Student and Teacher

Together on the Path

Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche answers a student's question about what stability means in practice and how we all can expand our ability to accommodate the challenges we face, as we integrate practice with life. This is an excerpt from oral teachings, winter 2021.

Student: I would like to understand a little bit more about what stability means in relation to practice.

Rinpoche: Some people can hold so many things and events in their life and feel totally calm and peaceful and cool. And others cannot handle that level. It's not like an objective sense of stability, it's a subjective stability. So for each person, what we need to learn is to be able to expand a little bit more.

For example, when I've been shaken by something, and I have too many thoughts, I feel unstable. But it's not that there are too many thoughts. Rather, it is my lack of ability to integrate with my thoughts that makes me unstable. Thoughts are not the problem. It's my lack of ability to accommodate them. That's where all the practice of integration is coming. Integration practice is not saying thoughts interfere with you so get rid of them. No, it's not saying that. It's saying for a moment you stop thoughts, find your stability and then invite thoughts, dance with your thoughts. Then thought will not take anything away from you. Instead, it will give you more. Then you have stability with the thoughts.

It's like whatever is not disconnecting you, it's stable. Whatever is connecting you, it's stable. Whatever is disconnecting you, it's unstable. And what that is, is a very personal thing.

Because of that, I think the ability to expand is always good to remember. We have been talking about this and personally I have been looking at my own life. As we get older, generally speaking, we tend to retreat, to retire. If you are doing a job you've been doing for 40 years that you hate, then yes, it's good to retire when you can. But retiring from life is not a good thing to do. You cannot retire from life; you cannot retreat from life. You cannot retire from love, joy, compassion, equanimity, creativity.

Remembering as we get older or as we get tired of the world, that we should not to retreat from the world, make the distinction. I'm not tired of loving; I'm not tired of laughing; I'm not tired of living; I'm not tired of creating; I'm not tired of serving. But I am tired of a particular pattern of serving, a particular pattern of loving, a particular pattern involving a lot of effort of doing things. And I will not repeat that again. That's the difference you know? That pattern destabilizes my being, but the creativity enhances my stability. It helps me to stabilize. Making that distinction is critically important. Many times when people get older, they really lose those fun parts of life. They cannot make the distinction between all of their stories and pain, and what lies ahead in the future. They can not separate them. They think it's the same thing; they cut everything.

So make that distinction. It will not take away life; it will give you life. It will not take away fun; it will give you more fun.