Sometimes life hurts. I think a lot of us are acutely aware of that fact right now, in the midst of a global epidemic and localized peaceful protests and violent riots after the unjust killing of another unarmed African-American person (his name is George Floyd). It's a natural human response to lash out when we feel pain. It's a survival technique that has been programmed into our brains for generations, going back to when we all slept in caves and were under constant threat of big scary animals with large teeth. Fear and pain cause anger. It's a fact.
The question is, what do we do with that knowledge? Dex, the Besalisk owner of Dex's Diner (Episode II), noted to Obi-Wan the difference between "knowledge and wisdom." Knowledge is knowing what the facts are, and wisdom is understanding what to do with that information. There are more and more knowledgeable people everyday, thanks to the internet and cell phones. Unfortunately, so far we have no reason to believe that Wisdom is "scaleable." Wisdom is something that is earned through life experience, through overcoming adversity. And YES, while some people's experiences are certainly more difficult, EVERYONE struggles. I personally have a lot of room to grow, but I've always been someone who was more attracted to wisdom than knowledge. I often seem like a bit of a dummy because I don't keep a lot of facts in my head, but you present those facts to me and I guarantee I will be able to decipher their deeper meaning. Maybe it's all because of that one line in Star Wars - I'm not sure. Regardless, I've sought wisdom through books, movies, music, lectures, scriptures, people, and many other sources for many years, so I want to share something that I believe would help a lot of people re-frame their understanding of this tragic situation we're in (and the many others that will come in our lifetimes).
You see, "Good" and "Evil" are not two different ends of an infinitely long line, with Good on the right side and Evil on the left side. You're looking at it askance. The line you see actually stretches our forever before you and behind you and is the path of goodness. It is less than one atom wide. To live a perfect life, you must tight-rope walk down the center of that line from birth to death, without ever stepping anywhere outside of the line. For beyond the line, on both sides, is Evil - it lies in wait in the dark forests beside the road, spilling out into the open ground and stretching up to the edge of that tiny, tiny line of goodness. It probably sounds impossible to live a perfect life with this metaphor. As one of my mentors would say, "No $***, Sherlock." Not even Jesus Christ, or Mohammed, or the Buddha lived absolutely perfect lives. "To err is human, to forgive, divine" (Alexander Pope).
Many people believe that they are justified in their actions because they fight against other actions that are clearly evil. To that I say, good is not the opposite of evil. If you cross the path of goodness and go to the farthest end of the other side, you will only find more evil, wearing different camouflage. Or, in the words of an African proverb quoted by Chinua Achebe, "He who will hold another down in the mud must stay in the mud to keep him down." Nothing will return the lives of the far-too-numerous unarmed African-Americans who have been murdered by unwise members of police organizations or the many more who were killed by private citizens during the Jim Crowe era, and reconstruction, and the Civil War, &c. The world is an unjust, painful place. No one can ever make up for all the lives that have been cut short, all the lives that have been wasted, all over the world throughout history. Like I said at the beginning - sometimes life hurts.
THE ONLY THING WE CAN DO is make it hurt less for our children, or if we don't have kids of our own, for the kids of our friends and family and of strangers we've never met whom we love anyway. We won't make the world a better place by meeting hate with more hate. As Gandhi said, "An eye for an eye makes the world blind." If we keep both of our eyes, we can watch both sides of the infinitesimally narrow path of goodness, and make sure we (each of us individually) are not drifting too far in either direction. There are numerous Eastern religions and philosophies wherein balance is a critical concept. Balance within oneself and balance between all the pieces of the world is what allows things to go smoothly. Is Buddhism, a concept similar to "path of goodness" that I described earlier is called "The Middle Way," and in Taoism it is simply "The Way." Taoism also has two other teachings that are very relevant to this painful situation: "the harder you push, the more resistance you will receive" and "have patience."
Patience is perhaps the greatest piece of wisdom anyone can earn and there is only one way to get that merit badge - by waiting. It's the critical piece of wisdom that Boomers think Millennials don't have and honestly, they are to a large degree correct (though it must be added that not all Boomers, &c., are as wise as we would hope). "The language of young men is pull down and destroy, but an old man speaks of conciliation" (Chinua Achebe again). I understand, I really do, all of the people calling for racial justice NOW. But the world doesn't work like that. We need racial justice as soon as possible, but it will not be easy and it will not be right now. The Dark Side of the force is not stronger, but is "quicker, easier, more seductive" (Yoda). The quick solution is to destroy everyone and everything that is a little bit racist and exterminate the problem once and for all. But that's just committing more evil. "To answer power with power, the Jedi way this is not." "Wars not make one great." "Patience you must have, my young padawan." Now Chinua Achebe: "It is praiseworthy to be brave and fearless, but sometimes it is better to be a coward. We often stand in the compound of a coward to point at the ruins where a brave man used to live."How many ruins do we need to create before we are ready to leave hate, in all its manifestations, behind?
