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About Our Guest
Anthea Ong served as a Nominated Member of Parliament from 2018–2020 in the 13th Parliament of Singapore. As a self-described “full-time human being, part-time everything else”, she is a mental health advocate, social entrepreneur and impact investor, life and leadership coach, strategy consultant, yoga and wellness instructor and author, amongst many other roles. She is never seen without headgear to match her multiple hats.
She divides her time, energy and love across many different communities and has founded or co-founded several initiatives in her main focus areas of migrant rights, mental health, environmentalism and social impact, including SG Mental Health Matters, WorkWell Leaders, A Good Space Co-operative, Hush TeaBar and Welcome In My Backyard. She also served and serves on several boards and committees in these fields, including Unifem (now UN Women), Society for WINGS, Daughters of Tomorrow, Social Service Institute, National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre and the Tripartite Oversight Committee for Workplace Safety & Health. Prior to devoting herself to civil society and social impact work full-time, she spent over 25 years in the corporate world as a C-suite leader. Her new mantra, as a former banker and reformed business leader, is “why start a business when you can start a movement, or two?”
Hi, it’s me again, Kai Xin, joined by my cohost Cheryl, and today we have a very special guest, Anthea Ong. So welcome to the Handful Of Leaves podcast where we bring you practical Buddhist wisdom for a happier life.
So today we are gonna talk about a really special topic on vulnerabiliy, and we can’t think of anyone better than Anthea Ong because she has quite a huge track record. At first, she would introduce herself as a full-time human and part-time everything else, which is very humble. I think this entire conversation is gonna help us unveil what the human behind Anthea Ong is because her long track record involves nominated member of Parliament, social entrepreneur, impact investor.
She’s the founder and co-founder of many different companies. One of the really special one, it’s called Hush TeaBar, where she provides space and opportunity for people who are deaf in order to make a living. And a very special concept around how people who are deaf can help to lead silent tea appreciation and tasting. And they are also people who have lived through mental health issues. Perfect for today’s topic on vulnerability. So, Anthea, thank you so much for coming on this show.
[00:01:18] Anthea:
Thank you, Kai Xin.
[00:01:19] Kai Xin:
And being open to share. I think both Cheryl and myself, when we look at your track record, it’s like, you’re so successful. But before we hit record, you were sharing a little bit about the challenges that you’ve been through. I think you can share more with our listeners. It’s so important for us to talk about vulnerability and to also destigmatize it, especially in the Asian context. So really looking forward to this conversation.
[00:01:44] Anthea:
Thank you for having me. I’m looking forward to this chat. Let’s just see how it flows.
Amazing. So just to kick things off. Vulnerability is a very big word. Everyone will have different interpretations and different definitions of it. Can you share with us what does the word vulnerability mean to you and how has it evolved?
[00:02:02] Anthea:
I think what comes up for me immediately would be that vulnerability actually means love. Love is not romantic love only. It’s love that comes from within yourself. Therefore, you’re willing to be vulnerable to the other because clearly there is a piece of yourself that you’re putting forward.
Usually, it’s when there is love that you are willing to do that. You’re also willing to do that when the other person has in some way demonstrated or earned even trust, and therefore there’s love there for you to feel safe enough. Kai Xin started this conversation talking about a topic needs to be destigmatized and it’s true.
We think of vulnerability as a lot of things, but one that we clearly associate vulnerability with is pain and suffering. I think it’s true that if you don’t have vulnerability or you don’t wanna show vulnerability, either we are avoiding or not talking about pain or not wanting to bring ourselves forward with the pain we have. But I’m pretty sure that that would mean we’ll also get a lot less love.
And so for me, vulnerability, I think it’s very intertwined with the concept of love. I wanna emphasize again and repeat myself that when I talk about love here, I’m talking about love in the broadest concept. It could be compassion, it is kindness, it is empathy. It is not just romantic love or the kind of love that we feel for family members. I think Sigmund Freud was the one who said something like, we are never so vulnerable as when we love.
I think vulnerability also calls up the emotion and the experience of relief for me. If you are a leader, then vulnerability has in some ways been so associated with weakness. And on the positive side it means that if you’re not vulnerable, you’re strong, you’re resilient, you’re stoic, you have it all together.
And the reason why I say relief is that when I went through my colossal collapse of a broken heart, a broken marriage, a broken business, a broken bank account 17 years ago now along with a lot of pain and suffering, because I was vulnerable, a lot of people come forward to show love for me.
I have to also say that I felt a deep sense of relief that now I don’t have to be seen as this person that is never going to be in a challenging situation or has all the answers. So, I think two big words, love and relief, based on my own experience.
Thanks so much for sharing, and I think it’s almost as though vulnerability is the ability to love yourself enough to let love come to you. When you were sharing on that sense of relief that you were experiencing as you allow people to come shower love and you don’t have to feel so alone. I was thinking probably the opposite of vulnerability is a sense of shame. And that’s why when you’re feeling that shame. You’re holding everything in, and then you’re burying yourself under all of that. And the moment when you’re able to let that go and just show the world. I’m imperfect! That’s it! Then, you get that sense of relief.
It’s relief. It’s liberating. It’s freeing. But most of all, it was very human. I think for the first time in the long time, because of the way my life trajectory was going up to that point of my colossal collapse, it would be seen as almost picture-perfect. It followed a very conventional trajectory of what success looked like. But of course, through that seemingly successful trajectory that was such a Midas touch at every point of my life, there were lots and lots of vulnerabilities. Just that I’d never showed them, because I never felt faith, I never felt like I should because I had a completely different notion of what being human was about. Along the way you held imposter syndrome, particularly as a woman leader in the 90’s. You also held shame when you did not do something well. But all of these are just kind of swept under the carpet and that make you then put on a veneer.
Because there is a public identity that we have to uphold and that really doesn’t allow us to be human. We go around living life feeling rather unsafe, almost as if we are constantly towing because we don’t wanna be vulnerable. We keep towing all the time. It can’t be good for anyone’s mental wellbeing or mental health, but to your point about the opposite of vulnerability, it’s likely shame.
I think absolutely. And actually one of the world’s most well-known vulnerability experts who would also call herself the shame expert is Brené Brown. When I went into the deep dark place 17 years ago, what actually propelled me on this really dangerous very scary downward slippery slope into that deep, deep, dark place was shame.
I actually hid it from family in terms of what was going on with my marriage and all of that for a good year. And that whole year was when things just progressively went down the slippery slope. And I think it’s because of shame that I could not allow myself to be vulnerable, to share, even to my nearest and dearest.
Well, we’re kind of living in a society where blaming and shaming, the cancel culture and all of that. It’s really making it so unsafe to be vulnerable. But yet, if are not vulnerable, then how can we ever really build real connections? How can we truly be human and to truly love and receive love? Therefore, how can we be well? Mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
I think the biggest irony that everyone, or at least we humans face, is that our deepest desire is almost to be seen, to connect deeply with another person. But at the same time, we are so afraid to be vulnerable, to do the exact thing that gives us that sense of wellbeing and connection.
[00:09:10] Anthea:
You just said about this paradox, right? We are biologically, emotionally built to wanna connect. But yet in the way we live, especially when we lived intellectually. And allowing ourselves also to just go along in a sort of autopilot mode without that sense of awareness of who we are, what’s around us. We then hold back our vulnerability and our humanness and therefore that actually doesn’t let us connect. And so we are constantly in this tension all the time. And you can understand why there is suffering. There will be suffering until we actually find a way to see this paradox.
That’s so beautiful. And the word that came out is authentic. Like what Cheryl has mentioned, we don’t necessarily have to feel the pressure to be perfect all the time. We don’t have to figure out everything in life. And sometimes that’s okay. We are all work in progress.
I do have this thought about the balance. Because I think a lot of people might associate vulnerability to sharing your fears, your deepest, darkest anxiety, the thoughts, et cetera. But how much is too much and what is considered a safe context and space in order to share that?
The reason why I ask is also because I have my own fair share of going through all these difficult emotions and sometimes it’s quite tempting to indulge in them, which is not healthy. So maybe you can share some experience in terms of how you draw the line.
[00:10:56] Anthea:
It is a great question. But I would say that in terms of my own experience, being vulnerable is not without boundaries, that’s not being vulnerable. That’s just being foolish. In fact, I’ve just had an experience with a teammate who was going through a challenging time and because there was no boundaries and self-restraint – it can become self-centered because you’re downloading on someone else, all of what you’re feeling. This is too much for the other person. Especially when the other person in this case is actually going through so much as well himself. And yet because he was kind and he wanted to be a listening ear, he then lets this completely unrestrained, unfiltered download to happen. And when I heard about it and I had to step in.
I shared very gently that when we are being vulnerable, we also have to be kind and being kind is not just saying, “Hey, I wanna be self-compassionate, and therefore I’m gonna just not stop myself from sharing what I’m going through, just let myself indulge, embrace these emotions.”
But what are you doing with those emotions? Saying you’re being vulnerable, embracing these emotions, but you are actually just projecting and transferring all of that to another person. And so outwardly it might seem like, “Oh, this person is being very vulnerable and sharing all that he’s going through. But if you look at the content of the sharing there’s actually a lot of shadows, projection of his own challenges that he’s not able to deal with.” And that’s giving him a lot of suffering, that he’s then transferring to this other person and actually even making this other person feel terrible about himself, in addition to having to be there to hold the space for the first person.
So I don’t think it’s vulnerability if there’s no boundaries. I don’t think it is vulnerability if you are not continuing to be kind to others and the people around you. I also don’t think it’s very kind to yourself if your vulnerability means you’re just beating yourself up in your own self narrative. I don’t think that’s vulnerability. I think that’s why, for me, vulnerability has to come from a place of love. Otherwise, it’s actually emotional vomiting as well.
You are complaining, you’re whining, you are also self-victimizing. You are getting yourself into a victimized mode to allow yourself to not be confronting what you really need to confront with yourself too. It’s not to say that you can’t feel bad about what you’re going through, but I think it is, “Are you ready (for change)?” Because I think vulnerability is the greatest measure of change. Brene Brown said this about vulnerability as the truest gauge of courage. And so it’s the greatest measure of courage and change.
Being vulnerable is such an opportunity to come so close to yourself and I speak from my experience. If I was not broken into a million pieces 17 years ago, I don’t think I would have confronted and given myself the biggest act of kindness of actually connecting with myself. My truest self and my true nature. The million pieces I thought was me broken became a million pieces, a million seeds of love that I could now spread.
That’s powerful. It almost feels like what you’re saying is to allow your emotions to come up to face them, but it’s also not to indulge them. I mean, in Buddhism we have the 4 Noble Truths, right? So it doesn’t just stop at, okay, there’s suffering and then keep saying, life is terrible, it’s unfair, et cetera.
But what is beyond that?
And I think the first step, of course, it’s not to push away just because the feelings are unpleasant, but to allow yourself to say, Hey, this is difficult, it’s a little bit shitty, et cetera. But also having boundaries.
[00:15:43] Anthea:
You have to see what is. You’ve gotta feel what it is. And that’s suddenly a big part of the Buddhist practice as well. What is the point of awareness? If you don’t go to the next step of knowing why this exists, right?
It’s for you to then put in the effort to move yourself along the path and actually in doing so, you are able to then see what the pain was for. It wasn’t for us to indulge and self victimize. That was not the purpose of the pain.
The pain was for you to see, this is always gonna be part of what life is. I mean, we cannot learn about life and this human experience if we don’t feel life. But then when you feel what life is, what do you do about it? I think this is the part of becoming a better human. And I believe this is also a part of the Dhamma.
Definitely. It’s like a purposeful use of pain or like vulnerability with purpose. Otherwise, it can just spiral into complaining. Actually, I was thinking also about personality. So for me, I’m quite the opposite instead of sharing everything in the open to say, Hey, you know, these are some of the fears, these are what’s bothering me. Because there need to be boundaries, right? So at the back of my head, I would think that I should be kind and compassionate to my friends. They are already dealing with a lot of their own struggles, so I shouldn’t burden them with my own challenges and problems.
So I would suck it in and try to solve them myself, but that’s also not very possible because I need to lean on somebody when my capacity is limited. Do you have advice as to how people of my personality or character can be vulnerable with purpose.
[00:17:39] Anthea:
My goddaughter, she’s 27 and a beautiful, beautiful human being. And that’s exactly what she said. She was sharing a little bit of the challenges she was going through and how she was feeling. And then she said, it’s fine. Compared to so many people, I’m in a so much better position and situation and I certainly don’t wanna download and make them feel even more challenged because I have to share my issues with them.
So this is what I would say: I’ve got so many resources. I’m actually in a very privileged position. So there shouldn’t really be a need for me to either transfer, download, or share this with people around me when they are seemingly in a more challenging set of circumstances.
But, suffering for the person who’s experiencing it is absolute. It’s not relative. It’s only relative when we bring in all of this social conditioning and intellectual abstraction of it all. Then we start to have a comparison and relativity to it. To say that I don’t think I should be sharing because I don’t wanna burden them, especially if they’re also going through challenges themselves. But then we all know that everyone has a story.
Everyone is struggling. First and foremost for me, the suffering of the person experiencing it is absolute to the person and anyone who’s going through suffering deserves compassion, including from ourselves.
And secondly, I don’t think we are allowing ourselves to explore the richness and the depth of our relationships with people around us if we hold back our troubles from them because then they only know you at a certain level. They’ll never know all of you. And even if it comes from a place of kindness or your personality type where you try to keep this to yourself and try to work things through on your own, the other way to reframe it and to look at it is, Hey, do these people mean enough for me to want them to know more of who I am, the layers, the texture, the richness of who I am, which comes from my own experiences. We do think that they mean enough to us that we want to let them in so they know all of us in all our richness as a human.
