In this forty-fourth installment of the ongoing live series with Wendy Nash, we continue our inquiry into meditation practice both on and off the cushion this time with Spiritual Friendship or Kalyāṇa-mitta basically meaning “friend of moral beauty” or a “companion on the path of goodness.” What qualifies as this? What are pseudopartners? What is our lived experience with this? Why is this important? How does this relate to meditation?
[Episode note: Even though Wendy has expressed past challenges in UK I’ve found my time there overall of great fruit and great benefit inside and outside the Dhamma and I stay in touch with numerous friends and acquaintances with zero enemies]
Related suttas:
The 7 Qualities of a Good Friend (AN 7.36)
According to the Mitta Sutta, a friend worth associating with is someone who:
- Gives what is hard to give (generosity of time, energy, or resources).
- Does what is hard to do (helps you out even when it’s highly inconvenient).
- Endures what is hard to endure (bears with your bad moods, flaws, or difficult moments).
- Reveals their secrets to you (they trust you with their vulnerability).
- Keeps your secrets (your private struggles are entirely safe with them).
- Doesn’t abandon you in times of trouble (they stick around when life gets messy).
- Doesn’t look down on you when you’re down and out (they don’t judge or scorn you when you fail or lose your status).
Ven. Ananda said to the Blessed One, “This is half of the holy life, lord: admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie “Don’t say that, Ananda. Don’t say that. Admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie is actually the whole of the holy life…https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn45/sn45.002.than.html
The “Warm-Hearted Friend” in the Sigalovada Sutta (DN 31)
“Householder’s son, you should recognize these four good-hearted friends: the helper, the friend in good times and bad, the counselor, and the one who’s sympathetic.
You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s a helper on four grounds. They guard you when you’re negligent. They guard your property when you’re negligent. They keep you safe in times of danger. When something needs doing, they provide you with twice the money you need. You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s a helper on these four grounds.
You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s the same in good times and bad on four grounds. They tell you secrets. They keep your secrets. They don’t abandon you in times of trouble. They’d even give their life for your welfare. You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s the same in good times and bad on these four grounds.
You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s a counselor on four grounds. They keep you from doing bad. They support you in doing good. They teach you what you do not know. They explain the path to heaven. You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s a counselor on these four grounds.
You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s sympathetic on four grounds. They don’t delight in your misfortune. They delight in your good fortune. They keep others from criticizing you. They encourage praise of you. You can recognize a good-hearted friend who’s sympathetic on these four grounds.”
The Buddha spoke this matter. Then the Holy One, the Teacher, went on to say:
“A friend who’s a helper, one the same in both pleasure and pain, a friend of good counsel, and one of sympathy;
an astute person understands these four friends for what they are and carefully looks after them, like a mother the child at her breast.
The astute and virtuous shine like a burning flame. They pick up riches as bees roaming round pick up pollen.
And their riches proceed to grow, like a termite mound piling up. In gathering wealth like this, a householder does enough for their family.
And they’d hold on to friends by dividing their wealth in four. One portion is to enjoy. Two parts invest in work. And the fourth should be kept for times of trouble.”
Past posts relating to Spiritual Friendship:
*There’s naturally an ongoing open call for meditation (related) questions for the (roughly) monthly “Meditation Q & A” either by the various social media means listed; integratingpresence[at]protonmail.com or just showing to type/ask live.*
Background
Regular, current and past visitors to Integrating Presence may recall the monthly series “Ask Us Anything” I did with Denny K Miu from August 2020 until January 2022 — partially including and continuing on with Lydia Grace as co-host for awhile until March 2022.
For a few months thereafter I did various Insight Timer live events exploring potential new directions and/or a continuation of the Ask Us Anything format while weaving in other related teachings to these events.
Then, after chats with meditation coach Wendy Nash, it became clear to start a new collaboration similar to “Ask Us Anything” simply and clearly called “Meditation Q & A” especially due to the original intent of the Ask Us Anything’s being “discussions about meditation and related topics.”
Audio: Spiritual Friendship | “Meditation Q & A With Wendy Nash” #44
Past chats with Wendy:
Transcript via YouTube (with timestamps removed and cleanups here and there too I suppose via ai or as ai puts it: “the cleaned-up transcript with minor typos, clear misspellings, and obvious miscontextualizations corrected while preserving the original wording and flow”):
Josh: Hey, wholeness. Welcome. This is Josh, Integrating Presence, and joined once again by the intrepid Wendy Nash. Wendy, what’s happening?
