Hoping to detach

[Matt The Clown]

A girl who was everything to me is at her last nerve and wants nothing more to do wiht me.

It was clear I was dependant on her for any happiness and without her is nothing but misery. I need to learn to not be dependant on people and things for peace and happiness. So far nothing can change the misery but I know meditation is the answer. Desire leads to suffering.

Peace be with all of you!

[DNS]

Welcome to Dhamma Wheel!

Sorry to hear of the emotional low right now. It will pass, best of luck.

[Ben]

Welcome to Dhamma Wheel.
Sorry to learn of your romantic troubles.
A lot of us has been where you are right now. It's not easy.
Be gentle on yourself and try to be your own best friend.
Certainly, the Dhamma will help but it will take some time.
With metta,
Ben

[cooran]

Welcome to DhammaWheel, Matt!

With metta,
Chris

[Mkoll]

Welcome to the forum, Matt The Clown!

[bodom]

Welcome Matt.. remind yourself often to let go and that this too shall pass.

[martinfrank]

A girl who was everything to me is at her last nerve and wants nothing more to do wiht me.

It was clear I was dependant on her for any happiness and without her is nothing but misery. I need to learn to not be dependant on people and things for peace and happiness. So far nothing can change the misery but I know meditation is the answer. Desire leads to suffering.

Peace be with all of you!

Dear Matt

Your problem is, of course, that when we are in love, we are not detached, and when we are detached we are not love. We may well reason that all love must end in separation, suffering, death... Time is said to be the best healer of broken hearts but in my experience it is a slow healer and bad gluer. If you can, try to go somewhere else for a few days, weeks or months. Distance heels too and so does doing something new which is not connected in your memory with the object of your attachment.

Sometime it is good to watch a sad movie which makes you cry, as if one sadness would dissolve into the other, and crying for both makes us feel better.

Unhappily it is easier for us to learn to love somebody who loves us, than to teach somebody who doesn't love us (anymore or never did) to love us.

Gilbert Bécaud sings "si tu n'as ce que tu aimes, aimes ce que tu as"
"if you don't have what you love, love what you have
let let the time do
and listen to the wind
...
and most of all, don't waste time make nian-nian-nian" (don't waste time thinking sad thoughts)

phpBB .

Not so Buddhist advice: The better is the enemy of the good. The fastest way to heal a broken heart is to fall in love again. Only this time select from among the girls who love you the girl you like best (rather than run after the girl you like best of all girls in the world).

Here is a little story from Ajahn Lee's Autobiography...

THE THIRD RAINS RETREAT, my preceptor had me come stay in his new
quarters to help fix up the place and assist him with his hobby: repairing clocks. My old
duties I was able to pass on to Phra Chyam, which was something of a load off my mind. But
looking at the state of my meditation, I could see that my practice had grown slack. I was
becoming more and more interested in worldly matters. So I decided to put up a fight. One
day it occurred to me, ‘If I stay on here in the city, I’ll have to disrobe. If I stay a monk, I’ll
have to leave the city and go into the forest.’ These two thoughts became the theme of my
meditation day and night.

One day I went up to a hollow space at the top of the chedi and sat in meditation. The
theme of my meditation was, ‘Should I stay or should I disrobe?’ Something inside me said,
‘I’d rather disrobe.’ So I questioned myself, ‘This place where you’re living now, prosperous
in every way, with its beautiful homes and streets, with its crowds of people: What do they
call it?’ And I answered, ‘Phra Nakhorn—the Great Metropolis, i.e., Heaven on Earth.’
‘And where were you born?’
‘I was born in DoubleMarsh Village, Muang Saam Sib, Ubon Ratchathani. And now
that I’ve come to the Great Metropolis I want to disrobe.’
‘And in DoubleMarsh Village what did you eat? How did you live? How did people
make their living? And what did you wear? And what were the roads and houses like?’
Nothing at all like the Great Metropolis.
‘So this prosperity here: What business is it of yours?’
This was when I answered, ‘The people in the Great Metropolis aren’t deva-sons or
deva-daughters or anything. They’re people and I’m a person, so why can’t I make myself be
like them?’

