Archery Practice With Buddha and Epictetus
I’m going to ask you to use your imagination today.
Your partner suddenly left you. You thought the relationship was going great. You gave them all the love, attention, and affection you could. It turns out they weren’t invested in the relationship as much as you were. There was nothing you could have done to prevent this. You are heartbroken, as every normal person would be. It hurts more than anything you’ve experienced before.
As if the heartbreak itself wasn’t enough, you start making things even worse for yourself. You start thinking that you are a failure. No one can ever love you. Or maybe you think that all people are liars and deceivers. No one can be trusted, and you will never develop a close relationship with another person again. You dwell on the time and energy you’ve invested in this failed relationship. You start resenting your ex-partner. But you also miss them. You check their social media daily to see what they are doing and if they have maybe started dating someone new. You can’t move on with your life.
It’s not just the pain of heartbreak that's your problem. You are living in anger, resentment, fear, and shame. You are suffering.
Okay, maybe you didn’t need to use a lot of imagination up to this point. But you’ll definitely need it now.
Fortunately, there are two thoughtful and compassionate friends who want to get you out of the house and help you get over this heartbreak. The Buddha and the Stoic philosopher Epictetus ask you to come with them to practice archery. And, of course, you accept. I mean, who would say no to the Buddha and Epictetus?
As they are adjusting the bows, the Buddha asks you if you could go set up the target. He asks so kindly that you feel happy, even privileged, to help.
You are adjusting the target and making sure it’s planted firmly in the ground when suddenly you feel a sharp, nasty pain in your back. You turn around to realize that the Buddha shot an arrow at you. He removed the tip of the arrow before shooting so it wouldn’t pierce you, but it still hurts like hell.
You’re in disbelief. Why would the Buddha shoot you with an arrow? Isn’t he supposed to be the ultimate nice guy?
But there is no time to think about that. Now you see Epictetus aiming at you and pulling back his bowstring. He then tells you:
"Now I am also going to shoot at you. Are you going to stay there thinking about why the Buddha shot you, or are you going to get out of the way of my arrow?"
You are still in pain. You are confused and even angry. What’s the deal with these two lunatics? But you know that the important thing right now is not to take another hit since you can avoid it. You run out to the side. Epictetus shoots the arrow right where you were standing up to that point and misses you.
Both the Buddha and Epictetus smile at you. "Do you get it now?" they ask.
You don’t get it. What kind of twisted way to have fun is this? You ask them to explain.
Everyone gets their share of inevitable suffering in life. That’s the first arrow. You couldn’t do anything to avoid it. And you cannot change the fact that it hurts. You are human; you cannot just switch off the pain.
The second arrow of suffering is something you can avoid. It’s how you react to the first arrow. Are you going to dwell on the first arrow and fall into negative thinking patterns? Are you going to start hating yourself and others because of what happened to you? Are you going to convince yourself that you can never be happy again? Or are you going to accept the fact that the first arrow hurts and there is no point in adding to that pain with your self-defeating and resentful thoughts?
There was nothing you could’ve done to avoid the first arrow. You are not all-powerful and don’t have absolute control over your life. What you do have control over is your reaction to the things that have happened to you. If you choose not to let yourself fall into negative thinking patterns and try to learn something from the unavoidable suffering or simply move on, you’ve avoided the second arrow.
Now you get it. You smile and thank your two thoughtful and compassionate friends for helping you.
The story that I tried to tell is my adaptation of the Buddhist parable of the two arrows. In it, the Buddha asks a student,
‘If a person is struck by an arrow, is it painful? If the person is struck by a second arrow, is it even more painful?’
He then explains,
‘In life, we can’t always control the first arrow. However, the second arrow is our reaction to the first. This second arrow is optional.’
Why did I add Epictetus to my version of the story? Because the idea of making a distinction between things in your control and those outside of your control is one of the main parallels between Buddhism and the Stoic school of philosophy. It’s in fact the foundational idea of Stoicism. And, of the three great Stoics, I would say Epictetus emphasized it the most.
I ask you to take your current suffering and put it in the context of this story. Maybe you are not going through heartbreak but through a stressful time at work. Or maybe you are torturing yourself with thoughts about how the unstable global economic situation is going to affect you and your family.
What is the first arrow? Identify it. Accept it. Feeling pain is human. And there is no shame in recognizing that you cannot do anything to stop it.
What are the thought patterns and behaviors you should avoid in order not to be hit by the second arrow? Remember: controlling everything that happens in your life is not in your power. Choosing how you react is.
"The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil? Not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself to the choices that are my own…"
— Epictetus, Discourses
Thank you for reading. Avoid the second arrow.
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