“Doubt comes in at the window when inquiry is denied at the door.” -Benjamin Jowett
We have come to the final of the five hindrances. Doubt can refer to self-doubt or doubting of other people, ideas, God, the world and anything else you could imagine. I have seen more than a few times how doubt seems to spring forth out of hope. Brene Brown speaks of how we can feel the most vulnerable when things are going well in our lives. This is when we have the most to lose and it can be quite painful to deal with. We can end up having doubts about if this happiness will last, if we deserve it, if it is really what we think it is, etc.
There are so many reasons why we might come to feel doubt about what we know and who we are. It can serve as a protection to not fully throw ourselves into knowing or feeling something. This could keep us from feeling the pain of disappointment or being wrong, but it can also keep us from fully feeling anything. In our great desire to know the truth, we can easily pass right by it.
Maria Rainer Rilke says it well. We can do our best to really know the questions even if the answers are not at all clear. To arrive at any answer often takes a great deal of time and listening and letting go of having to have a certain outcome. Can we do this while at the same time enduring the pain of not knowing?
Tara Brach is another wise teacher who gives great insight into how we might sit and take a closer look at what is right in front of us rather than continuously chasing after an answer that is not really out there. The answers, she has suggested, are within. The story of the musk deer and the love lost within illustrates this well.
I’ve given a lot of links in this particular blog. I think that may be because doubt is a tricky one for me. It is something I am continuing to work with myself. All of us are human and all are on this same path toward freedom. I wish for all of you out there to find ways to free yourselves from these hindrances. They are not evil, and they will not go away by brute force. We cannot run away or hide from them. But, we can know them and be curious about them and allow some space to look at them without having to do anything else.
May we find a way to hold still with ourselves and our knowing long enough to do what is wise rather than what is only convenient.
“Confusion is the first step toward clarity.” -Syd Field