Regret

I was in a pickle. My dad sent me an email inviting me to the symphony. I was all excited until I realized that the date of the symphony was the second day of sesshin. I didn't know what to do.
Part of me felt like, "C'mon, it's seven days, you can miss one night to go the symphony with your dad."
But part of me felt like, "No, the whole point of this sesshin is that you really can slow down, be present to each moment, each activity that you do all day long. Going to the symphony with your dad will bring things in to your sesshin. Let it go about your dad and actually experience this sesshin fully."

It felt weird to be "choosing" sesshin over my dad. But then I thought, "No, you go to the symphony with him once a month. You're not choosing sesshin over your dad. He asked you, out of the blue, on a day when you normally don't go to the symphony. You're busy, it's okay to say no."

And then I pictured telling my dad this:
"Sorry Daddy, I can't go to the symphony. It's on the second day of sesshin at the zen center."
"Sesshin?"
"Uh, yeah. It's this thing where we meditate for seven days straight."
"Meditate?"
"Um, yeah...we, uh, sit... and we, uh, face the wall, and we... breathe... and we uh..."

Maybe I'll just tell him that I'm taking a class at the zen center.

But then I would be lieing to my dad, and I didn't want to do that.

"Oooh," I thought. "I have therapy this week. I can talk to my therapist about this and then get back to my dad."

So, I didn't respond to his email.

The next day, I got another email from him but this time, it was a confirmation of his purchase of the tickets for the show.
"Oh my gosh!" I thought. "He hadn't bought the tickets yet! And now he has bought them. I can't go, and I knew that, and I didn't tell him because I didn't want to deal with whatever I was dealing with. I wanted to wait, to make things smooth, to try to change the situation. I didn't want to accept whatever I was dealing with, I wanted to have it both ways. And because of that, he bought the tickets."

I sent him an email immediately, telling him I couldn't go and apologizing for not telling him sooner. That felt better, but what I had done felt horrible.
And I thought about this: why the email telling him that I couldn't go felt okay, but the waiting to tell him felt so bad. I thought about how it felt sending that email, being honest with him, treating him with respect instead of trying to create some fantasy relationship with him. And I thought, "You know what? I think if you had responded to his email right away, if you had just been honest with him, just been present to what you were experiencing at the time, I don't think you would have regretted your decision. I think that what feels so bad is the deception, the manipulation, the attempt to change the way things were. Even though you would have felt bad saying you couldn't go with him, I don't think you would have regretted it or wished you had done it another way because you would have been yourself and you would have been honest."

It's funny, my big thing about all of this was this whole idea that there was some kind of choosing between the zen center and my dad, that I would have to explain the importance of sesshin to him, that I would have to talk with him about what's going on with me and the zen center. But in that email that I sent, as soon as I saw that he had bought the tickets, I said nothing about the zen center- just that I couldn't go. Because that was all he needed to know- that I couldn't go and that hopefully he could return the tickets. In the email that I sent, I was present to him, not to my fears and anxieties, and that felt good.

I got three more emails from him:
The first one told me how great the show was going to be, how much the tickets were selling for on- line, and how much of a deal he was able to get on the seats because he was a season ticket holder.
The second one suggested that we try to find someone to buy them (or give them to).
The third one said "Oooops, I forgot. I'm having a medical procedure a few days prior to the concert. I probably couldn't have made it to the performance anyway but would have felt like I should keep my commitment to you and so would have gone. It probably is for the best that you can't make it. I can't make it either."

I laughed when I read the third one, because this is how life is. You really never know how things are going to turn out. But I still think that accepting the situation, instead of trying to change it, just makes it easier to let it go, to not get caught up in it, to make peace with this life and to not regret what you do in it.