The other question to ask would also be, Have I given them opportunities to show and demonstrate their love for me? Because if I’m constantly being okay. And this is what was said to me, Kai Xin, when I was going through the colossal collapse, a couple of my friends actually came out to me to say, Oh, now I can finally come forward and say, Hey, this is where I can support you. This is how I can help you.
Because you were always able to solve every problem of yours and on top of everyone else’s problems as well. So there’s just no way in to you so that I feel I have contributed, to having supported you, to being part of your life. In a most authentic, vulnerable, very beautiful, very human way.
So I think that would be the two parts to look at it actually. I hope that was helpful. But that was what happened with me.
Side trivia, I remember there was someone without meaning to, after I shared my story of what happened she said something like, “But Anthea, of course, you’re gonna always be able to come out of it. I’m sure it was painful, but I’m sure you’re gonna come out of it. I mean, look at you, you were a CEO before the collapse. Your family’s very supportive and all of that.”
I had to turn around gently said to her. I thank you for having such an amazing impression of me, (even though she didn’t truly know me, but just cause of my CV maybe), I said, but can I just share with you that I didn’t feel that way? I actually did not think I was gonna come out of it. Because the suffering at that point in time for me was excruciating and was absolute.
“But I must say it was because I was willing to allow myself to be human. That’s one part. Because of that coming out and reaching out for help. That actually allowed me to start to climb out of that deep, dark hole.”
Initially, I felt a bit affronted. What do you mean? I shouldn’t be allowed to feel terrible because of my background?
[00:22:51] Kai Xin:
Or you have to quicken the process and come out faster.
[00:22:56] Anthea:
But your pain cannot be so… because I mean, look at you. What you were before? I think we sometimes forget that. We think that just because you are CEO, you don’t have a dysfunctional family, then whatever life gets at you, you can just sort of shield it off. That’s not what the human experience is.
[00:23:17] Kai Xin:
Even spiritual practitioners. You meditate, you can do it. You feel bad, but I thought you meditate.
[00:23:25] Anthea:
Exactly! Oh, it has happened to me when I do some posting and I talk about, feeling a bit spent, very challenged by this and all of that. And people would be also wondering, well if you do this, you meditate so much, every day for the last 16, 17 years, and you still can’t feel at ease. Then the rest of us have no chance.
And I would always turn around and say that, imagine where I would be if I haven’t meditated. It’s not as if I’m meditating to get some sort of results from it. Not at all, right? I mean, that’s not what it is. Every time I meditate, it’s that moment’s experience rather than think I’m meditating so that I will, I will not (achieve something.) It’s not a means to an end, it’s an end in itself for me. But when I was asked that question, I then said, imagine what could have happened to me. The same thing with, oh, you’re vegan. How come you can get sick? Imagine if I wasn’t taking care of health. So I think, some of these are just very normal because of the social conditioning and certain intellectual ideas we have.
I just love the discussion that we were all having just now. It’s like peeling the layers of the onion. At first, we come with, okay, vulnerability is this, vulnerability is that. Now I realize vulnerability is so many things.
Just to summarize, firstly, it’s about understanding that vulnerability is inclusion as well as exclusion. You’re setting the boundaries in terms of what to share, what to not share, and who to share with as well.
And then secondly, vulnerability is not throwing the responsibility to others, but you owning it. But at the same time also allowing yourself to feel the shit that you’re feeling. And the last thing is that, vulnerability as we often forget, could also be a gift to other people, to love us and to let us lean on them as well.
Just to move the conversation forward as well, I’m just curious, how can we help people to feel comfortable in sharing their vulnerable side?
I think it’s a great question and actually this is a big part of the work that I also do with Hush Tea Bar, but also with Workwell Leaders. How do you create that space? To help people feel comfortable in sharing their vulnerable side, there has to be a safe space. And what do I mean? I mean, a lot of people talk about safe spaces. Actually, the most important descriptor of a safe space is trust.
So first it has to be earned. So that space is not automatic. It has to be earned. And it doesn’t mean that it’s only with friends you have known for a very long time. And when I say earn, I mean that if we truly wanna hold a space of trust for another to share, then I think it’s really important for us to not expect them to be vulnerable with us if we are ourselves not vulnerable.
So I feel like to create and to earn that trust, it’s so important for us to disarm ourselves first. So that another person, as you talked about Cheryl, how do we help people feel more comfortable? How do we go to all the communities, all the spaces we are in, all the relationships we have. What do we do to help people around us feel comfortable to share their vulnerability. It’s not about what we can give to them, but it’s how do you show up? Do you show up armed? Because if you show up armed emotionally, then it’s very difficult. You have not earned the trust of the other to be vulnerable.
And this is especially important for leaders, which is the work at Workwell Leaders. It is to bring together CEO’s of largest employers in Singapore together to look at how do we become more human-centered leaders. And to do that, especially when it comes to championing mental wellbeing at the workplace. You have to walk the talk first as a leader, you cannot just say, Hey, just talk, tell me what’s going on. If you have not created a space of safety and trust because you haven’t even put yourself forward yet. You haven’t given a piece of yourself in this space yet. The moment a leader can be vulnerable, to say that, Hey you know, I just went through a really difficult challenge, I needed help, and all of that, even just something like that would already change the energy and the kind of narrative within the workplace or the team.
I don’t have to feel ashamed that I’m feeling so down because my grandma just passed on, right? Because my C.E.O. Just talked about how he lost his loved one, and he’s also struggled. I think that’s really important. I mean, Gandhi said this, right? We have to be the change we want to see in the world. We can’t just go and tell people, Hey, be vulnerable, tell me. But it’s not gonna work. What are you bringing to the space? And so I think this is really important. We have to earn their trust so they can be vulnerable. That goes to the same thing, right?
Don’t just share with everyone. There’s also a need to say, is this a safe space for me to be vulnerable too? And we often say that it’s not vulnerability if you don’t have boundaries. Those boundaries very often is along the values of trust and respect. And empathy and compassion. And if you feel that, then I think you are more likely to feel comfortable with being vulnerable to your question.
But also at the same time, I feel that it can be quite challenging to be vulnerable in the corporate setting because you don’t know what this information that you are divulging might be perceived.
[00:29:53] Anthea:
And the reason I initiated Workwell Leaders back in May, 2018 is that it then has to come from the top right, unless you have a cultural shift. Unless it’s a workplace culture that from the very top is encouraging this kind of conversations to be had. And because it’s actually directly gonna be affecting business outcomes and business performance. It’s directly gonna affect the employee’s mental health.
If we don’t have this kind of conversations, we don’t have this kind of culture that we built that’s inclusive, that is creating psychological safety, at some point, entire world economy is gonna hit the ground. Even with the whole AI thing, we’re not gonna be able to survive because the culture has become so toxic that you are just constantly just dealing with all of this. I don’t wanna say what I wanna say. Therefore, there’s no creativity or innovation and no new ideas.
You feel like if you say this, you don’t get promoted. Then that’s silly because then you might leave and then the company is actually losing good talent. So all around it’s just not a very smart thing to do, that we continue to sweep these conversations under the carpet or saying that in the corporate world, this is really not the place. But it’s not easy for employees to just say, Hey, I wanna talk about this. It needs to come the top to say that this is the safe place and then it has to be demonstrated. They must walk the talk. It must go all the way down to team managers to say that, Hey, you must intentionally create spaces for this kind of conversations. Make sure you talk with your team members and ask, how are they doing? Hey, I understand you just lost a family member. How are you doing? Is there anything I can support with? So, it’s very hard from the ground up to change the culture.
When you don’t have the power, of course you’re always gonna not risk it. At the same time, I must say though, Cheryl, that it’s important to also bring the awareness into your workplace, right? And so the practice of mindfulness is helpful to let you know that, I am aware that this person I can share with, this team manager I can share with, right?
So there’s also the need to be looking at context, people and not just say, oh, as long as it’s the workplace, I’m not sharing anything, it’s also not gonna be helpful because then you are not also living intentionally. It needs to be a cultural change. It’s also why with Hush Tea Bar, when we bring the experience into workplaces, cause we are a mobile tea bar.
The idea is that then we will create that space amongst all of the colleagues, including their bosses and their managers, come together to go through a silent experience, get them to learn how to sign emotions. To acknowledge emotions have a place. And emotions include negative emotions that we get them to sign, and then they have to go back and sign with each other. And then they go through the silent experience, and then they actually share. Going back to what Kai Xin said, then there’s the authentic conversations that you have as humans and not just as colleagues. After such a profound experience. The workplace is always gonna be a bit more challenging for sure.
[00:33:40] Cheryl:
And thanks for giving us hope that as long as we still look for the people who we can feel safe, we still can embody that side of vulnerability. And I think little seeds, that we plant can hopefully create a ripple of change.
[00:33:56] Anthea:
Yes, absolutely. Also, rest in the hope that there’s a lot of effort to try to make this change happen at workplaces from the top. Workwell Leaders is not the only one, but because we are targeting the CEO’s at the very, very top. But there are also many efforts trying to look into how HR policies can change how team management practices should embrace diversity and inclusion and stuff like that. And you are right Cheryl, it’s just different seeds that we plant with what we have, where we can. Never lose hope.
Perhaps, beyond just getting the leaders to set the tone, employees also have control in terms of asking their bosses how they are and making the effort to see their bosses beyond just performance and how they show up at work. One specific incident, which touched me very much. One of my colleague, usually we do quarterly reviews and I would ask what else can I do to support you in both your personal life as well as at work?
And then we went off the conversation. And then, the colleague asked. Boss, you always ask how you can support us, but how can we support you? I mean, even as I’m saying this right now. I feel so teary-eyed. Finally, people actually do see the human side and they care.
It’s kind of linking back to how we started a conversation about being vulnerable, sharing openly with love. I think it goes both ways. So if the employee can also disarm themselves a little bit, but of course with boundaries and lean in with curiosity, then the connection can happen.
[00:35:41] Anthea:
That is so beautifully said. I’ve had those experiences too. Many a time. And I join you in being teary-eyed when this happens. But it also speaks volume of how often we also think of our leaders and our bosses as superhumans. But actually they’re just humans, like all of us. And especially through COVID everyone goes to them, right? The workers go to them, they ask them how to deal with all of these challenges. The suppliers, the clients. And so in fact, studies are showing that there’s a significant level of burnout at the leaders’ level.
If we are always anchoring ourselves in love and compassion, then it’s never about how change should be made for me, but I should be part of that change as well. And if all of us think about it that way, then there’s no reason we shouldn’t show up with compassion for people who traditionally, we think they will always be fine. I mean, like the story I said about earlier, right? I think all we’re saying is, bring our humanness to every relationship, every space that we are in, because at work it’s actually a collective of humans coming together, right?
So that shouldn’t be any different to any community that we’re in. And if we can change the way we see workplaces where most of us spend most of our waking hours, it’s gonna have such a direct impact on who we are in our family and community lives as well.
[00:37:27] Cheryl:
That’s so beautiful. Thanks for sharing, Kai Xin. And thanks Anthea, for chiming in. Really helped me change my perspective as well. Because I guess I always feel intimidated if they’re the Senior Director or Senior VP or whoever, and I forget to see their humanness behind their titles, and their roles and all that.
Cool. So we’ve chatted a lot, I wish we could go on, but if we were to wrap up this episode and chat, I have a question for you because you have two books actually. One is “50 Shades of Love”, and another one.
[00:38:06] Anthea:
It’s “The Nominated Member of Parliament Scheme: Are Unelected Voices Still Necessary in Parliament?”
[00:38:15] Kai Xin:
And if you were to write a new book, hypothetically, on vulnerability, what would the title of the book be?
[00:38:24] Anthea:
It’s a good question. I sort of feel though Kai Xin and Cheryl, that “50 Shades of Love”, it’s so much about my vulnerability because I shared so much of when I was the most challenged in so many of the shades, the chapters. This is a great question. So if you’ll indulge me, I think one would be “Lost and Found”.
I was certainly in some way lost in the social conditioning of that trajectory I talked about. But also I was suddenly very lost when I was dealing with the collapse in the first instance. I felt lost because, who am I now if I’m not a C.E.O., I’m not a wife. And interestingly, my vulnerabilities across the decades of my life, especially the last colossal collapse has allowed me to find my “why”. Who I’m not and who I am or what I am? It’s not about the public identity anymore, but just allowing me to go back to, that I am a human being above everything else. So that’s one that just came up. I have always been very taken. I don’t know whether you both know about the Japanese art of Kintsugi.
[00:39:49] Cheryl:
Kintsugi.
[00:39:51] Anthea:
And I actually have a cup behind, which is a Hush tea cup that was broken, and then it’s patched obviously with the golden thread, and the golden paint. That image has always been one that I associated a lot of what I went through. And now I feel like my heart is definitely scarred. But now it’s enriched because of the scarring, which is vulnerability with so much more light and awareness and love.
I don’t know what I would call it. Maybe “My Kintsugi Journey” or something, “My Kintsugi Life”. The last one I’d like to bring up, because I know your project, it’s called a Handful of Leaves. What just came up to me is, we talked about vulnerability as being so important in that connection that we long for as human beings. So maybe it could be saying that I’m giving a hand of connection, I talked about my vulnerabilities.
And that I think can only come in the truest way and the most authentic way if we are actually able to sort of feel safe, included, belong enough to want to share our vulnerabilities and then therefore get the connections that come with it.
[00:41:15] Kai Xin:
Beautiful way to wrap up the episode. So we have three book titles in the making. Yes. And thank you so much Anthea for this chat. I’ve learnt so much from you. So I think at the end of the day, it’s really about being true to oneself, having love, and it goes both ways. And to all our listeners, hopefully you can take this all in and learn to be a little bit stronger by showing your vulnerability. Until we meet again the next episode, may you stay happy and wise. Thank you so much, Anthea.
