The Letting Go
When I first established an interest in Buddhism I saw it as a novel and beautiful method for getting me somewhere. Its philosophies were so elegant and were also in agreement with most insights that I had made on life. “This is it!” I must have thought. “Follow this and I will have all I want, I can do some practice now and then and, hey presto, I will become a better person!”

Many years of practice (and, of course, weeks/months of non-practice) later I have come to the conclusion that my beginning impressions of Buddhism were rather unrealistic, to say the very least. My view of Buddhism was rather in line with that of adopting a further world view that would correct my previously incorrect world view. It would be the gaining of a supreme worldview that allowed for me to become some manner of Supreme Being; some type of Super James! A fellow that meditates by night and then, by day, saves the world from itself in a Jesus at the Market place kind of way. I was looking for the extraordinary.

Yet, Buddhism is all about the ordinary. It is all about finding simplicity in life for life is, in essence, simple. In fact it is painfully simple. Yet we have, through our habitual thought patterns, made so much complexity out of it. We somehow know that we have done this as well but are just too scared to see this as, perversely, we are deeply afraid of losing our worldviews for we see them not as hindrances to happiness but as means of protecting us from the world. Our worldviews are what Trungpa Rinpoche called our “cocoons”: something that we think keeps us safe but, in fact, serve only to isolate ourselves from the world.

I once heard it said, in rather poetic manner, that humans are, essentially, creatures, lying naked, between the Sky and the Earth. We are born, we live for a very short while and then, inevitably, we die. Yet, we attach such significance to all of our activities! We have crafted the most convoluted and delicate ideologies out of this simplicity and it is this, I believe, that accounts for so much of our unhappiness. This is why I now see Buddhism as a letting go, or – to quote the musician Will Oldham’s latest album- “The Letting Go”.

To me Buddhism is the letting go, ever so slowly, of all the nonsense we have created about reality that not only has no basis in reality but also serves as an affront to us enjoying life. However, it is most difficult to stop deceiving ourselves as, for years, we have done so as an erroneous means of protecting ourselves from reality. It could be said that this is one of the most difficult endeavours to ask of a person. Yet, I believe that it is essential.

So, how do we begin “The Letting Go”? Meditation, I believe, is key. Yet one must also apply the insights gained in meditation to daily life and then actually challenge their own perceived view of how the world works. This is extremely difficult but it is also extremely gratifying as one slowly learns that things in life aren’t as fixed as they believe and that there is a lot of scope for movement in life. The main obstacle faced in this however is, of course, fear.

Habitually we often succumb to fear by avoiding things that initiate it. However, it is my belief that most forms of fear, save for obviously protective types, spring from a challenge to our world view and the view that everything in our carefully crafted world could collapse. Letting go of our worldviews involves facing a lot of fear. Also, and importantly, it means accepting fear, not avoiding it, when it does arise. A view that we can live without fear is unfounded in reality.


The letting go can also mean challenging universally accepted truths in our society that aren’t in accord with reality but that we have learned to accept. These beliefs range from thinking that an economic system based on infinite economic growth in a finite world is anything but insane, or that buying things can make us happy. It means challenging a worldview that put intangible profits above the planet and its inhabitants. It also means challenging common views on the absolute importance of human beings over other creatures. Often we refuse to see things as they are as we are afraid of the repercussions of this. Yet one cannot peacefully meditate on a cushion whilst the world is falling to pieces!

There is nothing to gain, nothing to do. Simplicity doesn’t mean becoming a simpleton though. More so it means letting go of nonsense, of our insanity and then re-connecting to our basic sanity. However, it cannot be forced. One cannot force one’s worldview to change at all. I believe, from my own experience that most change comes both slowly and unexpectedly. It is the motivation to see things as they are; to let go of nonsense, that is all important.

What I have learned is that rather than searching for the extraordinary we should really be searching for the extra ordinary. However, to finish on another quote by Trungpa Rinpoche: “when you live life in a thoroughly ordinary way, it is extraordinary.” It is this apparent dichotomy that I challenge you to investigate.