Of Virtues and Life!
Can we follow the virtues all the time? Here we have a look at the four virtues that Zen talks about and the needed perception shift to make it happen!
Can anyone be kind, compassionate and loving at all times?…or is there another way! The Zen says Compassion, Kindness, Humility and Forgiveness are the ways to a virtuous life but can we be at it all the time?
Once it happened, a young disciple was practising compassion and kindness as told by his master, he became very pleasant to everyone around. He became very kind and smiled all the time. Days went by…weeks passed, one fine day he was in the market to get some vegetables for the small monastery he lived in with his master. After getting a bagful of required vegetables he got en route to the monastery which is built across the jungle 2 miles away from the town. So to reach there the jungle needs to be crossed. It was a humid season and in the midway of the jungle a Cobra appeared among him, he was freaked and not smiling anymore! The Snake was already hissing at him, seeing the danger he took a sizeable stone and hurled it at the Cobra’s head, it bled and became lifeless after a while. By all this, his life was now safe but a sense of guilt engulfed him…after all he broke his practice of being Compassionate and Kind!
Well, what else could have he done? If he wished to continue the practice, the Snake would have made him dead by then.
Sometimes, life does not allow us to be in a constant stream of activity that we want to do. All this Compassion, Kindness or whatever is to extend our limits to be the new better we want to be, these practices or whatever literature you find written by anybody are to make us evolve as a righteous being and to not forget the contrast between mindful application and imposition. The mindful application comes by wisdom and imposition comes by literature… that’s all that makes the difference. If we keep on imposing everything that we think is good for every situation in life, it is gonna be a crazy drive! As you may see, a religious person for every situation in his life will always look up there in the sky for God to be the saviour because he has imposed everything that is written in the holy book as it is on himself while a spiritual person will be more responsible and thoughtful in handling the situation at hand because he knows the mindful application of the things written in the same holy book.
A Righteous vision is the one in which we define if this particular thing is right for the given situation or not, once this happens there will be no guilt about the decisions we take. In Social situations, it often happens that we can’t be pleasant to everyone, different kind of people need a different kind of treatment. In the whole day, you meet many wise people but at the same time, there are many stupids able enough to break any damn practice that you do.
One day, a friend of mine who knows me for quite a considerable time asked me very agitatedly after our conversation with a third person, “What is your real nature, for some people you are very kind and welcoming, for others you are completely opposite- what kind of a person you are? Good or Bad! Neither good nor bad, just the right one- I replied, isn’t it okay?
At some point, we all have to remove the covering of good or bad from us and do just what is right. Good or Bad is very subjective, we need to be right to ourself and the moment, the time. We can’t be Good or Bad for much longer, we have to be righteous and sometimes decisive as well about what we want and what is a strict no. If in the same sense suppose a teacher has to be compassionate and kind, I am telling you none of the students will do the homework, it is the righteous acts of a teacher that nurture a student, not the kind ones!
When it is said to be Compassionate or Kind, it is always in contrast to what the situation is…unless someone is living a constant life as a monk or sage, changes in situations are inevitable. It is not about being Conditional to your kindness or compassion rather it is about being mindful about what to show — when and where, or if we keep sticking to the literature only we will become imprisoned by the imposition. Social situations often can demand strategic thinking, decisiveness and sometimes diplomacy as well, and for sure in the name of being kind to everyone, we can’t bereave ourselves of the intellectual weapons that are to be carried :)
So, understanding the moment, being aware of the situation and mindfulness about what, when and how is important!
Life- as it is!
Namsakaram- Ad.
