So, lets just use the example of the brownie. When you go on a diet, and every Saturday or every Sunday, the kitchen puts out this big pan of brownies, and forever since you got here you just gobble them up. You love them so much. But now you’re on a diet, so – no brownies. So you have to go through withdrawal from brownies. So that could be renouncing brownies, refraining from brownies.
Harsh – it feels too harsh. I should just be able to have a little brownie because this is too harsh. Well maybe it is too harsh, you may have to figure this out for yourself, but basically we aren’t just talking about brownies, we are talking about habitual patterns.
Sometimes we fight. Some people are fighters. Other people disappear into the woodwork. You can’t find them. Theyr'e just – gone. Or you can’t find yourself. So sometimes ignorance is your exit. Sometimes anger is your exit. Sometimes crying is your exit. Sometimes blaming everybody else is your exit. Sometimes self-denigration, shame and guilt are your exit. But different habitual patterns that we do over and over and over…
excerpted from a talk entitled "Guidelines for Living Fearlessly"
Recorded in Gampo Abbey, July 2008
by Great Path, Pema Chodron Books and Tapes
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