Developing Compassion in a Troubled World
I am upset how divided and angry our country seems today. I usually write about Fatherhood but I decided to start this series “Developing Compassion in Troubled Times,” for a general audience. For the dads who follow my writing, I hope this series will help them prepare their children for the future.
What is disturbing me today is why Americans are not speaking more with the friends and families who hold different political opinions.
Why can’t we care about our fellow citizens and have different viewpoints? Why can’t we love and disagree?
This has always been the American way. Let us disagree and argue; knowing that although we have many differences, we have much more of our hopes and dreams in common. We all want good lives for our children’s future; clean air and safe water to drink. We may have different perspectives on how to achieve this, but we are all concerned about what our future holds for our families.
Knowing we will usually find imperfect solutions, we will keep trying to create that “more perfect union” as is our motto. Why are we not finding common cause and an understanding that we are all in this world together? These are difficult times, especially with the income inequality and a changing economy. The jobs world has been disrupted and the usual work people had believed in is gone. Changes in gender roles, religious difference, women’s right to choice and pro-life are worthy discussions, challenging each of us about who we are as a person. These difficulties have always been part of the inefficiencies of being a democracy. We are the world's great experiment in how people can create a country. There is really no other country that you can go to and by joining in our democratic experiment become an American. We all share a heritage, except for the native American people, of traveling from foreign land not just to make a home in the USA but to join in this experiment of being an American.
I think everyone should become a Buddhist! Over twenty five hundred years ago a man discovered that by sitting quietly his feelings of fear and anxiety could be alleviated. That he could actually feel connection and compassion for everyone and everything. That we were all interconnected. He understood that what he did had an effect on every other thing in the world. I don’t think you need to convert to Buddhism, that is not really what I am talking about.
You can be a Christian or a Jew or Muslim or a Hindu or a Quaker or a Christian Scientist or a Rastafarian. But how do you come to understand we are all in this world together?
I became a Buddhist to help me live a more ethically aware life in what I see as these troubling times. And the experience of Zazen, just sitting and watching my own mind, has helped me. (Zazen is a form of Japanese Zen Buddhist meditation where you just sit quietly and observe your own thoughts.) I “sit” for 30 minutes twice a day. How has it helped? I think there is what one of my teachers called “Small Mind” and “Big Mind.” “Small Mind” is when I am just focusing on myself and my needs and can’t see beyond my own ego or selfishness. “Big Mind” was a discovery of how I am not separate or alone in this world, oh no, that my home is with all of you…each and everyone of you. The wonderful and troubling family we all participate in.
I think if anyone can calm down themselves and their thinking for a while, they will discover this too. You can be of any tradition but it takes some work to do this self reflection part. It hasn’t been easy for me. Maybe there is a easier way to do it than with all this meditation? But that is what it took for me to know this “Big Mind” my teacher talked about. I know people who have found this “Big Mind” too who are not Buddhist.
Robert Wright, an evolutionary psychologist wrote a book called “Why Buddhism is True.” He said that the process of natural selection had bred us as humans to fear the other in order to survive. For many thousands of years we all did see anyone that was different from our family as a threat to our safety and wellbeing. That “fear of others” is actually in our DNA.
He found by exploring different types of meditations he could change his programing of fearing others. But without some experience of quiet and calm, we would continue to feel that people different from us are a danger. So we will each go on killing each other because of this ancient programing in our DNA or, will we survive as a species because we can discover something like this “Big Mind. ” “Big Mind” will allow us begin to change the process of natural selection where we now have a better chance as a species to survive through cooperation and interdependence.
So this morning when I went out walking and I found three worms that were struggling on the pavement. I picked them up and put them in the grass. I watched as they disappeared in the dark soil of the lawn. So maybe you hear this or read this and think. That’s weird! Who cares about a few worms. Yuk, who would want to pick them up! If you think that…that is good. You can see your “Small Mind” at work. But you know we need the worms and the bees and the spiders to survive. It felt good to me to help them back to their homes.
You become a “Buddhist” regardless of your religion when you can feel the deep connection in each of us for every living thing. This isn’t something you can understand by listening to me or reading about it. Although it is helpful to get some instructions. But it is a personal experience that transcends our logical thinking. It is something that happens in quieting one’s mind… and it happens when you can save a few worms too.
