A Season to Pivot || By Beth Hinnen, Certified Mindfulness and Meditation Teacher
More than ever, we’re pushed to have certainty. Strong opinions, tightly held and loudly proclaimed. And then, when reality intervenes, it can be stressful. … It’s not easy to say, “I was wrong.” And so people live in stress, sticking with something that used to work longer than they’re comfortable with. Our challenges in shifting perspective keep us stuck in the past. These are sunk costs, decisions we can’t unmake, but they don’t have to be forever commitments.
One way forward is to rename this moment and change the story. Instead of “I was wrong,” perhaps it’s useful (if less satisfying to others seeking victory) to say, “It’s time to make a new decision based on new information.” That’s not weakness. That’s not flip-flopping or even embarrassing. That’s practical, resilient and generous. — Seth Godin
It’s the end of the holiday season, a time which can be magical, or completely and totally depressing. I lean toward the former, even amidst some of the most depressing years of my life. Because no matter what, I always had a sense of the inherent goodness in people underneath it all. Brief as my experience of it was growing up, I nevertheless clung to it like a life preserver. Which is probably why I’m a sucker for any narratives that expound on the redemption of a character, primary or otherwise, in a storyline. For the first half, two-thirds, even nine-tenths of the movie we follow along all the misguided actions of said character until finally, s/he sees them for the fruitless and vain actions that they are, and voila, said character steps into the wholeness of their True Nature, the authenticity of who they are, a beautiful, caring, kind, albeit messy, vulnerable and unpredictable human being.
Which is why one of my holiday rituals is watching the Alistair Sims version of “A Christmas Carol.” It has been said that a descendant of Dickens commented that this was the most authentic rendition of the book ever made. And indeed, having purchased the book, I find it’s easy to follow along with the movie, turning the pages and hearing the dialogue almost verbatim. That, along with the transformation of Scrooge, make this a must-see for me at least once a year. And truly, the most joyous scene of the entire movie is in the last five minutes when Scrooge suddenly realizes, he knows nothing (so Zen!), and starts bouncing around the room singing, “I don’t know anything!” Then he pauses, looks at an upholstered chair with arms, and says, “I’m going to stand on my head!” and plants his crown in the seat of the chair, holds onto the arms and kicks his legs up until the char woman screams, throws her apron over her face and runs out of the room.
In that moment of sheer delight, Scrooge chooses to do something wildly different, out of his normal habits. Coming from a place of not knowing, he easily drops any old perspectives of who he was, writes off the sunk costs of his miserly ways, and drops his commitment to being a bah-humbug. A few scenes later, he attends Christmas dinner at his nephew’s, and says to his niece-in-law, “can you forgive an old fool who didn’t have eyes to see?” And in that brief moment of egoistic pain of admitting error, he unleashes an entire future of freedom and lovingkindness for himself. Indeed, I can recast Marley’s dragging chains of money-grabbing financial tyranny, as my own chains of habits and beliefs that I drag around with me in the face of an ever-changing landscape of social and political mores. If instead, I come back to the truth of my humanity, if I take the courage to look at a chair and say, “I want to stand on my head!” what a different world this would be. Indeed, what makes me hunker down and close in on myself, forcing me to stick to something that used to work, longer than I’m comfortable with?
In Zen (and a multitude of other disciplines, including psychotherapy), it would be labeled “conditioning.” I was raised, as we all were, not just by families, but by neighborhoods, society-at-large, TV, marketing wizards, movies, commercials, you name it — I, you, all of us were told — groomed — how to act and move in the world at very young ages. And we more likely than not cling to those same patterns of behavior well into adulthood and often, straight into old age and death. Even if we are familiar with the tropism that “the only constant in the world is change,” we somehow seem to resist that at every turn. We want love to last, careers to continue on upward trajectories, friendships to glide along on a glass surface sea. Even more so, we want to pout, lash out, run away, hide in a corner, do the same things that kept us “safe” as kids into adulthood even when such behaviors aren’t effective anymore and may indeed, exacerbate the situation. Such craving for same old, same old (permanence in Buddhist lexicon) is what causes suffering. And in the worst case, insanity (doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results).