Hush TeaBar – HUSH started in 2014 as a volunteer-run groundup initiative before becoming a social enterprise in 2016 where we have mostly given employment and empowerment opportunities to Deaf persons and Hearing persons in recovery from mental health conditions.
Special thanks to our sponsors:
Buddhist Youth Network, Lim Soon Kiat, Alvin Chan, Tan Key Seng, Soh Hwee Hoon, Geraldine Tay, Venerable You Guang, Wilson Ng, Diga, Joyce, Tan Jia Yee, Joanne, Suñña, Shuo Mei, Arif, Bernice, Wee Teck, Andrew Yam, Kan Rong Hui, Wei Li Quek, Shirley Shen, Ezra, Joanne Chan, Hsien Li Siaw, Gillian Ang
Editor and transcriber of this episode: Tee Ke Hui, Cheryl Cheah, Koh Kai Xin
Mr. Ng Yi-Xian oversees the operations of the EtonHouse International Education Group which runs schools from infant care to high school in 11 countries across 120 campuses. As a second-generation entrepreneur and son of founder Ng Gim Choo, he is driven to take the group to the next level — he has been instrumental in the creation of new brands such as the Middleton International School, a revolutionary niche of affordable international schools in Singapore and The Eton Academy, that provides inquiry-led academic enrichment programmes from Nursery to Primary 6.
Prior to joining EtonHouse, Mr. Ng worked in a Hedge Fund in the United States. In his free time, he enjoys the outdoors, adventure sports, and pursuing mindfulness as he leads the culture of mindfulness and well-being in the organisation. A father of twin boys and a girl, Yi-Xian is experiencing the joys and challenges of parenthood while he also oversees the education and well-being of more than 20,000 students in the EtonHouse schools.
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[00:00:00] Kai Xin:
Hi there. Welcome to another episode of the Handful of Leaves podcast where we bring you practical Buddhist wisdom for a happier life. Today we have the CEO of EtonHouse, Ng Yi-Xian, and my cohost, Cheryl. We are gonna ask a lot of questions regarding how mindfulness can influence leadership behavior. And if you haven’t heard of EtonHouse, it is an international institution with 120 schools worldwide headquarted in Singapore and specifically their aim is to provide high quality international education for K-12 students. As of today, there are about 20,000 children globally, it’s a very, very big portfolio that you’re handling and we are curious about how you manage that and how mindfulness kicks in. So perhaps you can share a little bit more about how long you’ve been practicing mindfulness and what’s your relationship with it and how does it affect your leadership style?
[00:00:59] Yi-xian:
Thanks, Kai Xin, and hi, Cheryl. So I discovered meditation about eight or nine years ago, right when I stepped into the portfolio of EtonHouse, prior to this I was an investment banking analyst and a hedge fund analyst. I stumbled into a meditation center in Boston, my roommates asked me to go. I meditated for the first time there. And I remember asking the most bizarre questions to the facilitator. I think I asked him, when I meditate, do I go to enlightenment, or like why do people do this? I was probably 27 or 26 years old then, and I probably walked out even with more questions than I did have answers. When I came back to Singapore about eight years, nine years ago, I stumbled upon meditation because a friend sent me a YouTube link.
It was a mantra-based meditation, and I did it and I found myself in Samādhi. So I’m blessed to be able to fall into very deep states naturally. I would confess to say that when I first started without proper instructions, I would fall into deeper states easier than I did with proper instructions. So I experienced a world where there was a void. Honestly, it was an altered state. First time I meditated and I experienced this feeling. I kind of realized like, oh, that’s why everyone’s talking about this whole mindfulness thing. Then when I discovered that that was the exception and not the norm, and I myself began to discover what so-called normal meditation is, I realized that, oh gee, how do I get more of what I used to have this deeper state?
So, I ended up discovering craving and suffering for better meditation through meditation. That led me to a multi -year adventure with discovering more about meditation and I say religion. So I started, I started on a whim and it also helped me deal with the day-to-day struggles of leading an organisation.
Being CEO is quite a tough job. In fact, a good friend of mine, a mutual friend of ours actually discovered what I did for, he kinda looked at me and said, well, you have a really tough job. And I remember I had a good laugh at that and he said you know, a CEO’s job is to handle the poop that no one else wants to deal with. In a healthy, so-called healthy organisation where people make decisions below you, only the real poop comes to the top. If you get good news or easy decision, that means that people didn’t bother to make the right decision below you. And I would say that as a young man taking over an education group with so many students and feeling very awkward because I wasn’t the founder myself.
And 100 of these schools are preschools. I think I definitely felt all kinds of feelings from imposter syndrome to “I don’t really know what I’m doing here.” And I would definitely say that mindfulness and having meditation practice really helped get to grips with my reality and how to actually look at it very impartially as an observer and really helped me grow.
[00:04:05] Kai Xin:
Yeah, I think it’s a really big shoe for you to fill right? Because your mother is quite a legend. I’ve read her profile, mad respect for how a single woman can build up this entire, I would say, almost an empire of sorts and benefit so many kids. So I am quite curious, was there a particular instance where you felt like, “wow, this is the most challenging period of my career in EtonHouse?”
How has your mindfulness practice kicked in to help you with that?
[00:04:31] Yi-xian:
So, well, my mother is quite literally The Woman of The Year in 2022. The joke was that when she was given the award, my father made a quip cause there’s a Young Woman of The Year and there’s the Woman of The Year. So my father said, “Well there’s a young woman of the year. You must be the good woman of the year. And my mother, to her credit, actually said, “You know, I’m 70 years old. I waited 70 years for this honour. so if I’m the old woman of the year, so be it, which I thought was really cool. So yes, my mom’s a pretty cool lady.
And I, for better or for worse very soon after I joined the organization. I was pretty much left with Singapore schools and we weren’t doing very well cause we had overexpanded at that point. So I walked into a situation where I thought that I could take several years to learn the ropes, to understand what we do.
I previously worked in an investment bank, a hedge fund, which is an institution and the other is a bunch of people trying to make sense of the world on their laptops. I think I really expected what you would call a training period, I guess onboarding and I didn’t really get that.
And I was thrown to the fire and in a way that was very difficult for me cause I had never fired anyone before. I had made tough decisions that impact not just one person’s life but many people’s lives. The responsibilities I had after the Army and before coming to Etonhouse really revolved around spreadsheets, numbers and concepts not real people.
So it was very daunting to me. And I would say that what helped me is you know, I mean now that I have children, I understand the concept of the red zone. So when you are, you’re in that red zone, your anger really flares up and you, you say things that you wish you never said. And I think I mean I personally can say that probably the worst things I’ve said in my life have been in that zone.
Luckily I don’t go to that place very often. I probably have gone to that place less than a couple of times. I would say that I, I’d have to thank mindfulness and my meditation practice for this. The vast majority of our team members are women. So big emotions are a commonplace in schools, and also commonplace with our team.
And as a male leader, I think yes, I had to figure that out very quickly and, and now I’ve got to a point where it’s the norm. Recently I hosted a session where people were trying to understand what’s it like to lead an education organization, and they kept saying, “What’s it like to work with so many women?”
I said, I don’t know. Haven’t worked in the world. unlike this for a long time.
[00:07:17] Kai Xin:
And just now you mentioned when you first started out meditation, it’s like, oh, you know, is it for enlightenment, what it is? So if now you were to look back at that time again, how would you have answered your own question?
[00:07:30] Yi-xian:
Well, I think like most experiences in life, it’s really what you make out of it.
And like anything else, I would say that experientially meditation has so much to offer. I like the analogy where oftentimes our minds are muddy water that’s in a glass that’s shaken. And over time the mud and the dirt kind of settles down, and then we begin to actually see your clear mind.
I think that’s a pretty accurate description. I will say that that’s just the beginning and you can experience infinite space. I’ve heard of people who have experienced the infinite consciousness. I have not. But I would say that it’s, it’s a very fascinating experience.
I personally felt intense emotions of love towards the entire world and towards all beings. It was very brief and very fleeting. And I got into an argument with my sister right after that and it went poof, it disappeared. But I, I have felt all these sensations with great intensity.
I think on some layer we’re all searching for the answers to the mysteries of life, and I feel like meditation kind helps speak just a little bit about what’s behind that cover. So it’s something that I wish I had more time to do. I now have three young children under age of three, it is not advisable for your health or career to do this.
Sad to say, you know, on a good day I only do about 15 minutes in the morning. Once in a while I can squeeze in a longer block of half an hour here and there. But yes, yes it’s a lifetime adventure for me, and I do hope that with my dying breath I do hope to be in a state of meditation when I go.
[00:09:16] Kai Xin:
I hope so. For you too.
[00:09:17] Yi-xian:
Well, unfortunately, yeah. I also have a passion for extreme sports. So, a year ago I found myself in a cave. I’m a cave diver and I was exiting the cave and Long story short, I felt an intense sensation of pain and I, and it grew to a point that was so extreme that I actually thought that I, might die of some kinda gas poisoning cause it picked up so quickly and I can confess to you that I was not anywhere near the meditative state and what I felt was eventually a ‘poof’ and then something in my ear coughed out some blood underwater and then realized like, “Oh, I’m ok!” Well, no lasting damage. I think just a blood vessel somewhere that wasn’t working right. But yes, I, I, thanks to my extreme sports, I have come close and this wasn’t even that close. And I think I know how hard it’s to say actually to really endeavor to to be in a clear, a clear mind when you go.
[00:10:11] Cheryl:
Yeah. I think that’s why a consistent practice is so important, because at that moment where you revert back to autopilot. All the habital tendencies of fear, anxiety can just overwhelm your mind. And if that is the last mindstate that you have, it could be quite an unfortunate cause that could also lead to your next rebirth.
[00:10:29] Yi-xian:
Well I just think it’s a very bad way to go. When I was traveling around the world, I had a misfortune to actually be a first responder to a fatal car accident. There was a man that I was giving First Aid to that passed away, right front me.
And I think when, when you see life disappear like this, I, I think it’s, it’s something which you know, if it’s so hard to meditate on a good day or a bad day, And most of us don’t meditate when we’re sick. You can only imagine what it feels like on probably the last moment in our life, so lifelong practice maybe a fraction of us succeed. But it’s ok, you can try again the next round.
[00:11:11] Cheryl:
The journey continues. Also you mentioned sometimes you try to cut out, 15 minutes or 30 minutes in your day. I guess it’s extremely difficult with three kids under the age of three and 20,000 other children under your care. How are you being intentional with it? Do you set it as a daily routine?
[00:11:27] Yi-xian:
Yeah, so for me I wake up and it’s probably one of the first things I do.
I have my cushion in my study next to my bed. And I go to my cushion and it’s quite funny when your children barge open the door and then they kinda like swandive into your lap, but I feel like it’s important to make a routine. As much as you love something like this, it’s just so difficult to keep things up if you don’t make it a process that you follow every day. And I’m lucky that I fell into it this way.
I think another practice that I tried to do, I did it before I had children, is to go to annual meditation retreat. And you know, the, the Tibetans and Theravadans do this a very different way. So you compare the Vipassana style retreat where there’s noble silence and then compare it to a Tibetan style retreat where everyone’s talking all time.
And you know, I guess you can just choose your own fancy, whatever works for you. But I do feel like a good friend of mine gave me this advice very early on. He said, put this on your calendar one year in advance and so you have no way of getting out of it, and so you can just block them. When the time comes, you just go.
And I give this advice to people very often and I personally try to do it. But when you have young children, you have to seek clearance from multiple parties in order to go. So yes, I just returned from one and it’s probably my second one since I’ve become a father. And I’m very thankful to my wife for actually giving me the time to do it.
[00:12:59] Kai Xin:
Sadhu, I’m very curious, how do you convince multiple stakeholders to let you go on the retreat?
[00:13:08] Yi-xian:
Well, the story of how I went to my very first one was because of burnout., So I had set up two schools back to back in Singapore. The last school I did without power and water in 55 days, and it’s a large school with more than a thousand students.
And it really took a lot outta me. And after it was done, I couldn’t feel joy. So I had parents coming up to me thanking me for setting up the school. And it, it is probably one of the schools I’ve set up that I know have really made a big impact on society. And to me, I just couldn’t take in any more joy.
I was just out. So a good friend of mine, he had sent me this link to this, retreat in the US and said, “Hey, by the way, there’s this guy doing this retreat next week, you can consider it. And I booked it, flew off, did it, came back, and then when I met up with this friend after that, I said, “Hey, remember that thing you shared?
Yeah. I actually went for it. He said, really? I hadn’t expected you to.
So I fell into this cadence that way. With regards to stakeholders, I think the first time you do it, the people around you have this whole myriad of, of emotions, right? I think some of them think that like your boss is weird. Some of them think boss is running away. I’m sure alot of them think thank God, boss is not in my face.
When I came back from my first one. So I actually got to a place where I could hear my heartbeat at every moment, which was fascinating. I haven’t been able to hear that ever since. And to my team members I seemed Very out of it in a way, in reality, I had discovered what it feels like to experience everyday mindfulness. So they actually said, I felt lost and different, because I came back so different from what I was used to, and as time goes by, you revert back to your usual self. It is the way of the world.
The second one I went to was on a concentration meditation. One of the insights I had from it was the realization that it’s my life’s purpose to run Etonhouse, to run this international education group, and that’s why I’m in this world. So that realization came to me, and like all good realizations it’s, it’s very tiny part cognitive and it’s a much larger proportion knowing with your whole being.
And so when I came back, actually I had a lot of thoughts and ideas and the team came back very surprised. Cause, you know, the first time boss comes back very Zonked out, and second time the boss comes back fired up and actually a few came up to ask what exactly were you doing over there?
They’ve come to realize that it’s an important part of me and the first time I went, everyone felt I needed a vacation.
