I wouldn’t last long in a monastery. Actually, I lasted about four days.
It was an unconventional Buddhist monastery, and I’d become totally enamored with it before I’d ever set foot there. The head teacher’s talks, which I’d found online, brought me to tears on several occasions. I daydreamed and nightdreamed about it. When I learned that they had only two branches in the country and one was 20 minutes from my home, I thought it was a sign from the universe that I was meant to join them.
Like a lonely woman who goes on a pleasant date and then suddenly starts imagining her wedding to this person and planning out their whole life together (which I’ve definitely done by the way), after one visit I was convinced that this monastery would be a perfect fit for me. Never mind that I’d never even been on a meditation retreat. I prepared myself by trying to live the way the apprentices did: I slept on the floor, didn’t eat after midday, read sutras daily and of course I meditated as long and as often as I could. I threw out all my makeup and many clothes I would no longer need. I told lots of people in my life that I was planning to do a one-year apprenticeship with them once I graduated school. I thought I was setting myself up for heaven, when of course I was setting myself up for heartbreak.
I actually had a lot of doubts about the monastery from the start. Even though I’d been interested in Buddhism since I was fourteen, I knew that practicing with this group would be demanding. I felt like maybe I wasn’t Buddhist enough for these people. I worried that I would get burned out from the intense commitment. I made a list of my doubts, I journaled about them, and I talked about my doubts with friends and mentors.
It did not occur to me to compare this monastery to the medieval Irish monastery that I’d been daydreaming about for the last fifteen years or so. So when I did visit the monastery, I did not notice the striking parallels to the fantasy. I did not notice how, like Crastor, I had gone there to run away from my perceived sins and ugliness. I did not notice the desperate fervor with which I’d hoped that this place would finally bring me peace. And I did not notice how I immediately started rebelling against it.
Mostly I rebelled only in my own head. I unconsciously kept score of the monks’ and apprentices’ little slip-ups: moments when they were not behaving wisely or compassionately. In these human moments, all my doubts came back to me, like a devil whispering in my ear. Now and then, my doubts came oozing out of me in the form of back-handed compliments or slightly impertinent questions.
When I had the privilege of meeting one-on-one with the head teacher, I peppered him with such questions. I pointed out the smallness of the place and the lack of diversity. I asked about the shortcomings of meditation as a tool for personal growth. I asked about the benefits of exploring many philosophies, rather than sticking to one. I asked him what he was really getting out of this practice. It’s almost like I went there just to poke and prod him.
Suffice it to say that the monastery was not a great fit for me. It turns out that I like food, and a part of me really hates meditation. Unconsciously, I mainly just went to the monastery to relive the moment when Crastor stands up to the abbot. Luckily the whole endeavor was harmless. Shortly after I started visiting, they shut their doors due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and then they relocated soon after. So, admittedly, I did not leave them out of a burst of self-analytical prowess. It could have ended badly if I’d stuck with it. Why we enact our fantasies is a question I’ll leave for another day. Today’s question is: could I have related to my doubts differently?
You probably also find yourself overruling your doubts in favor of your fantasies from time to time. You may find yourself saying, “I know he’s a bad influence on me, but I just can’t resist him!” Or, “I don’t have time for such a big responsibility, but screw it, I’ll make time somehow.” Or, “I can’t stand this job, but I do love seeing my name in big letters.”
In these cases, lists of pros and cons, or lists of our true motives, probably won’t be of much use. People make a bad decisions all the time knowing full well that they are making a bad decision. We aren’t rational actors, and we can’t simply resolve our dilemmas with a cost-benefit analysis.
Following our intuition is probably also counterintuitive. When we try to “feel into” the doubt so that we can choose a side, most of us usually end up choosing the same old side as always. After all, we repeat our patterns because it feels like the right thing to do.
There is another way we can relate to our doubts. Instead of looking for the truth, we can look for the pattern. In my experience, the big hurdle to making good decisions isn’t following your intuition—it’s going against your intuition. It can be really, really hard to resist the job, house, or woman of your dreams. Even resisting our patterns in mundane ways can be difficult—holding your tongue when Aunt Gertrude starts talking politics, or resisting the urge to make a detailed itinerary for your day off.
Getting to know our fantasies makes it easier to resist chasing them. Let’s take my monastery example. I didn’t really go to the monastery for the reasons I claimed I did; I went because, for whatever reason, I really like to play the tortured little guy up against the big, bad institution. That dynamic is compelling to me. I maneuver myself into places where there is an authority I can prod with my annoying little questions. I also subconsciously like it when the authority silences those questions, like the abbot silencing Crastor, (literally) drowning him out. When I peppered the head monk with questions, I was living this fantasy of revealing my true, disobedient self to the dictatorial authorities.
This technique is similar to the ‘list of motives’ technique, but there’s something special about recognizing our visceral, instinctive drives in our favorite images. When we create a list, there is an implicit assumption that we are objective spectators of the situation. It sets the tone of the work: it is to be rational, professional even. Fantasy work does not demand that we think rationally. It is all about recognizing the big and primal things that move through us. That urge toward the thing we shouldn’t do is not just a slip or a bad call, it’s a succubus or a big red button. Images help us dig into the feeling, so that we become intimately familiar with the shape and texture of it. When we encounter a dilemma, lists can be helpful. But we may also ask: which of my dreams might help me better understand this struggle?
When we can appreciate the power of our patterns, we come to doubt our own ability to judge a situation fairly. It can be easier to make a decision that feels wrong when we can see how our perception of things is not necessarily right. The dilemma that we might have once characterized as “follow your heart” versus “play it safe” becomes enact the fantasy or resist it. Contrary to the list-making strategy, which imbues us with divine judgmental authority, fantasy work teaches us that we are very biased, and thus poor judges. Contrary to the “follow your intuition” strategy, the strategy becomes “do the opposite of what feels right.” If you feel inexplicably drawn toward something, you’re probably enacting a fantasy, and that’s important to recognize if you want to make a good decision. When we are well-acquainted with our fantasies, with our ticks and our turn-ons, we are less preoccupied with choosing a side than with the fact that the sides probably aren’t what we think they are.