After all, what if babies never grew up, trees didn’t lose their leaves and bud again in the spring, or spring never ended, nor allergies? What if snow always fell, or never fell, and cats were always aloof, and children always crying? What if I always got a parking ticket on that one block, my iPhone 6 never became obsolete, and horror of horrors, I was still twenty five and full of anxiety, tension, depression, perfectionism, and frightened of my future prospects? When I really see impermanence as a chance to change outdated beliefs and habits, to embrace an attitude of softness and warmth and let go of the hard edge of tempered suspicion and anger, like Scrooge, I am filled with the glee of freedom to turn my world upside down. No longer do I have to be driven by fear, desperation, or worry. Instead, whether through meditation, therapy or Christmas ghosts, I can generously choose to behave differently and begin to operate from a place of patience, kindness and love.
Which leads to understanding, as hard as it may be to accept, that well-being is my nature, humanity’s nature. It is only from such a premise, I project, that the ghosts could do what they did in one night. If Scrooge had been completely evil down to his bones, I doubt he’d have been able to utterly change in less than six hours (90 minutes in screen time). What he had going for him is what the Buddha said we all have going for us, that we inherently are Buddha nature — compassionate, courageous, resilient, kind, caring, and a host of other wonderful attributes — we just don’t know it.
Or … maybe we do and it only feels awkward, uncomfortable, egotistical to admit it. This is not what is reflected in popular culture. Popular culture wants us to be perfect from an external standpoint, the right partner, career, house, car, kids, pet, wardrobe, watch, etc. In fact, we have very little time to turn inward to experience what is there. Practically nothing in our lives encourages us to pause for a moment, to see how we view something, an event, a person, a tree, and even more reprehensible, how we feel about such things. Because if we did, we might touch into something that is deeper and more real than the swirling, impermanent externality of life that comes and goes, and to which commercialism fuels such superficiality.
This is what the ghosts presented to Scrooge, a chance to touch his past, present and future to really experience it for what is was … to remind him of the goodness that got gilded over with greed, hatred and delusion. Seeing his pain as he watches his lonely boyhood, failed romance, and trite relationship with BFF, Marley, makes him realize what he’s given up, or really, deeply suppressed, in order to have power and money. And that is … connection … with other wonderful, caring, messy, vulnerable human beings. Which makes the ending perfect. Scrooge doesn’t give up worldly life to atone for his miserly ways, he actually becomes an active and engaged citizen and spends his money on Tiny Tim’s health, on increasing the salaries of his employees, and becoming “as good a friend … as good a man as the good, old city knew.”
And in the movie’s penultimate scene, after he raises Bob Cratchit’s salary Scrooge says, “I’m so happy. … I have no right to be so happy, … and I just can’t help it!” and throws his pen into the air and giggles. He names what I project we’ve all felt at one time or another — that we don’t deserve to feel so happy. Except, when we truly recognize our goodness, we can’t suppress it. It’s no longer about deserving or not; it’s about being who we authentically are — practical, resilient and yes, generous. We reach past the superfluous layers of identity to embrace our Buddha Nature, and from there, we share that with others. If we want, we can make amends for poor behavior and apologize, or we can simply say, ”ah, there is a new way I can be, and I choose this going forward.”
And so it is my wish for 2025, that all those reading these words:
May you tap into your inherent goodness;
May you find the courage to pivot and embrace resiliency;
May you be open to new information that leads to freedom and caring;
And may you feel happy, really happy, knowing this is your True Nature.
About the Author: Beth Hinnen came to the spiritual path from the corporate world. After experiencing impermanence and greed, she left to study Yoga and has over 1,000 hours in Yoga teacher training, and ended up specializing in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, spiritual scripture that closely aligns with Buddhism. From there, she studied Zen Buddhism for over ten years, including in-person, month-long monastic retreats, until she earned certification, in January, 2023, as a Mindfulness and Meditation Teacher with Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach. Currently, Beth is a co-leader of the IMCD Council, and on the Teachers Collective, as administrator. She hosts a Meetup group called Yoga Meets Buddhism, and for the past three years, has held an online Dharma Wednesdays class that discusses the Yoga Sutras while also bringing in Buddhist teachings, along with Sufi poets, Christianity, Judaism and other spiritual paths that reinforce the words of Sri Swami Satchidananda, the founder of Integral Yoga where Beth studied. “The truth is one, the paths are many.” More information about Beth is at www.samayaco.org.
