Dear Brothers and Sisters,

We encounter things we dislike very often every day – crazy drivers, dumb roads, flooding rain, liar, nasty neighbor, being tricked into buying unclean food, unethical sellers, jealous coworker, hated ex-boyfriend… You name it.

Meeting what we hate is one branch of suffering in Buddhist philosophy called “Suffering meeting what we hate” (oán tằng hội khổ, khổ vì ghét mà gặp).

(This English phrase “Suffering meeting what we hate” is my translation. Other versions are “Suffering being together with the despised ones” or “Association with the unbeloved is duḥkha.” The problem with these and many other versions is that they talk only about people and miss the entire world of things, animals, events, situations… that you hate).

Anyway, we all have experienced meeting what we hate, every day. Probably we call them “suffering” only in heavy circumstances – like, working with a person we hate in the same office or the house is on fire – but the truth is that every inconvenience big or small can give us stress regularly and the accumulation of constant stress can be a killer.

How do we deal with this constantly stressful problem?

Of course, Zen masters wouldn’t need a solution, because when they have practiced Zen to the degree of calmness that nothing can bother them,  inconvenient things or inconvenient people are not a problem to them at all.

But how do we have a quicker solution instead of doing 10 years of Zen exercises?

I still encourage you to do 10 years of Zen exercises, because Zen can wipe out all problems in your mind, not just several types of problems. But, in the meantime, we need some quick fix.

We need to work on our attitude toward inconveniency.

Let’s talk about inconvenient things first, because they are easier to deal with. Inconvenient things are a natural part of life. Life is a river with many different parts of different characters – quiet waters, stormy waters, clear waters, murky waters, rocky rapids, falls, lakes, bends… Peaceful waters pose no problem, but rocky rapids are lots of problems.

Howewer, if you are a river traveller, you enjoy a river’s different characters. In deed, different characters are the main reason for your travelling – if the river has only quiet water throughout, probably you wouldn’t want river travel.

Life has different things, some convenient and some inconvenient. That is the nature of life and of things. It makes life everchanging and interesting. Convenience and inconvenience go together and make life interesting for you. You don’t hate one and like only the other.

Switching to dealing with humans. Humans are diferent from rivers & mountains, animals,  events and circumstances in one point: Humans may intentionally act, nicely or badly, to each other, while the rest of  creation rarely do anything intentionally to humans (except that family pets will intentionally do nice things to you). So, many inconveniences you face may be intentionally done to you by other people.

So, the real issue is the intention of the actor. If someone unintentionally does something unpleasant to you, by accident, for example, then probably you will not be upset and will readily understand that person’s position and reasons.

However, when someone intentionally does somethings inconvenient or maybe harmful to you, that is when the real problem appears.

When someone badmouths you, lies to you, stabs you on the back, cheats you, hurts you in some way… What do you think about him? Probably, Stupid! Uneducated! Low class!

Do you know what? Every derogatory word you give to the bad guys is probably correct. They are really low-class. Hence, you don’t want to lower yourself to be in the same class with them. That means, you ignore them. You really don’t want to pay attention to or be bothered by the people you consider uneducated. Some stupid guy on the street points right at you and say: “You’re stupid”, what would you do? Of course, you would ignore him and continue going about your business. That is the way you react to bad stuff from stupid people.

And I say “ignore” means you ignore the bag stuff they do to you, but you don’t ignore them (the persons). Say, you’re used to be nice to a guy, but after he badmouths about you, you walk past him and you ignore him like you don’t even see him. That means, you are not ignoring his badmouthing – his badmouthing is actually controlling your behavior. Instead, you should ignore his badmouthing and still smile and say “Good morning” to him, like nothing has happened. That means “ignoring his badmouthing” – it has no effect on you.

You still act friendly and noble to the guy, and do not allow his badmouthing to pull you down to the low class that you think he belongs.

Ignore the bad stuff people do to you, and don’t be pulled down to their lower level of behavior.

People who do bad stuff to you, but see you act like you are not affected in any way -you seem to not knowing a thing – will stop the bad stuff, because they play game only with themselves and that is very boring game.

The Buddhists say “we all are ignorant.” “Ignorant” is a polite term for “stupid”. So, you are correct that people do bad things to you because they are stupid. You are wiser, at a higher level of development. So, you feel sorry for them and ignore what they do – no reaction to their dumb games in any way.

And probably you may want to help them be wiser and better – by acting like you don’t see anything. They will learn from you to be good.

That is very much what Buddist teaching means by “Non-discriminating heart”, Upekha, also translated into Englsh as “Equanimity” – treating everyone the same, because all people are very much the same, with Buddhahood and ignorance inside.

Non-discriminating heart, Upekha, is how you deal with bad thing from other people. Treat all people, good or bad, the same.  Treat all bad things and good things the same. That is Upekha, non-discriminating heart.

Everything I said upthere about low class and high class actually disappears, because when you have Upekha, there is no class.

And you shall be happy and wise.

Wish all of us be non-discriminating.

With compassion,

Hoành

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Trần Đình Hoành
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Dear brothers and sisters,

Below is Parable of the Sower in the Bible.

¹ That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. ² Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. ³ Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. ⁴ As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. ⁵ Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. ⁶ But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. ⁷ Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. ⁸ Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. ⁹ Whoever has ears, let them hear.” (Matthew 13:1-9.)

Then Jesus explained to them what the Parable means.

 ¹⁸“Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: ¹⁹ When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path. ²⁰ The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. ²¹ But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. ²² The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful. ²³ But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” (Matthew 13:18-23.)

So, when we read these words of Jesus, we should ask ourselves: “Who am I?

Which seed am I? Am I the seed sown along the path? Or am I the seed falling on rocky ground? Or am I the seed falling among the thorns? Can I be the seed falling on good soil?

Who am I?”

Knowing who I am is an important thing. We only can grow when we know who we are. We’ll stand still in one place when we don’t know who we are.

How to know who I am?

Read again Matthew 13:18-23.

Reading the Bible is to know our self.

Have a nice day.

Phạm Thu Hương