Dear son, I can’t raise you. Not because I don’t love you, but because I don’t trust myself. I don’t trust this world. I don’t trust this angry deluded mind. I don’t trust how adding billions more to this hot planet won’t kill us all. I don’t know where you are, son — but I can hear your whisper. I can feel your ache to breathe. I can see your dreams to play with me. But it pains me to say, you must not be born.
I’m living at chithurst buddhist monastery for a couple of months.
Your post triggered me.
Partly because I have three children and which one would I look in the eye and say, I wish you hadn’t have been born?
Whilst your eloquent, as always, rant has some intrinsic logic, it goes against everything in this Covid fearful world that I would invite people to fight for. Don’t give into pessimism, over thinking, climate catastrophising.
Rebel.
Feel your power and assume your child has a right to life, to try and make a difference and to be reborn with cute parents like you and his or her yet to be identified mummy.
By all means go to Vermont but it’s not a binary choice.
Follow your heart not some narcissistic head conclusion, that I have no sense would stand up to authentic, non traumatised meeting life as it is reflective practice.
Please! Do not succumb to some abstract ideal, but align and honour with full acceptance how things are and then use your passion to make the world better. Your intention to do so has its own meaning- don’t assume you know how the story will end. Much love Tony
Hi Tony, I remember you and think of you often actually (every time I think of Christopher Titmuss, Buddhist lists, Saranath, or my aching knees). I hope you are well friend and I am glad you’re living at Chithurst!
I apologize for triggering you. I couldn’t imagine looking a child into the eyes and deciding that. Yet I empathize a little because that’s what I struggle with when contemplating the future. Or even a few months ago I wrote a letter for a 1 year old to open on their 18th birthday. What would that world be? Would we as a society be proud of what we left behind for them? It pains me to imagine that.
On your behalf, I do think that the ethics of having a child in your times vs now are dramatically different. And I don’t think I am giving in to pessimism but rather realism at our ecological situation globally. Locally, I am giving into a community of connection and love. I am trying to live with equanimity with our current ways while striving to make the world better. Part of that path that I struggle with is Buddhist Right View. The house and kids and consumer lifestyle all have consequences— on our environment — and at the current trajectory thus risking the lives of all beings. Can we afford another billion American sized consumers? That’s less abstract ideal and more complexity science of complex adaptive systems. But in the end, for me it comes down to am I contributing to destruction and injustice or trying to find a better middle way? And for that reason I think both you and I striving for that at Chithurst and the Monastic Academy. We don’t know the way, but long for a better way filled with wisdom and compassion.
Thanks for sharing and wishing you well dharma brother.
I hear anger, loneliness and despair in you post. I hear so much love, longing, and grief for the state that the world is in. Longing for a son who isn't born yet and may never be, longing to belong, longing for a sense of purpose, a longing to become and offer the very best that you can to the world. None of these longings are wrong. I hear you struggling with decisions about how to show up in the world and make the best possible impact. A desire to live in a world where lover, power and wisdom have become as one. You can see clearly that the world needs compassionate and wise leadership. I see that too.
And I promise you, that this is not the only way to explore these questions and these themes. I promise you that there are many paths to becoming the wise and compassionate leader that you desire to be.The Monastic Academy may teach you many things but it will also drag you deeper into the heart of your despair. You will be taught to risk everything, and that risking everything means being of service to the organization, that being of service to the organization is how you can be of service to the world. It is likely that you will seriously risk your psychological wellbeing. You will be told that this is part of the process, that you should go deeper into in. This is a mistake. Your defense mechanisms will arise and you will be instructed to surrender these. Little by little your internal compass and ability to trust yourself will be eroded as you relinquish more and more of yourself. You will be told that this is what is in service to the world and in service to these longings for an ethical life and a harmonious society in which we take care of eachother and we take care of the earth. It is not. While you give months or even years of your life to this training the suffering of the world will continue. When you reach your breaking point, when you finally decide to leave you will be left with a view of the world and of leadership that has been deeply distorted. One that may take years to unravel, unlearn and heal from. Finding your truth north again will not be easy. But you will learn, yes you will learn a lot. You may wonder like I did, why your spirit drew you to this experience. To may look back on it as a mistake or you may view it one day a powerful learning lesson. Maybe it's both. I've learned many powerful lessons about what not to do as a leader from the Monastic Academy. The souls call is a powerful thing. How do I know this? Because you are not the first to walk this path. No I've since heard many stories of those who've had to stich there lives, their hearts and spirits back together after their time at the Monastic Academy.
