HOW MANY PEOPLE DOES IT take to make your life into a spiritual practice?
Never mind if your partner will not cooperate. Sanity — consciousness — can only come into this world through you. You do not need to wait for the world to become sane, or for somebody else to become conscious, before you can be enlightened. You may wait forever. Do not accuse each other of being unconscious.
The moment you start to argue, you have identified with a mental position and are now defending not only that position but also your sense of self. The ego is in charge. You have become unconscious. At times, it may be appropriate to point out certain aspects of your partner's behavior. If you are very alert, very present, you can do so without ego involvement — without blaming, accusing, or making the other wrong.
The passage above comes from one of my newest favorite books of all time The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. I think it's a perfect way to "be here and now," which is something that Tolle himself equates with the idea of god (with an uncapitalized g). The last sentence in the passage above is what I find most useful.
Let me quote just it again here, "If you are very alert, very present, you can do so [point out certain aspects of your partner's behavior] without ego involvement — without blaming, accusing, or making the other wrong." The idea of this post came as a profound afterthought after a light (but deep) discussion with my mother during our car ride in the afternoon today. Our topic was simple, Why do people blame, accuse, or make the other wrong? Well, this may sound like a banal topic, but it isn't.
In the passage above, Eckhart Tolle argues that it's because the ego is in charge, and when that happens we place all the emphasis on the "me," "me," and "me" and only see everyone else as a culprit who is living against my being. Look, guys, this is interesting because I usually do not have time to blame, accuse, or make the other wrong, directly or indirectly. In fact, as I have written about earlier, I wholeheartedly believe that gossiping is a crime against humanity.
I don't associate myself with those who regularly engage in gossiping because (although I do not judge them) I think I have the right to protect myself by choosing not to be friends with them. Make no mistake, as Harvard Business Review reports, information overload is now a serious problem that can hurt your efficiency. It's better to #unfriend gossipy people if you want to keep your efficiency up, let alone keep your hope and faith in humanity.
Now that I think about it again (more carefully this time) the urge to answer this question actually never came to me earlier than today. It's simply because I always like to spend time improving myself, rather than bringing other people down. Sadly, there are many people who find pleasure in doing so. Just today I often to overheard a conversation between two strangers. While the first one was obviously very proud of his recent job promotion, the other one was doing the best he could to bring him down.
I heard, "Someone else got a better promotion." I honestly did not understand why the second person (I assume was a "colleague" or "friend") could not just be happy with the first one. Again, I only knew very little about what's going between these two. The one who got promoted didn't talk back, walk away. Instead, he smiled at everything that the second person had to say. Well, maybe there's a point there. Maybe they're true friends.
Maybe there's a point in having a true friend like that to keep your ego in check. As a trained anthropologist (and still trying so hard to be a practicing Buddhist), I also rarely judge other people. One very very simple reason: I simply don't have the time to judge everything and everyone. My mother gets annoyed at me when I couldn't help her decide which shirt she would wear to go out, or which food to eat for dinner. I simply do not have any opinion.
I simply don't have the willpower to judge which is better. Either, or even both, is okay. There're so many things in the world I would like to judge, such as the quality of great non- fiction writings (yes, I am a nerd so I read about 200 non-fiction books a year), or the importance of acclaimed architectural edifices and how they shape how we think about the environment.
I see people's making judgment on someone or something based news they hear from the television, based on from gossip they eavesdropped from a stranger, and based on from flaw sources. These are the sources that they themselves would not make any important decisions based on. It's only so ironic how these people are so comfortable making judgment about others based on these sources that they themselves would not rely on.
Psychologically speaking, the kinds of things one can make a "snap judgement" about those that "confirm" your already established (however credible) assumption. This kind of snap judgement is called "heuristics." It's a mental shortcut that most of us use to make decisions (although, not all decisions are judgments, and not all judgements are equal). Clearly I can make a quick decision about wearing black rather than red today.
I have to make a judgment which shirt to wear but it's not a big decision, and whichever option that I choose probably won't lead to a calamitous result (as long as I use my now-favourite Issey Miyake Nuit D'Issey perfume). That said, this snap decision is barely a good one. Almost always, we're already biased by our lack of something.
An example: If you can't afford an iPhone and have recently heard from someone -- just one person -- about a new iPhone's being bad, you're likely to think that the iPhone isn't worth your hard-earned cash.
Psychologically, you are being "pre-suaded" (Dr Bob Caidini's term) to "pre-judge" the new iPhone by your own pre-existing "confirmation bias." Just to complicates things a bit: If somehow someone happens to tells you that the iPhone really isn't good, you're very very (as in 87.5%) likely to confirm your judgement that the iPhone really really isn't good -- even though you have never touched it, never seen it, and all you know is the name of the product and the fact that "two people in the world" have said it isn't good.
How strange. That is to say, that "lack of something" is the pathological symptom of jealousy. If you ever notice yourself, whenever you feel the urge to accuse, blame, or make someone wrong, it's almost always the case that you're jealous of that person. Hold on. I know what you're thinking about: Your sudden "snap decision" to disagree with the statement. You might say, "But I blame my inferior everyday, clearly as a superior, there's nothing that the inferior could have that I don't." Muse over that for a second.
That feeling of lack doesn't have anything to do with rank; but with appearance, age, personality, or even the ability to be carefree with life for which you, a superior, always yearn but do not have. As all the Stoic philosophers like to say when someone is accusing you, "Be proud; nobody accuse, blame, or gossip about a dead dog." I have written about this earlier but let me repeat it again. In dealing with people's accusing, blaming, and making you wrong, just rise above.
You have something that they do not have, and that's why they're trying to bring you down. What I usually do is this two golden steps: Forgive and forget. You'd rather enjoy yourself -- be in the moment -- than dignifying jealousy.
Judging others -- let alone accusing or blaming -- based on information confirming your bias is nothing less of judging the quality of the entire Indian Ocean by the small cup of water you have just scooped up from a small contaminated river two thousand miles away from that Ocean. As I have written earlier, one of my 12 rules for life is to be content with not having to have an opinion on things about which I do not know.
This goes without saying that I am a big fan of Dr Jordan B Peterson's "set your house in perfect order before criticizing the world" rule. And since a "perfect order" is rarely accomplishable, don't criticize. Live your life in the here and the now.
Back to Tolle's words "If you are very alert, very present, you can do so without ego involvement — without blaming, accusing, or making the other wrong." In short, I find the act of badmouthing other people to be intellectually, spiritually and morally a big fat waste of time. One rule still applies: Don't engage, walk away.
On Freedom