The Story
My husband’s boss up and quits — it wasn’t exactly unexpected, she had been unhappy for a while. But what was unexpected was that my husband wasn’t immediately promoted to her position; he was the most qualified, had been groomed to be her successor, it was, we thought, ‘in the bag’. Only, it wasn’t ‘in the bag’, and now my husband and I started to stress about his career and what came next. Not getting the big boss job felt like a career set-back, plus someone new was likely to come-in and fire/demote all the senior staff so they could bring in their own people. Either way, it wasn’t looking good for my husband. This was bad…
Or was it? Dharma practitioner Alana started to contemplate on impermanence. I recalled my jury duty story, a time when I was so happy about an outcome until a little later when that same outcome made me sad — there is impermanence in my desires.
I thought about my last trip to the GYN: all year, I feel fine, so I don’t worry — I have the wrong view that since I was healthy before, since I feel healthy now, it will always be the case. But when I am in the Dr’s office, waiting for my exam, my mind fills with the threats of cancer and disease and troubling test results. But the truth is if the Doc finds something today it was likely there yesterday too, I just didn’t know it yet — there is impermanence in my body, my life, I am just not always aware of it.
Which brings me back to my husband and his job — we thought he would be promoted, for sure. But whether we are aware or unaware of the uncertainty –aka impermanence — of his job, it was always there. We were upset simply because we were seeing what was always there for the first time. The thing is, this uncertainty that surprised us when my husband didn’t get promoted can just as easily surprise us again and a different, possibly better way down the road. Or, the situation can stay the same, but our desires can change and we can be happy with this non-promoted outcome that seems so devastating right now. Likeliest of all really is that the two-sided nature of reality shows its face and we get an outcome that we see as good in some ways and bad in others.
Lately, I have been coming to see that impermanence is a source of refuge. I used to think it was the thing I had to change or work against. It was my enemy, not allowing me all the things I wanted, all the outcomes I imagined. I only paid attention to impermanence when it ‘robbed’ me of something, I never paid attention to when I got something new, or something I hated was removed, or how my own heart changed. Impermanence however is an indiscriminate master, it doesn’t bow to my wants or desires. It is completely beyond my control.
Refuge is in understanding that there is never certainty and there is absolutely nothing I can do about that fact . What comes will come, and the truth is, in a world where ups and downs go hand-in-hand, where circumstances are constantly shifting, something being ‘good’ (for me) or ‘bad’ (for me) is going to shift as well. I write this blog several years after these events and the epilogue is the best example I can give for the shifting, bundled, two-sided nature of circumstance …
Epilogue
Upon not getting promoted my husband decided to start looking for new jobs. He got a good offer at a NY-based company and we moved from SF to start our new NY lives. A few months after my husband left, news came out about how badly his old company was treating employees and it was a public relations nightmare. The company was offering-up sacrificial lambs left and right and my husband realized that had he been promoted to head of HR at a company getting so much flack about their HR policies it could have been super bad for his career — because he got out, he was safe, he had an untarnished resume and quietly slipped under the media’s radar. So it turns-out, not getting promoted may have been a good thing….
Only we hate New York. I really really hate New York. I miss my old life in SF, I am miserable, I feel like moving was one of the biggest mistakes I have ever made. It has been a strain on my health, our relationship and our finances as we try to ‘solve’ the problem with extra homes and time away and ultimately a move to Connecticut. So maybe, it wasn’t such a good thing…
Only the suffering from the move to New York has helped super-charge my Dharma practice. It has helped me see the limitations of my control, it had helped me challenge my beliefs about money and material things as a source of safety and it has shown me how temporary happiness and comfort can be. Since dharma is truly one of the most importation things in my life, perhaps it is all a good thing…
And on and on and on… a story that will shift and take on new meaning as time and perspective shift as well. I had to let impermanence have the final word today. After all, whether I am aware or unaware of it, it always does.