The second time I went, they realized that it was almost like it was gonna be good for the business. I think that’s the way how my boss, my mother, looked at it. Maybe. I think for my team members, they realized that it was my way to get greater clarity on what we were doing.
[00:16:17] Kai Xin:
Hmm. So they saw your transformation and they felt like it’s not so much of an obstacle for the business, but you going and coming back actually brings great benefit.
[00:16:28] Yi-xian:
Well, I can’t speak for what they say, but I mean, I do believe that, you know, it’s important for us to rest and recharge. We’re not machines and you know, this is important and relevant and it’s important for at least once a year we go for a longer break. How long is relative to everyone and it’s something I do encourage in my team, for my direct team members.
So yes, actually they do do that.
But I think what different about this is that you go alone and I haven’t actually spoken to them about being in noble silence. Cause one particular team member she’s incredibly talkative , and I’ve often joked to her. I mean, I thought to myself like, yeah, maybe you should go a meditation retreat cause you experienced the opposite.
So sometimes people ask me about this and I tell them that, you know, who are you when you strip everything away, where you can’t even express anything verbally. And who is this person left behind? And I get very weird looks when I, I say that to people, but I think for those of us that have retreats, I think we all understand.
[00:17:36] Cheryl:
That’s two very, very powerful questions. Who are you when you strip everything away? And who is this person left behind? And do you think you are close to finding the answer for those two questions?
[00:17:47] Yi-xian:
Well, I think in another world I would probably be a very happy monastic, but I also feel like I’ll be a very impatient monastic. I think there’s a side of me that does wanna get stuff done and sometimes I’ve heard before, that the greatest suffering is actually in the walls of a monastery, so far yet so close. But to me, yes, I, I think I’m generally a very happy person. After passing the first four days.
[00:18:16] Cheryl:
Your mind takes that time to settle down..
[00:18:21] Yi-xian:
Yeah.
[00:18:21] Kai Xin:
For me, I think day one is the most peaceful, cuz like, oh, finally I got a break. And then the last day is usually the most frustrating for me. Cuz like, it’s a form of escape, right? So I think it’s so important to be able to integrate that to the day-to-day life. And I wonder how do you do that?
Cause you run a school, a lot of people are under you. I think it’s good that you have the 15 minute a day practice. How else do you integrate mindfulness into your, your work or the way you lead?
[00:18:49] Yi-xian:
Well, I don’t do this. I mean when I first met Chade-Meng Tan, he introduced the concept of the one minute meditation.
And I really wish I could tell you that A, I did this in my team very often, and b, that I do this very often myself. But both of these are lies, I don’t do that very often. I have that you can say grounding exercises that are secular at work and in these small groups that I’m part of. And I think personally, I believe that I have very secular beliefs in terms of religion and I think even today I would, I’m not entirely sure if I would call myself Buddhist.
And also there are very many forms of Buddhist, so I can’t actually pinpoint if I am Buddhist what exactly I am. But when it comes down to what I would call secular practices, I mean just breathing exercises, body scans, and you can say, call it positive psychology or whatever you want, just telling yourself that you’re safe, that you have everything that you need and that you’re loved. I think all these things are secular. So I do do these things in public settings.
In my own wedding actually. I led a loving kindness meditation it was my wife’s idea. Yeah, it was pretty cool. And I think I wish I did it more and I’ve actually been told that I should, and I do feel like there’s this side of me that I don’t want to intrude on other people’s religious beliefs or as a bit of like an imposter syndrome of like, who are you doing these things?
But yes, I, I do know that I should do this more. And that when a leader does this, it shows to everyone that, look, I care about your wellbeing and that we want everyone to be space. So it’s something which I think is important for me to role model. And I’m doing more and more of every year, but I do still feel very important.
And perhaps it’s because. What I do for a living influences directly the lives of young children, that it might have a very strong impact to them their whole lives. I think the secular part of this is still very strong in me.
I’ve been called a hypocrite about this because people have said like, look if Christian schools have chapel, and if you consider yourself Buddhist then why do you feel awkward doing this?
And I think for me maybe it’s because I know I’m not Christian and I went to Methodist College and I really didn’t like being a chapel and I couldn’t get outta it. So perhaps that’s why I feel very strongly about their respecting peoples boundaries.
[00:21:22] Kai Xin:
How do you integrate that to your work culture too, because I mean, people usually also would associate mindfulness meditation with religion and I think some is like, oh, you know, is, is this the back door or to Buddhism? And do you face any resistance when you’re trying to, you know, ground people through all this practices at work?
[00:21:44] Yi-xian:
Oh, sorry Cheryl.
[00:21:45] Cheryl:
Oh, sorry. Just to add on, I think specifically also, cause I think you partner with Contentment Foundation to offer mindfulness, like formal programs. And with that context also, are there any resistance there?
[00:21:59] Yi-xian:
Yeah, actually both your questions implementing something like this in the organisation.
There are many mindfulness programs out there for schools, most of which are completely secular, which was important to me. And when I was exploring the implementation of this in schools, I began to actually realize what some people’s boundaries are.
I would say that well for most people when they experience the practices themselves, and I always invite people like, look, if you feel that intrudes upon your boundaries, stop. You can stand up, you can walk away. I wouldn’t take offense at all. And it’s your decision, but I always preface this very clearly. I give them a bit of a mini briefing about what I’m going to do, and my practices aren’t very long. The maximum I would do at work is five minutes. And maybe I have a very sensitive hearing. You know, when people aren’t really involved, when you start hearing very long sighs. I, try to read the room while leading it.
I’ve had people come up to me saying they’re not comfortable and I say, look, it’s okay, you can step out.
And for this particular person, what happened is, she spoke to her pastor and she did a lot of research online and the answer that came back with her was, I’m OK with a guided meditation to do with my body or to do with instructions that would make me feel happier and better.
I’m not okay with sitting down and having a blank space because, it’s my relationship with God, and I don’t want you to be part of that. And I really appreciated her actually telling me that this is her boundary and I respected that. So yeah, we were able to cross that hurdle.
And for our schools, for the Contentment Foundation, it’s very clearly secular.
Mindfulness is just the first pillar of four. Community is the second one. The third one is I believe self-actualization and the fourth one is very, it gets increasingly complex and I’ve always appreciated that cause Yes, mindfulness is a very internal journey, but there’s obviously a part to do with interpersonal relations, especially loving kindness.
I think the challenge is really living this and implementing this. There are plenty of people who meditate a lot of hours in a day, but then, you know, they might not be very nice people to be around, and then I would say it’s a failure, and so I think it’s important for us to be able to do the practices, but also be able to have a healthy culture within the organization.
I don’t do the Contentment Foundations program in every school. I do it for schools which I believe are open to this in Singapore, I believe four schools doing it right now. And it’s something that I hope to progressively roll out.
[00:24:50] Kai Xin:
Yeah, that’s very skillful because I think personally, I feel like breath, you know, everyone has it, it’s secular, and Buddhism is not really a religion also, but that’s my perception. So it’s very skillful for you to open the conversation with people to step out and say, “Hey, I don’t feel very comfortable with this. Can we switch it to something else?”
And also going back to the intent: why do we want to bring such activities or practices in the school is really to benefit people. So if they feel uncomfortable, then perhaps it’s further away from a calm mind, they’ll get more agitated, maybe don’t feel so good at work also, and it can backfire.
So thanks. Thanks for sharing that piece. I’m wondering if you don’t have this mindfulness practice, who do you think you will be today?
[00:25:43] Yi-xian:
I think anyone who’s been in a senior position and anyone who’s worked in a family business has thought about leaving. In family business, we have a joke about hotel California: you can check in but you can’t check out. and I, I don’t know if I would be doing what I’m doing now, and I think that might have taken me away from my life. So who knows? We just don’t know that it’s one of those unknown unknowns. I do think that I probably would’ve a more challenging relationship with my wife and I do think that I’m quite hard on myself to begin with and I think I might have be even harder on myself.
[00:26:26] Kai Xin:
Yeah. And I think people can be hard on you also. And it’s good that you do the loving-kindness thing. I think the, the wedding idea, it’s fantastic. Yeah. I would like to ask this question to Cheryl also, cuz Cheryl also guides meditation at work in different contexts. Who will you be, Cheryl if you don’t have mindfulness?
[00:26:51] Cheryl:
It’s a very interesting question, I think, cause I started meditation and mindfulness on the wrong foot actually. It started from a place of insecurity. So I was bullied and then it was kind of, I didn’t, I feel like I didn’t have any worth. Because being bullied. Yeah, isolated. Isolated, you’re different from everyone else.
So meditation, mindfulness was kind of an identity that I took on to protect myself. You know, I’m cool. I have something, this is my shield. So for many years I struggled with that until maybe like one, two years ago I realised that it was a form of escapism. And meditation is really not about that.
It’s about embracing the discomfort, embracing the unglam parts of yourself. And I think without mindfulness, I will probably be stuck in a very dark place uh not being able to become friends with myself, so just forever at loggerheads with my inner critic. But with mindfulness now, I think, I can put the inner critic aside and say, “Hey, thanks, thanks for your concern, but you know, you’re not exactly helping me out right now, so let’s change the narrative a little bit.”
So I wouldn’t want to imagine my life without mindfulness. I think it’s kind of part of my DNA now but not, not in the unhealthy way of it being a mask protection, but rather just a, I guess, a soft landing when life gets tough. So hope that answers the question
[00:28:21] Kai Xin:
Yeah, I loved it and I, I can relate to both because I am very hard on myself.
And also I think to some extent in the past without meditation, I’m just so busy and occupied with life and I thought that I’m living life purposefully, but I was just running away from my own thoughts. And when I finally was able to sit down, like, wow, you know, it’s so amplified, it’s so loud. I didn’t know I had all this maybe insecurities these worries and it really took a while for me to be courageous enough to look inwards and now even though outwardly I might be doing the same thing, but it comes from a very different place. And it is also my wish that I can die peacefully with the calm mind. Recently, I had a health scare and I thought I was gonna die.
And then it was quite interesting because that’s where the push comes to shove, and I know, okay, my mindfulness practice is not as good as I thought it is because I still had a fear and anxiety. And also like the how fleeting life is because I went to AnE and then I was asking the doctor how’s my organs?
And the moment the doctor said that, oh, your, your kidney is fine. Wow. I just went back to autopilot mode and started planning my week, my month, when’s my next appointment to rescheduling. And then when I look back in hindsight, it’s quite funny because the mind plays trick and there’s a lot of unconditioning that we have to do.
So yeah, mindfulness practice I think it’s definitely essential. It’s not really a good to have, but a must-have. And I’ve learned that if it is, like we see it as an essential part of life, we would find time to meditate.
[00:29:58] Yi-xian:
Actually, I, I like to build up on that cause
I began to explore this element. I experienced this myself where there’s a criticism, especially in some schools of Tibetan Buddhism that like generic mindfulness makes people more compliant. And in a way I kind of understand what they mean because I went to a particular workshop, I don’t how to describe this workshop.
It was effectively systems theory in actions. And certain very provoking things occurred in the workshop where Yeah, so basically you could say that people were triggering each other’s poop that was triggering everyone’s poop. And they’re like, yeah, there’s a lot of poop. And my boundaries weren’t very strong then.
But I almost feel like, in a way, cause of my mindfulness practice, I was able to let a lot in and to let a lot sit with me. And I began to realise that actually, boundaries are incredibly important. And maybe it’s because of what I do, or maybe it’s because of the way I’m choosing to live my life, but I’m not a monastic who can care about every and all degrees of suffering all around me all the time. And with equal attention. And that sometimes I realise that, ‘look, this is your poop within you, it is not my poop’. And I think that’s actually, and that, you know, I know who I am and I am not that. And I, I think there was actually quite an important realization of me. So you could argue that maybe when you meditate a lot, and especially when you mix around the crowd of people who tend to meditate a lot, there’s a lot of love for everyone around you. I mean, no pressure for like, you know, love for all sentient beings, but then on the other side it’s just not really that possible. And you have to realize that if this is this person’s suffering, that person’s suffering shouldn’t become your suffering.
I mean, obviously we want the help, but it doesn’t mean that this burden is compounded on me.
So it was a realization that I’ve had and I feel like there’s something that it wasn’t easy for me to realize. It was actually my wife who pointed that out to me. Like, what’s wrong with you? because I went to this 5 day course I got a migraine for four days.
[00:32:17] Kai Xin:
Wow. It sounds really intense.
[00:32:19] Yi-xian:
Yeah, it was really intense. But I think I have that course to thank for me to actually realize that, and yeah, just trying to process all of that.
[00:32:28] Kai Xin:
It’s interesting you call it poop, I guess because of your line of work, you can’t swear, so you tone it down.
Cause we have other podcast guests, they curse on our podcast.
[00:32:38] Yi-xian:
Yeah. I guess there’s pg and there’s G.
[00:32:43] Kai Xin:
It’s interesting you say Buddhists are compliant, so are you suggesting that we comply for the sake of complying and sometimes don’t set boundaries? And that’s where we might get our internal emotions stirred up or not very beneficial. So that’s where mindfulness comes in to know, okay, when is the line to be drawn? Just so I interpret your sharing correctly.
[00:33:05] Yi-xian:
Actually, I wasn’t applying this to Buddhists as a whole. When you’re taught generic mindfulness you’re almost taught to deal with and sit with discomfort and to sit with all these thoughts that come and go.
And to just, to sit through it. I mean, power hour is power hour, right? And I think a lot of us realize that that yeah, you know, all these things pass. Yeah. I think it’s something that we all realise and that’s great, but it shouldn’t actually build up, what I can call it stupid grit. You know, grit is good, but the same time, Yeah.
Yeah. Wisdom is very important. That’s why we do all this to achieve it.
Yeah. So don’t lose yourself while doing it.
