New Years Resolutions: Buddhist Style

After reading a couple fellow bloggers thoughts on New Years, and finding them wonderfully provocative and inspiring, I’ve decided to try to round ’em up. It’s somewhat in the style of Tom from his ZenUnbound days, but with no hopes of being so thorough or wise in my observations.

Buddhists are a peculiar bunch, and as you’ll see, around the holidays the eggnog and lack of sunlight seems to bring that out in spades. It’s been a great privilege to read so many interesting angles on Thanksgiving and Christmas over the last month, and now…. It’s New Years: Buddhist Style.

First, and winning awards in the concise category is Barbara over at About.com. The title is really the best: “Acknowledgment of Arbitrary Marker in the Time Continuum.”

Nathan, over at Dangerous Harvests, a blog not even a year old but already on the vanguard of the Buddhoblogosphere, picks up on Barbara’s notion and suggests we “Screw New Years Resolutions” and basically focus more realistically on the daily and momentary opportunities for living better. I think he sums it up well in this bit:

I like the idea of beginning anew. Of starting again and again – with fresh eyes. Beginning anew is akin to “don’t know mind” in that both, in their process, breaking through fixed views of what is.

Resolutions, on the other hand, feel like sucking on sugar coated shit balls. You roll a piece of your shitty self, a part you really don’t like, in sugar and then suck on it, hoping that you put enough sugar on to spur you to make the effort to change.

He goes on to use one of those nautical metaphors that I heard a lot in Catholic church growing up.

Next, NellaLou, at the Smiling Buddha Cabaret, keeps it simple (though not as simple as Barbara), resolving basically just to awaken. She quotes the often repeated exhortation by the Buddha:

This is peace, this is exquisite — the resolution of all fabrications; the relinquishment of all acquisitions; the ending of craving; dispassion; cessation; Unbinding.

The other Nathan (Nate), or perhaps the original one, over at Precious Metal – the great mind behind our recent article swap and one coming soon – used his New Years wishes to thank people, and to devote himself to practice. Speaking no doubt for many Buddhists, new and old, he says:

Speaking of practice, my resolution this year is to truly buckle down on it. I’ve had difficulty sustaining for the most part, mainly on the cushion. So, however minor it seems, I hope to spend alot more time on the cushion so my time off the cushion is more beneficial for myself and those in the community in which I coexist.

Arun, the Angry Asian, writes something Asian, and probably very angry 😉

Shravasti Dhammika, at Dhamma Musings, fits somewhere in with Barbara and NellaLou, also quoting the Buddha:

For the pure every day is special. For them every day is holy.
The Buddha, M.I,39

Being only human, he does, on Jan 3, post another perspective, stating “The New Year is always a time for neuralgia – sorry, I mean nostalgia – so I thought a few old photos might interest some of my readers.” It’s nice to see this wise monk taking a pause to turn the pages of the past and share the stories of his youth.

Kyle, the Reformed Buddhist, doesn’t fail to delight with his gratitude list for ’09 (he’s dropped his old disclaimer, but basically just be forewarned that it’s off-color humor, so if you’re easily offended by such things, best not mosey over there).

Adam of Home Brew Dharma, announces that his number one change in 2010 will be going meatless (sharing the following video).

Jack at Zen Dust Zen Bones, resolves to “keep it simple.“ (he then goes on to list a bunch of ways to keep it simple, and writes about Bjork and designs a t-shirt; that post begins, “So, I was bored and…”). Irony?

Lastly (for me at least, there are many many others out there, just not enough time to cover them all), is my neighbor in Bozeman, MT, the Bitterroot Badger. His post has no resolution, but rather an invitation to join him for a Vajrasattva ceremony at his monastery. For the curious, he provides an exemplary boiling down of Vajrayana Buddhism:

If we were to distill the essence a Buddhist practice down, our actions aim at two things: purifyin obscurations and accumulatin merit. What’s obscured? Our natural wisdom state, free from even the possibility a sufferin. Imagine that for a second.

It’s nice to see the variety of approaches to this little holiday. My own approach will probably be to eventually make some resolutions, and probably post them here. I’ll check back next year or along the way to see how I’m doing. I’m not sure my resolutions from last year are up to everyone’s standards (I don’t think they fall prey to Nathan’s “sugar coated shit ball” critique, for instance). My strategy was to think of what I realistically could accomplish in a handful of aspects in my life and then to aim at the “farther edge” of the realistic spectrum.

Perhaps my resolutions then are simply goals. Goals that require a moment, or more, of reflection on life: where it is now and where one can reasonably expect it to be in 360 or so days. I agree wholeheartedly with Nathan’s critique of the mythical and naïve instant transformation that so many people resolve for this time of year. If you find yourself repeatedly going down in flames in this or that aspect of your life, it would do you much more good to figure out what started you on fire in the first place before resolving to rise from the ashes.

And that’s the hard work of day-to-day life.

Resolutions are only as good as the awareness with which they are made. I cannot resolve to master French this year unless I am completely unaware of all of my other obligations. I can resolve to publish two or three papers this year, not including the one that is currently under review, because I am a scholar, reading and writing about scholarly things and that’s what a scholar does if he works hard and stays focused. So what I’m really resolving is to work hard and stay focused. Simple enough. The publications, thesis pages and the rest are just measuring sticks; external goods (the internal goods being my own development along the way).

So long as we are feeble-minded unawakened beings, we need these things. We need pats on the back for a job well done, reassurances from loved ones, admiration from children, and all these external goods. To act purely for the sake of goodness is the ideal we strive for (as good Kantians or Buddhists). But in the meantime, encouragement along the path, including goals, resolutions, vows, whatever you want to call them, is simply a human necessity.

So go ahead. Make some resolutions. But do so with awareness, not poetic musings or pie-in-the-sky dreams. Stick to what you’re really capable of – and if you’re over the age of 22, you should have a pretty good idea of what that is. If you are resolving the same thing(s) from last year, you’re probably failing to see a deeper issue at hand.

And finally.

Keep it simple (many fine examples of that above).