Sometimes the person we are judging is not the only thing worth looking at.
We are often certain about what is wrong with other people. It is much harder to become curious about what our reactionis telling us about ourselves.
Lately, I have been thinking about selfishness. Not only the selfishness I see in other people, but the selfishness I may carry myself.
Sometimes someone does something and my first thought is:
How can you be like this?
Then I pause.
Perhaps it is:
What is this reaction showing me about myself?
We are very good at looking outward. We notice someone’s pride, attachment, anger, fear, or selfishness and quickly give it a name. We create a story about the person:
They are selfish.
They are difficult.
They always think about themselves.
But Buddhism keeps bringing the attention back to the mind that is making the judgment.
The person we are looking at is changing.
So are we.
The “I” that was angry yesterday may not be the same “I” today. Our thoughts change. Our feelings change. Our bodies change. Our opinions change. Even our understanding of ourselves changes.
Yet we constantly turn something changing into something permanent.
This is who I am.
This is who you are.
And perhaps this is where attachment begins.
The teaching of anattā, or non-self, challenges the idea of a permanent and independent “me.” What we call the self is a collection of changing experiences—thoughts, feelings, memories, perceptions and circumstances.
There is no fixed version of me that remains untouched.
And there is no fixed version of you either.
So when I call someone selfish, perhaps I should be careful.
I may be observing a selfish action. That does not necessarily mean I know the whole person.
And when their behaviour triggerssomething strong in me, perhaps that reaction deserves attention too.
Not because I am necessarily the same as them. But because something in me has been touched.
Maybe it is my own attachment.
My own expectations.
My own pride.
My own need to be understood.
My own idea of how another person should behave.
This doesn’t mean we should tolerate harmful behaviour. We can have boundaries. We can disagree. We can leave situations that are unhealthy. But perhaps we don’t need to turn another person into an enemy in our mind.
We can simply see what is happening:
This is anger.
This is attachment.
This is suffering.
This is changing.
And then we can look at our own mind in the same way. Maybe compassion does not begin with agreeing with everyone. Maybe it begins with seeing more clearly.
The person I judge today is changing.
So am I.
And perhaps the freedom is not in creating a better identity for ourselves, but in holding our identities a little less tightly.
Less I, me, mine.
Less you are this, I am that.
More observation.
More space.
More willingness to say:
I don’t have to make this person permanent in my mind.
And perhaps that is the quiet lesson of the mirror. Sometimes, when we point at another person’s selfishness, there is something for us to look at too.
Not necessarily because we are the same. But because we are human.
And the mind that judges is also part of what we are learning to understand.
Maybe I don’t have to change you.
Maybe I don’t even have to fully understand you.
Maybe I can simply notice what arises in me when I meet you.
And let it pass.
Because you will change.
I will change.
Everything we are holding onto is changing while we are holding onto it.
Perhaps letting go begins with simply seeing that.
Maybe the practice is not to stop seeing what is difficult in others, but to become quiet enough to see what it awakens in us.
Comments