Wendy: I’m here on Kabi Kabi country in Queensland, in Caboolture. It’s quite cold. Straight after this, I have to dash out, so I’m a little bit flimsy, but I’m hoping I’m going to keep warm enough [laughter] during our discussion.
Josh: We’ll make it hot and exciting. [laughter] Well, we’ll see. But so tell me about the weather in Australia in the winter. It’s not that cold there for that long, is it? But when it is, nobody’s really prepared for it, and it comes as a shock all the time, or no? How does it work?
Wendy: So Australia is a really big place, so people misunderstand how huge it is. Just to give you a bit of an idea, it’s the same size as the US mainland. If you take off Alaska, then that’s basically the same size as Australia. So to say, “What’s the weather in Australia?” is like saying, “What’s the weather like in the US?” It just depends on where you are.
Where I am is kind of maybe like Miami, where it’s very humid. It’s about maybe 2,000 kilometers south of the Tropic of Capricorn. And so actually the range of temperatures is not particularly variable here. We’re just outside Brisbane [snorts], but it is very humid.
So when it’s really—there’s something called the wet bulb effect, which is that once the relative humidity gets up to like 95 or 100%, you actually can’t perspire anymore. And then if the temperature gets to 35 degrees Celsius, which I don’t know what that is in hot [laughter]—then you actually can’t perspire, and this is sort of an increasing health problem, particularly with all the heat. So you’ll have seen, obviously in Europe and North America, all these heatwaves. So that’s what happens. Even if you’re in front of a fan, it doesn’t make any difference. Trust me, I know because [laughter] I’ve tried it.
Josh: You’ve tried it. What’s it called? A wet bulb effect? Bulb, B-U-L-B. Wet light bulb? Light bulb?
Wendy: Wet bulb effect.
Josh: Okay. Interesting. I haven’t heard of that.
Wendy: Okay.
Josh: Hey, so yeah. Well, [sighs and gasps] it’s hot a lot of places, but at least you have some coldness there, right? Or some coolness now. So, that’s nice, [gasps] I guess. But anyway, okay, we’ll jump right in here, right? It’s time to start. I’ll just read my little blurb here.
In this 44th installment of the ongoing life series with Wendy Nash, we continue our inquiry into meditation practice both on and off the cushion. This time with spiritual friendship, or kalyāṇa-mittatā—it’s a Pali word for what’s translated as spiritual friendship, basically meaning a friend of moral beauty or a companion on the path of goodness. What qualifies as this? What are pseudo-partners? What is our lived experience with this? Why is this important? How does this relate to meditation? This and more live. So join us if you’re not already here, somehow get here and listen, or listen on the replay, which you may be doing, too.
So yeah, spiritual friendship, and this struck me as particularly important because I just came off of two retreats, and everybody [clears throat] should do more retreats. I love retreats and highly suggest them a lot. And at the same time, when we’re doing silent meditation retreats, it does limit our ability to connect as spiritual friends, which—we need this time alone, but then I think we also need this dynamic of spiritual friendship. What say you, Wendy?
You’re not saying anything. You’re on silent retreat.
Wendy: No, I’m not. I was just going, “Can I quickly get this email out?” [laughter] which I need to send.
Josh: Oh, please go ahead. I could talk forever. Go for it. No, seriously. Talk about spiritual friendship.
Wendy: So this is bad behavior on my part, but I’m like madly trying to dash and get this thing out…
Josh: And we can wrap up [laughter] early today, too. You’ve got extra busy stuff, and it’s not like we’re on the clock getting paid or anything. So yeah, there’s no seriousness here that if we don’t need to be, you know what I mean? Like, you’re more than welcome to—you could turn off your camera and I could just talk and you can listen. But seriously, yeah.
Wendy: But no, let’s not do that. So what is a good friend? You know, like a kalyāṇa-mitta. What is that? Huh, [clears throat] I’ve got some guidelines here.
Josh: I’m sure you do.
Wendy: I think it takes many forms. I was at a community building workshop yesterday and it was talking about social capital, and there’s two types of social capital. One is bonding social capital and one is linking social capital. Bonding social capital is the benefit that you gain from being with your friends, with being with people who are alike. The other one is making connections with people you are not like, but still feeling some sort of connection. You wouldn’t maybe have a big discussion with them because it might go really badly [gasps], but nonetheless, you sort of ride your bike or walk or wherever, and you see them and you go, “Hi,” or whatever.