This last bit is my request to everyone, and I mean everyone, that is ever suffering from an injustice forced on them by this unfair world. Please don't burn the whole place down. There are far more people trying to do good than those trying to do evil - it's just that the evil ones are a lot louder. Have patience, know that you are not alone. I suffer too. I cannot understand your suffering but you can also not understand mine. Let us turn to art, and create beautiful things to express our pain rather than destroy. My mother always told me to "be the bigger person" when I was in an argument with my brother, or when I was being bullied at school. It was hard to understand as a kid, but for God's sake, we're not all kids anymore. Let's be the bigger people and not resort to violence, not resort to shouting, not resort to venting on social media, not resort to calling out vast swathes of the population as complicit. Let's have a real person-to-person conversation. And yeah, the conversation might be hard, but here's one last Igbo proverb for you, courtesy of Chinua Acehebe: "A person may refuse a request, but they cannot refuse to be asked." In modern English: You may disagree, but you should still talk to each other about it.
Lawson Malnory
31 May 2020
Dallas, TX
You see, "Good" and "Evil" are not two different ends of an infinitely long line, with Good on the right side and Evil on the left side. You're looking at it askance. The line you see actually stretches our forever before you and behind you and is the path of goodness. It is less than one atom wide. To live a perfect life, you must tight-rope walk down the center of that line from birth to death, without ever stepping anywhere outside of the line. For beyond the line, on both sides, is Evil - it lies in wait in the dark forests beside the road, spilling out into the open ground and stretching up to the edge of that tiny, tiny line of goodness. It probably sounds impossible to live a perfect life with this metaphor. As one of my mentors would say, "No $***, Sherlock." Not even Jesus Christ, or Mohammed, or the Buddha lived absolutely perfect lives. "To err is human, to forgive, divine" (Alexander Pope).
Many people believe that they are justified in their actions because they fight against other actions that are clearly evil. To that I say, good is not the opposite of evil. If you cross the path of goodness and go to the farthest end of the other side, you will only find more evil, wearing different camouflage. Or, in the words of an African proverb quoted by Chinua Achebe, "He who will hold another down in the mud must stay in the mud to keep him down." Nothing will return the lives of the far-too-numerous unarmed African-Americans who have been murdered by unwise members of police organizations or the many more who were killed by private citizens during the Jim Crowe era, and reconstruction, and the Civil War, &c. The world is an unjust, painful place. No one can ever make up for all the lives that have been cut short, all the lives that have been wasted, all over the world throughout history. Like I said at the beginning - sometimes life hurts.
THE ONLY THING WE CAN DO is make it hurt less for our children, or if we don't have kids of our own, for the kids of our friends and family and of strangers we've never met whom we love anyway. We won't make the world a better place by meeting hate with more hate. As Gandhi said, "An eye for an eye makes the world blind." If we keep both of our eyes, we can watch both sides of the infinitesimally narrow path of goodness, and make sure we (each of us individually) are not drifting too far in either direction. There are numerous Eastern religions and philosophies wherein balance is a critical concept. Balance within oneself and balance between all the pieces of the world is what allows things to go smoothly. Is Buddhism, a concept similar to "path of goodness" that I described earlier is called "The Middle Way," and in Taoism it is simply "The Way." Taoism also has two other teachings that are very relevant to this painful situation: "the harder you push, the more resistance you will receive" and "have patience."
Patience is perhaps the greatest piece of wisdom anyone can earn and there is only one way to get that merit badge - by waiting. It's the critical piece of wisdom that Boomers think Millennials don't have and honestly, they are to a large degree correct (though it must be added that not all Boomers, &c., are as wise as we would hope). "The language of young men is pull down and destroy, but an old man speaks of conciliation" (Chinua Achebe again). I understand, I really do, all of the people calling for racial justice NOW. But the world doesn't work like that. We need racial justice as soon as possible, but it will not be easy and it will not be right now. The Dark Side of the force is not stronger, but is "quicker, easier, more seductive" (Yoda). The quick solution is to destroy everyone and everything that is a little bit racist and exterminate the problem once and for all. But that's just committing more evil. "To answer power with power, the Jedi way this is not." "Wars not make one great." "Patience you must have, my young padawan." Now Chinua Achebe: "It is praiseworthy to be brave and fearless, but sometimes it is better to be a coward. We often stand in the compound of a coward to point at the ruins where a brave man used to live."How many ruins do we need to create before we are ready to leave hate, in all its manifestations, behind?
This last bit is my request to everyone, and I mean everyone, that is ever suffering from an injustice forced on them by this unfair world. Please don't burn the whole place down. There are far more people trying to do good than those trying to do evil - it's just that the evil ones are a lot louder. Have patience, know that you are not alone. I suffer too. I cannot understand your suffering but you can also not understand mine. Let us turn to art, and create beautiful things to express our pain rather than destroy. My mother always told me to "be the bigger person" when I was in an argument with my brother, or when I was being bullied at school. It was hard to understand as a kid, but for God's sake, we're not all kids anymore. Let's be the bigger people and not resort to violence, not resort to shouting, not resort to venting on social media, not resort to calling out vast swathes of the population as complicit. Let's have a real person-to-person conversation. And yeah, the conversation might be hard, but here's one last Igbo proverb for you, courtesy of Chinua Acehebe: "A person may refuse a request, but they cannot refuse to be asked." In modern English: You may disagree, but you should still talk to each other about it.
Lawson Malnory
31 May 2020
Dallas, TX