The following article was written by Elizabeth Jun’en Allen, who is a life coach and former Novice Monastic in the Mountains and Rivers Order at the Zen Mountain Monastery in Mt. Tremper, New York. I am grateful to Elizabeth for permitting me to print her candid and thoughtful article here.
Why do people choose the monastic life?
People chose the monastic life for many complex reasons. Some feel called to it, some don’t know what else to do with their lives, some don’t know how to live in “regular” society, some don’t want to live in “regular” society.
I think it’s fair to say that everyone who gets ordained does so because being a monastic somehow makes them feel “better” inside. After ordination, motivations continue to grow and
change, just as people do.
For myself, much of the call to monastic life lay in the fact that I had an inherent sense of myself as bad. I felt that the monastic life was how I could make some good come of my existence. Being at the monastery was the first time I felt good about myself and how I was living my life.
I came to understand this justification and left the order just prior to full ordination. I had completed almost four years in monastic residence, as a lay student, postulant, and novice monastic.
Are monks really that much more evolved?
Not necessarily. They are just people. I have encountered monastics who are no more evolved than you or me. I have encountered those whose commitment and practice blow me away and make me feel humbled to be in their presence. I’ve encountered “false” monastics who appear
to be using the monastic structure as a personal power trip.
Zen literature has a number of stories of deeply enlightened monks being put to shame in their understanding of the Dharma by the old woman selling tea by the side of the road.
Someone recently asked me: If an executive decides to devote their life to their role as an executive, the same level of devotion of one who chooses a life of solitude, silence or some other zen like pursuit, how is there really any difference?
The difference is that an executive is choosing to devote their life to a worldly role, generally to their own benefit. The nature of a monk is one who choose a life of spirituality above all else, leaving behind worldly values.
Now, if you’d asked about the person devoting themselves to a life of charitable work–aid workers in Africa, folks who run soup kitchens and help the homeless, people working to end poverty and despair–and monastics I would say that the form is different, but that the heart
operating there is very much the same heart of giving for the benefit of all beings.
Just because someone is a monk does it mean they have a better life?
Nope. In the Zen tradition, which is the tradition that I was ordained in, a monastic is a “home-leaver”. We forsake the ideas of home and having a family to dedicate our lives to the Dharma, the teachings of the Buddha, and to serving others.
There are many lay Zen practitioners who do not leave home, who have families and jobs, and whose commitment to the Dharma is as deep or deeper than some monastics. Monastic life is very much about group living and is free from many of the responsibilities faced by lay practitioners.
In some ways, it is much easier to live as a monastic: you’re schedule is set for you, you don’t worry about rent or food or clothes. You get to spend a great deal of time in contemplation/meditation. You also get to practice a vow of obedience to the head of the order. This can be a very difficult aspect of monastic practice. It is a beautiful and demanding way to live.
On the other hand, someone with a family has to deal with many of those things at the same time as devoting a significant amount of energy to their spiritual growth.
My life as a lay practitioner has challenged my practice in ways I never imagined. My four-year-old daughter is as demanding as the Abbot of the monastery ever was.
For me, life as a lay practitioner is harder than my monastic life in that if I choose not to practice today, I am not surrounded by a schedule, fellow monastics, and a teacher who call me back to my vows. I just don’t practice. No one notices but me.
Lay practitioner or monastic–neither one is inherently better and neither path guarantees wisdom. That said, I am deeply grateful to all the monastics who have touched my life with their vows.
Elizabeth J. Allen can be reached through her website www.iridescentliving.com
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