So for good well-being, you need both. You can be poor, you can have any other stuff [clears throat] going on in your life, but if you actually don’t have those two aspects of social capital in your life, you actually don’t have good well-being. This is what he was saying. And you look around at the world today and you go, “Yeah, that’s it.”
So linking back to what is a kalyāṇa-mitta, I think it is both of those. In a way, with the bonding social capital, I think we do need people who support us in our practice. We do need people to have chats with about the dharma, about meditation, to know if we’re on the right track, how we’re going, and just to feel connected to somebody else in this space. And I think also we need to be able to practice with people who are really different, because that’s where the edge is—people who are really different. So that’s what I would say about a kalyāṇa-mitta: one is a place to practice, and one is a place to chat. What do you think?
Josh: Yeah, this is pretty much—I mean, in the traditional Theravāda stuff, at least for monastics, if I’m getting this right, you have the spiritual friend, you have your companions on the path, and you want to associate with wise people basically, and that goes beyond just people in the holy life as well, I would say. And you have your teachers and friends, like you just said, to keep you supported and see if you’re on the right track.
And then, the monastic community—the Buddha, I think, deliberately arranged it this way where they can’t store up food. They can’t touch and handle food themselves, so they’re entirely dependent on laypeople. And so this means traditionally, I guess, going on alms rounds, and they’re forced in a sense—I don’t know, maybe “forced” is too strong a word—but it’s structured so there’ll be interaction with those outside their normal circles, right? Usually.
And so this is where—I agree with what you’re saying, and I couldn’t help but just think, “Oh my gosh, social capital, it’s like a human asset, you’re treating people like…” I don’t know, I’m pushing a little bit far here, but the language is really interesting. The sentiment is what matters—what the meaning is, right? The phrase just makes me roll my eyes a little bit.
But yes, absolutely. And I would say the second category, Wendy, is unavoidable. We’re not going to have to go out of our way too much unless we’re a hermit, and some of us are, especially some people who are deeply introspective and meditative—they don’t go out a lot, they don’t interact. There’s so much loneliness and longing for belonging. But eventually, whether you buy things at a store or step outside your house and have a random encounter, it’s almost entirely unavoidable, unless you live in a cave for three years or whatever, you’re still going to have to do this.
But yeah, some of us need more of that and some of the other. But the importance here too is the wise friends, because that’s the support system, that’s the bonding, and then the reinforcement and strength when it’s good to then go out and interact with the world in this other category you’re talking about.
Wendy: [snorts] Yeah. So let me just—there’s one thing here. In Tibetan Buddhism—I can’t remember his name, he’s one of these cranky old people who just traipses about the countryside with very clear capacities, very skilled—he goes to this monastery and hears about this monk who’s in his own house, who never goes out or anything like that and is sponsored by the local community. I think I might be conflating a couple of stories.
This very famous Rinpoche comes up to him and says, “What are you studying?” And he says, “Oh, I’m studying patience, refining my practice.” And this maverick, Lharampa-kind of guy turns around and [laughter] slaps him on the back and goes, “Well, we’ve got them hoodwinked good and proper, haven’t we?” And the monk just gets livid. And the Rinpoche goes, “There you go, that’s what you’ve got to be working with.”
So, yeah. I put that in as a kind of—that in a way is the role of the kalyāṇa-mitta. I guess that’s a teacher role, but you don’t want to be abusive in that role by any stretch, because people can be very weird in that space, but I think that kind of wisdom is really good.
Josh: Yes, I’ve talked about this with a few people too, and I don’t know if this fits in the crazy wisdom tradition, but yeah, it’s great. I love these teachings. However, I would say that it’s high risk, high reward, right? The success rate is best in a narrower case. The practitioner has to be ready for it, not take it the wrong way, and has to be firm and certain, because there are really high levels of potential abuse. You can’t just go teaching in that manner to everyone. In some of the Zen teachings I’ve heard about, it would completely traumatize some people, but for other people, it’s the breakthrough they need. It’s a skillful means. That’s how I look at it.
Wendy: Exactly. I mean, I just think that’s a fun story, too. I wouldn’t put that in the crazy wisdom, abusive category, because he’s really just highlighting—he’s triggering this person’s sense of impatience and going, “Well, how enlightened are you? You think you’re so far ahead.” So I think that is just such a great example.
