James Kullander

JK: So even back then you were drawn toward painful experiences.

Pema Chödrön: I guess so. But what I really remember from the 1950s is everyone always smiling. It wasn’t until I studied Freud in college that I had any inkling there was anything below the surface.

JK: Freud observed that we’re awfully hard on ourselves, that we judge ourselves and others all the time. Do you think this sort of judging is inherent in human nature, or is it something learned?

Pema Chödrön: Several years ago the Dalai Lama was in a conference with Western Buddhist teachers. At one point, meditation teacher Sharon Salzberg brought up the subject of self-hatred. She said it was a major issue that had to be addressed by anybody teaching Buddhism in the West. The Dalai Lama didn’t know what she was talking about. So he went around the room and asked the other Western teachers about it, and every one of them agreed with her. Self-hatred was something that the Dalai Lama literally didn’t understand.

The first noble truth of the Buddha is that people experience Dukkha, a feeling of suffering. We feel this dissatisfaction because we’re not in tune with our true nature, our basic goodness. And we aren’t going to be fundamentally, spiritually content until we get in tune. Dzigar Kongtrul, my teacher for the past five years, says that only in the West is this dissatisfaction articulated. It seems that thinking of oneself as flawed is more a Western phenomenon than a universal one. And if you’re teaching Western students, it has to be addressed, because until that self-hatred is at least partially healed, people can’t experience absolute truth. — Beliefnet.com