Contentment and Desire

I had a few classes on Buddhism in college.  I memorized the Four Noble Truths, the eightfold path, a few Sanskrit words, some names and dates and holy sites, some fables and mythology, some far-out stuff I don’t remember. 

There aren’t many Buddhists in the Tennessee hills where I live. You don’t see anyone around in burgundy robes, or robes of any kind, really. No one carries a begging bowl. I haven’t talked at length with many practitioners lately.

But I always think about Buddhism when I think about desire, because Siddartha Gautama’s flash of intuition centers on desire: Life is suffering, he said, and suffering is caused by desire. Therefore, the way to eliminate suffering is to eliminate desire. 

Though I ultimately disagree with the Buddhist view of the world, I don’t disagree that desire can cause great suffering. 

There was a time when I would regularly threaten to turn Buddhist and run away to Canada. 

I wasn’t serious, of course; I was trying to communicate–to those who might understand–that I was suffering. 

I was suffering–first–because of a desire to belong. 

I was suffering–second– because of a desire to be useful. 

The funny thing is that when I look back, I see quite clearly that I had those things. I had friendship and community. I had meaningful work. But I couldn’t see what I had because I was focused on what I had not yet achieved. 

What I was missing was contentment. 

I think the word “contentment” has some unfortunate baggage. It’s become kind of a  consolation prize (consolation is another beautiful word with unfortunate baggage!). You don’t get what you want, so you get “contentment” instead. 

You haven’t found a spouse, so you get to be “content” as a single person. 

You haven’t gotten the job you want, so you get to be “content” in the stupid job you already have. 

Contentment is perhaps, in our modern usage, synonymous with resignation, even stoicism. 

I think that, for much of my life, I was trying to practice Buddhism–trying to eliminate desire–without the robes and prayer flags and begging bowls. 

But Christianity doesn’t exactly teach the elimination of desire. 

For the Christian, desire is neither something to follow selfishly at all times nor something to squash and repress or seek to eliminate. We yield our desires to God and we ask him to fulfill those desires that we believe are good and in accordance with His will–and when our desires remain unfulfilled, we trust and wait to see what He will do. 

Because He will always do something good. 

Contentment, in the biblical sense, is not resignation. It isn’t stoicism. Contentment is satisfaction; it is fulfillment. It is a kind of deep joy and rest that we experience–not because everything in our lives is perfect, or because we have achieved all of our goals, both spiritual and temporal–nor because we have totally rid ourselves of goals and desires–but because we have a relationship with God, whom we love above all things, whom we trust with our lives. 

Because Christ is with us, we can be fully open to the present moment, to experience all the beauty and goodness that God has created for us in it.