People ask me about what it was like living in a monastery. It's really hard to explain, because of how much it looks like everyone else's life on the outside.
There's breakfast, lunch, and dinner. There is work to be done, money to be made. There is laughing. There is arguing.
Some of the monks had social lives outside of the monastery, while others didn't. Sex wasn't outlawed. Feelings and emotions weren't taboo. Masturbation happened.
Like I said: life in the monastery was similar to life outside the monastery on the surface. That part was intentional. We didn't want people to know what we did and how we lived. In short, we were openly invisible.
What we did that was different than most people was practice stilling our mind. Once one could establish that as being part of their lifestyle, they were told they had to go out and start volunteering in the community to learn to open their heart. While this was going on, they would undergo severe discipline training at the hands of the older monks. They had to be in the present moment at all times. They would be screamed at, laughed at, mocked, and cajoled in every way possible.
People think being disappointed about something is bad! The monks had a way of exposing the very basis of how one comes to disappointment and lays it bare for the whole world to see. They would say things like "It's not that you are disappointed that's the problem. It's that you had irrational expectations to begin with that's the problem." They would incessantly ask 'where your mind' was, no matter the time of day or situation.
They did this, not because they wanted to (though I can think of one of he monks who seemed to get a little pleasure out of it), but because each person needed something different to help them wake up. For that was our goal. It wasn't peace or happiness. It wasn't love or kindness. It was merely to be awake. That sounds easy on paper (or on screen), but it's not. One of the dead monks said in retrospect that "the path is simple, not easy." I couldn't agree more.
And there is no end, either. You wake up and get on with life, not be done living life. Like the old enlightened man who carried bundles of stones. One day a younger man asked him what enlightenment was like. The old man took the bundle off his shoulder. When the younger man asked him what was after enlightenment was like, the older man smiled and picked the bundle back up and continued on his way.
When I moved out of the monastery, life was no different. There were different meals of the day. I had to go to the bathroom, have a job, etc. What was on paper similar to living in the monastery, was completely different in another way. People shy away from direct openness and instead use opinions as a means to hide their anxieties. People don't strive to wake up. Instead, they strive to keep busy with dreams and hopes.
It was definitely a wake up call for me to move back into society. Probably a bigger culture shock than leaving the army and coming back into civilian life. People were vindictive at worst and sloppy at best. The stress was so bad I would come home to our rental and would vomit. That happened about 2-3 times a week. When I would speak to people, I could tell that they would filter what I was saying through their differing agendas they held mentally. It would be so odd to see that, and then to wonder how people could live like that. As time has gone on, I can understand now how people live like that. It's not an overnight behavior. It's an adaptive one. It's a survival one. Some people use agendas to survive. Some people use love. Some people use misogyny. Everyone has their own unique adaptive skills in order to make it in this unforgiving world.
I don't think I could ever truly go back to sleep, but I have had to learn to be a little meaner and more coarse at times. And at other times, I have had to learn to be a bit more gentle. I have had to learn to recognize and act on my instincts when I see agendas. The world isn't perfect, but it is still the world.
When I go out, I almost never mention the process of waking up to people. I used to, but I started noticing that being a bit more invisible about it was the most skillful way. Because for the most part, the majority of people don't want to be awake. And to be honest, I don't necessarily want them awake. If you wake up a person to early, there could be terrible repercussions. They could become violent or even commit suicide. There are some though that you see are wanting something more, so you begin to show them more, while ensuring that they are the ones who experience the more. If they start asking more direct questions, then I answer more directly. If not, we still have our lives to live and I have my alcohol to drink! Ha!!!
To be fair though, when I left the monastery, I was the one who was like a baby coming to an adult world. I had expectations that were irrational and I was the one who needed to adapt. It's not the world's responsibility to adapt for me. As I have come to realize this and make it a lifestyle, I am realizing that the world has always been this way, People say that the world has gone to shit, or that people are more stupid than the previous generation. That's just not the case. There has always been stupid people, smart people, funny people, depressed people. The context of what society looks like may have changed, but that hasn't changed human nature. We still look for acceptance while trying to avoid rejection. We still want happiness and work to avoid sadness, thinking it is something wrong. The world isn't a different place than it was a generation, or even eight generations, ago. It is still spinning and going around the sun. Just because one political party rises in power doesn't mean the end of the world, just as when the other rises in power doesn't mean the glory days are here. People all have different perspectives and do their best to survive and make it in this world.
These are just a few of the things I have had to recognize and learn from since leaving the monastery. They say that there are no teachers, but that life is the teacher. Whoever said that knew something pretty awesome. I want to buy them a drink! :)
