Avalanche Warning
A couple of months ago, I was leaving a parking garage that had a couple of exit lines. One of the lines seemed to be moving faster than the other, so I pulled into that one. At the same time, someone in the other line was backing up with the intent of switching lines. When they saw me pull in before them, they leaned on their horn for a good 20 seconds. Then, suddenly, the driver got out of his car. He was a huge man, and he started walking toward me, gesticulating and cursing at me for “cutting him off.” I locked my door and closed my window, shrugging at him through the glass and mouthing a meek “I’m sorry.” At that moment, the parking lot attendant told the man to get back in his car, which immediately redirected the man’s ire. I took the opportunity to pay my parking fee and get out of there as fast as I could.
As I drove away, still shaking with adrenaline, I went through a rapid succession of thoughts and feelings. First, I had to flush some of the terror out of my system, which took several minutes. Then I was worried for the parking lot attendant, and wondered if I should call the police. Next, I felt my own anger rising. What an asshole! What was his fucking problem, anyway? But by the time I got home, I had landed on a different, more interesting question that stuck with me for the rest of the day. What drove that man to his breaking point?
The first “Noble Truth” of Buddhim is often translated as “Life is Suffering.” That’s an oversimplification of a much more complicated idea, but for our purposes we can focus on the notion that pain is a feature of every life. We all have desires and wants, and some of them go unmet, or are fulfilled temporarily only to be lost. That hurts. None of that negates our moments of joy and peace and satisfaction, but the reverse is also true. Even the happiest life contains its full share of pain.
Given that pain is inevitable, we have a decision to make: what do we do with it? It’s tempting to just bury it and forget about it. Who wants to spend any more time thinking about their pain than they have to? But pain always has its say. If we don't give it a voice, it speaks through our actions, sometimes loudly and destructively. I don’t know what made that man lash out in the parking lot that day, but I’m pretty sure it had nothing to do with parking. I’m willing to bet he’s built up layer upon layer of pain over the years, like a new slab of unstable snow after each winter storm. After a while, the avalanche isn’t a question of if anymore, it’s a question of when.
It’s hard to listen to your pain. It’s even harder to share it with others. You have to muster up a lot of courage and go where you don’t really want to go. But pain seeks expression the way snow seeks the bottom of the mountain. How it gets there is up to you.