But frankly, whoever you are, you deserve better. There are less painful ways to learn. More trustworthy teachers. Paths in which the teachers don't just talk about embodied ethics but actually live it. Where teachers demonstrates through there example compassion and wisdom rather then simply repeating to themselves and to you that they are trustworthy when in fact they are not. Those teachers haft to have first done their own shadow work and heal from their own trauma. Those teachers need to be accountable to more than just themselves. Those teachers need to have their own teachers and to continue to grow and learn, and have reflected back to them the places where they have blndspots Many former residents and apprentices have approached Soryu and the organization to share their experiences and feedback. Many of them have been dismissed, denied, gaslit, and in some cases threatened. Former students who've asked again and again to speak to leadership because we care. It you want to know more, if you want contacts and context I'm happy to share more.
What does one do when a teacher fails to demonstrate even a basic level of empathy for the suffering of others? What does one do when a teacher continue to make decisions that risk the well-being of others by placing inexperienced and novice practitioners into positions of power and responsibility that they do not have the training or skill to hold ethically? Do I want to train with and support a teacher who holds the belief that the ends justify the means? Is this really the kind of man or woman or other being that I or you or any of us want to be? Perhaps it's because we have bought the story and the vision hook, line and sinker and it is our own cognitive dissonance and lack of shadow work and healing that has kept us from seeing how truly far we have strayed from the beautiful longings that animate out souls.
Please know Alf, that whenever your portion of this journey is done the world will still be waiting. There will still be suffering. We will still need leaders who are compassionate and wise and whom have done the work to address their shadows and heal from their personal trauma. You will still have work to do. Joining a cult will not be the end of the healing process, not by a long shot. The world will still need people who are courageous enough to confront the abuses of power and of life rampant in our society. So whenever you are done, please know you are not failing if and when you choose to walk away. The world will be waiting for you and perhaps, your son will be waiting too.
Hi Alf
We met in Sarnath and Varanasi.
I’m living at chithurst buddhist monastery for a couple of months.
Your post triggered me.
Partly because I have three children and which one would I look in the eye and say, I wish you hadn’t have been born?
Whilst your eloquent, as always, rant has some intrinsic logic, it goes against everything in this Covid fearful world that I would invite people to fight for. Don’t give into pessimism, over thinking, climate catastrophising.
Rebel.
Feel your power and assume your child has a right to life, to try and make a difference and to be reborn with cute parents like you and his or her yet to be identified mummy.
By all means go to Vermont but it’s not a binary choice.
Follow your heart not some narcissistic head conclusion, that I have no sense would stand up to authentic, non traumatised meeting life as it is reflective practice.
Please! Do not succumb to some abstract ideal, but align and honour with full acceptance how things are and then use your passion to make the world better. Your intention to do so has its own meaning- don’t assume you know how the story will end. Much love Tony
Hi Tony, I remember you and think of you often actually (every time I think of Christopher Titmuss, Buddhist lists, Saranath, or my aching knees). I hope you are well friend and I am glad you’re living at Chithurst!
I apologize for triggering you. I couldn’t imagine looking a child into the eyes and deciding that. Yet I empathize a little because that’s what I struggle with when contemplating the future. Or even a few months ago I wrote a letter for a 1 year old to open on their 18th birthday. What would that world be? Would we as a society be proud of what we left behind for them? It pains me to imagine that.
On your behalf, I do think that the ethics of having a child in your times vs now are dramatically different. And I don’t think I am giving in to pessimism but rather realism at our ecological situation globally. Locally, I am giving into a community of connection and love. I am trying to live with equanimity with our current ways while striving to make the world better. Part of that path that I struggle with is Buddhist Right View. The house and kids and consumer lifestyle all have consequences— on our environment — and at the current trajectory thus risking the lives of all beings. Can we afford another billion American sized consumers? That’s less abstract ideal and more complexity science of complex adaptive systems. But in the end, for me it comes down to am I contributing to destruction and injustice or trying to find a better middle way? And for that reason I think both you and I striving for that at Chithurst and the Monastic Academy. We don’t know the way, but long for a better way filled with wisdom and compassion.