[00:33:53] Cheryl:
And I guess that’s why mindfulness is always complemented with wisdom and loving-kindness. And loving kindness always starts with ourselves, making sure that we are full, we’re feeling good, feeling safe as well, and our boundaries are not overstepped, before we can then take on other people’s poop and, and help to reduce that.
But if we are not taking care of ourselves, it’s almost impossible to do that.
[00:34:14] Kai Xin:
Yeah, that’s so true. And I think to some extent you packing a bag and flying for a retreat is also setting boundaries, right? There’s a threshold and maximum amount of capacity that you can intake all these things that’s happening and sometimes, you know, hitting the reset button is good and you come back stronger.
I feel this is particularly important as an advice to Buddhist practitioners. Cause in the past especially, I would feel so lousy. You know, shouldn’t I be more tolerant? You know, shouldn’t I be kinder? Why am I angry? And then I take it upon myself, which is also not very good because that’s also moving further away from lessening greed, hatred and delusion.
So thanks for that.
[00:34:54] Cheryl:
I have a super curious question, and this comes from my reflection, talking with a lot of Buddhist friends who meditate and experience sometimes profound deep states that is very unusual and you cannot find this kinda pleasure in the world. So as you meditate, do you feel that sometimes you would have a disconnect with the world in general where you find yourself like one feet into the spiritual realm and one fit in the material world and you find at any point the divide is getting a little bit bigger, if you get my question.
[00:35:27] Yi-xian:
Yeah. Actually, I get your question. And I think anyone who’s experienced states like this, the answer is obviously yes. I think the framework and I understand what I’ve experienced is I guess they call it the Jhanas.
The analogy I give people is You can use depth, ocean depth as an analogy here. So I guess the conventional mainstream Theravada as an institution, Theravada Buddhism would describe the Jhanas as like maybe 1000 meter version. I’ve, I’ve probably experienced maybe the 300-meter or the 500-meter version of that, and I’ve also experienced the 5-meter version of that.
I personally think it’s relative, and I think definitely when you experience the deeper depth I’m talking about, yes for sure It’s something that it’s totally unlike reality. It is a new reality or I dunno, really what to call it. And I think for me when I exit these states the real world actually feels, I hear a difference.
My emotions are different and it’s actually very strange because I almost feel like a robot for a little bit of time because emotions just hit very differently. And cause you’re so at peace and everything is like, oh, okay, it’s like this and you can deal with it like this. And I think you can rub people off the wrong way cause they assume that you’re angry cause you have no emotion in your body. And for me, I can’t sleep. I can’t sleep for hours after this. And, it’s very unfortunate whenever I encounter this in way, cause like I tend to do it at night and then like, then just ruins my sleep cycle.
Unfortunately, you can’t really watch this away, so you try to work like a good Singaporean and I was incredibly productive, and then I’ll play computer games and I’ll get all highest scores possible. So I play first-person shooter and then then this like challenge move and I’ll get this high score that I’ll never achieve in a non-Jhana state.
And so you know, when you discover this other sense of processing reality, there’s also this learning that you have to go, you have to learn that look, it’s not the real world. And from what I understand I think the first time I got there, I actually thought to myself, oh, this is what enlightenment feels like all the time.
But from what I understand, they don’t feel that way either. Like their sense of reality is not what I’ve experienced. So I’m sorry this is a great mystery. I still have, but I do feel like that yes, this is another box of suffering to open up and to explore.
[00:38:18] Kai Xin:
Cheryl is deep in thought. How many meters is your thought?
[00:38:26] Cheryl:
Do you feel like it’s something that you need to reconcile with? Because like Buddha, just ran off in the middle of the night to go and explore after seeing old age, sickness and death, he couldn’t unsee that. And, you know, he, he decided that, okay, I need to go off and find the answers.
But obviously we can’t just do that. Or I guess, you know, general people wouldn’t just throw everything away, especially in your case, family, business, three kids, your wife and, and all this stuff. So is it something where you just kinda accept that this is the state where, you know, it’s, it’s struggle, it’s where I would just have to be, stay in it for a while and then answers would just pop out on its own?
Or are you doing anything actively?
[00:39:13] Yi-xian:
Actually, for me, I feel like I found my answer. This life my purpose is to run this school group to make the biggest impact possible. It’s very clear for me. And once it landed, I knew it. So my path is not enlightenment, this life or, and, you know, maybe never, maybe never life.
So I, I know that this is what I’m here to do and whatever practices that I know that are important to me in, and in a certain way I accept.
[00:39:47] Kai Xin:
I guess you can plan the seeds of enlightenment in whatever you do. That’s actually very beautiful and I think it also nicely wraps up the episode. We’ve covered quite a lot. I think when you first started, you also mentioned that you have this thing in you that, hey, you know, Etonhouse you wanna make the greatest impact.
You’ve talked about how it’s actually not so rosy, you know, like, oh yeah, mindfulness is putting work. Then what? Suddenly you become a saint, but it’s a journey. Sometimes you don’t react and respond so well, and that’s also okay. And however you try to integrate a routine in your day-to-day.
I think that’s very helpful and being able to identify boundaries. I think that theme came out quite a lot, be it whether it is kind of introducing mindfulness practice to other people, you know, what their boundaries are and our own personal boundaries when it comes to our capacity to help, to tolerate poop and to tolerate our own poop as well.
Yeah. I would like to ask if there’s anything else that you’d like to share before we officially end the episode. And Cheryl, as well.
[00:40:14] Yi-xian:
No, I was just laughing to myself. Cause you know, when I share that philosophy that I know that like the enlightenment is not my path. Like, I guess I get very interesting responses from Buddhist and then they go like, No, no. You Go ahead, bro. It’s ok.
[00:40:34]Cheryl:
I mean, everyone’s journey, right? Yeah. Yeah. And I think for whatever way, shape, or form, like yeah, I know it’s not my yet.
[00:41:27] Kai Xin:
Yeah. Perhaps not this life. Maybe next, life you have a different, you know, intent and that’s also
[00:41:32] Cheryl:
or maybe next retreat.
[00:41:34] Yi-xian:
Oh, yes, yes. True. Yeah. We’ll see.
[00:41:41] Kai Xin:
All right. I would like to leave with one note. I just suddenly thought of it regarding mindfulness practice in day-to-day, cause I think you’re so busy. You have proven that it is possible to integrate in day-to-day life. And even if you can’t do even the one minute breath. I’ve learned this from one of the monk, I think it’s called the Luangpor Sumedho method whereby every door you walk past, you would just be aware of your breath. So you know how sometimes we enter a room without knowing that we enter a room or like we shampoo our head twice, things like that. So I found that to be very helpful. I mean, we don’t need extra time to be mindful, but just passing the door and that can be our sign post.
Thanks for listening to this episode. If you like it and benefited for me, please to share with a friend and give us a five star review on Spotify. It would help us a lot. And til the next episode, may you stay happy and wise!
Buddhist Youth Network, Lim Soon Kiat, Alvin Chan, Tan Key Seng, Soh Hwee Hoon, Geraldine Tay, Venerable You Guang, Wilson Ng, Diga, Joyce, Tan Jia Yee, Joanne, Suñña, Shuo Mei, Arif, Bernice, Wee Teck, Andrew Yam, Kan Rong Hui, Wei Li Quek, Shirley Shen, Ezra, Joanne Chan, Hsien Li Siaw.
Editor and transcriber of this episode: Tee Ke Hui, Cheryl Cheah, Koh Kai Xin
Editor’s note: This article is adapted from PJ’s website. Do check out his past articles on tackling the workplace over here, here, and here.
On 19th October 2022, I flew back to Singapore after spending three months at my teacher Ajahn Brahm‘s retreat centre Jhana Grove and monastery in Serpentine, Western Australia.
Since then, I’ve been asked quite frequently about what I learned and “gained”, which I’ll attempt to summarize here. Below are the 11 things I’ve learnt.
(Graphic image warning: Please note that learning point 8 has a few graphic pictures of a decaying dead kangaroo. You may quickly jump to point 9 if you are easily affected.)
1. A much clearer & experiential understanding of how suffering works.
Expectations, wanting, hopes, plans, etc. are a huge barrier, because of the Second Noble Truth: wanting causes suffering. During this retreat, I think I’ve let go more of the expectations & wanting to re-experience the life-changing yo-yo-jhana in 2010, which I’ve written about here and here . And if I wanted anything, whether it was the beautiful breath, or silence in the mind, or nimittas, or jhanas, that wanting always led to suffering.
So towards the end, I was deliberately cultivating the mantra of “Good enough”. Heavy rain while walking to the monastery? Good enough. Restless mind while sitting in the morning cold? That’s more than good enough!
And that really helped and worked: there was a lot less suffering when I was developing this mindset of being “contented and easily satisfied”, instead of striving with strong wants.
It’s not all perfect: there were definitely days when it felt like walking into a perfect storm. The lowest point I experienced was towards the end, on a Monday. For the whole of Monday, I struggled with a very, very restless mind: I could barely sit. It was, as Ajahn Chah (Ajahn Brahm’s teacher) described, “you can’t move forward, you can’t go backwards, you can’t stay where you are”.
I’m experienced enough to know that restlessness is the mind being discontented with the present moment experience. So I tried to make peace with the present moment experience and tried to be unconditionally kind and gentle to my own mind. That caused my mind to kinda go into a kind of split, where a less-critical, more-loving PJ was having a dialogue with a very fault-finding, very discontented PJ:
Loving PJ: There there! It’s ok to be discontented. You’re not enlightened yet!
Fault-Finding PJ: Of course it’s easy to say that!
Loving PJ: Remember Ajahn Brahm’s instructions? Just make peace with the suffering, be kind, be gentle…
Fault-Finding PJ: Of course it’s easy for Ajahn to say that! He’s the MOZART of meditation, whereas you are still playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Stars! You can’t even watch your stupid beautiful breath, for goodness sake!
It just spiralled downwards from there, into outright fear and despair. I was reminded of the episode in the Buddha’s passing, when his attendant Ananda cried out of despair. I understood what he felt because I felt this deep fear of what will happen when Ajahn Brahm dies? Who else can I have as a teacher I am dependent on?
And there was despair because I was nowhere close to the jhanas, which are needed to really remove the defilements. And I had so many defilements … it felt like I was tasked with using a single box of matchsticks to melt an entire iceberg or glacier.
The fear and despair was very, very real, and very, very bad: I sobbed and cried my eyes out in the shower. I don’t think I have cried like this ever since my colleague Parathy died… after I finished crying, I asked my mind what it wanted to do, and went to sit and meditate, before going to sleep. The next morning, I went to ask Ajahn for advice on how to deal with such days.
Ajahn was so kind and compassionate… he kept saying “trust. you are so close“, and also talked about how, often, progress on the Path isn’t about more effort, but about finding the right place to perpendicularly cross the river. “And when you’re over, you’ll then realize how stupid you’ve been all this while, because you’ll look back and say ‘wait, that was it? That’s all it took?’ ” And that was all it took for me to gain back the trust, confidence, and patience to carry on.
2. A more experiential understanding of non-self”
The other learning is a more experiential understanding of non-self. Basically, I don’t really control my body or my mind: it is heavily influenced by the environment around me. The body is out of control, and the mind is out of control because they are all complex processes which have no single source of self, and where effects become causes for further effects. It’s all about putting the right causes in place, I.e. Right Motivation (Samma sankappa). A few episodes really highlighted this to me.
No matter how much I tried, I could not change the fact that my body is made in Singapore, and that I struggle with the cold. Cold makes my mind restless, as I am really not made for this climate. It’s quite funny because whenever it’s cold, there is automatically a soundtrack playing in my mind (for the first two months, it was the soundtrack of Crash Landing On You, because my wife and I re-watched it before I left…). But what was even more interesting was the short spell of warm weather in late September and early October: the soundtrack playing stopped in my mind, with no choice nor force at all! So it was really caused by the cold.
Physically with my body, there were a few incidents (suspect Covid; my twitching eye; body pains from sitting meditation) which drove home the point of non-self. From the Buddha’s second-ever discourse (Anattalakkhanasutta SN 22.59):
“(this body is not) fit to be regarded thus: ‘This is mine, this I am, this is my self’”, because “…if…(this body) were (my) self, this (body) would not lead to affliction, and it would be possible to have it of (this body): ‘let my (body) be thus; let my (body) not be thus’. But because (this body) is nonself, (this body) leads to affliction, and it is not possible to have it of (this body): ‘let my (body) be thus; let my (body) not be thus’. “
Basically, if your body was you or your self, then you would be able to compel it and control it to be well, not be sick, and to take on any shape or form you wish. Which you can’t.
3. Reduce the drivers of negative emotions
Much of Ajahn Brahm’s teachings are really about undermining and reducing the drivers for negative emotions, especially the overthinking mind that tenses up, comments, interferes, fault-finds, strives and tries, is ruthless, and seeks to control everything (especially due to fear).
If we do the exact opposite to the above verbs, those are the causes for future deep meditation and eventual liberation. So we should:
Relax to the Max
Disengage from commentary
Don’t interfere or do anything, because it is all none-of-your-business
Let the mind decide what it wants to do, rather than tell and control it
Cultivate contentment: “good enough”
Not try
And be kind, unconditionally.
4. Cultivating the opposite of fault-finding
Ajahn Brahm once wrote that “cultivating the opposite of fault-finding is 90% of the Buddhist practice”, and this was something I realised from the three months.
It is so easy to lapse into fault-finding and criticism of everything: I could be sitting for 45 mins, watching the breath for 44 mins, and daydreaming in the last minute, and that is often enough for me to say “that was not peaceful”! This is crazy, if you think about it, because I wasn’t really looking realistically at the whole session, but only picking out the bad parts to smear the whole thing.
