A Monk's Guide To Happiness, Fearless Living & Thriving in Hard Times with Gelong Thubten #387
Buddhist monk Gelong Thubten discusses how distraction and addiction push away emotional pain, making discomfort worse. He advocates for meditation to sit with uncomfortable emotions, transforming them into opportunities for resilience, kindness, and happiness, emphasizing that meditation is simply 'being you'.
Deep Dive Analysis
18 Topic Outline
Introduction to Gelong Thubten and the book's premise
Distraction and addiction as root causes of suffering
The paradox of chasing pleasure and avoiding discomfort
Gelong Thubten's burnout and path to monkhood
Embracing hard times for personal transformation
Working with physical sensations during difficult moments
The energy behind behavior and giving up intoxicants
Societal influence, advertising, and feeling incomplete
Common misconceptions about meditation
The role of distraction in meditation practice
Reframing stress and cultivating acceptance
Reinterpreting 'suffering' in Buddhist philosophy
Managing ego and external validation
Understanding core emotions: fear, desire, and anger
The neuroscience of meditation and its benefits
Releasing anger and the power of forgiveness
Hard times as opportunities for growth and self-compassion
The practice of expanding unconditional love
7 Key Concepts
Addiction to Distraction
This refers to using external things like food, phones, or social media to avoid facing internal feelings and discomfort. Paradoxically, this habit of avoidance exacerbates suffering by reinforcing the need to push away uncomfortable emotions.
The Discomfort in Pushing
This concept suggests that the pain or suffering we experience often stems not from an external situation itself, but from our internal resistance and effort to push away discomfort. The act of resisting is where the true discomfort lies.
Meditation (Buddhist View)
In Buddhism, meditation is not about clearing the mind or silencing thoughts, but about changing one's relationship with thoughts and emotions. It involves noticing when the mind wanders and gently bringing it back to a focus, which builds mental strength and presence.
Stress as Resistance
Stress is fundamentally defined as a resistance to a situation or feeling, a desire for it to go away. By learning to dismantle this internal resistance through mindfulness, one can remain calm and okay even in conventionally stressful situations.
Acceptance (Active)
This is not a grim resignation or passively tolerating something, but an active embrace of a situation or emotion with compassion, loving-kindness, and openness. This approach leads to transformation of the experience rather than feeling oppressed by it.
Suffering (Buddhist Interpretation)
The Buddhist concept often translated as 'suffering' is more accurately described as a constant sense of something missing, incompleteness, dissatisfaction, or discontentment. It's an inevitable part of existence, but the aim is to learn how to work with it without being oppressed.
Core Emotions
Traditionally in Buddhism, fear, desire (wanting), and anger (not wanting) are considered the three basic energies from which many other emotions like jealousy, hatred, and resentment arise. They are often rooted in a fundamental fear of not getting what we want or getting what we don't want.
9 Questions Answered
Modern society is definitely addicted to distraction, fueled by technology and constant barrages of information. The underlying cause is often an inability to face one's own feelings, leading people to use external things like food, phones, and social media to escape themselves.
Pushing away discomfort reinforces the habit of needing to push away discomfort, creating an endless cycle where the mind will always find something uncomfortable to avoid, leading to increased suffering and dissatisfaction.
One way is through meditation, by going beneath the 'storyline' of the difficulty and working directly with the physical sensations of discomfort (tightness, turbulence) in the body. Meditating on these feelings can transform them into a doorway to deeper peace.
No, this is a common misconception. Thoughts are inevitable during meditation. The goal is not to clear the mind, but to change one's relationship with thoughts, noticing when the mind wanders and gently bringing it back to the present moment, which builds mental strength.
Outsourcing well-being to external substances or activities makes us dependent on them, causing us to lose our own personal strength, power, and sovereignty. It also reinforces an underlying message that we are 'not enough' or incomplete without these external products or experiences.
Neuroscientists have observed visible changes in the brain even after a few days of someone doing 10 minutes of meditation daily. While immediate subjective feelings might not change, the scientific evidence suggests that consistent practice leads to increased calm, reduced stress, and greater happiness over time.
Instead of focusing on the external cause of anger, one can meditate on the anger itself—the physical feeling in the mind and body. By moving closer to it with compassion and without trying to push it away or tell stories about it, the emotion can transform and dismantle, leading to freedom from its grip.
The Buddha's concept, often translated as 'suffering,' is more accurately described as a constant sense of something missing, incompleteness, dissatisfaction, or discontentment. It's an inevitable part of existence, but the aim is to learn how to work with it rather than be oppressed by it.
One can start by thinking of someone for whom they naturally feel unconditional love (a parent, child, or pet), allowing that feeling to flow. Then, intentionally expand that feeling to include other people, strangers, and even those one dislikes, using this natural capacity for love as a tool for deeper compassion.
42 Actionable Insights
1. Learn to Be With Yourself
Cultivate the courageous and compassionate practice of learning how to be with yourself, as it is a powerful idea for personal transformation.
