How to STOP Jealousy & Comparison | A Monk's Approach

[Music] so today i wanted to talk about a topic that affects so many people and this topic is regarding how to not compare ourselves to others and also how to not feel this sense of jealousy and normally when we are in a group setting because we have to interact with other people we're not just by ourselves it makes sense because we're trying to find our place we're trying to see how are we doing so then we look outside to compare ourselves to judge ourselves and then to use it as a measure and that is just basic because we're dealing with other people and we interact with other people now with the way our culture with the way our society is now with the advancement and the invention of technology it just exploded you can see now with the mere fact of the amount of social media the amount of news the amount of information that is available to us we're just bombarded from the time that we wake up all the way to the time that we go to sleep many people struggle with this so if it's not you that's okay but most people in this moment just have this difficulty because everything is so accessible we have our phones in our hands we're always looking down at it and it's just in front of us the whole time also with the messages that we receive and the expectation of society then everything is compounded so it makes sense why we would have a tendency to feel jealous compare ourselves to other and then make a judgment about our own lives so in this video i wanted to take time to normalize that this is something that most people deal with or most people face with but the other part of it is that we can look at it in a different way where instead of using this comparison using this jealousy where it impairs you where it makes you feel bad about yourself and then you get into a negative loop cycle why don't we take a look at this from a different perspective using wisdom and then using techniques where to learn and to study and then you can benefit and use this as a stepping stone to transforming yourself so in no particular order these are five tips that i wanted to share with you to help you not compare yourself to others and also feel a sense of jealousy see the good in others and then integrate it it's very common that when we look at others then we start to compare we see that they're doing so good they're so successful they're so beautiful they're so fill in the blank and then when they are that beautiful when they are that successful when they are that strong then when we are not at that level then we tend to make a negative judgment about ourself then you feel bad then we can get into a negative cycle we can feel insecure we can feel inadequate not enough so these are again very common so instead of going on that path repeating the pattern and it doesn't help you because you just get into this negative loop cycle we ruminate about it and again we just feel bad and then we continue the process and it does not benefit us so one way we can take a look at this is let's do something different like i said before this is normal so then now let's train ourselves differently so one tool that i wanted to share with you is something that i did when i was first in the monastery i knew when i came in here being in the west being in malibu and in california it's very normal and it's very common to feel that pressure to compare yourself to others but i knew when i came into the monastery i wanted to look at myself in a different way i wanted to fix this issue because i knew and you know that comparing yourself to others it's just not healthy so then instead i decided let me train myself when i started the ordination program we had men coming from around the world so instead of comparing myself to the others feeling inadequate i decided let me take out a journal and on this journal then because we had 30 men in the program who were ordaining i decided just take a a normal journal like this and on each page i actually gave each person two pages i just wrote their name on it and dedicated those two pages for them instead of my mind naturally going to compare myself and judging them and critiquing them i wanted to learn from them i made it a habit and an exercise for that for the remainder of the program i would just observe other people intently and then just pull out the good things from them so i would see my brother monk who is from russia and then i would notice of wow look at his habits he is always on time so i would write that down wow when this person eats they're very mindful they're very quiet they're very polite when this person does chanting they speak very clearly they're very confident and they project their voice well so again this was an exercise that took many days and for each person i just trained myself to pick out all the good qualities that i saw in them and then in the end of the program i just instead of looking to compare looking to judge other people then i kept my eyes on me i kept my eyes on my own training and then the second part of this is then you use all these good qualities and try to integrate it into yourself now you have a map now you have a foundation of things that you are maybe lacking things that you want to improve on and these are good qualities so then with this gold information with this nugget that you just found like this treasure use that to your own benefit and slowly integrate it into your daily life so again this part just has two step the one is to start looking for the good that you see in other people write it down and the second part is then to integrate it and in english it's rejoice in your merits and merits is really just the good deeds that we do so in the monastery when i first came to thailand this is a thai word where when you do good deeds everyone will kind of cheer you on and congratulate you and point that out and the word that they use to rejoice in your merits is anumotanabun so anytime someone does a good deed then they would say anumotenabun and for me when i first came to ordain and to come into this culture every time someone did something good and again people would really rejoice in it and they would keep saying and for me i didn't even know how to say this word so it was uncomfortable i was not trained in this concept or practiced this concept prior to coming here so it felt a bit off and people just kept saying it over and over any time i did something good or anytime someone else did something good it's just anumotenabun you did good anumothena and and like i said in the beginning i'm like okay this is very strange really do we have to do it every single time but now that i've been in the monastery for some time i can see that this is one way that we use to train ourselves so anytime someone does good we recognize what they