Behind The Mask ~ SEEING BEYOND
SELF
Someone
once came to me to complain that his mother was overly-superstitious
and believed in untenable things. I told him that
he was lucky to have such a mother and that he should
regard her as his teacher, as she unintentionally
provides him with an example of things to be avoided,
if possible.
It is normal and natural for kids to rebel
against authority, but often, it is just rebellion
for the sake of rebellion—a blind hitting-out
at things that are not understood. If we understood
things clearer, and rebelled intelligently, our rebellion
would not only satisfy our need to rebel and assert
ourselves—a normal part of growing up and learning
to stand on our own feet—but would enhance psychological
growth and maturation. Indeed, such rebellion should
go on throughout our lives and not just when we are
young (that’s just a ‘practice-run’),
because the forces of darkness, ignorance and oppression
are always with us—within and without—and
our search for truth necessarily entails rebellion—rebellion
against everything that is not true, everything that
is wrong and harmful.
It is just as important to know what is
wrong as it is to know what is right, and if we can
perceive and understand wrong in others, we might
be able to avoid such wrong in ourselves. Imperfections
in others provide us with a platform for going further
than them ourselves, and so we should be grateful
to other people for their faults and failings as well
as for their good points and things we admire in them.
This requires discernment on our parts, not fault-finding,
and we must keep it in mind that no-one wants to be
wrong or bad. We all have negativities of character,
but this is not because we want such things (we are
all mentally imbalanced to some degree, as we are
this side of Enlightenment, but we are not that crazy!)
So, recognizing that we have our faults and limitations,
we learn to be more tolerant of, and to make allowances
for such things in others, and in this way, something
positive can be seen in negativity; there is white
in the black.
No-one is 100% bad, and to say about someone—as
we sometimes do—that, "he is no good",
is not only incorrect but is a limitation of ourselves,
and actually says more about ourselves than about
the one we are referring to, as it means we have failed
to perceive anything good about that person, and there
is—there must be—something good about
him, as he is a human being. Thus, that is something
we should never say.
When we turn our gaze inwards, introspectively,
to see what is there, we must be equipped with honesty
and courage, as we are sure to find, almost immediately,
frightful and horrible creatures lurking there, things
that, hitherto, we have managed to suppress and contain
quite well, or to disguise with reason and rationalization
in order to preserve our relative sanity and self-respect,
or have pretended that they didn’t exist.
To many of us, it comes as a shock to discover
the presence of such disreputable characters as ambition,
pride, envy, anger, hatred, jealousy, lust, greed,
deviousness, hypocrisy and so on, ensconced in our
minds. It is even more of a shock to realize that
these things are not mere guests in temporary residence,
who can be given notice to leave at any moment, and
who will readily comply, but are elements of what
we call our character—that is, they are parts
of our psychic make-up. Compared with positive things
like generosity, self-restraint, kindness, understanding,
forbearance, willingness to step back at times and
make way for others, ability to recognize when we
are in the wrong and to apologize, and so on—the
negativities are stronger, more numerous, and more
tenacious.
The shock of discovering and recognizing
what is there is too much for many of us—understandably—and
we hurriedly back off and close the door on it all,
never to open it again, preferring to let things be
as they are and to live under the illusion that "all’s
well with the world".
But a chain is only as strong as its weakest
link. We have names for things like jealousy, anger,
greed, pride and so on, and recognize them as such,
only because they are there in us. If they existed
only in other people and not in ourselves how would
we be able to recognize and understand them? They
are probably remnants of our remote and primitive
past, when personal survival was of the utmost importance
and everyone had to look out for themselves. We can
see these things openly manifested in animals; they
are not found only in humans.
We do not live alone in this world, however,
and although, individually, we may turn away from
and refuse to admit the existence of negative states
of mind in us, collectively we cannot. The world is
made up of individuals, and if we ourselves, and even
the majority of people like us, refuse to see and
accept what is there within us, there will always
be some brave pioneers who will dare to venture where
most of us fear to tread. And their discoveries, painfully
gained and dearly bought—like the discoveries
of science—will then be available to the human
race as a whole, for people good and bad, weak and
strong, rich and poor, young and old, near and far,
just as, when a cure for cancer is finally found,
it will benefit humanity as a whole, and not just
the nation or race of the person who discovers it.