I questioned myself back and forth like this for several days running until I finally
decided to call a halt. If I was going to disrobe, I’d have to make preparations. Other people,
before disrobing, got prepared by having clothes made and so forth, but I was going to do it
differently. I was going to leave the monkhood in my mind first to see what it would be like.

So late in the quiet of a moonlit night, I climbed up to sit inside the chedi and asked
myself, ‘If I disrobe, what will I do?’ I came up with the following story.

If I disrobe, I’ll have to apply for a job as a clerk in the Phen Phaag Snuff and
Stomach Medicine Company. I had a friend who had disrobed and gotten a job
there, earning 20 baht a month, so it made sense for me to apply for a job there too.
I’d set my mind on being honest and hard-working so that my employer would be
satisfied with my work. I was determined that wherever I lived, I’d have to act in
such a way that the people I lived with would think highly of me.

As it turned out, the drug company finally hired me at 20 baht a month, the
same salary as my friend. I made up my mind to budget my salary so as to have
money left over at the end of each month, so I rented a room in the flats owned by
Phraya Phakdi in the PratuuNam (Watergate) section of town. The rent was four
baht a month. Water, electricity, clothing, and food would add up to another eleven
baht, leaving me with an extra five baht at the end of each month.

My second year on the job my boss came to like and trust me so much that he
raised my salary to 30 baht a month. Taking out my expenses, I was left with 15 baht
a month. Finally he was so content with my work that he made me supervisor of all
the workers, with a 40 baht salary, plus a cut of the profits, adding up altogether to
50 baht a month. At this point I was feeling very proud of myself, because I was
making as much as the District Official back home. And as for my friends back
home, I was in a position way above them all. So I decided it was time to get married
so that I could take a beautiful young Bangkok bride back home for a visit, which
would please my relatives no end. This was when my plans seemed to take on a little
class.

So now that I was going to get married, what sort of person would she be? I
made up my mind that the woman I married would have to have the three attributes
of a good wife:

1. She’d have to come from a good family.
2. She’d have to be in line for an inheritance.
3. She’d have to be good-looking and have a pleasing manner.

Only if a woman had these three attributes would I be willing to marry her. So I
asked myself, ‘Where are you going to find a woman like this, and how will you get
to know her?’ This is where things began to get complicated. I tried thinking up all
sorts of schemes, but even if I actually did meet such a woman, she wouldn’t be
interested in me. The women who would be interested in me weren’t the sort I’d
want to marry. Thinking about this, I’d sometimes heave a heavy sigh, but I wasn’t
willing to give in.

Finally it occurred to me, ‘Wealthy people send their daughters to the high-class
schools, like the Back Palace School or Mrs. Cole’s. Why don’t I go have a look
around these schools in the morning before classes and in the evening when school
lets out?’

So that’s what I did, until I noticed an attractive girl, the daughter of a Phraya.
The way she walked and the way she dressed really appealed to me. I arranged so
that our paths crossed every day. In my hand I carried a little note that I threw down
in front of her. The first time, she didn’t pay me any attention. Day after day our
paths crossed. Sometimes our eyes would meet, sometimes I’d stand in her way,
sometimes she’d smile at me. When this happened, I made it a point to have her get
my note.

Finally we got to know each other. I made a date for her to skip school the next
day so that I could show her around town. As time passed we came to know each
other, to like each other, to love each other. We told each other our life stories—the
things that had made us happy and the things that had made us sad—from the very
beginning up to the present. I had a salaried job at no less than 50 baht a month. She
had finished the sixth year of secondary school and was the daughter of a very
wealthy Phraya. Her looks, her manner, and her conduct were everything I had been
hoping for.

Finally we agreed to become married secretly. Because we loved each other, I got
to sleep with her beforehand. She was a good person, so before we were to be
officially married, she told her parents. Furious, they threw her out of the house.
So she came to live with me as my wife. I wasn’t too upset by what her parents
had done, for I was determined to work my way into their affections.

We went to rent a flat in a better district, the Sra Pathum Watergate area. The
rent here was six baht a month. My wife got a job at the same company where I was
working, starting out at 20 baht a month, but she soon got a raise to 30 a month.
Together, then, we were making 80 a month, which pleased me.