did that that was a good action that was a good behavior and then two we want to acknowledge that and share in the goodness with them so it trains ourself every single time to point that out and to highlight it and to bring people up so again instead of focusing on their faults instead of focusing on areas that we do not agree with let's start with something that is positive and the positive that we can all agree on is that when people do good let's encourage that and let's support that and together we can rejoice and we can share in this good energy that will be beneficial to ourselves and to the other party so how does this tip apply to you and really if you are somewhere else in the world and you're not used to the term anumotenabun you don't have to use it in your office because people are going to look at you weird but really take time and make an effort to a share to rejoice in the good deeds that other people are doing and then this is another form another training of oneself to start to see the good and focus it on a positive aspect spreading loving kindness so when we have a comparison when we have darkness of the mind we have jealousy those kind of things in the buddhist context we call that kilesa or defilements and we have this darkness of minds so for us how do we counter this and it's really a practice of sharing loving kindness sometimes we hold grudges sometimes we hold heaviness in our hearts and this is the antidote that will help you so what we do in the monastery is really to practice ourselves in meditation of course you know from other videos that our training system involves developing oneself morally developing oneself in meditation and then also to develop oneself in wisdom and then to use that wisdom to shift our life forward so once we are done with meditation your mind should be more clear more bright more light more open and hopefully just very still and in this stillness for us we like to start with sharing goodness spreading loving kindness first with yourself and why do we start with ourself because it's really it's the easiest it's hard to share good will and good energy to people we do not like to our enemies people who are far away so we always start with ourselves first because it's the most easy the spreading loving kindness is just covering yourself with this good feeling so if you don't know what that means you can just imagine like a bright light or a bubble that surrounds you that feels loving that feels compassionate and brightening your mind that all the negative all the bad will be wiped out so cover every ounce of your body every pore in your body and then just let it sit here then when you can do that expand this good loving energy to cover the people in the room with you let's start there then move this energy this bubble to go even wider this pure energy that you cultivated in your meditation and allow it to cover uh the whole building to cover the whole town to cover the whole city to cover the whole world and then keep spreading it till infinity and just allow it to keep growing and in doing this act you're training yourself to soften your mind to soften your heart and to add that compassion for yourself and other people and it takes training because there are people out there that we don't agree with you know people out there that we despise but even then that people are different from you people have different points of views different lifestyle can you then still share loving kindness with them and that's why it's a training and when you first practice it you'll notice that i kind of theoretically understand that i should share loving kindness to the people who are my enemies to people who i don't agree with but then the practice of actually doing it is different from just theory and that's why we need to put it into practice every single day keep spreading it and with that daily practice it gets more natural then automatically you just want to cover everyone in this world with loving kindness but it starts with the practice talk to them and ask them how so when we get into a space where we're jealous of someone else we feel inferior we feel that we're less than so for me again it's it's not helpful it's not helpful so let me go the opposite end instead of that then let me go talk to you and let me go understand those great qualities that you have that i admire how did you develop that how did you get that and for me what was helpful in the monastery was really then after i did my journaling taking the time to understand each person the person who had the amazing habit of never being late and not only were they never late they were early you know i had a brother monk who always came way early he set up all the cushions for the rest of the monks he turned on the fans he turned on the lights he would sweep he would mop and prepare the whole meditation hall every single day for a whole program and for me i want to learn and i want to know how you did that so instead of comparing or feeling jealous of their quality then i said you know what let me have a sit down with them and of all the good qualities that i listed with each person in this journal and because maybe i'm lacking it or maybe i want it then i would sit down with them and get the know-how now p how did you develop those characteristics how do you not be lazy what technique do you use are there any tips that you can provide me because i love this quality that you have and i by doing that instead of focusing on the negative parts like i said then i focus on the positive part and i can learn directly from that person because that was their strong suit and this was something that if you can do often then slowly you start to get the know-how and then you start to integrate it into yourself and the characteristics that you were so jealous of then it becomes part of you imagine doing this on a daily basis going down and genuinely this is not a um i'm secretly plot plotting or i'm no i'm just genuinely wanting to be a better person to develop my skills to integrate what you have and then i would continue this process from one brother monk to the next to the next and next thing you knew they were so kind and they handed me their wisdom on a silver platter the things that i was wanting to improve the things that i was struggling with these were the people who were doing amazing with that and directly they gave me tips that i did and never even considered but this has worked for me this is a technique that i use this is a secret that i found that you can apply to yourself and right there this was something then that was beneficial for me so you can try that out for yourself and bridge the gap because when we're judging other people or comparing then we feel like a distance but bridge that go directly to the source if you can