It is fascinating to see how, when we discover something
good, beautiful or true, we transcend the barriers
of like and dislike we have erected—or have
been erected—in our minds; our discoveries are
made available not just for people of our own various
groups, like family, nation, race, religion, or to
people who we like for whatever reason, but to all,
without distinction, including those we don’t
like. Discovery of the Good, the Beautiful and the
True liberates us from the narrow limits of self and
gives rise to love, and love, in this sense, does
not choose or divide and say: "I love these but
not those". It embraces all equally, without
discrimination, as it is not born of self but of understanding;
it has no center and therefore no circumference.
Although the present is the result of the
past, we have not made ourselves—you and I—as
we are now. It is very important to understand this,
so that we may cease feeling guilty and responsible.
This body-mind of ours is not of our own deliberate
creation, but is rather a product of countless forces
working together, and involving not a little ignorance.
Actually, we—as we are now—had very little
to do with its creation; we merely inherited it, like
something passed down in the family for generations,
although it never belonged to anyone else before us.
Imagine, if you had used your choice, intelligently,
from childhood, and if your choice had been enough
to bring about change, would you have chosen to be
as you are right now? Are there not things about yourself
that you are dissatisfied with, ashamed of, and would
like to be rid of, if you could? While everything
arises from causes, and nothing by accident, it does
not mean that we have carefully and consciously orchestrated
the causes to become as we are, for it is plain to
see that we are nowhere near to being masters of ourselves,
but are more like victims, led hither and thither
by our whims and fancies, which again, are things
that we do not understand, and which we did not deliberately
cultivate.
I am speaking of conditioning. We are products
of our environment and our times, results of countless
causes conspiring together, of innumerable influences
pressing on us from all sides, bending, turning, twisting,
molding, nurturing, brainwashing, indoctrinating us:
parents, siblings, friends, teachers, leaders, colleagues,
strangers and even enemies, by society and its ideals
and standards in general, language, education, politics,
religion, philosophy, climate, food, clothes, music,
television, fashion, the media, and so on. Simply
put, we are not ourselves, but neither are we the
creation of any one thing like a God, a factory production-line
or an artist’s studio; we are results of causes,
of conditioning; we react according to our conditioning,
and will continue to do so until we learn to understand
it, and then we might begin to operate more freely
and independently, might begin to rebel intelligently
instead of blindly, to put our powerful preferences
aside and look at things less subjectively and more
objectively, and to be more in control of our lives
than we are.
Even our names are not ours, but were given
to us, applied to us, stuck on us by others to enable
them to conveniently identify us and distinguish us
from others. We have accepted their names for us without
question and have taken them for real, so that, when
asked: "Who are you?" we answer with the
name that others have given us. This is a great mistake,
and a great loss, because, first of all, we do not
know who or what we are, and secondly, names and words
are not the things they refer to. We are much more
than a name that distinguishes us from others, much
more than a sound in the air or a word on paper; but
how much more, and who or what we are, we have yet
to discover.
Looking at things like this, we see that
people cannot be held totally responsible for their
actions, as they really do not know why they are doing
them, but are often merely reacting, as programmed
victims, according to their conditioning.
Poor humans! We stagger through life, not
knowing who we are, why we are here, where we came
from, or where we are going, subject to our blind
urges and fears, searching for and grasping after
happiness but usually finding only more of its opposite;
confused and suffering, we move ever forwards to the
dreaded finalé of death. Our situation as individuals
and even as members of the human race, is pitiable,
and, as we peer into the mists of the future, trying
to perceive something there and make sense of it all
and find some light therein, we may be excused for
feeling lost and hopeless.
Yet all is not black and bleak. If we look
back on the way we have come, and review our history
as a species, we may see a pattern in our sorrow and
madness, and path that twisted and turned, rose and
fell, doubled back on itself, came up against obstacles,
and indeed, often seemed to disappear altogether,
only to reappear elsewhere. Our collective history
has not been just a series of blunders, wars and crimes,
a record of man’s inhumanity to man, an utmost
unbroken trail of tragedy and suffering; we have also
made progress, not just in a material sense, but mostly
in a mental and spiritual way. We have achieved widespread
literacy in a very short time, and this is a great
leap forward, as it has altered our attitudes and
behavior and broadened our horizons tremendously.
