This passage from The Trauma of Everyday Life by Mark Epstein has stuck in my mind.
Maya's (Buddha's mother, who died within days of his birth) predicament mirrored one that the Buddha would confront over and over again in his adult years. People could not believe in their own Buddha nature. Even Gotama himself, in his pre-enlightenment years, could not believe in his inherent perfection. He thought he had to extinguish himself to find transcendence. His mother acted out of a similar belief. Unable to stay with the thrill in her human embodiment, unable to believe that her physical body could bear her joy, Maya was forced to take refuge in her celestial bliss body, the only one that could hold the feelings evoked by her child. In so doing, the Buddha's mother acted out an inadequacy that many a mother— like many a lover— is vulnerable to, an inadequacy fed by thoughts of doubt and fear that erode confidence and corrode connection. Doubting the capacity of her physical form to sustain the thrill of her motherhood, Maya was compelled to seek a self -state that split her off from her child. Like an infant forced to disconnect from his ruthless self when his mother fails to receive it, Maya could endure only by dissociating. Forsaking her body and her child, she survived by departing her physical form.
Epstein, Mark (2013-08-15). The Trauma of Everyday Life (p. 78). Penguin Group US. Kindle Edition.
I have read that the Buddha feared that he would be unable to explain in a convincing way what he had discovered about life and our minds. Telling people they are inherently perfect would never work. They can easily produce dozens of examples from their lives where they have sinned or erred or failed in some personal way.
Tara Branch has a book on Radical Acceptance and if one can take a longer view, it seems possible that the entirety of one's life might be accepted as ok, even though such acceptance might be difficult.
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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety
