A lesson in attachment, please observe Exhibits A & B:
You, I’ll assume, aren’t attached to either exhibit in the pictures.
They have no meaning for you whatsoever, yes? Rightly so. Quite boring in fact? Excellent.
Exhibit “A” is the remainder of my glasses. That is what can happen to a decent (oh, still attached I see) pair of specs when you put them on your car windscreen, having stopped for a toilet break, only to forget you put them there.
You resume your journey at 50 mph with your glasses riding alfresco, at least until the currents whip them from their moorings and they fly off and into the path of an oncoming car which mercilessly ploughs them into the tarmac.
At this point I am ever so slightly annoyed but resign myself to the fact that “hey ho, such is life!” and declare inwardly that I must be becoming less materialistic and a slave to my possessions. Oh, how spiritually evolved I am!
Attachment level? I’d give it a 5% attached. Slightly annoyed, but they were a little scratched, I’ve had them for a while, and I know I needed a new eye test.
Exhibit “B” is the ring my Mum gave me as a present. 10 minutes after the glasses incident I noticed the stone was missing.
Attachment? Off the ‘friggin scale! Read: screams of a ‘Nooooooo!’ and all tears and snotters because it was my Mum – whom I deeply love – gave me it as a present. Her gifts matter to me. I place value on them. (Plus, having to attend her ‘show down’ when I told her it was lost did not create nice pleasing pictures Mother/Daughter bond at all). It’s not my fault the stone didn’t want to be still attached to the ring!
“Attachment is the root of suffering.” Buddha did say (Pali canon scriptures, Theravadan Buddhist).
Yep, I get it.
I love stuff, I lose the stuff I love. I suffer.
I like my things. My things break. I suffer.
I love stuff but stuff changes. I don’t want it to change. I suffer.
Lot of ‘I’ in there. A lot of me-me-me.
But it’s not just things, it’s not just the glasses, the ring, sofa the cat has shredded to paper, or the carpet I threw out when the dog was a pup and friendly with her ‘presents’.
Oh no, there been ideas. Ways of working. Plans. Qualifications. Job titles. Business. Websites. Words. Beliefs. Oh, this attachment thing is applied to everything .
[D]etachment means letting go and nonattachment means simply letting be. -Steven Livine
For peace all signposts point to: ‘don’t search outside yourself for happiness’, ‘don’t be attached to anything that isn’t permanent’ and ‘let all value go’ – but take the Exhibits above – just when I think I’m getting somewhere – up pops something to remind me ”Hey! You haven’t learnt it yet Barclay!’
And that’s okay. I’m not going to get attached to learning how not to get attached! How silly would that be?
Here end the trial, I’ll just finish with this from don Miguel Ruiz, Jr – The Five Levels of Attachment: Toltec Wisdom for a Modern World
By letting go of your attachment to what you think the melody should be, you open yourself to the potential to create a unique and beautiful song of your own composition or a collaboration that can be shared with others.
How do you let things just be?
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