As time passed, my position advanced. My employer trusted me completely and
at times would have me take over his duties in his absence. Both my wife and I were
determined to be honest and upright in our dealings with the company, and
ultimately our earnings—our salaries plus my percentage of the profits—reached 100
a month. At this point I felt I could breathe easy, but my dreams still hadn’t been
fulfilled.

So I began to buy presents—good things to eat and other nice things—to take to
my parents-in-law to show my good intentions toward them. After a while they
began to show some interest in me and eventually had us move into their house. At
this point I was really pleased: I was sure to be in line for part of the inheritance. But
living together for a while revealed certain things about my behavior that rubbed my
parents-in-law the wrong way, so in the end they drove us out of the house. We
went back to live in a flat, as before.

This was when my wife became pregnant. Not wanting her to do any hard work,
I hired a servant woman to look after the house and help with the housework. Hired
help in those days was very cheap—only four baht a month.

As my wife came closer to giving birth, she began to miss work more and more
often. I had to keep at my job. One night I sat down to look over our budget. The
100 baht we had once earned was probably as much as we’d ever earn. I had no
further hopes for a raise. Our expenses were mounting every day: one baht a month
for electricity; 1.50 baht for water; charcoal and rice each at least six baht a month;
the help, four baht a month; and on top of it all, the cost of our clothing.

After my wife gave birth, our expenses mounted still higher. She wasn’t able to
work, so we lost her percentage of the profits. After a while she became ill and
missed work for an extended period. My employer cut her salary back to 15 baht a
month. Our medical bills rose. My wife’s salary wasn’t enough for her needs, so she
had to cut into mine. My old salary of 50 baht was now completely gone by the end
of each month.

In the end, my wife’s illness proved fatal. I had to borrow 50 baht from my
employer—which, along with my own savings of 50, went toward her funeral
expenses, which totaled 80 baht. I was then left with 20 baht and a small child to
raise.

What was I to do now? Before, I had breathed easily. Now it seemed as if life was
closing in on me. I went to see my parents-in-law, but they gave me the cold
shoulder. So I hired a wet nurse for the child. The wet nurse was a low-class woman,
but she took awfully good care of the child. This led me to feel love and affection
toward her, and ultimately she became my second wife.

My new wife had absolutely no education—she couldn’t even read or write. My
income at this point was now only 50 baht—enough just to get by. After a while my
new wife became pregnant. I did my best to make sure she didn’t have to do any
heavy work, and I did everything I could to be good to her, but I couldn’t help
feeling a little disappointed that life had turned out so differently from my original
plans. After my new wife gave birth, we both helped to raise the children until both
my first wife’s child and my new wife’s child were old enough to feed and take care of
themselves.

This was when my new wife started acting funny—playing favorites, giving all her
love and attention to her own child, and none to my first. My first child started
coming to complain to me all the time that my new wife had been unfair in this way
or that. Sometimes the two children would start fighting. At times I’d come home
from work and my first child would run to me with one version of what had
happened, my second child would have another version, and my wife still another. I
didn’t know whom to side with. It was as if I was standing in the middle, and my
wife and children were pulling me off in three different directions. My new child
wanted me to buy this or that—eventually my wife and children started competing
with one another to see who would get to eat the best food, wear the best clothes,
and squander the most money. It got so that I couldn’t sit down and talk with any of
them at all. My salary was being eaten up every month; my family life was like falling
into a thorn patch.

Finally I decided to call a halt. My wife wasn’t what I had hoped for, my earnings
weren’t what I had hoped for, my children weren’t what I had hoped for, so I left my
wife, was reordained and returned to the contemplative life.

When I came to the end of the story, my interest in worldly affairs vanished. The sense
that life was closing in on me disappeared. I felt as free as if I were up floating in the sky.
Something inside me sighed, ‘Ah!’ with relief. I told myself that if this was the way things
would be, I’d do better not to disrobe. My old desire to disrobe was reduced about 50 to 60
percent.

Did you detach?

May you and all beings be happy!

Martin