and talk to them and learn from them and what i find is that most people they want to share the things that have worked for them and it's actually an honor and a privilege and this little act can change your life drastically so give it a try everyone experiences suffering one key assumption that people can make when they are comparing themselves to others when they feel jealous is that other people are happy and they're not experiencing any suffering but that is just inaccurate and use the teaching of the buddha and the buddha taught that the fact that we have birth that we're born we have aging we have sickness and we have death so the mere fact of being alive we will experience suffering and many times we can look at life and other people from a lens where well my life is not where i want it to be and it looks like everyone is so happy and they don't experience any suffering we have an image of what celebrities look like of what athletes look like people who are successful uh the different um array of images available to us it can look like they don't experience any suffering and that's just not a fact and the teaching that we get is you can be the most successful the richest person in the world but yet you'll experience a rich person suffering you can be the poorest person in the world and you will experience a different kind of suffering people look at other people's relationships and wow i'm single yet someone is in a relationship and they must be happy yeah sure there's an element to that but also at the same time there are challenges and there are struggles with having a partner having a relationship but we can go black and white where we think wow it's just romantic all honeymoon roses and butterflies you get love notes every single morning so if you are in a relationship please describe it is this the case where it's just roses and butterflies and rainbows and poetry every single day and that is just not how it is so if you are single there's benefits to it there are um parts of it where it's challenging all the same if you're in one part of the world they have challenges you know when i was in malibu there are malibu challenges and there are benefits and when you're in this country i'm in thailand there are great things and there are also challenges but to be a mother even of a newborn baby is the most happiest most precious time she's holding her child in her arms so yeah that's a very sacred moment but yet this new mom still experiences some form of suffering people who are famous has their suffering people who have um the nice body and the six-pack and everything that you so desire they also have some form of suffering and how is this helpful to you and just know that any ideal of the type of person that you are idolizing or looking towards just know that there's a common thread there's a common ground that we can relate on and the way things look does not necessarily meet the eye and we can get into the habit of just going one full spectrum wow so happy but again just know the mere fact of being alive regardless of your status regardless of your race regard regardless of your wealth anything that you can have the pinnacle of you will still have some form of suffering so by knowing this it gives you some kind of comfort to know that it is normal and then the last part of it is then keep cultivating your own serenity your own peace become your own refuge and looking outside sure okay you can see it it brings up a lot of things but ultimately let's do our own work because that's important and that's the real stuff and allow your mind to be bright keep training yourself and train your perception to see things as they are this is buddhism see yourself as you are see other people as they are and see your situation as it is and these kind of dhamma for me is just very helpful and that can give you a peace of mind so there you have it these are the five tips that i can offer for you to not compare to not judge yourself to others the good thing with this part for me i feel like if you can look at things very neutrally is that it exposes when we look at other people it exposes maybe good qualities that we may be missing maybe that we want some and that's a great thing so use that and learn it and try to integrate it into your life so you can be better but i find that when we engage in this comparison jealousy thing it just doesn't benefit us it gets us in a negative loop cycle and it goes nowhere so instead go the opposite learn from the situation learn from the other people take their goodness and then apply it to yourself teach yourself develop a system and a model where when you engage with the outside world this is how i train my mind and to look at the situation in a positive light otherwise like i said it does not benefit you so develop a system where it does benefit you and keep constantly training yourself so we can look at the world where we always feel less than inadequate not enough always striving and yearning for me i just take it lightly i take it easily and i just feel like a kid where i look at the world and i'm just playful where i just look at things or i try to look at things with uh open eyes like a learning like a playground where wow that's so cool these are the qualities these are the virtues these are the characteristics that i want the last piece that i would add to it is to pay attention to what are you jealous of and and for us in the monastery what we look at is we try to integrate virtues good virtues good morality good habits good qualities and perfections that we see in other people such as patients such as equanimity and kindness and endurance of a person who has grit a person who is honest those are the things that we value and we look for and we study study in other people and then try to integrate in ourselves so i know this is a lot of information i hope it makes sense i hope it's helpful but just wanted to put this out there so again i'll wrap it up but as always all the way from thailand just sending you all my blessings all my regards and please stay safe train yourself in a gentle way and i hope you are all doing well so sato and anumota [Music] you

Channel: Nick Keomahavong

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Keywords: a day in the life of a monk, monk, monks, buddhist monk, life of a monk, monk life, the life of a monk, jealousy mental health, comparison mental health, how to stop jealousy and comparison, buddhist monk jealousy, how to end jealousy, buddhist monk mental health, buddhism and mental health, how to stop jealousy, how to not compare yourself to others, a monks approach, buddhist monk lifestyle, nick keomahavong, buddhist monk life, end jealousy, buddhist approach to jealousy

Id: 3MHA1zgDk50

Length: 27min 2sec (1622 seconds)

Published: Thu May 06 2021