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I logged in here tonight just especially to do a bit of venting. After this, I'm going to bed. But I just had to let this out first or I'll never be able to sleep!
So I hang around with this community of Buddhists from time to time. I won't go into the details now, because it's a really long story and not at all the focus of this. So we'll just say I hang out with them, I attend some meetings and such, and there's some people in the group that I especially like.
One of these people has been a bit... off with me lately. We've always gotten along well, and while we don't know each other all that well I consider us to be pretty decent friends, as far as a situation like this can go at least. Well, I was going to go to this meeting at her house earlier this month. I wasn't going to say anything about it at first, since it's an open meeting and people come or don't come all the time with little or no RSVP. Then I couldn't remember exactly what bus stop I had to get off at, and I couldn't find her address to re-figure it out (I've only been on the bus once before and only been to her house specifically a few times).
So I send her a message, telling her I'm planning on coming and asking for her address again. She sends me the info and says she's looking forward to seeing me. Well that night I can't get to sleep, and the next morning comes and I really feel like hell because of it. I'd been fighting a cold the previous week or so as it was, and the lack of sleep set me back quit a bit with that battle. I woke up with a headache and just general icky feeling. I figured, bleh... forget it. I'm going back to bed. So I turn on my laptop, send her a message saying I'm not feeling so hot and I'm going to go back to bed and sorry I'm missing the meeting etc. etc.
Nothing happens. I go back to bed until around noon, wake up feeling a bit better and check my messages to see if she responded. She didn't, but then I don't really need a response for something like that anyway, right? So whatever. I forget about it.
But then maybe a week ago I get this message from her. And it's strange. She's worded it as if she never got my message about not coming, and while tone is really hard to detect in writing I'm still sort of sensing one in there. It's like she's mad at me.
Confused, but not wanting to make something out of it in case I'm misreading her, I write back kinda dropping a mention of my having messaged her, saying something like 'yeah, it's like I said in that message, I just wasn't feeling well so I went back to bed. I'm feeling better now though so it's all good. I'm sorry I missed the meeting though, cuz I was looking forward to going' etc. etc.
She responds today, correcting me for calling the get together a meeting (because there are official 'meetings' versus these casual sessions) and then lays some not so subtle lines on me about how I should try and make such sessions. Now part of the reason I like her above some of the other members is that she doesn't give me a ton of s**t about being a strict practitioner. But now here she is pulling the same tricks that piss me off about those other members. And seriously, what the hell is with the correction on term? I just felt weird calling it a gathering and I didn't really know what else to refer to it as aside from using the activity encompassed by it and I just didn't feel like saying it that way. I didn't mean the specific use of MEETING I just meant the general sense of the term. What's with the nitpicking? I mean, does it really matter? And the attitude and lecture that followed... I mean, I could forgive the meeting thing if she didn't try that half guilt trip half lecture all posed in friendly advice and I'm-not-saying-you-I'm-just-talking-in-general bullshit right after.
I don't know... maybe I should just stop hanging around them. I mean, there are elements of Buddhism and specifically their practice that I really like. Things I think are valuable and which have helped me in the past. But then there's this whole other dimension. I guess it's kinda like how there's a biblical version of Christianity and then the westernized version that everyone (around here anyway) practices. And while both have their good and bad points I can forgive them the bad. The one thing I can't do though is say that they are the same religion. They do cross paths here or there yes, but they are not the same religion. The westernized version is not, strictly speaking, Christianity because it is not purely biblical.
But now I'm going off on a whole other tangent xD sorry! Getting back to the point: they're beliefs I like, even if some of them I don't quit share/agree with. And some of their practices I'm good with, but a fair few of them... not so much. And I don't see where those practices are, strictly speaking, the same as their beliefs. I see them as two different worlds, and while one I like quit a bit the other I dislike just as much. It's not a good mix >.>
I've tried to separate the two out and to be careful whom I hang around from the group and what meetings I attend, but now I'm wondering if that's really enough. It seems like the BS is more widespread than I originally thought.
I know, I know. This event doesn't seem that bad. I guess... I guess it just symbolizes some underlying issues I'm having with the group. And I've been thinking all year about this. About whether or not I want to be involved with them anymore. Thing is... I read a horror story once about a former member who tried to leave. She said she got all kinds of crap about it >.> so now I'm a bit nervous. Maybe... if I can just hold out another year, I can just let things slip through the cracks a bit more and then drop all connection once I graduate and move away from here. That might actually work. The only question is, if I can make it another year. o.o?
 Morrighan-Brann · Mon Jun 28, 2010 @ 08:12am · 0 Comments |
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