Don’t Get Swept Away, Dear Human
Stand firm and stay grounded as the Eight Worldly Winds blow.
Dear human,
You may not realise this, but you get swept away quite easily.
In this world where Eight Winds ceaselessly blow, you sway without knowing that you are being swayed.
You are influenced without knowing that you are being influenced.
You are carried away without knowing that you are being carried away.
What are these Eight Worldly Winds, you ask?
They are also known as the Eight Worldly Concerns.
They are four pairs of hope and fear that please and displease you.
They are forces of the material world that have you oscillating back and forth - constantly coveting the highs and dreading the lows.
When these winds blow at you, they seemingly pull you in opposite directions, and yet they are really two sides of the same coin.
They are so persuasive to an untrained mind that they keep you preoccupied and exhaust you of any capacity to lead the free and joyful life you truly deserve.
So, what are these Eight Worldly Winds?
They are Pleasure (1) and Pain (2)
Your entire life has been about chasing after what makes you feel good (i.e. pleasure), and running away from what makes you feel bad (i.e. pain).
This pleasure and pain duo covers the physical, mental, and emotional aspects of your experience.
You don’t like pain - nobody does. But you mistakenly think that to avoid pain, you have to seek pleasure.
It then dismays you when the pleasure you experienced is now fading, and you find yourself back in pain.
Your aversion to pain then drives you to go after pleasure, again and again.
Overtime, you are hooked.
See clearly how the winds of pleasure and pain are sweeping you away.
They are Gain (3) and Loss (4)
You celebrate when you get what you want, and you get upset when you don’t get what you want.
You also weep when you lose what you have.
A promotion, a possession, a relationship, a belief…
Anything that you allow yourself to get attached to causes you pain, even if it gave you pleasure at the start. You fear that the pleasure will be taken away from you.
Because you don’t recognise that in this world, everything changes, and nothing lasts.
You won’t always get what you want. And you won’t always get to keep what you have.
See clearly how the winds of gain and loss are sweeping you away.
They are Praise (5) and Criticism (6)
You get affected so much by what someone else says, even though those are just words.
Words of criticism bruise your ego instantly, and weigh you down endlessly.
One harsh comment easily fuels your anger, and you burn with rage.
Without thinking, you respond with greater harshness, turning it into a competition of who can win by having the last words.
It also doesn’t take much for a single word of praise to make your heart flutter and wanting more.
More approval, more acceptance, more applause, more admiration. More, more, more…
Until the praise stops coming. And dejection takes over.
See clearly how the winds of praise and criticism are sweeping you away.
They are Fame (7) and Insignificance (8)
In this attention-starved world, fame and glory seem to be a default, a must-have experience for you to feel adequate, for your existence to feel worthy.
You are secretly obsessed with how many likes you get on that latest post on social media.
You feel elated when someone you don’t know shares your content. And then your heart drops when someone you don’t even like unfollows you.
Your self-esteem gets damaged a little when your idea is ignored or bypassed.
You lose yourself in pride and pomposity when your status is revered.
Being recognised, even by a person you have never met, sends you over the moon.
You are being lifted off the ground by something quite ephemeral, and you don’t notice that underneath those feet hanging in the air, there is nothing solid you can really stand on.
See clearly how the winds of fame and insignificance are sweeping you away.
Does this article come across as accusatory to you? Perhaps a little unkind?
Do these words sting? Are you sensing a tinge of unpleasantness stirring in the depths of your being?
There is a rather amusing story about the Eight Worldly Winds I’d like to share.
Su Dongpo was a famous Chinese poet and government official who lived in the Song Dynasty. Being an avid student of Buddhist teachings, Su felt inspired one day from his practice and wrote a poem:
稽首天中天
I bow to the heaven within the heavens
毫光照大千
Fine rays of light illuminate the universe
八风吹不动
The Eight Winds cannot make me move
端坐紫金莲
As I sit still on the purple golden lotus.
Su Dongpo was so pleased with what he wrote, that he decided to have someone cross a river to deliver the poem to Fo Yin, a renowned Zen Master.
Upon receiving and reading the poem, Fo Yin simply smiled. Without saying anything, he penned something on the letter, and asked to send it back to Su.
Su opened Fo Yin’s reply with much anticipation of compliments, only to see a huge word written on the paper - “屁”, which literally translates to “fart” and implies that a person is spouting nonsense or speaking rubbish.
Incensed, Su hops onto the boat himself and crosses the river to Fo Yin’s temple to demand an explanation from the Master.
When he arrived, he saw a written note stuck on the temple’s door:
八风吹不动，一屁打过江
The Eight Winds cannot make you move
Yet one fart blew you across a river
Su was an intelligent man, and understood what Fo Yin was trying to get at. The teaching humbled him, according to the story.
So learn to stand firm, dear human.
Don’t get swept away so easily.
Let the Eight Winds blow, for this you cannot control.
But stay grounded.
How? You might ask.
Stay grounded by practicing mindfulness and cultivating equanimity.
Equanimity comes from the word “equal”, and means “an even, balanced state of mind”.
When the mind is equanimous, it is poised, composed, and very rarely disturbed.
It doesn’t get swayed by the highs and lows. It doesn’t visit extremes.
Now don’t be mistaken - equanimity is not the same as indifference.
With indifference, there is distance and disconnection. We build walls and withdraw.
Walls don’t work so well when the Eight Winds come. Walls are fragile, crumbling at the slightest turbulence, and our propensity for reactivity reveals itself.
Equanimity keeps us strong, but not in a bullish kind of way.
An equanimous mind lends grace to any situation - it doesn’t engage, nor does it reject. There is no struggle.
Equanimity gently releases us from any identification with our experience, and encourages us to just be.
Like a wise tree, who knows that she can stay deeply rooted in the ground, firm and resilient in the way she stands, even with all its branches and leaves dancing in the wind.
And the wise human, who knows that she too can stand firm and stay grounded, calm and unmoved by even the harshest of currents or the most alluring of breezes.
遇缘则定😊