And although we still give vent to our violent tendencies
in aggression and war, deep inside us, we know that
the old conviction that ‘might is right’
is not so. Our conscience is alive and well, though
not yet strong enough, perhaps, to prevent our passions
from carrying us away and leading us to do things
which we know to be wrong. But do we not respond,
on an unprecedented scale, to disasters and misfortunes
far away, by donating to help the victims, who are
often of different races, nationalities and religions
than our own? We are making progress, even if only
slowly and painfully; the picture of human-nature
is not totally black and negative; there is Yin as
well as Yang, and so much that is positive remains
to be discovered in us.
Life
is like a river:
Straight, it seldom flows,
But twists and turns and winds about,
As on and on it goes.
Life
is like a play, in which
We are all actors.
But the script is written as we act,
Not before, and no-one knows
What will happen next.
Alone, and by ourselves, we simply do not
exist; in isolation, our lives simply have no meaning.
Only when seen as parts of something else—in
context, like a piece of a jigsaw-puzzle—do
our lives have any sort of meaning. We do not live
alone, by and for ourselves. In order to make sense
of our lives, in order to be more in control of our
lives than we have been so far, in order to go in
the direction that we wish to go, in order to live
more positively, we must understand two things. First,
our conditioning: how we have come to be as we are,
that is, as the result of many causes, and not by
choice or plan; and secondly, that we do not live
alone. Our lives can only be lived effectively if
we understand that we are parts of the community,
and that whatever we do has an effect upon the community,
just as what all the other members of the community
do has an effect—even if we do not see or feel
it—upon us. We henceforth work, not just as
a way of earning a living and supporting our families,
but as a way of serving others; whatever work we do,
as long as it is within the limits of the Right Livelihood
of the Noble Eightfold Path, can and should be seen
as a way of contributing something to society, and
making the world a better place for all to live in;
one’s work therefore becomes—and is seen
as—part of one’s Dharma practice; it becomes
a spiritual or religious activity. Imagine how this
world would be if everyone would consider their work
in this way. People would find joy in their work instead
of working only for money, with long faces; they would
have much more energy and work more efficiently.
So, too, with study. We spend years in school
and university, some of us, all the time thinking
that we are studying for and helping only ourselves
instead of realizing that our studies enable us, first
of all, to overcome ignorance with knowledge, and
secondly, to be of more help in the world around us
than if we remained ignorant. It is not—or should
not be—just a matter of studying so as to become
better qualified and earn more money. But most people
do not realize this, and so study and work only for
themselves, locking themselves up and depriving themselves
of the satisfaction of knowing that what they are
doing is serving others and benefiting them, just
as they themselves benefit so much from the labors
of others. We are often so short-sighted that we see
no further than our own noses.
If and when we understand that almost everything
we have, as well as most of what we know, has come
from others, we cannot help but ask ourselves: "What
can I give? What can I put back, after receiving so
much?" The answer is, of course: In reality,
very little. In fact, we can put back almost nothing
that we have not first received. But what little we
can put back we should do so, not with the idea of
getting something else out in return, but because
it is the only thing we can do when we see how much
we benefit from belonging to the community we call
the World. And if the Communist leaders had understood
this, and had helped their people understand it, their
system might have stood a better chance of success.
Communism failed because it was an idea whose time
has not yet come; it was premature in a world that
was not ready for it; people cannot be made equal,
but must think equal, and treat others as they would
like others to treat them. The psychological basis
for Communism to succeed wasn’t there, and so
the leaders tried to force it to succeed, and we have
all seen the results of that.
We often hear Buddhists talk about ‘renouncing
the world’, by which they mean leaving their
homes and families, shaving their heads, and becoming
monks and nuns, instead of abandoning or transcending
selfishness. How can we ‘renounce the world’
when we are the world, when we can understand ourselves
only in context, as parts of something much bigger
than ourselves? It is not a question of seeing ourselves
as separate from the rest of life—’I’
as apart from ‘You’—but of realizing
the Oneness of Life—not mine, not yours, but
ours!
We live in this world for only a short time
and then die. We do not know what happens—or
even if anything happens at all—after we die;
we merely believe. About this life, however, we can
know something, and the time we spend here can be
either wasted or used to good effect. We leave our
marks in passing and, just as we have inherited so
much from people who lived here before us, we too
will leave something behind for those who come after
us. We create gardens, we create garbage. What are
we—you and I—going to leave behind us
for those who will follow?