Josh: Yeah, it reminds me of a Zen story, but I don’t feel confident enough to retell it and not screw it up. But yeah, there’s so many around this where I think we get tested when we need it, right? A lot of times we’ll have—and I’ve seen it in parents, too; I’m not a parent, but their kids are a great mirror to show them their own stuff and what they need to work on. It becomes pretty obvious about certain things.
And the thing I wanted to read here—this is the other end of this stick here, too. I think this one little paragraph is kind of the classic thing that we hear about spiritual friendship. I’m just going to read a little selection here:
Venerable Ānanda, who was the Buddha’s cousin and attendant, said to the Blessed One, “This is half of the holy life, Lord: admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie.”
And then the Buddha said, “Don’t say that, Ānanda, don’t say that! Admirable friendship, admirable companionship, admirable camaraderie is actually the whole of the holy life.”
You know, when I first heard that teaching years and years ago, I was like, “Really?” The Buddha was known to teach people according to their needs and means. So I wonder if that factors in here with Ānanda, who was known for always being by the Buddha’s side, memorizing everything, being his close personal attendant. I wonder how much time he had to interact with so many other people in a friendly manner.
I don’t know, but no matter what, this is a huge emphasis, and to let that really sink in—what about meditation? What about ethics? What about wisdom? Well, I think spiritual friendship easily encompasses all three of those when we’re doing it right. What do you think, Wendy?
Wendy: [clears throat] You know, I’ve never heard that said about Ānanda—that he gave the teaching at the right time and right place because he was an attendant. I’ve only ever heard it as a general statement: “It is the whole of the life.”
Josh: That was my extra commentary—that the Buddha taught those at their level and what they needed. But anyway, Ānanda underestimated it, and the Buddha said it was actually more important than he thought it was.
Wendy: Yeah, I think that is actually really relevant today. Because the thing is, it’s easy to think you’re further along the path when you don’t bump into people on the road, when you’re not looking at a person and going, “Oh, that was a bit uncomfortable, that wasn’t so gracious, I regret saying this.” All that sort of stuff.
So I think actually that statement is truer today than at any time in the past. In the past, people were living on top of each other a little bit more, but today we have this hyper-individualist society. We don’t meet in groups. We are afraid of conflict. We are afraid of speaking up, disappointing people, and hurting people, so we don’t say anything. We don’t have any connection, and then we wonder why we’re all so desperately lonely.
Josh: Totally. And we’ve got social distancing remnant that’s still left over somewhat from the lockdowns. And we have texting and social media. This is a new way of interacting socially, but how does that work with the flesh-and-blood connection? So there are these other interesting dynamics of friendship and interaction. You’re involved with not only Buddhism but other social groups, is that correct? And some of those are spiritual?
Wendy: I don’t know about physical life so much, but I talk to people from all walks of life. Even in Buddhist circles, you meet people from all different kinds of backgrounds who are there out of curiosity or staying at the free monastery.
Josh: In the past, I moved in different spiritual circles, New Age-type thingies, and found the helpfulness of those and the distortion of those as well. As far as being socially interactive in certain social groups these days, I wouldn’t say that. I will get together with my friends while I’m here—old college buddies, new ones I’ve met. But anyway, sorry, I’m rambling on again. Where were you going with this?
Wendy: Whereabouts are you based at the moment?
Josh: I’m in the States. I’m in Missouri. Back to Denmark in early September.
Wendy: Okay, so you obviously move around, you spend time in different monasteries and different countries, your friends change, and the cultural mores of those times change. How do you experience kalyāṇa-mittatā in the context of those diverse cultures?
Josh: There’s a certain social messaging application that I use quite a bit to stay in touch with people I’ve met overseas. And then when you get a chance to see them again, I’ll usually say, “Okay, I’m going to be at this place, if you’re available, let’s meet up and hang out.” So that’s how I keep up with that. In a way, a lot of that’s dependent on certain one-time situations and then staying in contact online. It’s a different dynamic—it’s allowed for more expansion, but also a different type of contraction.
Wendy: But you do live in monasteries for, say, two or three months, and you go on retreats…
Josh: Even less than that, too—like the winter retreat at Chithurst in England, or staying at Amaravati. I was in South Korea for a couple of months at a monastery, too. I’m going to be going on another one in October for a month in Indonesia. So that’s pretty cool.
Wendy: In those different spaces, in those different cultures, do you ever bump into the same people at different places?