I think this fault-finding is due to social conditioning: it seems “smarter” to seem pessimistic, cynical, and negative (as shared in Psychology of Money: see point 7 in the original article here). This mindset is especially prevalent in Singapore, I think.
5. Systems, Not Goals
Scott Adams’ “system vs goals” came up in my mind during the retreat, and I started wondering what was my “system”, vs the “goal” of enlightenment. My system is to keep precepts, learn Dhamma, create the supporting environment for practice around me, and meditate daily. I’ll let the results take care of themselves. Some specifics that I picked up during the Rains:
If the meditation was me largely “letting go, being kind and gentle”, then the meditation was a success, regardless of the results!
I started debriefing myself after each meditation, as part of my “system”. I ask myself these questions:
What suffering was absent? How much peace, calm & stillness was generated from the sit?
Was there letting go, kindness and gentleness in the meditation, between me and the meditation object?
Which defilements were gone? Usually for me, there’s no ill will, sloth and torpor, and doubt. The usual suspects are Kama canda, and restlessness and remorse.
7. Meditation is like taking a shit
Meditation is a lot like taking a shit: there are a lot of parallels between the two.
Both are non-self: in both processes, there is no single part you can point to, and say that’s me, mine, a self. There are also none of the accumulations of a self in any part of the processes e.g. ego, pride, expectations, will, etc.
Both are natural causal processes, where willpower & expectations are NOT necessary causal factors & are often counterproductive:
If you’re blocked in meditation, often you need more mindfulness and kindness, to unblock yourself. If you’re blocked in shitting, often you need more fibre and water to unblock yourself.
Using willpower in both cases causes haemorrhoids in your mind and in your a**
Expectations in both cases are major blockers.
Both processes are about clearing their “containers” of defilements and debris: one is clearing the mind, the other is clearing the digestive system.
Last but not least, the best sits and the best shits are effortless and joyful, and very healthy.
7. Keeping Precepts is Critical
Keeping precepts is critical for progress on the Path. This is often overlooked, especially in western meditation instructions. But this importance becomes very clear when meditation deepens, and when your mind starts to reflect the spottiness of your ethical behaviour by body, speech and mind. Let me share a story about someone, whom I’ll call PJ2. Imagine that PJ2 is single, and that he once had a very, very deep meditation experience a few years ago.
At the start of the Rains Retreat, I was discussing nimittas and jhanas with PJ2. However, as the retreat progressed, PJ2’s past caught up with him: he had not kept his precepts fully, and that caused him to feel this overwhelming sense of guilt that triggered panic attacks.
This lasted until PJ2 left, and it was very eye-opening for everyone to see how important keeping precepts are, for deeper meditation and for one’s practice.
8. Death is everywhere
Death and dying is everywhere, in the most unexpected places. In September, as a few of us returned from visiting Kusala Hermitage, it turned out that two kangaroos had been hit by vehicles just outside Jhana Grove. One of them was more decayed, while the other one was quite intact. It was very eye-opening to see the decaying and decomposition process over the weeks, which I captured by taking multiple videos and photos.
What videos and photos do not capture is the smell: that nauseating odour of death and decay, which reminds me of the very first time I smelled that odour, as a teenager helping my father clear the drowned rat stuck under our driveway.
But what the photos and videos do convey are the charnel ground descriptions in the suttas, especially the Satipatthana sutta (** CONTACT ALERT: Pics of dead things**)
The dead adult kangaroo just outside Jhana Grove
…And it had been dead for one, two, or three days, bloated, livid, and festering. They’d compare it with their own body: ‘This body is also of that same nature, that same kind, and cannot go beyond that.’ 15.1
The dead adult kangaroo had moved due to heavy rain and had decayed
Then:
…a corpse discarded in a charnel ground being devoured by crows, hawks, vultures, herons, dogs, tigers, leopards, jackals, and many kinds of little creatures. 16.2They’d compare it with their own body: 16.3‘This body is also of that same nature, that same kind, and cannot go beyond that.’ 17.1
Same dead kangaroo, much more decayed. Note how the skull has gone missing, and the skeleton has changed color.
Then:
Bones rid of sinews scattered in every direction. Here a hand-bone, there a foot-bone, here a shin-bone, there a thigh-bone, here a hip-bone, there a rib-bone, here a back-bone, there an arm-bone, here a neck-bone, there a jaw-bone, here a tooth, there the skull …
A finger fragment of the dead kangaroo by the roadside marking
Then:
Bones rotted and crumbled to powder. 30.2They’d compare it with their own body: 30.3‘This body is also of that same nature, that same kind, and cannot go beyond that.’
It is extremely sobering, especially since an adult male kangaroo is about the same size as me, to reflect that my body is truly “of that same nature, that same kind, and cannot go beyond that.”
The Sangha at Bodhinyana Monastery paying respects to the Triple Gem
9. The monastic practice is the Buddha’s Training Programme
The monastic practice set by the Buddha is THE way to get to Nibbana. Before this Rains, I had doubts about this: what’s stopping me as a lay person from being able to practice towards liberation? But after three months, there is no longer any doubt in my mind that the Training Programme decided by the Buddha is the best bet to Enlightenment.
However, my conditions in life are such that, it has to be lay life for me, at least for a while: as a married man, I have to take care of my wife, but also have to take care of my parents and parents-in-law as they age.
10. Some observations of my fellow retreatants:
My “alms bowl” for three months, filled with food generously given by lay supporters of the monastery. Those lay supporters drove 1 hr each way to feed the monks and lay retreatants every day, for 3 months!
The generosity of people is astounding. For three months, I was fed by other people. Also, this group of Rains Retreatants really were very generous with helping each other out. For example, Becky would serve Ajahn tea, but also do a lot of acts of loving kindness to others. And in turn, I saw others helping her: a number of retreatants were talking to her to give her an introduction to the suttas, just before her silent retreat. Everyone was helping each other out like one big family (e.g. Gayathri making soup for Piotr, our Polish retreatant, when he fell sick a second time), which the Jhana Grove staff observed was quite unusual to our group.
There seems to be a bit of PTSD from past experiences with SN Goenka vipassana meditation: a couple of retreatants mentioned to me something along the lines of “I can’t watch the breath, because I end up trying to control it from my vipassana experience” and “I can’t watch the breath with pleasure, because my vipassana conditioning kicks in”. Which is a real pity, because the breath can be a lovely meditation object.
Dhamma vitakka (thoughts of the Dhamma) as a subtle hindrance was something that came up in a sutta class taught by Ajahn Brahm, but it seems to have been rejected by a number of retreatants. This hindrance was something I saw in my own mind: at some point, I realised that reading the suttas was actually complicating my own meditation practice, because I ended up generating a lot of questions (“Am I doing X right, like in the sutta?”) which disturbed the peace of mind. So towards the end, I deliberately cut down on my reading of the suttas, and reduced my thinking on aspects of the Dhamma.
11. The Practice isn’t just about meditation
While on a day outing with Ajahn Santutthi, abbot of Kusala Hermitage, I asked Ajahn about advice on the practice, especially since I felt stuck and stagnating in my meditation depth. He gave very good advice: “the practice doesn’t end after three months”, “the practice isn’t just about meditation”, and “just develop contentment and peace.” Which is perhaps the main takeaway I got from my three months.
Monks from Kusala Hermitage walking in a botanical garden bed of tulips
Editor’s note: It is rare to share about porn addiction so openly, may this piece help those struggling out there. Due to the sensitive nature of the topic, Joshua is not the author’s real name.This is a two-part article. The second part is here.
TLDR: Joshua shares how his porn addiction brought him on the path of the Dhamma and how the four noble truths spoke to him as he began his Dhamma journey.
I have been a porn addict for most of my adult life. It started when I was a teenager, and I would spend hours on the internet watching adult videos. It was like a drug for me, and every time I binged on it, I felt a temporary sense of pleasure and satisfaction. But as soon as the pleasure was over, I was back to feeling empty and unsatisfied, and the cycle would begin again. I felt disgusted at myself after watching it.
Here is my story of how I struggled with porn, how the Dhamma helped me overcome the addiction.
This is not professional advice and is not meant to replace support/help for those who need professional help. Do seek it out if necessary.
When Porn becomes a daily habit
As I grew older, I found that I was spending more and more time watching porn and engaging less time in real-life activities. I would fight for time to be alone so that I could watch it.
I was subsconsciously objectifying my female friends especially if they wore tight fitting clothes. This was unnerving to me. I wasn’t looking at human beings anymore but rather potential mates. I was slowly spiralling out of control.
I tried to understand why I was developing such a crazy tendency for porn. I could not pinpoint any reason as to why I would be hooked on it other than the engulfing lust that hits me from time to time. The search to understand why led me to the Dhamma.
My arrival in Dhamma
I heard about how Buddhism could help people break free from addiction, so I decided to give it a try. At first, I was skeptical.
How could something so ancient and spiritual help me overcome something so modern and destructive? Anyway, I am an ‘educated’ Singaporean who rejects traditions and begrudgingly participates in customs. This was something foreign to me.
However, the paralysing hold porn had on me led me to surrender the prejudices I had against the Buddha/Buddhism. I was tired of the cycles of lust and guilt.
I started by listening to Buddhist talks and the suttas that covered the topics of lust and desire.
I found many parallels with what Addiction Psychologist Gabor Mate, talked about. Gabor shared that addiction is like a cycle where the person is simply trapped like a child that never grew up or matured. We need to ask the right questions, ‘It is not Why the addiction but rather Why the pain?’.
Both the Buddha and modern addiction psychology pushed me to enquire deeper, what pain am I avoiding? My initial ‘failure’ to uncover why I am addicted as mentioned above, was me just scratching the surface and not diving deeper.
The four noble truths and porn
I had to confess to myself that I had an addiction problem because I had a deep feeling of emptiness and dissatisfaction. I wanted to be loved. I was using pornography to fill a void, but it was never going to be enough.
Only by facing and transforming my suffering, could I then address the ‘symptom’ of the problem. The Buddha’s four noble truth stared me in the face.
1. There is suffering (I am suffering from this porn addiction)
2. The cause of suffering is desire (I cling to porn because I desire to be loved and fulfilled)
3. There is an end to suffering (My addiction to porn can end and I can break the cycle)
4. The way out of suffering is the noble 8 fold path (My desire for porn ends when I pursue a moral path capable of making me feel contented without the need for porn)
The realisation felt as if a rock that weighed me down had suddenly started to float. I could break free.
As I read, I started to understand the concept of the “three poisons” – desire, aversion and ignorance. I realised that these were the same forces that kept me trapped in my addiction.
Desire makes you want more and more and like the Buddha said that ‘there is no ocean vast like tanha (craving)’. It is always never enough. Aversion makes you push away things you dislike. The frustration and unhappiness with my feelings of emptiness and not feeling loved, made me push them away by pursuing pleasure. Ignorance is the lacking wisdom and knowledge of the way out. Not being aware of the power one can have over the defilements instead of being led on by them.
Tackling the dangers of sensual desires
I started by tackling the desire and aversion portion of the problem, as I believed that ignorance would slowly fall away as I developed my wisdom. One sutta that really resonated with me was the Bhayasutta.
It states,
“Seeing the danger in grasping,
the origin of birth and death,
the unattached are freed
with the ending of birth and death.”
The danger of grasping onto this habit of pornography to find pleasure in life would ultimately lead me to many rounds of suffering or birth and death.
I started to practice mindfulness and meditation to become more aware of these negative thoughts and feelings. Removing the triggers was key. I started to recognise them for what they were: empty, fleeting states of mind.
Outside of my mind, it also helped to change my environment to support my return to normalcy. I opened my room’s doors at all times so that the fear of shame/being discovered was always there if I decide to surf porn.
In addition, I avoided placing myself in situations where I was exposed to attractive females in close contact. This included giving up drinking and avoiding nightclubs where dancing in close proximity could put my desires into overdrive.
The fifth precept, to not drink and participate in activities with intoxicants, was a struggle. However, I reflected that if mindfulness was already so hard to cultivate in meditation, why was I willingly impairing my mindfulness every Friday night?
Those friends who encouraged me to drink were not helping my recovery and I had to eventually let go of those social circles to build my mindfulness. It was not easy. But it had to be done.
Hanging out with Dhamma friends I made in Buddhist circles helped me transition out of my old friendship circles. Night chats revolved around tea and iced lemon tea, with deep reflections on life. I slowly uncovered that everyone has their own struggles.
Hearing a fellow Dhamma friend share his struggles with womanising made me realise how rare it was to have deep conversations without a need for social lubricants (alcohol or smoking). Being present is all you need. It is amazing how the Dhamma brought us together. Walking the path towards lesser defilements.
I am grateful for how the Dhamma showed me the way out of addiction and into a freer life.
Thanks for reading my story. I will share in the next story 5 practical ways that helped reduced my porn addiction.
Wise Steps:
If there is a bad habit that we wish to quit we need to find changes in the environment and the social circles we keep
Addiction is extremely tough, but with friends, loved ones, and the Dhamma, we can slowly break through our clinging
Seek professional help if your welfare is being compromised severely by addictions like pornography.
Low Mi Yen, a clinical psychologist and one of Malaysia’s foremost proponents of the application of psychology, mindfulness and self-compassion, for individual, couple, family, workplace and community, for more than 27 years. Pioneered Employee Assistance Program (EAP) in Malaysia since 1999, providing corporate training, coaching, crisis intervention, psychotherapy, psychological assessment, lecturing and supervision, mindfulness and self-compassion interventions in enhancing resilience.
Transcript
[00:00:00] Kai Xin:
Hi, welcome to another episode of the Handful Of Leaves podcast, where we bring you practical Buddhist wisdom for a happier life.
Is ignorance bliss?
