everything is indicative of something else, investigate any strongly held
beliefs or opinions, whether your own or someone else's, and you will either discover
Aversion or Desire, the two causes of suffering according to the Buddha.
Now that I recall what happened and see how I have tried to cope with the pain
for so many years, what I need to do is forgive myself for guarding my heart
for so long, more than I need to forgive Colin for his mistake; that's his cross to bear.
My job is to free myself from the fear of being betrayed again.
I can't avoid light switches for the rest of my life because one of them might cause a fire;
that is no way to live. Some people think revenge is the only way forward, but
hurting someone back does not heal our pain.
Forgiving Colin doesn't mean saying that what he did was acceptable,
nor do I need to let him or alcohol back into my life. It just means I will not
blame myself or every potential new friend for Colins's mistakes.
On the cover of my memoir: Faithfully Religionless, is a small figure with huge wings
It symbolizes liberating ourselves from the confines of conformity, freeing ourselves
from the pain of the past, and saving ourselves from delusions about the future.
Living in the moment is the greatest gift we can give ourselves.
Living in the moment indicates that we are healed.
Will people disappoint me again? Probably. But there is a big difference between
realizing that I may need to change the light bulb from time to time,
and thinking that something is wrong with the wiring behind the wall.
Remember: the goal is not to create a bubble in which nobody pushes your buttons,
it's to get to a place where you don't have any buttons that can be pushed.
So, when you do get triggered, or something makes you flicker, investigate further.
Let's treat one another the way we would approach a bird with a broken wing.
Even if they refuse our help when we get close, it's likely due to their fear and distress,
so don't take it personally. You can't help the bird until it is ready to surrender,
just like you can't use force to get a flower to bloom. All you can do is create a
nourishing environment where it feels safe and ready to open up.
The flower can be someone else, or it might be you. Either way, be patient.
I sometimes share personal experiences with you to depict how the Dharma continues to
enrich my life with insight and clarity.
If you have experienced something traumatic and the pain is expressing itself through
unstable behavior or thoughts, there is professional help out there that offers
coping skills to move through life more gracefully. Finding the right therapist
or even the right therapeutic approach can take time, trial, and error — Be patient.
And, if you want to talk to me about ways of
incorporating the ancient teachings into our daily lives, you can schedule a
One-on-One session with me at BuddhistBootCamp.com
and I will see you soon.
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 🙏