People dabble. And they dabble at Buddhism. And tonight I realized I've been too harsh on dabbling.
After all, I dabbled myself. On Buddhism and also other things (Chess, home repair, 3D printing, psychology)
Dabbling is normal and possibly necessary and unavoidable on the path of learning and exploration.
But dabbling is also an impediment at some point.
The question of dabbling is actually pretty essential. It speaks to learning and change. When something is important, dabbling is a good start. But if someone gets stuck at the "dabbling-stage", then they may not go very far.
A good way to think about it is that dabbling is like treating something like a hobby. And one goes beyond dabbling by choosing to become an expert, or making it more like one's job. Notice the word "choosing to". It's about the "attitude" to the subject. It's actually not about your skill level. There can be beginner "dabblers". And also beginners who aren't dabbling, who treat it more seriously. So, in my terminology, dabbling is a limiting stage. One that suggests one isn't really serious about something.
Tinkering is like dabbling. But tinkering is more about one's actions/exploration, than about one's attitude. There are serious students or professionals that tinker. Tinkering can be a lot about expertise. Tinkering can be serious business, at least in the divergent stage of exploring more and more ideas. Dabblers can tinker, but they don't have to. Serious students don't have to tinker, but they can. The purpose of this paragraph is to say that tinkering is like dabbling and they often overlap, but there isn't a tight coupling. Why? Dabbling is about attitude and goal. Tinkering is a tactic/technique.
So, that gets to Buddhism and dabbling.
Everyone starts with dabbling at Buddhism. This is true because one can't have a serious attitude and deep goal when one isn't familiar with the terminology, the landscape, and the terms.
Upon hearing about the possibility to the "End of Suffering" and the 4 Noble Truths, it's possible for a complete beginner to "get serious" and really aim at ending their own suffering. Perhaps their life is full of suffering and grief. Perhaps much of it self-inflicted. But, a beginner, even one with a "get serious" attitude, is still dabbling. They are enamored and glamoured of the end result. But Buddhism is as much about the path as it is about the endpoint/goal. And, regarding the path, they don't really know.
It's like a kid watching basketball on TV and saying, "I want to be like Michael Jordan." But never practicing basketball yet. In a very narrow sense, they are very earnest and dedicated. But that dedication is unlikely to have follow through in most cases. That dedication is untested and uninformed. And for that reason, I'd say they are still at the dabbling stage.
Moving beyond dabbling is about the attitude when faced with difficulties/obstacles. When things are hard, a lot of people give up. And so, the boy with the basketball realizes that long practices are not fun. And they'd rather play Xbox. Fair enough. They still like basketball, they may even love it. They play it everyday at recess. But this is back to dabbling. The serious student faces the difficulties and says, implicitly or explicitly, "I think it's worth it to go through the hard parts to level up." At that point, they have moved beyond dabbling. At least temporarily.
At some point, they may plateau. They may get really good, maybe even play at the college level. But maybe other priorities get bigger. A life partner and kids, perhaps. Or the call of fortune in business. Or family drama. When they decide "Going through the hard parts isn't worth it", that's when they go back to dabbling.
I LOVE dabbling. I love exploring things. I can pick up hundreds of hobbies, get really intense, watch endless youtube tutorials. And then give up on them for a while. And then pick them back up. And then give them up for a while. I kinda hate saying this is dabbling, because I am "intense and hardcore" and like to be better and win, but I have to be honest. I am a great big dabbler. I'm not a serious student.
How can I tell? Well, I have a saying I repeat: "You can do anything you want in life, but you can't do everything." For me, the hard part, the obstacle, is time. And, when it comes down to it, I often don't have the time to get serious about so many things. IF I had the time, I probably would be a serious student of many things. After all, I took over 15 AP tests as a kid. A few of those courses weren't even taught in my high school. I just picked up a book and started reading. So the curiosity and drive is there. But the time isn't. I think this is common for many people. People may not want to stay in the dabbling phase, but they don't have the ability to commit the time. And that's a motivational issue ina constrained (24 hours a day) environment. You might be motivated to want to learn. But are you motivated to set aside the time to learn more.
So, we dabble. And dabbling is good. For me, I dabble at playing the trumpet. I pick it up and it feels like it "feeds my soul". I've been playing around with a trumpet mute. And thinking of that song I love, "If only", by Olu Dara. It's fun. It's inspiring. I'm getting better. But, I'm still dabbling. I'm not motivated enough to really focus on leveling up. Luckily, dabbling still allows a leveling up. Whatever we practice, we get better at, bit by bit. When kids learn reading (or adults learn a foreign language), just being around it and practicing is the path to getting better. And, similarly, if we practice being angry or indignant, we get better at these unskillful skills/habits. Even if we don't intend to. Even if we are just dabbling with white supremacy.
I used to be very annoyed with people who dabble with Buddhism. Buddhism is serious stuff, and it is meant to be taken very seriously. And, of course, serious means that people do it my way, or at least in a way that I approve. I can laugh and smile at this now. Ridiculous! But not so long ago, I would spin myself in a tizzy about it. It helps for me to remember that I dabbled with Buddhism for years. Some days, I'm still dabbling in the sense that things are hard and I kinda give up. Or I don't make the time. So, I gotta not be too hard on dabbling. In particular, I want to guard my own citta by making sure I don't harden based on my own spinning thoughts. My own GAD.