You know, in the process of wanting to be a good person or being taught to be a good person, we learn how to identify right from wrong. And we are also reminded of moral conduct and standards and thus become increasingly cautious of our own actions, sometimes fearing the consequences or you’ll feel ashamed if we were to fall short.
So wouldn’t it actually be better if we remained ignorant? We’ll be happier, right? In this episode, we will talk about how the fear of wrongdoing and shame can actually lead us to peace. I know it sounds paradoxical, which is why we have our guest today Sister Miyen and also my co-host, Cheryl, to talk about this because we know fear and shame, they are very unpleasant feelings. So how is it possible that it can result in peace?
And is it really true that these mental qualities can pave the way to enlightenment?
A lot of big questions and this episode is going to be very educational. So without further ado, let’s dive right in.
Hi. Good to see you, sister Mi Yen. I’m joined with Cheryl to chat with you today.
[00:01:20] Sis Mi Yen:
Thanks for inviting me, Kai Xin and Cheryl, to join you in this wonderful series of podcasts with interesting topics to share with your listeners. So I’m actually very happy and excited to have the chat with you today.
[00:01:34] Kai Xin:
Yeah, definitely. Today’s subject is quite interesting because we’re gonna talk about fear and shame. And there is this term in the Buddhist scripture, which is Hirīottappa. We’re gonna unpack a lot of that to see where these two words fit into our life? Because I think in a religious context, we sometimes feel like, oh, I’m not a good enough Buddhist, I did something wrong. Then there’s the sense of shame and guilt, but it can get to a point where it’s not so beneficial and I personally in the past have a lot of misconceptions about it.
Just for our listeners, a brief background about Sis Mi Yen, who’s on this podcast with us today. She’s a clinical psychologist who spent more than 27 years helping individuals, couples, families, to teach them how to be a better person, either in a form of leadership or in a form of managing crisis as well as emotion. She also does psychotherapy.
I do wanna start off this episode with our first question. You know, in our modern world, there are a lot of distractions and vices. I would say that a lot of people would agree that it’s quite challenging to be a good person, because sometimes, people shout at you, they do certain nasty things and the tendency is, oh, I wanna fight back, or I wanna hurt another person.
So how do we actually not be triggered by all these temptations or these responses and end up hurting others? How does Hirīottappa come into the picture, and this sense of fear and shame?
[00:03:03] Sis Mi Yen:
Like you said, we are not doing justice to our topic itself, especially these two very important mental qualities in our short podcast today. So I’ll try my best to unpack as much as I can. It is a difficult practice. Today I’m speaking more as a Buddhist practitioner rather than a professional psychologist. From the Buddhist perspective, I myself, personally, find that in our Buddhist teaching, Hirī and Ottappa, these are the twin mental qualities that are present in all of us. And these mental qualities, they are associated with skillful action. At times they’re referred to as the two superheroes that protect the world or the guardians of the world.
If you Google Hirī and Ottappa you’ll see all these words popping up. These are very important mental qualities. It actually helps us to make right choices in life. How do we act? How do we speak? How do we think? Hopefully, in a helpful, healthy, and skillful way for us to uphold ourself as a human being, especially our moral conduct and of course in Buddhist practice, the importance of keeping the precepts. So, these two mental qualities are huge. I’m not sure whether you would like me to delve into the definition because sometimes the definition itself can cause a lot of misunderstanding too.
[00:04:22] Kai Xin: I see Cheryl nodding her head. We would agree that it’s good to maybe just define what exactly is Hirī and what is Ottappa in short, and then we can slowly unpack and clear some of the wrong views or misconceptions.
[00:04:34] Sis Mi Yen:
Yes, Hirī refers to the inner conscience refraining us from doing deeds that would jeopardise our self-respect, honor and dignity as a human being. In a way it’s an inner ability to see unwholesomeness arising as shameful or wrong. This is where different terminology has been used to translate the Pali term Hirī. We have moral shame as one of the main one. But I think the English translation, moral shame is a bit tricky. I really like the ability to see unwholesomeness as shameful, our awareness of the value of human being.
Ottapa on the other hand, refers to a healthy fear of wrongdoings. I don’t want to do this unwholesome action because by doing this, I’m gonna bring harm to myself and others. That means the ability to actually reflect on consequences. As human beings, we do have responsibilities and awareness of our action, kamma and so forth. But a lot of the English words that describe ottapa, they use the word moral dread or moral fear.
I prefer to just use Hirī and Ottappa, having a clearer understanding of the actual definition. But again, it can cause a lot of misunderstanding from the English term itself.
[00:05:56] Cheryl:
Yeah, I think the words fear and shame are very intense words. It elicits a very negative reaction. In our day to day, you’re trying to avoid fear and shame. I really like how you rephrased it as the ability to see unwholesomeness as shameful. It really helps us to reflect on the actions and behaviors that are actually very dirty in nature, that’s why it’s shameful, rather than us having that shame that perhaps comes from wrong conditioning.
[00:06:21] Kai Xin:
I would like to share an example to illustrate Hirīottappa, you can correct me if I’m wrong. You mentioned that it’s something that we innately have, Hirī, a sense of shame or conscience. We know what exactly is wrong or right.
So, there was one day my mom when she was fetching my niece from preschool, she’s around four years old. She’s a little bit out of character. Very unusually quiet. And then my mom kind of noticed that something is amiss and then she found out that my niece has taken from the preschool, a Lego and then she put it in her arms. She kind of knows that she’s not supposed to do it, but she also doesn’t wanna tell. So there’s a little bit of like, okay, what if I get found out, you know? Like, will my mom scold her? Will her mother scold her? And what’s the consequences? Which kind of led her to also be not so vocal about what is wrong. She probably have taken it by accident and then only found out about it afterwards.
So I thought that’s particularly interesting because at such a young age she already knows that taking things that is not hers is not so right. So would that be an example of Hirī?
[00:07:31] Sis Mi Yen:
In a way. I think your niece has gone into another experience. The Pali word that I can recall is Kukkucca. It is actually the guilt and remorse happening. I think this is again, very, very natural. A lot of us have this frequent misunderstanding. We get Hirīottappa quite mixed up with Kukkucca, remorse. So actually Kukkucca is the feeling that arises after the bad action has been committed. So your niece has taken the Lego. It’s actually committed already, that’s why it is already Kukkucca.
Whereas, Hirī and Ottappa are actually the conflict in our mind and the feeling that arises before the bad action happens. So they are actually protective factors. Hopefully they are here to protect our minds from moral defilements or immoral action.
Thank you for bringing this example up. That’s why a lot of times in the classes on Hirīottappa, we have to discuss about Kukkucca. Cause it comes together in that sense.
[00:08:32] Kai Xin:
It’s kind of like the cartoon, you know, they have the angel and devil. So it is before to prevent us from even taking the Lego. But then after you have already committed, then that’s where the remorse comes in.
[00:08:46] Sis Mi Yen:
And the guilt comes in.
[00:08:48] Kai Xin:
That’s interesting. Could you give us some examples of real-life situation of Hirī and Ottappa?
[00:08:54] Sis Mi Yen:
Okay. Actually, all of us in a way, innately have Hirīottappa in us.
But it is still important for us to develop or practise it. For this, I actually want to bring us back to a very important reference from Ashin Buddhaghosa, a fifth-century Indian Theravāda Buddhist commentator, translator and philosopher. So, Ashin Buddhaghosa has actually highlighted eight factors that can help us to facilitate or cultivate Hirī and Ottappa. Hopefully we have these eight factors to guide us further.
First, remember we are a person of good birth. Birth is rare in our Buddhist practice. So remember that it is not worthy of a person with good birth to do unwholesome action. Remember our rare birth as a human being.
Number two. These unwholesome actions are not worthy of a mature person like me. Hopefully our maturity from our practice will also prompt us to recall that.
Third, these unwholesome actions are just unacceptable. I am a strong and courageous person. I have been practicing all our Buddhist practices, therefore I should not do this.
Fourth, these unwholesome actions are usually committed by those who are unwise. Hopefully, I have wisdom from all my Buddhist practices to guide me.
Fifth, I am a Buddhist practitioner. So I would reflect on our Buddhist doctrines, which always teach us on wholesomeness. Reflect on the dignity of the Buddha our teacher who has given us the Buddha Dhamma as the path, especially our Noble Eightfold Path. So let me keep to this. My Buddhist practice is my inheritance in this present life. So I would like to honor this for myself and also for the other people in my life because if I do something unwholesome, I’m going to hurt them.
So he described these eight beautiful factors that can help us to practice Hirī. If we can remember, just go back to the basics, the Four Noble Truth, the Noble Eightfold Path. You’ll be guided by what Ashin has actually mentioned.
He says there are another four factors. Clear understanding of the consequences will totally stop us from committing unwholesomeness. He says this, we will be afraid of doing something that we are gonna regret later, if we know this unwholesomeness is gonna be criticised, that we are gonna be punished in the present life or the future life. Very related to our core Buddhist practice. I always love contemplating and reminding myself of maintaining Hirī and Ottappa in myself. That’s how we can practice to cultivate Hirī and Ottappa. I know it’s a long explanation but we will share with our listeners all the important links.
[00:11:59] Kai Xin:
It’s good that you actually brought up the context or the different line of thoughts because then these are signposts on the kind of narrative that goes in our head. Then you recognize, oh, this is actually trying to guard my morality so that I would have no regret in the future.
In fact, I would share another anecdotal experience to kind of make this a little bit more relatable. I would say, especially the Dhamma practice, because we have the Five Precepts. So no killing, no stealing, no sexual misconduct, no lying and no intoxicant, right? The precepts itself has always been at the back of my head and has actually allowed me to avoid troubles or dangers, particularly when it comes to lying. This one is quite difficult, I would say, because white lie is also involved and sometimes you not saying anything, hiding the truth, if you’re strict about it, it’s also considered lying. Right? So that was actually a very interesting instance at work. I was in a moral dilemma. Our team has actually accidentally circulated a confidential piece of information from client A to client B, and this was by accident.
So the moment when we found out, it was a moral dilemma because if we don’t tell, then the client won’t know that we have made this mistake. But if we do tell, our client might feel that, hey, why don’t we kind of guard their confidential information safely. There might be trust that is lost.
But then there’s also the other side, which is what if we don’t tell? Eventually our client were to find out and we knew that we should have told. So there was kind of like a little bit of ding-dong and then I kind of couldn’t sleep as well. In the end, we made the difficult decision, which is to own up to our mistake because it is our responsibility. And I think the whole concern is about, okay, will we destroy the trust? But the very fact that we are hiding the truth, there’s no transparency, there’s no trust, right? So we have to bear our consequences.
Our client actually appreciated it. What we thought would be quite a big hoo-ha didn’t unfold in the manner that we expect, we expect our clients to actually scold us. So what happened was our client was very thankful and said, okay, it was by mistake, can you let us know who are the relevant parties? And also let me check with my team, who’s part of legals and comms to see what can be done. And then for us, of course our offer is okay, whatever corrective actions you want us to take, we will go ahead and take it. But it was such a big load off all of our chests because the very fact that we are not hiding anything to me it’s about keeping the precept of honesty as well as being truthful.
Also from a leadership standpoint, it does set some form of tone, right? Like how do you own up to your mistake and say that it’s okay, we make mistakes. Be responsible for our actions. There’s so much more respect from there rather than doing it otherwise.
[00:15:01] Sis Mi Yen:
Wow. I’m so proud, you know, of what has transpired between you, your team, and the other team. And this is the amazing part, you know? Cause we human beings actually have conscience. We have the ability to recognise mistakes and we know that if we do not resolve it, it’s gonna be sticky. And it’s very interesting that we can’t go against natural emotions.
In the psychology of emotions in Buddhism, there are four sets of basic challenging emotions that none of us can escape. The example that you give is guilt and shame. The four challenging emotions are anger and hatred, fear and anxiety, grief or sorrow, guilt or shame. It will arise. We cannot run away from it.
And of course, the more we are able to reflect and practice Hirīottappa, hopefully it will prevent occurrence of the four sets of challenging emotions and your example is right on the dot on that. Instead of anger or hatred from your client, you know, they actually have positive emotion. They were appreciative of your honesty. So you see we are always very stuck on the negativity. But we forgot that there’s always the other positive part of emotions and actions of course. I’m so happy to hear that the situation was actually resolved. I cannot imagine that stress that you guys were having due to that.
[00:16:32] Kai Xin:
It was quite stressful. Like, will we lose a client because of that, you know, our reputation will be tarnished. And everything turned out to be alright and I think it was for the better. I thought whatever you mentioned was so true. Fear and shame, connotation is usually very negative, very intense. Ajahn Jayasāro clarified to say it’s actually wise shame and wise fear, when you use it skillfully, it actually helps you to reduce the emotions that you talk about – anxiety, restlessness and helps us be more peaceful.
[00:17:01] Sis Mi Yen:
Yes, definitely. That’s why Hirī and Ottappa are called the two superheroes or the protectors of the world. We need this as a human being in our world. It’s so scary. There are a lot of bad deeds, evilness because of the lack of Hirī and Ottappa. If we didn’t have Hirī and Ottappa, to protect us, we have to then deal with Kukkucca. It’s when the bad action has been committed, but we need to deal with the guilt, the remorse, the shame.
[00:17:33] Cheryl:
I got a question that could be quite obvious. So what would be considered a good deed or a bad deed? So, for example, in Kai Xin’s case, it’s obvious, following the five percepts. That’s examples of maintaining morality, maintaining goodness but a lot of times, what we think is bad is not really bad. For example, premarital sex. Some people would think it’s very bad, but if you dive a little bit deeper, it’s because society said so, or your parents said so. So it’s very subjective to a certain extent. How do we know what is truly considered a good deed?