2. Embrace “Doing Nothing” in Meditation
Understand that meditation is about “doing nothing” and undoing habits of running away from yourself; by simply being you and relaxing into your essence, you cannot fail and will discover inner happiness.
3. Meditate 10 Minutes Daily
Practice meditation for at least 10 minutes a day, as neuroscientific evidence shows visible brain changes even after a few days, leading to increased calmness, reduced stress, and greater happiness over time.
4. Sit With Discomfort to Transform Emotions
Instead of pushing away emotional pain or discomfort through distractions, learn to sit with what’s making you uncomfortable, as this allows those emotions to transform.
5. Sit With Thoughts During Meditation
Use meditation to sit with your thoughts rather than trying to escape them, as this approach leads to genuine transformations and helps you become less controlled by negative emotions.
6. Change Relationship with Thoughts
Understand that meditation is not about clearing your mind, but about changing your dynamic and relationship with your thoughts, learning to relate to them differently rather than trying to get rid of them.
7. Embrace Distraction in Meditation
View distractions during meditation as beneficial opportunities to build mental strength; noticing your mind has wandered and gently returning to your focus (e.g., breath) is the core practice that makes you stronger.
8. Practice Breath Counting Meditation
Focus on your normal breathing, mentally counting cycles (in and out is one), and when your mind wanders, gently return to the breath and start counting again, which builds focus and presence.
9. Work With Body Sensations
When going through difficult times, focus on the physical sensations of discomfort (tightness, turbulence) in your body through meditation, rather than getting lost in the thoughts or storyline.
10. Develop Relationship with Pain
Use meditation to develop a creative relationship with your own pain and suffering, rather than always trying to let go, which helps you work with it differently and transform it.
11. Give Compassion to Painful Feelings
When experiencing painful emotions like depression or anxiety, learn to give a sense of compassion and love directly to those feelings, rather than feeling shame, to allow them to shift, change, and relax.
12. Transform Unhappiness for Stable Happiness
Learn what to do with your unhappiness to break through and find stable happiness, as it is the key to a doorway.
13. Embrace Difficulties as Opportunities
View life’s difficulties and hard times as opportunities for personal transformation to cultivate resilience, kindness, and happiness.
14. Reframe Hard Times for Growth
Change your perspective on hard times, seeing them as fertile ground that can benefit you by cultivating compassion, resilience, and strength.
15. Use Life’s Difficulties as Compost
View all the difficult or painful experiences in your life, which you might normally discard, as “compost” to be used as fertilizer for your meditation path, fostering growth through suffering.
16. Commit to Working With Whatever Happens
Adopt a liberating and powerful mindset by committing to work with whatever happens in life and use it in meditation, rather than being a victim dependent on external circumstances.
17. Dismantle Resistance to Stress
Understand that stress is resistance to a situation; learn to dismantle this resistance to reduce or eliminate the feeling of stress, even in conventionally stressful situations.
18. Actively Embrace Discomfort
Practice acceptance as an active state of mind by embracing uncomfortable situations or feelings with compassion, loving-kindness, and openness, moving into them rather than pushing them away.
19. Work With Inevitable Dissatisfaction
Recognize that a sense of incompleteness or dissatisfaction is an inevitable part of life, but learn to work with it rather than being oppressed by it, choosing to “sink or swim.”
20. Control Perception, Not Events
Realize that you have control and choice over how you perceive things and the world, rather than feeling like the world is happening to you, to break free from limiting patterns.
21. Change Reactive Habits
Practice changing habits of reactivity by learning not to get triggered by others’ comments, creating space, and understanding that their behavior may not be about you, fostering compassion and acceptance.
22. Transform Blame with Compassion
Transform internal blame, upset, and anger through forgiveness and compassion, sometimes by putting yourself in another person’s shoes, to change your relationship with difficult people or situations.
23. Practice Forgiveness for Self-Liberation
Understand that forgiveness is primarily about dropping your own burden of anger and suffering, freeing yourself from re-traumatization, rather than being about the other person.
24. Examine Anger Itself
When feeling angry, shift your focus to the anger itself rather than the external person or situation, as this helps break the habit of anger and prevents it from proliferating.
25. Meditate on Anger’s Physical Sensation
When experiencing anger, remove the storyline and meditate directly on the physical feeling of anger in your body, focusing on it without judgment or trying to push it away, allowing it to transform and dissipate.
26. Use Triggering Events for Self-Inquiry
When a heavy emotion or social friction arises, view it as an opportunity to inquire into its origins, asking “What is this emotion? Where has it come from? What is underpinning it?” to foster self-transformation.
27. Practice Empathetic Reframing
When dealing with others, adopt the phrase “If I was that other person, I’d be doing exactly the same as them” to lead with compassion, reduce emotional triggering, and better address situations from a calmer state.
28. Reclaim Inner Power from Intoxicants
Give up relying on external intoxicants (like alcohol or caffeine) for relaxation, as this allows you to discover and cultivate internal power, autonomy, and strength to feel relaxed and happy independently.