Josh: Oh, yeah.
Wendy: And then what’s the experience of the actual friendship side of it? Because that’s what we’re talking about—how to, you know, is there friendship in that sort of space, and what does that look like?
Josh: The context and the container are really important, I feel. How we interact with each other and other people is significantly dependent on the space, the container, the time, and what’s appropriate. Even from monastery to monastery, how I interact with someone in one monastery might be different because it’s more surface level and there are so many more people involved, versus doing a winter retreat at a different monastery where it’s a really tight-knit community.
Wendy: I sort of wanted to explore—we’re talking about kalyāṇa-mitta / kalyāṇa-mittatā in this context. I’m very curious about different cultures and how they change the way we understand friendship. I’ve lived in England for quite a bit of my life, and even in spiritual communities, I couldn’t get off this question of “What’s the weather?” and “What will people think?” I just couldn’t form any connections with the spiritual communities, which really shocked me. I found them all quite aloof and not particularly warm. I was curious to see—you may have had a very different experience.
Josh: I can tell you how I dealt with it in England at the monastery: I just became the loud, weird, unapologetic American guy. I didn’t really bother to do the social niceties. People just knew that I was a little bit more irreverent. What was nice is that this Ajahn Chah tradition is known for being an unorthodox method sometimes—very earthy, grounded, and testing in a sense, but with very brilliant ways. I’m not comparing myself to Ajahn Chah, because I have a long way to go to be that wise and skillful in interactions.
I will say, though, that at some point I would ignore a lot of that, but then I’d be ignored a lot too, and I’d be okay with that. Then there’d be a few people there that I would really connect with who didn’t play those games a lot, and I just spent more time interacting with them.
There was a huge international community in some of these, too, so that whole English thing didn’t apply as much. For example, friends from Sri Lanka—not to generalize or stereotype, but the faith and fervor around being inspired by the Buddha as a historical figure, the teachings, and the usefulness of the teachings… I didn’t really have a reference point for how reverent and faithful that is, and it inspired me in a way.
And then in America—I say this jokingly—you have a couple of people from Iran and Israel in the same space, and they got along great. I loved who they were as individuals, so it’s just so ridiculous to me that people want to harm each other in the world.
And people from Europe, even from Germany, have a whole different way of seeing the world than the English do. You have to be okay with being weird, standing out, and not fitting in, but also knowing your place and knowing the limits of that—when to exercise that more and when to dial it back. My life got so much better when I realized that what other people think about me is none of my business.
Wendy: Having spent time in England, and knowing a lot of English people in Australia—a former boss realized after being here, “What will people think?” Well, you actually don’t know unless you ask them, but it’s a huge thing in England.
In terms of friendship, what does spiritual friendship look like in different cultures? Here in Australia, I go to a day-long event once a month in Brisbane, but I’m on the outskirts, so I can’t go to any of the classes during the week, and I can’t [clears throat] form friendships there at all. It’s hard.
When I was in Sydney a long time ago, when I first started meditating, it was a particular tradition that really focused on building the community, and the edges to learn on were with the other people in the congregation. I use the word “congregation” because there was a teacher who said, “I don’t know why you call it a sangha. Sangha is the monastics, the people in robes. What you’re talking about is a congregation, that’s different.” I prefer to use the word “congregation” because we’ve taken this Christian church experience and applied it.
Josh: The technical term is the “four-fold assembly.” You have the monastic males, monastic females, and then the laypersons, male and female.
I just talked to my buddy in England that I met at monasteries, and we talked about practice today. I was wondering—a lot of times, if there seemed to be a connection, I’d just exchange numbers, and then later on, maybe once a year, I’ll blast through with almost the same message to see who takes the bait or is interested. A lot of them won’t respond; it was just a nicety, and that’s totally cool. But with others, there are different levels of engagement.
I have to put the onus on me: if I want spiritual friendship, I’m going to have to put forth the effort. If it’s not reciprocated, that’s okay, just let it fall away. I love the richness of different traditions and cultures because they all have something else to add, and they act as different types of mirrors and angles.
Since we’re trying to find out what it looks like, this is called the Mitta Sutta, and it has seven points. A friend worth associating with is someone who:
- Gives what is hard to give (generosity of time, energy, resources).
- Does what is hard to do (helps you out even when it’s highly inconvenient).
- Endures what is hard to endure (bears with your bad moods, flaws, or difficult moments).