[00:18:06] Sis Mi Yen:
Ah, that’s very tricky. To me, not good deeds they’re any deeds that does not fall under our practice of Five Precepts. It’s actually very deep itself. So that will definitely always guide us to perform good deeds and to abstain from bad deeds. Another Buddhist practice will be the Noble Eightfold Path. To practice the Noble Eightfold Path itself is not easy. Having the Right View, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Concentration, that is itself will take us many lives to practise.
Based on what you have actually mentioned, that example is very frequently asked by people. So is premarital sex a sexual misconduct breaking the third precept? So I would say that it all depends on the two persons involved in the act. The element that you touch on, the cultural aspect or the religious aspect is tricky. Some religious rules is no premarital sex. So then they will view that as very negative.
But I think our third precept to abstain from sexual misconduct, it has to do with these two individuals. Are they truly clear and respectful of each other when they are in that sexual relationship? Are they both willing?
It’s very tricky on the frame of mind of the two person. If there is clarity on both sides, then it is a mutual relationship. If one person is hesitant or not comfortable and so forth, then of course, that act itself is a misconduct.
Right or wrong, the mind always wants to judge, it’s so tricky. If we wanna go deeper into the perception that arises in us, in making that judgment itself, what are many more layers behind it that make us arrive at the right or the wrong. It’s much more worthwhile to go back to actually investigate the processes, rather looking at what is right or what is wrong. It’s so subjective. But of course, living in a society there are rules set by the country, the government, of course those are hard to challenge. But in terms of moral or social rules that becomes very tricky.
My suggestion is, if we are practicing Buddhism always have that mindfulness to bring us back to investigate the processes that’s happening internally. Learn from that processes itself. So, I’m not sure whether I’ve answered you, Cheryl.
[00:20:51] Cheryl:
You helped to remind us that it’s important to understand what’s really going on internally because you cannot lie to yourself to a certain extent.
[00:21:00] Kai Xin:
And I think it’s also important to understand the purpose behind even keeping the precepts or discerning what’s right and wrong. What I find beautiful about the Buddhist teaching is everything should lead us to peace. So if we have this mental restlessness and agitation by saying, oh, but it’s a gray area. Is it right? Is it wrong? Caught up with this endless debate, then it doesn’t actually help us free ourselves from suffering. There’s this term called sīlabbata-parāmāsa, clinging to rules and rituals, or even clinging on to our views. And it’s a very subtle part of practice because sometimes we like to follow rules, especially a very Asian context, right? Like, oh, this means this, B means B, C means C, but the world isn’t so black and white.
I think precepts is meant for us to find that peace and also live harmoniously with the society around us. Which is why in the discourses, a lot of times actually the Buddha did mention to abide by the law of the nation to not cause a disruption. As practitioners, our own responsibility is to also say, okay, if I were to do this, yes, it’s a little bit gray. Once I do this deed will I then have regret? For me, I found that to be very helpful. If it doesn’t bring peace, then perhaps I won’t venture into that path.
[00:22:19] Sis Mi Yen:
Somehow, there is this extreme category where some people have that deep, ignorance about the world, about being human. They will not be able to even have the realization, the reflection or the awareness of wholesomeness and unwholesomeness in the first place. That will be the very hard evil, really hardcore bad deeds and so forth, but to me, that’s a very small percentage.
But the bottom line is, the higher percentage of all of us have this basic ability to know what is wholesome and what is unwholesome. A lot of times because we are challenged by our greed, we want “Nevermind lah”. So I think it’s a lot more on that. In our Buddhist practice, we really understanding our greed, hatred and delusion is always with us. How do we deal with that?
For me, the Noble Eightfold Path has really unfolded for us the answer. The cultivation of the mind, the mental development, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Concentration. This is the hardest part for a lot of Buddhist, the meditative practice and effort. It’s only with that do we actually train our mind, every moment so that hopefully we do have this calmness, clarity in us that we can carry to face the world with a lot of vices and evilness and so forth, we can’t avoid that.
But hopefully with this cultivation, no matter how ugly it is out there, hopefully we can maintain that inner freedom and peace, which to me is the main Buddhist teaching or Buddhist practice. If you don’t practice Right Effort, Right Concentration, Right Mindfulness, you are not able to cultivate Hirīottappa. No way.
[00:24:10] Cheryl:
I think Hirī and Ottappa also helps to protect our long-term happiness. For example, the Fifth Precept to not intoxicate, but sometimes life is very hard. You just want to numb yourself by intoxicating.
[00:24:22] Sis Mi Yen:
The temptation, fighting greed, is very challenging for all of us in this materialistic world. Right?
[00:24:29] Kai Xin:
Yeah, I do see how mindfulness and concentration especially, can help us to have that clarity of mind to even tap into our own inner wisdom because we have many things happening around us. It’s very easy to be swayed. Like if we hang out with the wrong company, then we would think that it’s okay to indulge, but it doesn’t necessarily lead to our long-term welfare. Yeah, so also very important to hang out with wise friends in order to kind of help us stay on the path, to recalibrate. And most importantly, we have to be truthful to ourselves.
[00:25:01] Sis Mi Yen:
Since today we’re talking about Hirīottappa, I would like to highlight that a lot of our Buddhist core teachings are all interconnected. But Hirī and Ottappa, it is placed under the Treasure Dhana Sutta. It’s two out of the seven Noble Treasures. So maybe let me just share with the listener what are the Seven Noble Treasures? We will give the link to the audience.
So the first category is actually moral training. Under the moral training there are four treasures, four practices, the treasure of faith, Saddhā. Start with Saddhā, our faith towards Dhamma. Second one is the treasure of moral virtue, followed by the treasure of Hirī, moral shame and the treasure of Ottappa, moral fear. So these four are grouped under moral training.
And with this, comes in the next category, the meditation training. Here they have two treasures for us to practice. The treasure of learning, and I think it’s very deep. The next one is the treasure of charity or generosity. It’s very interesting that this sutta they place it under meditation training.
The last one, number seven is actually the wisdom training and this is the treasure of wisdom, paññā.
See how important is Hirī and Ottappa. It’s within these seven that Budha has actually taught all of us. Hold these as treasures in your life as human being. It’s very, very near, interconnected back to our Noble Eightfold Path.
So it’s all interconnected. The moral training is gonna be connected to our wisdom training. And it’s gonna be connected to our Samādhi training, the mental cultivation training. The Eightfold Path is also three categories. It’s similar with the seven treasures.
But the one I really like is the first treasure, saddhā, faith. We should ask ourselves, you know, how deep is our faith towards the Buddha Dhamma, so how deeply or strongly, we understand the Four Noble Truths, the Three Defilements, the Noble Eightfold Path and of course the Mahā Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, the mental cultivation, the meditative practice. All these core itself takes many lives to practice. But go back to that again and again. I think this is so complementary how they positioned the Hirī and Ottappa, very systematic.
Our Buddha, our Buddhist suttas are very systematic. It’s very interesting how they categorize it. But if you actually are able to look at the matching of the categories then you find that the practice are actually very flowing. Like these seven treasures, to me, it’s so flowing like the Noble Eightfold Path.
[00:27:53] Kai Xin:
Thank you for sharing. I have a curious question. You mentioned learning and charity is under the meditation training. Can you elaborate more on that?
[00:28:03] Sis Mi Yen:
Okay. Disclaimer, I may not understand the Treasure Dhana Sutta well. So please the listeners forgive me if I’m not clear or misquoting, but based on my reading and my understanding why the treasure of learning and the treasure of charity is under meditation training.
I think learning is very clear because in meditation training the learning of the mind system especially, if you do not have this ability, passion, to actually want to learn, then meditation training will become very difficult. So the attitude in learning is very important for meditation training.
Charity is very interesting. If we actually hold this treasure of charity in our life, which means that we are a generous person, a giving person, and also know how to receive at the same time, we are a very balanced person. This balance is also very important in our meditation practice.
If we always have that greed and all that stinginess and that holding back, which is the direct opposite of the treasure of charity, you can imagine the state of your mind, very constricted. Right? Versus the generosity, that openness in your practice, which is definitely very important for the meditation training, the quality of the mind. So the practice of generosity itself, you know, it’s just not like, donate, donate, donate. It’s a very meaningful and detailed process of what’s going through your mind, right? That readiness, that openness, that happiness in giving. Sometimes we give, but it comes with, “Aiya, I should have given so much…”. When you go into the processes, corrupted already right?
[00:29:53] Kai Xin:
Haven’t really let go and renounced. Actually, speaking of meditation, just wanna circle back and tie it to Hirīottappa.
I do know some people might say, Hey, you know, I don’t wanna get too deep into this Dhamma practice, because then it kind of makes me feel very uptight. Like in the past, you know, ignorance is bliss, right? I don’t know all these Five Precepts. I don’t meditate. You know, I can still enjoy life in a different way and fleeting happiness, that’s just part of life.
So they kind of restrict themselves from entering the Dhamma practice in a too deep manner. What are your thoughts on that? Do you feel like there’s a need to recalibrate the view in order to serve them while they’re still practising without, I don’t know, compromising their happiness?
[00:30:36] Sis Mi Yen:
That’s a very tough question, Kai Xin. I think I’m gonna approach it this way. If the individual truly is happy, peaceful, blissful with whatever they are practicing or living with. It is fine. But if it’s ignorant bliss or more of a denial kind of situation, No lah, I don’t want to practise Five Precepts, you know, it’s very restricting and things like that. If it is more towards that, they will help to deal with a lot of those challenging emotions that is gonna arise. A lot of times, people have to discover the hard way.
After they encounter the difficulties, then only they will actually appreciate, you know, what Buddha has taught us. If as we are sharing or talking, some people say, “Aiya, all these are not gonna be helpful for me”, my approach is always, yeah, it’s okay. As long as you are actually doing fine, you’re okay. But then, when they encounter challenges, if they come to us, that’s when, hopefully we have the skillfulness, to impart our Buddhist practices or teaching to them subtly. You know, that’s where we are not gonna talk about Hirī and Ottappa because I think it’s already Kukkucca a lot of times.
But we gonna help them to look at their emotion of guilt, remorse, shame. What are you gonna do with it? What can you do with it? And whether our Buddhist practices then can help them to deal with it. So that’s an easy way to convince them to practice. Yeah, nobody’s going to go for meditation retreat if they’re doing fine, I tell you.
But really, you know, people who really encounter problems and then they meet people that can share with them the Dhamma in the right condition, right timing, then they will hopefully attempt and appreciate it.
And there are also people who goes into all our Buddhist practices, but they will still have a lot of hindrances. In meditation practice, the five hindrances itself is great. You can imagine it is a lifelong learning to even face all these hindrances.
So I would say that if people are in denial, we continue to be a good person, a good friend or a good colleague, to be there to support them when they need it. That’s where our generosity in helping will be helpful at that point.
[00:33:02] Kai Xin:
Thanks for that. I think that’s very wise and it also allows people to navigate based on their own capacity and we don’t become like a precept or a Dhamma police cause it can then be another situation where we feel that we are more superior and people are more inferior and they should do things a certain way, which is not helpful for our practice as well. So there’s a lot of inner search and inner calibration that we have to do. This very nicely wraps up our session, in a nice tone.
So today we have talked about quite a lot of things. Starting with what exactly is Hirīottappa and how it’s commonly misunderstood as Kukkucca. So the first one is having wise fear and shame before we commit a wrong deed. So that’s gonna protect us from even going down the wrong path or a path that we might end up feeling guilt and feeling remorseful, which is Kukkucca.
And then you also shared about the importance of keeping precepts and really there’s no real right and wrong. We have to understand our thought processes. It’s really about the interaction between people, right? When we have the precept, whether it’s between you and your partner, or you and society.
[00:34:08] Sis Mi Yen:
You and yourself.
[00:34:10] Kai Xin:
Yes, definitely. So it’s all intertwined and we ultimately have to see how peaceful we are when we are embodying all these qualities or trying to be an upright person. Also, you talked about the noble treasures, moral training meditation training, as well as wisdom training. We’re gonna put resources in the show notes for our listeners who want to find out more about each of these treasures.
Yeah, I think at the end of the day it’s about being truthful and honest. Innately, we already know what is beneficial. We just need that mental clarity and stillness to tap into our inner wisdom, sometimes, be the support to our friends around us without forcing, and sometimes also lean on others to guide us on the right path. So, thank you very much, Sister Mi Yen.
Any last advice for our listeners before we say goodbye?
[00:35:02] Sis Mi Yen:
I would say maybe start with the treasure of faith and really maintain the treasure of learning, if I would pick two out of the seven. I’d like to thank Kai Xin and Cheryl for inviting me to share this difficult topic.
I hope we are able to shed some light through all our definition and dialogue and so forth. Nevertheless, I wish everyone a fruitful path in our cultivation. I’d definitely place mental cultivation, meditation, as the path that hopefully all of us will continue to stay on. So naturally, thank you to both of you for having this session with me. And we’d like to thank all the listeners. Especially when they click on our podcasts and listen to us. We thank them for spending time with us.
[00:35:56] Kai Xin:
Thank you so much.
[00:35:57] Cheryl:
Thank you Sis. Mi Yen.
[00:35:58] Kai Xin:
Thanks for tuning in till the end. That’s a very insightful sharing. And if you’ll like to look at some more resources about the topic, you can go to our transcript or the show notes. We have placed some links there. And ultimately, if you’ve benefited from this podcast, it would really help us if you can give us a five-star review and share it with a friend.
And till the next episode, may you stay happy and wise.
Remorse & guilt = feelings that arise after bad action is committed Kukkucca often discussed together with uddhacca (restlessness), both uddhacca-kukkucca is the 4th of the 5 hindrances in our meditation practice. Refer to the full text of “The Five Mental Hindrances and Their Conquest” by Nyanaponika Thera https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/nyanaponika/wheel026.html
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Editor and transcriber of this episode: Tee Ke Hui