29. Cultivate Internal Happiness
Focus on cultivating and recycling your own internal happiness rather than constantly needing more from outside sources, which is essential for sustainable well-being.
30. Reduce Negative Emotional Influence
Recognize that while emotions are not inherently wrong, being overly driven by core emotions like fear, desire, or anger leads to suffering; aim to be less negatively influenced by them.
31. Go Beneath Emotions to Essence
When caught up in emotions like desire, anger, or fear, practice going beneath the emotion and its distracting story to connect with your inner essence, where you can discover peace and happiness.
32. Be Intentional with Consumption
Be very intentional about what content you consume and how often, as your thoughts and ideas are often downstream of the content you’re consuming.
33. Use Technology as Nutrition
Approach technology consumption with discipline, similar to food as nutrition, using it in a balanced and healthy way rather than consuming it endlessly like sugar.
34. Take Regular Social Media Breaks
Periodically disengage from social media and online content (e.g., for six weeks) to tune into yourself, realize you have enough, and cultivate a heightened sense of calm and contentedness without external influence.
35. Practice Portable Meditation
Engage in formal meditation practice, distinct from other activities, because it is a portable skill that you can take with you anywhere to achieve a calm, balanced state, even in stressful situations without equipment.
36. Use Annoying Sounds as Mindfulness Cues
Reframe oppressive or harsh sounds (like clanging metal in a prison) as mindful moments, using them as opportunities to practice mindfulness and change your view of the sound.
37. Practice Situational Mindfulness
In stressful or uncomfortable situations (e.g., on a crowded train), intentionally practice mindfulness by feeling the ground under your feet, relaxing your shoulders, and being aware of your body to change your relationship with stress and enjoy the moment.
38. Cultivate Compassion and Service
Make it a daily practice to cultivate more compassion for yourself and others, and strive to be of help and service, as this is an ever-evolving path to personal growth.
39. Improve Self-Relationship for Others
Change, improve, and transform your relationship with yourself, as this becomes the source for improved relationships with others, where compassion for self and others work as a unity.
40. Model Unconditional Love for All Beings
Use the unconditional love experienced between parents and children as a model to develop and extend a similar pure love, without wanting something back, towards all other beings.
41. Expand Unconditional Love Through Meditation
Begin a meditation by focusing on someone you love unconditionally (e.g., a child or pet) until that feeling naturally flows, then intentionally expand and send that same love to other people, including strangers and those you dislike.
42. Be Aware of Ego’s Seduction
When experiencing success or positive external validation, be mindful and notice the ego’s buzz and seductive nature in yourself, rather than letting it control you.
9 Key Quotes
In pushing away discomfort, we usually don't see how the discomfort lies in the pushing.
Gelong Thubten
It's our habit of chasing pleasure and running away from hardship that is the real problem.
Gelong Thubten
It's only when you learn what to do with your unhappiness that you can really break through and find stable happiness.
Gelong Thubten
Our unhappiness is the most fertile grounds for the cultivation of inner strength, resilience, and compassion.
Gelong Thubten
If you are using alcohol, for example, just to help you relax, there's something in you loses the ability to do it for yourself.
Gelong Thubten
The more we want external things, the more we rely on them for our happiness, the more we're also telling ourselves, I lack something. I lack well-being. I lack happiness. I lack a sense of completeness. I am incomplete.
Gelong Thubten
You can't fail at meditation because meditation is where you just do nothing.
Gelong Thubten
Forgiveness is not actually about the other person, you're not giving them forgiveness. Forgiveness is you dropping the burden.
Gelong Thubten
The most courageous and compassionate thing we can ever do is to learn how to be with ourselves.
Gelong Thubten
3 Protocols
Working with Difficult Emotions in the Moment
Gelong Thubten- Go beneath the storyline of the difficulty and work with the sensations in your body right now.
- Identify the physical discomfort (e.g., tightness, turbulence) in your body.
- Keep returning your focus from the story to the physical sensation, even if your mind wanders back to narratives.
- Through meditation on these physical sensations, allow them to transform, creating an alchemy where misery becomes a doorway into a deeper kind of peace.
Breath Counting Meditation
Gelong Thubten- Focus on your breathing without trying to change it (just breathe normally).
- Mentally count the cycles of breath: in and out is one, in and out is two, and so on.
- When your mind gets distracted and you lose count, gently bring your attention back to the breath and start counting again from one.
- Recognize that each time you notice your mind wandering and return to the breath, you are building mental strength and focus.
Expanding Unconditional Love Meditation
Gelong Thubten- Begin by thinking of someone for whom you naturally feel unconditional love (e.g., a parent, child, or pet), allowing that feeling to naturally flow.
- Once the feeling of love is naturally flowing, start to think of other people and intentionally send that same love to them.
- Gradually expand this feeling to include strangers and even people you don't like or have difficulties with, using your natural capacity for love as a tool for deeper compassion.