The last week of this practice has been both interesting and troubling. Besides being beset by doubts as to the legitimacy of this project I have found that coming to know, coming to actually honestly experience the arising of anger, and distinguishing from other emotions, has left me strangely anger-free.

This state of being anger-free should not be misconstrued. I am still experiencing the same emotional and physical phenomenon that I experienced before this project. For the life of me, however, I can’t say that it is “anger.”

As I have become more intimate with the experience of “anger” and trying to differentiate it from other emotions, I’m finding that it doesn’t actually matter whether I label the emotion I experience as “anger”, “fear”, “frustration”, or any number of other official designations. At least not at first. The actual experience is the same regardless of the name. As originally experienced it is simply a raw negative aversion to whatever is immediately present.

I think the Existentialists have best discussed this original emotional moment. They coined many terms for this raw negative emotional arising but my favorite is “angst” because it best captures the fact that the experience is both emotional and bodily. “Angst” nests in your gut. It grows and swells pushing upwards and compressing your lungs. Your breath shortens and you heart speeds up. I will borrow this term and ask to be allowed to be only marginally burdened by any baggage it carries.

What I’ve come to see is that regardless of what “negative” emotion I end up experiencing it always begins with this same state: angst. For instance, my wife may say something to me that I don’t want to hear (alternatively she may not say something I do wish to hear) and I experience a negative emotional arising. As this angst arises, as my ease and comfort escapes me, I “need” to give it vent, a channel that promises to relieve the moment.

Thus I give it form: angst becomes anger or fear or dread, or any one of the hundreds of other emotions. The unformed and formless angst is made object for me: I feel the anger, I experience the fear, I taste the dread. As an object I can measure or judge it. I can embrace it or dismiss it. I can compare it, preserve it and memorialize it. At the extreme it even ceases to be an object for me and I become the object itself. I am angry, I am fearful, I am sad.

Thus, by the time I’ve come to experience “anger” it is something I’ve already processed. We often say when a feeling arises let it go. However, it seems that if the “feeling” has already moved beyond the raw angst (and here is where naming it “angst” becomes paradoxical) and become any recognized distinct emotions I haven’t let it go, I’ve held it, selected it, and given it a river bed within which to flow.

This last week of practice has been troubling because I’m coming to recognize that anger, or any other emotion isn’t the issue. It’s been disturbing because all my tools for dealing with my emotions are rendered useless if the emotions are just secondary effects of something deeper. They are all just salves for the symptoms (symptoms of my choosing) of the underlying state.

Thus, today I say:

Anger only a choice I make to relieve the experience of angst.
Anger is just a response to my own suffering.
I choose to live 30 days without anger

There is a danger when we bring our attention to a thought or emotion that we will invest in that thought/emotion. That is, when we bring our attention to it we will form an attachment. We will come to embody that thought/emotion. Said another way, we will move from “feeling anger” to “being angry.”

Conversely, there is a danger that by bringing our attention to the thought/emotion we will form an aversion. As we feel the rise of anger we become so adverse to the feeling (or threat thereof) that we come to be “NOT ANGRY!!!”

For me, and what I hope to be doing with 30 Days Without Anger, the nature of the attention that I hope to bring is not attachment or aversion but instead an “attending to.”

When one brings one’s attention to anger one attends to the anger. That is, one gives it it’s proper due. One sees it arise, understands from whence it came. One shows it the proper respect, understanding that it has the power to possess but only if we embody it. When one has no other choice we sit with it for a time, have tea with it. In the end, when the time comes we see it safely to the door, and watch it leave. Ultimately, we don’t “let it go” because if we properly attended to it, we never will have held it in the first place.

I commit to attending to anger properly and skillfully.
I commit to seeing anger pass.
I commit to 30 days without anger.

Have and spread peace.

In my post announcing this idea I spent a brief space describing my personal experience of my own anger. I described how it can fester within a person, and how it taints a person’s interactions with others (and so taints their subsequent interactions).  While I do believe this to be true I also think anger plays an interesting and ultimately crippling role in society today.

Each of us can feel small and unimportant in this world. We may look out at what’s happening in the wider world and see war, poverty, injustice, and all manner of cruelty. In our personal life we may experience the smaller wars of familial strife, economic hardship, unfair or heartless treatment, and uncaring behaviors.

The suffering we experience as a result of these things can be felt as an enormous overwhelming wave or as a nagging sorrow or depression. In my own life, debates on the political stage can set off a rant. At other times I see toddlers walk out of a courthouse not knowing mommy or daddy will not be home tonight (or maybe this decade). Such a sight dampens my mood to a place of near hopeless for our world. For each of us there may be different causes, but the suffering is the same.

