We Are All Responsible
I have often wondered about my connection to major events that seem to be out of my control or influence. What is my responsibility for a genocide occurring across the sea, cultural obliteration taking place on the other side of the world, or everyday abuses happening in the backyard of my own country? I have contemplated this question and shared it with other members of Buddhist study groups. But it was not until recently that I came up with a possible answer.
Buddha Shakyamuni, when talking about karma (cause and effect), spoke of group or collective karma. In a nutshell, collective karma shapes the ethical, social, and even health outcomes of communities, influencing both suffering and well-being. That is to say, through our actions as a group, we shape the contours of our mind and the world we inhabit. I think this is very relevant in the globalized environment we have built in the twenty-first century.
Disconnection or Interconnection?
We are responsible, as individuals and collectively, in as much as we perpetuate a mental framework that divides the world into self and other, us and them, friends and enemies, good and bad, victims and aggressors.
This split between self and other leads me/us to defend myself/ourselves tooth and nail against all that is not me/us. This way of understanding reality and the actions resulting from it renders us not only as victims (Why me?) but also as aggressors (I am right, and you are wrong!). This is precisely the launching of the endless cycle of suffering that the Buddha called samsara. It is exactly this polarity that prevents us from breaking free from our self-made prison of opposing labels. Paradoxically, we create this split in our pursuit of happiness.
At a practical level, in everyday life, how can we begin to do something different?
Empathy and Compassion
The Buddhist teachings tell us that we will be breaking our habitual pattern when we empathize not only with the victims, but also with the aggressors. Even if we get nauseated thinking about it.
Until we are able to have compassion not only for those being harmed but also for the perpetrators of such harm, we are generating suffering for ourselves and for others. We should remember that all beings—friends, enemies, animals, gods, hungry ghosts, hell beings, demigods—are trying to be happy and transcend suffering. But more often than not, we make choices that create further misery, ours and others’. When we recall that all beings are pursuing the same happiness, that renders us all equal—beyond what is imaginable.
Where can I begin? Where can we begin?
By looking within. By familiarizing ourselves with our own mind, seeing its capacity for desiring, hating, and ignoring, the same as everybody else’s. Recognizing the outside events that make us angry is a start, but we have to see what is happening inside, even if we do not like it and we do not want to recognize it, even if we think no, we are nothing like them. Ultimately we are all the same beyond our superficial choices and actions.
Eliminating Duality
I imagine this proposal might sound subversive or crazy at a relative level. That’s because it challenges our way of thinking since beginningless time. “I” am not more important than “you.” “We” are not more important than “them.” We must let go of this duality which, according to the Buddha, is the origin of everyone’s suffering.
As we work with our mind, as we examine our assumptions and our prejudices, indignation and self-righteousness can begin to transform into compassion. And compassion can help us to go beyond the limitations of our extreme views of hate, blaming, and all kinds of terrorism.
Contemplative Practice
- Sit a few minutes in calm-abiding meditation and settle your mind.
- Bring to mind someone whom you strongly consider an enemy, an aggressor, or even the personification of evil.
- As you breathe in and breathe out, consider the possibility that this person is actually looking for happiness in the same way you are.
- Allow anything that arises in your mindstream to flow by without judging or grasping it.
- If you can, connect with your heart of compassion toward that person, taking into account the suffering they are generating for themselves as well as for others. If you cannot do that, connect with compassion for yourself and the effort you are making.
- Let go of any thoughts, feelings, and sensations, and settle your mind again in a space of peace and openness.
For more by Adela, see “I Take Refuge in the Sangha”/”Tomo refugio en la sangha” and “Apparently Opposite.” You can also visit her websites, reflejos en juego (as writer and translator) and https://adelaiglesias1.wixsite.com/balance (as psychotherapist).
