7 August 2016:
Insecurity and impermenance
If you are a Buddhist, you should be no stranger to the Four Noble Truths, one of the foundations of Buddhism. Very loosely, they are:- There exists suffering (dukkha) in life.
- Dukkha arises due to a desire or craving, i.e. tanha.
- There is a way to be free from dukkha, which is nirvana.
- The way to attain nirvana is to practise the Noble Eightfold Path (aryastangamarga).
As a Buddhist myself, I must confess that I know of these Truths, yet in daily life I find it very hard to comprehend and put into practice. And the one aspect in which I know I haven't been very Buddhistic, would be the fact that I still cannot face impermenance.
From a Buddhist point of view, impernance is associated with the Four Noble Truths, in particular dukkha. One of the earliest concepts one would come across is that tanha is often targeted at that which is impermanent (anicca). Thus dukkha.
It is very simple and easy to comprehend, isn't it? Yet, the painful part (no meta-pun here) is really that till now, some part of me refuses to face this truth and as such bring upon misery to myself. A very common field in which I am struggling with this is relationships.
And I'm not even talking about romantic relationships (although that'll probably apply too). Simply on friendships, I am constantly faced with insecurities. Let's just say the whole thing with YS affected me quite a bit. And by quite a bit I mean a lot, given that I am already sensitive to begin with.
Along the way I hear certain things about what happened vs what I thought happened. It slowly strikes me, time after time. That there could be someone that was, the whole time, faking it, for lack of a better word. I am really stunned and simply do not know what / how to react.
I'm not saying that I had no part to play in how things turned out. WK has explained to me where I gone wrong and yes, what I did was not entirely correct. But still. When I explain what happened (at least from my viewpoint), people say that it's almost as if I went through a break-up.
Obviously, it wasn't a break-up. But no doubt, it certainly did feel as if something was ripped off, especially in such a situation. It's been 2+ months since what happened but it still affects me from time to time.
Like currently, I am seriously hesitant about getting to know more people. There are a few people in camp who are really nice to me, but I am constantly afraid that what if this ends up just like what happened. That when I think this person would be a good friend, suddenly, no friend.
And this insecurity is breeding a whole vicious circle. When others take the initiative, I end up clamming up or responding badly for fear of recurrence. And obviously, which I don't blame them for, people retreat.
This quandry is really, really draining and I really don't know what to do. I would love to take a leap of faith but if this means experiencing the whole issue with another friend ... 我真的不知道. Of course, through all this, it has made me all the more thankful for those by my side.
~
Another thing that's in a way affecting me is the impermenance of the people around me. Given the nature of my office, I have soldiers-in-transit "flowing in and out" throughout the months. These SITs aren't meant to stay; they're just here for the time-being.
Which is really what gets to me. Those nasty ones of course I don't care (and wish they'd leave sooner). But the nice ones? It's very 揪心 to spend time with them not knowing if tomorrow may be their last day in the unit.
TTFN.
If you feel this post is very fragmented, that's because this was written in two parts.