The itch

I’ll never forget the first time I learned the true meaning of ‘learning to stay’. A couple of years ago I was on my way to teach a class in South Sydney. I felt desperate. Like I couldn’t breath. Like there was no space. I felt completely STUCK. Stuck in traffic. Stuck in my repetitive self destructive cycles. Stuck in my conditioning. Stuck in my own brain that, no matter what I did, never seemed to be at ease.

Someone had introduced me to ‘Getting UNSTUCK’ a transcript of retreat talks with Pema Chodron. At that time the last thing I wanted to listen to was another spiritual teaching. I just wanted to return to my habits of binge eating, drinking, partying, having sex, anything to get away from the present BUT here I was, a yoga teacher, on my way to class. There was nothing else to do.

She started to speak. I stared crying uncontrollably. You know when you hear a teaching and it just gets you. It cuts directly through all the dust obscuring your open, loving heart. Something within you cries ‘yes. this. This is what I’ve been waiting for.’

This teaching is learning to stay.

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche originally shared this teaching and it is beautifully explained by Pema. These are her words not mine.

‘We are all like young children with a bad case of scabies. We are old enough to scratch, but not old enough to realise that when we scratch, the scabies spreads and get worse. This is an analogy for what we do. We have discomfort, the itch, that goes along with the scabies and we scratch it. When we scratch we get very temporary symptom relief. So the scabies spreads and pretty soon we are scratching all over our body, the whole thing is bleeding and we are really suffering. In this analogy the child is taken to the doctor who gives a prescription, which is like going to a spiritual teacher, being given the teachings, and in particular being given the meditation. Learning to stay is a description of meditation. Staying with the itch and not scratching. In other words, scratching is turning away from, trying to get away from the fundamental discomfort. The itch. Which we could also call insecurity or just the bad feeling that comes over us.

So we itch and itch and we go to the doctor and the doctor says ‘you have scabies. Scabies itch. If you keep scratching them it gets worse, so what you have to do is stop scratching and apply this medicine, the teachings and the practice. Ways to work with the itch. Then you can heal’. And then, what I love so much about this analogy, Rinpoche said ‘and if the child wants to heal, and if the child has enough love for themselves and wants to heal they will follow the doctors instructions and will go through the discomfort of feeling an itch that you’re not scratching. And then gradually they have their own reward. It isn’t the doctor that gets the reward or anyone else but its you that experiences the rash getting less, the urge to scratch gets less, the itch gets less. And as we know, particularly those with strong addictions this can take a very long time. Never the less its the only way because if you keep scratching, not only does the itch get worse but you find yourself more and more in hell because your life becomes more and more out of control and misery based. Either you numb out, or you start craving things, or we have a more aggressive style and we obsess and rage about others, self hatred etc. 3 styles of scratching: numb out, rage and craving comfort. It comes down to a willingness to do something for yourself. Willingness to connect to your own wisdom and confidence rather than just doing the habitual thing which is going for the short term symptom relief which never addresses the issue.

Learning to stay, we reach that place where no one wants to go and our whole facade is based on not wanting to go to that place. When you’ve touched it you become fearless because there’s nothing to hide and you’re no longer in this ignorant dance of wanting to move away from it all the time.

Learning to stay with anything, pleasant and unpleasant, not struggling, stabilising, staying present is basic thread but within that a big emphasis on kindness, friendliness and seeing whats happening. If you don’t judge what happens there’s some kind of ease with what happens. Basic warmth towards the whole situation. Not judging your mind or emotions. Introducing you to open awareness of your mind. Its available to us all the time. Each time we really see something without talking to ourselves about it. A sight that makes us, the first flower or a surprise view, something that delights us. A direct experience. What is experiencing that is your wisdom. When you love somebody, that feeling of connection from the heart is your buddha nature. Awakened heart. We try to listen.

1. Not easy to stay present

2. Sometimes we are present – this is our basic goodness that’s connecting to sound, heart, sight.

So in learning to stay we learn to identify the present and we learn when we’re not present. We study with interest that our mind goes off all the time and we use the present as a reference point. At first if we are never present we don’t even realise we are scratching.

But if we want to heal, if we have enough love for ourselves, enough trust and confidence that we have the wisdom and openness then our wisdom becomes activated more and more. I don’t want to die bleeding to death from all this scratching. I don’t have to have one more scratch in order to already know what is happening here. I know. But, this will take a lot of courage because I don’t want to feel that itch. So, are you willing? yes. Because I don’t want to die bleeding to death from my own unwillingness to heal.