Idealism. The achievement mind is based in ideals; ideals of ourselves and ideals of others. When it's directed towards ourselves, we wish to become something better. We wish to achieve, to become an ideal of ourselves that we have created. Sometimes, we would like to be perfect. This ideal brings up the energy to go out and become that, but often it's coming from a sense of rejection of who and what we are.
So, hints on the achievement mind if it's directed toward self-idealism and trying to become something better: We want to look and see how we are relating to who we are now. Are we having Compassion for ourselves now? This has to do with the talk that I give to the new students tonight, about learning how to open to who we are and practice through Compassion moment-to-moment. Through Compassion to ourselves, we try to let go of our Dukkha, not by rejecting the negative things that we see, but by opening with Compassion to the Dukkha that arises from our ignorance.
If we can transform the effort to achieve into the Compassionate motivation to open to Dukkha, to see the cause of it, and try to find the way out of it, moment-to-moment, based on the Four Noble Truths, then our practice will be based in Right Intention or the Compassionate motivation for ourselves and others. Then, there's less of a wish to become. If there's an achievement mind, then there is always a sense of self, wanting to be, wanting to be, but suffering and Dukkha actually tend to fade away when we're not wanting to be so much, when we're letting go of this idea of me and just opening to Dukkha, the cause of it, and trying to let it go, moment-to-moment or day-by-day.
That does not mean that we throw away our ideals because it's nice to have a direction, but we don't impose them onto who we are now. Our idealism has to be balanced with a realistic idea of what our capabilities are, but that doesn't mean we freeze those limitations. We always realize we have the capacity to expand those limits, not through a sense of, "I'll be a good meditator if I expand those limits" or "I'll be able to like myself better if I'm able to do this," but because we see that it helps us lessen our suffering and touch more that human potential that lies within us. The Energy Parami needs to be balanced here with the Wisdom and Compassion Paramis. Sometimes the achievement mind has strong Determination and Energy, but not enough Compassion and Wisdom.
That does not mean that Energy and Determination are not important Paramis. I often give the analogy of a wild horse. The Energy and Determination Paramis are like a wild horse, with lots of energy and dynamic. In order to train that wild horse, do you cut the legs off the horse? Seems a bit stupid, doesn't it? So we don't want to lessen our capacity for Energy and Determination; we just want to learn how to direct it in the right way. We train the Energy and Determination to be directed in the right way. That is, they need to be preceded by and/or balanced with the Compassion and Wisdom Paramis so that we can channel the Determination and Energy in the right way. Personally, I would prefer people to have a bit of achievement mind because it is very dynamic; it is a bit like that wild horse. In the beginning, it is very useful if we can learn how to train it, in the right direction and balance it with Compassion and the unselfish emotions and with Wisdom.