Cynicism

  Perhaps the essence of cynicism is "been there and done that", without realizing that there are no two steps that have been in the same place. It's important to be mindful of when the mind becomes weary and falls into the habit of expecting negative things--repetitions of the past--to happen again. In those moments, we must have the courage to face things freshly knowing that they really are new experiences. This is the essence of beginner's mind, in fact, but I realize in myself the strong resistance, the thought that if I open myself up to beginner's mind, I might take on too many of the same things as before. Cynicism can only be countered with a kind of disciplined decision to be surprised by the moment--in fact, to see inspiration as a choice and not as something that just happens out of a whim or as a result of novelty. We have to always be on guard against this habit of falling back into a habitual malaise--a kind of feeling that nothing new is to be discovered, or an attitude which protects us from being alive.