How can one deal with social pressure, status, money, put upon oneself to get the expectations of close relatives and friends fulfilled?
How can I explain to them the ideas of Buddhism?
Explaining Buddhism to others is very difficult.
It can be done.
The best thing is to
practice yourself and be a source of information for people.
So you should not try to impose Buddhism on others, proselytize.
The most effective form of proselytizing
that I've seen is the Mormons, I think.
Probably the Jehovah's Witnesses are the same.
But the Mormons, they don't push their religion on you.
They just come visit you.
Then they just sit there and talk to you.
and let you ask them questions.
That's what it seems to me.
Or maybe they're just afraid of me, so they don't.
But they would just sit there and I'd be able to put all my questions to them and test them out and scrutinize.
And they end up being very approachable and likable.
And you can see that that's really, that seemed to be how they got the good word out there.
Just by being kind and approachable, being nice people.
by being real people and by being fallible, by not pretending to be all-knowing, omnipotent beings with all the answers.
Once you become self-righteous or
To become sure of yourself, then you really lose people, dogmatic and so on.
But when you talk about your experiences, rather than pretending or trying to be Buddha, trying to say, I have to be Buddha.
in order to help these people and answer their questions, just answer as best you can.
Say, you know, I really don't know.
For example, the best example we have is Asaji, who was an Arahant.
And yet when he was asked, after becoming an Arahant, five days into his practice,
after being asked by Upatissa what is the Buddha taught the first thing he said is I'm only newly gone forth I don't have a good comprehensive understanding of this teaching which is true that he didn't because only a Buddha can have that kind of understanding so he hadn't gained all this knowledge that he would gain by being in close contact with the Buddha over time even as an Arahant
So it's important to be fallible, to not pretend to be something you're not, and to just talk about why you've practiced Buddhism and what benefit you see in it.
And explain that, yeah, you're not, you don't really know, but you've talked to these people, and it really is logical, it's reasonable, it seems to work.
When you put it into practice,
do seem to feel happier and more peaceful, which is really what we're trying to gain.
When you clear your mind up at that moment, when you're able to be clear in mind, when you're able to give up worldly pursuits and give up the requirements that are put on you by society,
then you really find true peace and happiness.
And so as a result, you find it difficult to be ambitious about things which you know are really going to just bring you stress and suffering and dissatisfaction and ultimately disappointment.
So talking openly, because really what you're dealing with is other people's neuroses, other people's brainwashing and conditioning that these things are good.
When you deal with people who have expectations for you, well those expectations were pushed into them, were ingrained into them by society, by parents.
Sometimes they were beaten as children.
Our parents may have had a horrible child, very repressive childhoods that have caused them to be as a result repressive towards us and demanding of us.
And friends are totally indoctrinated by society.
So they always come back and tell us how we're indoctrinated.
We had a woman, everyone said she was brainwashed.
All these people who are totally brainwashed by society into thinking and believing such ridiculous things that are irrational and that they'll even accept as being irrational.
Like someone came and said he knows that attachments are wrong.
Buddha taught this and I know it.
But still we have these.
And then they can turn around and call us brainwashed, right?
When really, if they're honest with themselves, they can see that they're brainwashed.
So be honest and be demanding and not be expecting too much because given the fact that these are really mental states that they have to deal with, the only thing that's going to really help them is meditation.
And people who are meditative, people who are letting go, not people who are putting expectations on them.
So it would be wrong for you to expect them to give up their expectations, but you should be a sounding board, like a blotter almost.
You pick up and just take in their, like a vacuum, you take in their stresses and their requirements and you listen and you accept them, but you don't react to them.
And when they get angry at you and call you a loser, a bum and so on, accept it.
and react with it rationally and as though they were talking about someone else.
If someone came to you and said, that guy's a bum, well, you'd be able to react rationally.
That person is useless and I want that person to do this and that.
You'd be able to look and say, well, you know, sometimes people, you can't force people to do things or whatever, or this is just leading you to suffering.
If they don't do this, you're just going to suffer.
So kind of taking yourself out of the picture, which is accomplished by giving up self and so on.