I was wrapped up in a blanket wearing at least three full layers of clothes, and sitting on a pillow to insulate me from the cold floor. Strewn around me were bits and pieces of an infrared heater I had found sitting in the barn that I currently reside in. My fingers were sore from the cold, but even so, I managed to carefully unscrew sections of the heater from each other before my hands were totally numb. I’m no handy-man by any means, but after a couple weeks of being huddled under blankets to stave off the 20-degree bite, I was eager to find some way to warm up. The snow had me trapped in the barn for over a week, and what with it being coastal range Oregon where the cities don’t budget plowing services out in the sticks where I live, I had no way out. On top of that, my truck, Bonnie, is no mean-machine in adverse weather such as this. Rear-wheel drive on a lightweight truck whose tires are just about bald is little more than a sled with an engine. Even so, I was content. As I meticulously disassembled the heater while the snow loomed and sat doggedly outside, the cold of its underbelly seeping in through my poorly insulated windows, I felt a settled peace within myself. I didn’t have much hope in actually fixing the heater, but I figured if I didn’t try there was exactly 0% chance of having heat whereas if I tried something, my chances would increase to 1 in a billion. It was worth a shot. It wasn’t long until I found the problem. There, a blue wire, perhaps connecting to a fuse, was totally cooked. The insulating sheathe covering the wire was black and brittle from being fried near. Since I didn’t have a spare wire, nor did I have any way of knowing what the wire was for, that was the end of my tinker-attempt. You may think I felt disheartened or frustrated. Maybe a little sad. But I wasn’t nearly as sad about not being able to fix it as I was pleased that I could actually recognize the problem. If anything, I felt a little proud of myself. For a while now, I’ve been putting into practice the notion of lowering my expectations. That may sound nihilistic, but hear me out. I didn’t attach myself to any hope or expectation that I would fix the heater when I started. Why should I? Like I said, I have no experience in fixing appliances of any sort. I’ve changed out a light switch, helped install a new ceiling fan-that’s the extent of my electrical expertise. No, taking apart this heater was a part of a more important practice. The practice of abstaining from suffering. If I may be so presumptuous, you may wonder, “But wouldn’t heating your place up alleviate your suffering?” Well…yes and no. Certainly I’d have been far more comfortable if I could fix the heater, put it together, plug it in, and enjoy the wonderful sensation of being able to feel my hands for the first time in over a week. But wouldn’t something else come along to make me uncomfortable later? Wouldn’t I suffer then, too? This is where lowering expectation comes in. I don’t mean getting rid of expectations altogether. I think expectations and desires can be very important, but we need to be skillful about how we place them. We need to simplify our use of them. If I make the state of my happiness contingent on how warm my house is, in how nice my vehicle is, in how lovely the weather is, in how comfortable I feel in my body- I’ll never be happy for long. That kind of happiness is transient and wavering because it’s being invested in transient and wavering things. However, if you expect your car to break down at some point, you’ll never be disappointed. One of my favorite stories goes something like this - One day, a monk was meditating peacefully in his monastery when a strange man came in from the village. Seeing the peaceful monk, he ran over to him and pleaded, “Please! I’m so miserable and so sad all the time, what can I do?” The monk told him to just sit and meditate. “This will pass,” he reassured the stranger. So, for several days, the villager would meditate morning, noon, and night, but found that it wasn’t working. All he could think about was how sad and miserable he was. Frustrated, he went back to the monk, “Hey! You said meditation would make me happy, but I’m not!” The monk calmly told the man, “Be patient. Your misery will pass. Just meditate.” The man was skeptical, but with nothing else to do, he went and sat again, this time for many weeks. Then, one day, he burst into the monastery and approached the monk again, “You were right! I’ve meditated and meditated, and now I’m so happy! I’m cured!” The monk looked at him and simply replied, “Don’t worry. This too will pass.” Why was the monk, who has no ownership or possession of anything, so peaceful? If the stranger lost his happiness, or stopped meditating, he would suffer, unlike the monk who accepts all things. That’s because the strange man is putting his contentment outside of himself. We all do it! It’s not our fault, part of it is human nature, part of it is indoctrination. I love cake, and eating it certainly makes me happy. Then it’s gone, and I’m sad (true story, I love cake!). If I could learn to eat cake without attaching myself to the pleasure of eating it, I’d be equally happy with or without it. The joy from eating it would be free to come and go without being given the job of making me a happy person. This is the simplest practice of happiness. I strive to gain joy from the most minimal number of things and places as I can until it is seated firmly inside of myself. If you want the pendulum to stay centered, don’t pull back on it then be angry it’s not being still. If you want to see it swing, expect that it won’t stay centered. This is honest expectation. This is simplicity. If you expect for people to behave or act in a certain way because of certain things like their age, sex, their relationship to you, religious beliefs, race, job, or whatever, then you will be sorely upset when these expectations you have put on the world are unfulfilled. Then you will point the finger at all those things for failing you, when it is you who has failed to see your attempts to control the world are the root of your suffering. Be simple. Understand your happiness, your contentment, isn’t anyone else’s responsibility. That’s not to say you can’t love people, or that you shouldn’t greatly enjoy being around those you like and love. Of course, it’s wonderful being with lovers, and friends, and in the light of good company. It’s beautiful! But, don’t tell yourself, “I am a happier, better person because of them.” You’re not. You are a wonderful, better person because you are you. It’s like saying you only behave when you’re being watched, “But I have integrity!” Having integrity means doing the right thing, regardless if someone else is watching. Being happy means being happy regardless of who comes and goes in your life, regardless of what you do and don’t have. Think of it this way; even if you’re married, you will never spend as much time with anyone else in your life as you do yourself. Therefore, you need to invest your happiness, your peace, your contentment, within yourself. This way, you’re free to accept pieces of life as they simply are, and not try to burden yourself with the job of molding the world into something that it isn’t.