Furthermore, just like some kids dabble at basketball and I dabble at trumpet, others can dabble at Buddhism and that's 100% okay. REPEAT TO EUGENE'S JUDGY BRAIN: That is 100% okay. Dabbling doesn't mean they aren't going to get better. They often are. Dabbling also doesn't mean they will be dabblers forever. Someday, I may make the switch and get serious about the trumpet. And everyone has limits on time. So, they have to dabble on some things, even if they love and treasure them. There is no advantage for me to be so judgy. That judgyness is a self-inflicted wound, a bad habit of the mind.
(ASIDE: Some people dabble about their relationships/marriage. And that can be okay, but it can also cause conflict if the other side wants them to get serious. But how can you force someone to be serious about something? Yes, there is a scientific method around motivation; there are things that can help turn it on. But there isn't a reliable on switch. And even if the motivation is turned on for a few days, it may not last.)
While I am starting to be tolerant of dabbling (in others and in myself), there is something I'm still struggling with: Sometimes people say they are serious about something when they are really just dabbling (at least from my perspective). In terms of teaching programming to kids, this is a big deal. A kid can say they are serious. But the actions matter more than the words. Do they put in the time? Do they confront difficulties and work through them? If not, then their words are "I'm serious", but their actions say, "Dabble." This doesn't mean to write them off. Someday they may switch from dabbling to serious. But, the one big thing is that you can't force a person to switch, not reliably. They gotta want it themselves. The US idiom is that you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink. To build on that metaphor, you can force them to drink a little bit. If you put in high stakes testing or bribe them, they will do the action. You can trick the horse, cajole the horse, bribe the horse. So, the metaphor is perhaps more accurate with a few words added.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them want to drink.
And the Buddha knew this, I think. He would give up teaching to some people, or at least give up on teaching them very actively. Because they gotta want it. Instead, for them, there is the gradual path. The gradual path fits better. It fits people who are dabblers. People who might just want to go 1/4 of the way, not all the way. Of they are 100% earnest and want to go all the way, but they don't have the time.
I notice a kind of my struggling myself. It is a common pattern. I get really frustrated when I help people who say they are serious and are actually dabblers. One of the issues is that, since they are dabblers, sometimes very sincere dabblers, they ask for a lot of help and advice. But, the problem is that you can give 100 hours of advice to a dabbler, and they will maybe use bits and pieces and maybe practice only an hour or two. You can see the signs. They will constantly make excuses, sometimes justifiable. They will critique the advice (I do this a lot too. My egotism and sense that I know more keeps me very on guard against learning from others. It's not helpful.)
For someone who is really serious, they can take 1 hour of advice, or just 2 or 3 sentences, and they can practice it for hours and hours and hours. I've seen this in kids learning music or basketball. If they love it, they can take one move/idea, and just practice the hell out of it. And they don't get tired. They get curious. They get sensitive. They get nuance. They grow like crazy. (It does help to be inherently skilled and gifted. Like a basketball player with height, dexterity, and reach. Performing well can enhance motivation. But it doesn't enhance grit, ability to overcome setbacks. In some cases, talent can probably slow/retard the development of grip. I know, for me, early Buddhist success was an impediment for later overcoming fresh difficulties.)
I'm doing the Satipatthana mind-memory-framework around vedana (emotions), and I notice how angry I get at people who do that: who are dabbling and say they are serious. I notice the unpleasant. I notice the spinning (rope and wind, constricted and scattered). And that fire burns long and hard.
Of course, this is my own creation. There is a simple solution. Don't treat everyone who says they are serious as serious. Look at their actions. Give proportionate and appropriate help.
When people ask for specific help, look at the help you think will be really helpful. There is a truism in the (reformed) nonprofit world: ask people what they need and give it to them. This is an antidote to the paternalistic attitude of, "I know what they need. I'll give them what I think they need". The helpful could be either, neither, or a mixture of both. But, in this context of dabbling, the answer is to collaboratively figure out a "next step", and a step that reveals and learns about what will be helpful. Too often, we want the "silver bullet" that works perfectly and every time. People are different, messy. (I am messy too). And things work iteratively. We've been spoiled by mass-produced well-engineered products to believe that consistency is normal and easy. It's not the norm in the universe. And it's not easy.
Furthermore, remember that "They don't owe you anything. And you don't owe them anything." The first part says: if you provide 100 hours of help, they don't owe you carrying any of it out. Similarly, the second part says, "they may be the best student, so needy and deserving, and you don't owe them even 5 minutes." Everything you give is a gift. They can do with it however they want. And you can choose to stop giving anytime too. And remember: if you gave something useful and they really care, they can look to what they've already been given and get a lot out of it. The crux isn't how much YOU (as in Eugene... I'm talking to myself) give. The crux will always be about their motivation and desire to follow through.
Don't be surprised either if someone goes from serious to dabbler. Remember that YOU do this too. Just slow down. And remember to have goodwill instead of ill will, and especially sneaky ill will / buddhist baseball bat.
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Dabbling and sex? In fact, people don't dabble at sex/popularity. They are obsessed with it. So sex/popularity is something people will say they treat lightly, for fun. But, looking at their actions, they are deadly serious about sex/popularity. As a piece of evidence: they can take a small idea and spend 1000s of hours chasing that idea.
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COMMENT: Beware of critiquing dabbling as part of the Buddhist Baseball Bat syndrome. Ultimately, this perspective on dabbling is for me to be more aware of my own actions around both (1) my own dabbling and (2) interacting with people who are dabbling.
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Synonyms for Dabblers
- Tire kickers
- Fly by night
- mile wide, inch deep
- Tourists
- Time wasters / Time Suckers
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