- Reveals their secrets to you (trusts you with their vulnerability).
- Keeps your secrets (your private struggles are entirely safe with them).
- Doesn’t abandon you in times of trouble (sticks around when life gets messy).
- Doesn’t look down on you when you’re down and out (doesn’t judge or scorn you when you fail or lose status).
These are some summations of this sutta. I think these are pretty good traits. What do you think, Wendy?
Wendy: If I was around somebody who treated me [laughter] like that, I’m like, “Yeah, I’m out.” This is a really unpleasant situation. To me, it depends on the frequency of bad behavior. I quite like John Gottman’s stuff from the Gottman Institute—that you have to have 19 positive interactions before you have a negative one [laughter] in order for a relationship to be good. If someone was 19 times really lovely, appreciative, and had a good laugh, and then on the 20th time said, “Oh man, I’m having a really bad time,” then all fair and good. But once you get below that ratio, actually it’s not a good relationship.
Josh: So you’re saying if it’s constant crisis all the time, it’s not worth doing. Yeah, this applies to someone you’ve hung around or known for a long time and still want to be with, not when you’re trying to gain new friends. This isn’t a starting point for friendship; this is what strengthens it and acts as a benchmark. It’s kind of a rarity in the world. It’s interesting to see how well I stack up and fulfill these benchmarks, and when they make sense to do and when not.
Wendy: I was thinking about a friend of mine. We were at school together—ordinary friendship, not spiritual. She has somebody in her life who is like fictive kin, because we all had English parents, so we didn’t have cousins or extended family. This person was essentially her cousin, and we were all at school together. My friend just said, “You know what? I actually just don’t think she’s kind, she’s not somebody I want to hang out with.” We’re now coming up to 60—I’ll be 60 next month—so this is somebody she has known her whole life. She suddenly looked at this person who she always thought was caring and kind, and went, “Ah, she’s actually not a very nice person.” I said, “Be careful about giving away that friendship, because that’s somebody you’ve known a really long time.” But she decided, “No, this is not where I want to go.”
So where is the dealbreaker? There’s a point sometimes in a relationship where you add things up and go, “Actually, this person is not who they seem.”
Josh: Those are really good points. When I first started getting on the path, gradually a lot of my old friends—probably 90%—fell away. As I changed, grew, and evolved, I made new friends, but there was a really long period where I was alone and felt like I couldn’t relate to anybody, and nobody could relate to me. In hindsight, that’s very common on the spiritual path during transitions of waking up.
These guidelines are helpful in regular friendships, too. Who wants to never get close to anyone by not telling them any secrets when it’s appropriate to do so? That’s a sign of depth. And keeping secrets is a big dealbreaker in regular friendships.
Wendy: One of the things that can make a difference in a friendship is depth. Some people aren’t deep, and that’s okay. And some people aren’t shallow. There can be a mismatch.
I don’t actually know what makes somebody deep. I was talking about depth with a former colleague who’s Chinese, and I asked, “What’s the word in that context for deep?” And she said, “It’s the same: deep.” I thought that was very interesting. There must be some neurological thing about what is deep and what is shallow. Why do we say it’s deep? Is it because it rolls up from the bottom of the mind?
Josh: That’s a really good question. “Deep” is almost like a trigger word. It goes into things that aren’t on the surface—things that everybody can connect to easily. All of a sudden, something hits us and reminds us of something significant that happened and how we felt.
These guidelines—giving what’s hard to give, doing what’s hard to do, enduring hard things—are the peak. On a surface level, that just means being kind and generous, spending extra effort, and not being a fair-weather friend.
Wendy: I’m probably a fair-weather friend! [laughter] I like to have a conversation with somebody, enjoy that person, and then I feel like the friendship has run its course. I’m actually hurt very quickly, which is not such a great part of my personality. If somebody says or does something, I can frequently feel quite hurt, and then that’s not helpful for other people and not helpful for me.
Josh: This has been a big topic on our show. If we’re practicing Buddhists, it’s about non-harming. When you feel hurt, it’s painful enough, and then the tendency is to lash out, blame someone else, or blame yourself. It feels like a double bind after double bind, and it snowballs. It’s a core thing—harm and hurt.
Wendy: You have to take responsibility for your own feelings of feeling hurt. For me, the dharma is always: I have to look at my own experience here and how I’m dealing with whatever is going on—whether I’m skimming over the surface, reacting badly, or indulging. The experience starts with the body.
