Perfectionism, Depression and Boddhichitta
I just read this post by Jess at Flip Flopping Joy, a long meandering reflection on, among other things, privilege and perfectionism. It struck a chord. Jess writes about suffering from at times debilitating depression based to some extent in a need to justify her existence through accomplishment—through some sort of contribution demonstrating exceptional intelligence or ability. I may not be representing her story completely accurately, because I am also expressing mine. And it became clear in the comment thread that this sort of depression is a very common experience. People in the thread attributed this phenomenon to capitalism, white supremacist culture, the Midwest, being poor and trying to compete with/become the rich—and I would add modern education. While all of these may be complicit, it is not my intention here to find the culprit and excoriate it.
In fact, I’m not quite sure what my intention is. Reading Jess’ post brought me out of myself a bit; made me realize that the experiences that I struggle with in solitude—the very experiences I use to isolate myself—are shared by many, many others. Two of my dear friends seemed also to have recognized themselves.
I have been studying Buddhism and dabbling in the practice of tonglen, or sending and taking. I’ll explain my understanding of it. If this interests you, find some genuine Buddhist teachings on it. Pema Chodron is a good source. Tonglen is a practice in which one breathes in suffering and breathes out happiness. One can begin with some suffering one is experiencing, such as (to take one personal example) anxiety about finding a job. One breathes in this anxiety, then breathes out spaciousness, acceptance, or even the image of having a job. Then one thinks of other people having the same (or a similar) experience—perhaps one or two people one knows—and breathes in their anxiety as well as one’s own, and exhales relief to them. Then one inhales the anxiety of all the people in the world who are unemployed and worrying about it, and exhales happiness to all of them.
This and other Buddhist practices have been encouraging me to allow those private sufferings which normally cause me to draw away from others to instead bring me back into connection with my fellow human beings. However, Jess’ post brought the point home in a way these practices have not. It made me realize that yes, other people really do have debilitating doubts about whether they deserve to exist if they haven’t or won’t make some brilliant contribution to the human race. And something as simple as expressing this can be tremendously helpful to others who share that pain.
The discussion was not, however, entirely about the depression that comes from this sort of paralyzing perfectionism. It was also about how this myopic attention to whether I’m good enough or smart enough or doing enough gets in the way of helping other people who are suffering—whether that’s by engaging in mass activism, or simply being ready to really listen to the next person who talks to me, and really be present in my reply. Again I’m blending her thoughts and my own. Jess’ post, for me, was about realizing that it doesn’t matter how good what I write is, if it helps one person to soften as I did when I read her words.
April 5th, 2009 at 1:22 am
well you helped me, so there you go : )
thank you, really. this has given me a lot to think about. i’m going to go read Jess’s post now, and I’m going to read more about this breathing practice. I’ve been reading Buddhist literature lately to try to help with some things going on, but I hadn’t yet heard about tonglen.
January 13th, 2010 at 12:53 am
This is some good information, I just finished my paper for class and wish i would had found this article sooner. You may have just made me a regular