Thanks for sharing and wishing you well dharma brother.
Powerful stuff Alf. I liked the recontextualization on the concept of a 'cult'
Dearest Alf,
I hear anger, loneliness and despair in you post. I hear so much love, longing, and grief for the state that the world is in. Longing for a son who isn't born yet and may never be, longing to belong, longing for a sense of purpose, a longing to become and offer the very best that you can to the world. None of these longings are wrong. I hear you struggling with decisions about how to show up in the world and make the best possible impact. A desire to live in a world where lover, power and wisdom have become as one. You can see clearly that the world needs compassionate and wise leadership. I see that too.
And I promise you, that this is not the only way to explore these questions and these themes. I promise you that there are many paths to becoming the wise and compassionate leader that you desire to be.The Monastic Academy may teach you many things but it will also drag you deeper into the heart of your despair. You will be taught to risk everything, and that risking everything means being of service to the organization, that being of service to the organization is how you can be of service to the world. It is likely that you will seriously risk your psychological wellbeing. You will be told that this is part of the process, that you should go deeper into in. This is a mistake. Your defense mechanisms will arise and you will be instructed to surrender these. Little by little your internal compass and ability to trust yourself will be eroded as you relinquish more and more of yourself. You will be told that this is what is in service to the world and in service to these longings for an ethical life and a harmonious society in which we take care of eachother and we take care of the earth. It is not. While you give months or even years of your life to this training the suffering of the world will continue. When you reach your breaking point, when you finally decide to leave you will be left with a view of the world and of leadership that has been deeply distorted. One that may take years to unravel, unlearn and heal from. Finding your truth north again will not be easy. But you will learn, yes you will learn a lot. You may wonder like I did, why your spirit drew you to this experience. To may look back on it as a mistake or you may view it one day a powerful learning lesson. Maybe it's both. I've learned many powerful lessons about what not to do as a leader from the Monastic Academy. The souls call is a powerful thing. How do I know this? Because you are not the first to walk this path. No I've since heard many stories of those who've had to stich there lives, their hearts and spirits back together after their time at the Monastic Academy.
But frankly, whoever you are, you deserve better. There are less painful ways to learn. More trustworthy teachers. Paths in which the teachers don't just talk about embodied ethics but actually live it. Where teachers demonstrates through there example compassion and wisdom rather then simply repeating to themselves and to you that they are trustworthy when in fact they are not. Those teachers haft to have first done their own shadow work and heal from their own trauma. Those teachers need to be accountable to more than just themselves. Those teachers need to have their own teachers and to continue to grow and learn, and have reflected back to them the places where they have blndspots Many former residents and apprentices have approached Soryu and the organization to share their experiences and feedback. Many of them have been dismissed, denied, gaslit, and in some cases threatened. Former students who've asked again and again to speak to leadership because we care. It you want to know more, if you want contacts and context I'm happy to share more.
What does one do when a teacher fails to demonstrate even a basic level of empathy for the suffering of others? What does one do when a teacher continue to make decisions that risk the well-being of others by placing inexperienced and novice practitioners into positions of power and responsibility that they do not have the training or skill to hold ethically? Do I want to train with and support a teacher who holds the belief that the ends justify the means? Is this really the kind of man or woman or other being that I or you or any of us want to be? Perhaps it's because we have bought the story and the vision hook, line and sinker and it is our own cognitive dissonance and lack of shadow work and healing that has kept us from seeing how truly far we have strayed from the beautiful longings that animate out souls.
Please know Alf, that whenever your portion of this journey is done the world will still be waiting. There will still be suffering. We will still need leaders who are compassionate and wise and whom have done the work to address their shadows and heal from their personal trauma. You will still have work to do. Joining a cult will not be the end of the healing process, not by a long shot. The world will still need people who are courageous enough to confront the abuses of power and of life rampant in our society. So whenever you are done, please know you are not failing if and when you choose to walk away. The world will be waiting for you and perhaps, your son will be waiting too.