Carrie Link

FEEDING THE DEMON

There is a Buddhist practice called Chod. It is meant to cut away fear, cut out ego, get to purity. Part of the practice involves the feeding of demons, and it's all gory, weird and scary. Unfortunately/fortunately, it was also one of the first Buddhist practices I learned. You feed the demons to the point of completion, until they are full. Again, lots of gory, icky terms and notions are used, but the essence is lovely. What you resist, persists. What you feed gets full, and will stop gnawing on you.

When my daughter was diagnosed with OCD, we learned the same damn thing. By trying to re-direct her, soothe her, rationalize with her, it only created more anxiety and obsessiveness.

I recently attended a workshop called Falling Awake . It is a life-changing action plan. Specific skills are taught for getting what you WANT out of life. Now, I know what you're thinking, "If I get what I want out of life, won't that take away from everyone else getting what they want, and isn't that Selfish with a capital S?"

No. Self-sacrifice, at least in my case, only causes resentment. I can give myself totally away to the needs of others, in the name of selflessness, but guess what they "get", grumpy, anxious, pissed-off Carrie. Nobody likes that Carrie, especially me.

By "feeding the demon", giving into the wants of ourselves and others, we are actually liberating ourselves. The key is to determine what underlies the want. Obviously, if we give our kids everything they THINK they want, we'll raise spoiled brats. Ick. Hate that. The trick is determining what they WANT from what they want.

Most of the times the want is to fulfill a basic need, love, acceptance, assurance companionship, safety or validation. Occasionally the need is more primal, food/clothing/shelter.

What do you want? Really?