We must have a vision of how we fit into
and belong to this world as integral parts, and how
we have a responsibility to live as members of it.
Hate the world and cause trouble in it, and we hurt
ourselves deeply thereby; love the world and do good
in it, and we help ourselves. It is in our own interests,
therefore, to live responsibly, thinking not just
about ourselves.
I would like to supplement and enhance what
I have written above with a passage from The Lessons
of History by the famous American historian, Will
Durant:
"We should not be greatly disturbed
by the probability that our civilization will die
like any other. As Frederick the Great of Prussia
asked his retreating troops at Kolin: "Would
you live forever?" Perhaps it is desirable that
life should take fresh forms, that new civilizations
and centers should have their turn. Meanwhile, the
effort to meet the challenge of the rising East may
reinvigorate the West.
"We have said that a great civilization
does not entirely die. Some precious achievements
have survived all the vicissitudes of rising and falling
states: the making of fire and light, of the wheel
and other basic tools; language, writing, art, and
song; agriculture, the family, parental care, social
organization, morality, and charity; the use of teaching
to transmit the lore of the family and the race. These
are the elements of civilization, and they have been
tenaciously maintained through the perilous passage
from one civilization to the next. They are the connective
tissue of human history.
"If education is the transmission of
civilization, we are unquestioningly progressing.
Civilization is not inherited; it has to be learned
and earned by each generation anew; if the transmission
should be interrupted for one century, civilization
would die, and we would be savages again. Our finest
contemporary achievement is our unprecedented expenditure
on higher education for all. Once, colleges were luxuries,
designed for the male half of the leisured class;
today, universities are so numerous that he who can
run may become a Ph.D. We may not have excelled the
selected geniuses of antiquity, but we have raised
the level and average of knowledge beyond any age
in history.
"None but a child will complain that
our teachers have not yet eradicated the errors and
superstitions of ten-thousand years. The great experiment
has just begun, and it may yet be defeated by the
high birth-rate of unwilling or indoctrinated ignorance.
But what would be the full fruitage of instruction
if every child should be schooled till at least his
twentieth year, and should find free access to the
universities, libraries and museums that harbor and
offer the intellectual and artistic treasures of the
race? Consider education not as the painful accumulation
of facts and dates and reigns, not merely the necessary
preparation of the individual to earn his keep in
the world, but as the transmission of our mental,
moral, technical, and aesthetic heritage as fully
as possible to as many as possible, for the enlargement
of man’s understanding, control, embellishment,
and enjoyment of life.
"The heritage that we can more fully
transmit is richer than ever before. It is richer
than that of Pericles, for it includes all the Greek
flowering that followed him; richer than Leonardo’s,
for it includes him and the Italian Renaissance; richer
than Voltaire’s, for it embraces all the French
Enlightenment and its ecumenical dissemination. If
progress is real despite our whining, it is not because
we are born any healthier, better, or wiser than infants
were in the past, but because we are born to a richer
heritage, born on a higher level of that pedestal
which the accumulation of knowledge and art raises
as the ground and support of our being. The heritage
rises, and man rises in proportion as he receives
it.
"History is, above all else, the creation
and recording of that heritage; progress is its increasing
abundance, preservation, transmission, and use. To
those of us who study history not merely as a warning
and reminder of man’s follies and crimes, but
also as an encouraging remembrance of generative souls,
the past ceases to be a depressing chamber of horrors;
it becomes a celestial city, a spacious country of
the mind, wherein a thousand saints, statesmen, inventors,
scientists, poets, artists, musicians, lovers, and
philosophers still live and speak, teach and carve
and sing. The historian will not mourn because he
can see no meaning in human existence except that
which man puts into it; let it be our pride that we
ourselves may put meaning into our lives, and sometimes
a significance that transcends death. If a man is
fortunate, he will, before he dies, gather up as much
as he can of his civilized heritage and transmit it
to his children. And to his final breath he will be
grateful for this inexhaustible legacy, knowing that
it is our nourishing mother and our lasting life".
Yes, we need a vision—a broad vision—of
how the present has arisen from the past, and how
we are now—and always—in the process of
creating the future, which is a result of everything
that has gone before. Only the present, however, is
in our hands, only this is ours, and here and now
we must act with wisdom, to learn from the past and
endeavor to bring about a better future. |