📖 Introduction
Growing up in a difficult environment leaves deep emotional scars. Childhood poverty, hunger, and hardship often manifest later in life as a severe inferiority complex. To protect ourselves from feeling vulnerable, we build thick walls of pride, striving for absolute perfection at work and fighting relentlessly for success just to prove our worth. Yet, behind this aggressive, “flawless” mask, we feel isolated. We struggle to express love to our families, argue over trivial matters, and become exhausted by the constant need to pretend we are stronger and better than everyone else. But what happens when you finally stop pretending and break free from the painful mold of your past?
In this post, a 53-year-old man shares a breathtaking journey of self-reflection. After seeing his wife’s positive changes, he gave up his Lunar New Year holiday to attend a meditation camp. There, he confronted the deep trauma of his impoverished childhood and the intense perfectionism and pride he used to cover it up.
Read his incredibly moving story to see how discarding the painful pictures of the past reveals an eternally unchanging, truly happy mind.
💬 Story: 🎁 “A Precious and Marvelous Time Giving Up the Lunar New Year Holiday”
By Jungkwon Je / Age 53 / Level 1
Seeing the true, changing appearance of my wife who started this meditation a few years ago, I came to the Main Center of this meditation with a half-believing, half-doubting mind. However, unlike what I thought, this meditation was not a meditation space that made me dignified and cultured, but a marvelous process of exploring the truth by discarding the picture world, which is the fake world in one’s mind, and finding the true world.
“Looking back on my life, during my poor childhood, I was scolded by my teacher for not being able to pay tuition, so I hated going to school, and I often filled my hungry stomach with water because I couldn’t pack a lunch box. When I returned home from school, I helped with chores and always devoted myself to farming. Because of this, I lacked confidence in front of others, became timid, and tried to cover it up with pride rather than revealing my flaws.”
Before starting this meditation, I acted within my own mold, so I lacked ways to express love even among my family, and we frequently argued over trivial matters. Because I grew up in a difficult environment, a strong inferiority complex surfaced, so I had to be flawless in my relationships with people or when handling tasks at work. Also, because I hated losing in competition with others and ran forward solely with the drive for promotion and success, looking back now, it was a foolish me without my true self.
Living for fifty-three years, every time I subtracted the remembered thoughts from the pictures my body took in my mind according to the method, I could confirm the change in my mind. Also, as I discarded the remembered thoughts of my lived life, the true world gradually became clear.
“I lived a fake world wasting my life, pretending to be better than others, pretending to be stronger, and thinking negatively rather than positively. When I discarded the picture world taken with my body as I lived until now, the revealed universe was the unwavering, eternally unchanging world itself.”
It was the truly happy mind itself that cannot be expressed in words. The meditation method that enlightened me, who thought I was the best due to an inferiority complex and greed for work, to the correct answer to the most important question in life. I am thankful, and thankful again to the Level 1 helpers, my wife, my daughter, and all connections.
Completing Level 1 by even giving up the Lunar New Year holiday is a precious and valuable gift to me. Now that “I know the true world,” I make a firm resolution that I will finish all the Levels until I become this very thing. Why does the spring rain falling through the meditation room window feel so cozy today?
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🌱 NEXT STEPS: Clear Your Mind Today
Are you hiding your insecurities behind a wall of pride and perfectionism, exhausted from pretending to be stronger than you are? You do not have to let childhood hardships dictate the rest of your life. Discover how discarding the painful memories of the past can melt away your inferiority complex and bring you true, unwavering happiness.
👉 Book a Free Introductory Session at Santa Clara Meditation https://santaclarameditation.org/free-meditation-introduction