That’s why I talk about hurt—it’s a deep inquiry point. I heard of a nunnery where they used to recite the 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva. When I was living in England and working in a horrible workplace where people were cold and aloof, I memorized those 37 verses. It was so helpful because I was incredibly lonely, unhappy in my relationship, and people were very unsympathetic. If you say something mean, that’s bad speech; but if you don’t say anything at all and remain aloof, to me, that is also bad speech. Reciting those verses every day kept me grounded and stopped me from getting carried away in those confined, frustrating spaces.
Josh: That’s lovely, and maybe that would be a topic for another day. In the safe container of a silent retreat, everybody agrees we’re not snubbing each other. But even in silence, the mind wants to fill in the gaps: “Why are they acting that way? What should I do?”
There’s a time to remain silent, and a time to promote social ease, well-being, and camaraderie. Being silent can also be an avoidant tactic—it’s all about the intent behind it. Why am I intending to speak? Why am I intending to be silent? That’s where the karmic payoff is.
Sensitivity can actually be a strength, and vulnerability shows a depth of connection and heart. But that’s not an excuse for other people’s bad behavior. We are responsible for our own speech, actions, and intents, but only partially responsible for how people take it.
Wendy: Yesterday at this community building course, the instructor was saying, “When you want to build community, read chapter 2: don’t get anxious, dominant, and controlling.” And this woman sitting next to me pulls out the book and says to the class, “Yeah, so this is what you shouldn’t be doing!” [laughter] And I’m just sitting there thinking, “Thanks, I’ve already read the book.” [laughter]
Last week, someone was about to hand out leftover papers to the middle of the class, and this woman goes, “Hello?!” and then says, “Thank you,” in this really snide voice. This is kind of what group living is like. Monasteries and nunneries are exactly the same. We are all patients in the clinic, you know?
Josh: Yeah. I have a pivotal story about that, but I’m not ready to tell it publicly here. But by and large, what I like about staying in monasteries is that everybody is on the same page to some degree, and they’re answerable to that.
Wendy: I was thinking about Robina Courtin—she’s an Australian nun. She joined because she had basically run out of people to hate! She arrived in the monastery and couldn’t sit for seven years; she was just wild and intense. In a situation with someone like that woman in my class, if I say anything, it’s just going to escalate. So I have to kind of take it, even though I don’t want to. How would you respond in that situation?
Josh: I would probably fail! [laughter] Usually, I make wisecracks. I don’t have the restraint you do, Wendy. Restraint of speech and action takes work, but the most important thing driving it is our thinking. That’s where meditation helps. I would probably make a wisecrack to mirror her behavior back to her, or wait for an opportunity outside away from everyone to approach her. How you say it is just as important as what you say. But like you said, sometimes it’s a lost cause and you’d just be wasting energy.
Before we wrap up, I do want to briefly mention pseudo-partners. I didn’t know this term, but basically, it’s a platonic relationship with someone of the opposite sex that looks like a friendship, but is actually fulfilling an intimate emotional role without the physical intimacy that someone might be lacking in their own relationship. I used to confuse it for regular friendship. There are gray lines in dharma communities because a lot of times it’s about the dharma. Do you have anything to say about this before we wrap up?
Wendy: I don’t know much about the term, but thinking about monastics—nuns and monks are in separate quarters, and men and women can be friends, but they must never cross that line.
Josh: I’m not thinking of monastics here, but laypeople. Just interactions with females where I thought it was a completely benign friendship, but didn’t realize there could be a potential that they’re interacting to get certain emotional needs met.
Wendy: I can speak to that. Relationships with other women are great, but they can be really intense. I have a lot of friendships with guys—often previous partners where we’ve moved out of that whole thing and remain friends. We know each other well enough, but we don’t have that sexual stuff between us anymore.
Relationships with women can be full-on, whereas with guys, that hyper-intensity is dialed down. For guys who might have an aloof experience with other men, having a conversation with a woman allows them to express a more intimate side that they can’t with their guy friends. It’s kind of the opposite for women.
Josh: That’s very helpful, Wendy. Thank you for that—it explains a lot of these dynamics.
Well, with that, until next time, y’all find your wise friends, figure that out, and ask for feedback.
Wendy: Yeah, and keep sane in this crazy world.
Josh: Yes, please! Definitely write in with your feedback and responses for me. Stay safe, and I love you all. Goodbye!
Integrating Presence 