Regardless of the suffering we feel, the feeling causes us to respond. We want to feel something else – often anything else. Problem is, even the smallest suffering seems unresolvable. Thus, while depression or melancholy are unacceptable in the eyes of society, and unsustainable as a way of life, we attempt to take refuge in an emotion that is acceptable: Anger.

With anger we escape the suffering of sorrow and helplessness and throw ourselves into an emotional high and apparent action. While the suffering of our experienced helplessness further reduces us, makes us smaller and less significant, anger blows us up. We become larger, louder, and stronger. Even if a person, like myself, takes no traditionally described angry “actions”, we feel our blood surge, we may rant and decry all that is wrong with the world (or simply whats wrong people like the one in front of us). Like the Hulk we become large and important.

Thing is, the feeling created by our rant or our righteousness indignation is a lie. We responded to helplessness and possibly hopelessness with and emotional explosion that ultimately means nothing. Ranting and raving (even just internally) may make us feel like we have done something in response to the suffering, after all we condemned it, but that’s all we did. We didn’t change anything.

I said that anger is socially acceptable but that isn’t the half of it. Exhibitions of anger have become not only part of our social discourse, but the height of it. News channels fill themselves with talking heads spewing hatred on their (imagined) political enemy (with greater or lesser subtlety). Television is filled with reality stars who seem to celebrate conflict, strife, and anger.

We have come to accept that expressing anger is an end in itself, proof of self-confidence and being resolute of purpose. We have even come to accept that as long as the person ends an angry or mean-spirited outburst with “I’m just saying…” or some such phrase, they are to be celebrated for their candor and for speaking out. All despite the lack of any actual movement toward helping the situation that gave rise to the suffering that started it all.

We have accepted anger as a response to bad things in the world.

We have accepted anger as a replacement for real positive action in the world.

We have accepted anger.

I commit to live 30 days without anger.

If you want to join me, please do! In what follows I spell out the 5 principles that I am committing to at the outset. That said, I know they will evolve and grow.

My hope is that we can use this forum to share our experiences and evolve (or abandon altogether) these principle. I will post each day and I look forward to our discussions here and on twitter (hashtag #30dayswithoutanger – though we need something shorter).

Finally I’ve added a short piece on my personal reasons for this practice.

Good Luck and peace to you all!

The Principles

For each of the next 30 days I commit to the following:

1) I will endeavor to remain mindful of the inclination to anger.

2) When the inclination to anger arises I commit to a moment of calming, regardless of the circumstances, presence of others, or any seeming discomfort in doing so.

3) Following the moment of calm I will commit to listening to whoever has occasioned my dis-ease, or if not a person, to contemplate the situation. This will be without judgment, but with the intent to appreciate what is before me

4) I will not disengage from that which inclined me to anger, or from the world generally. Instead I commit to both stay in the moment and the “angering” situation. I will be an example of what I hope to be, and I will give my calm to others

5) When anger arises despite the above, or should I fall short in my commitment to any of the foregoing, I will not judge myself. I will not see this as a failing nor a failure. Neither will I see it as a great moment for growth. I will see it for what it is: The arising of anger – and I will let it go. (If I must, I will have tea with it.)

My Personal Inspiration

So, I have an anger problem.

Not the kind one normally thinks of when one hears the phrase “anger problem.” I do not go into rages, I don’t scream, curse or hit things. I’ve never threaten violence by word or deed, and I don’t think I’ve ever been accused of or been described as an angry person. In fact, much to my surprise people at work consider me mellow and a peacemaker.

But that’s really my problem. I never have any direct and obvious fallout from my anger. Thus, I get angry at something or someone, fester and churn. My anger stews inside and flavors all my interactions with the world. I simply get bitter and want to disengage from whatever/whoever angered me, and ultimately from most of the world.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not inclined to believe that I need to become more explosive, violent or mean. What I do need to recognize is that anger, even the quiet sort I most often experience, affects how I am in the world. Thus, it affects all those around me and then all those around each of them. My anger breeds more anger, more unrest, and more withdrawal of one person from another.

So, for 30 days I will vow to be (or attempt to be) anger free.

“My car has passed away!”… Or so my mind has flung me. “My car has passed away,  or will shortly. I will never be able to afford the repairs it needs.” Often at night, more often while driving, the attraction of this dark and hopeless future would seduce me.

Next my head skips from living in this most likely to be realized and despair infused future to its preferred mode of Judge of all things moral.

“I’m a decent person, hardworking, sincere. Heck,  I’m a Buddhist for heavens sake! Not captured by materialism and filled with metta for all creatures. Don’t I deserve a running car? Perhaps not one with a heated seat, but at least one that doesn’t overheat at every stop sign!”

The absurdity of these thoughts does not escape me, but neither can I seem to escape them. I know it’s ridiculous but somehow allowing myself to indulge in this way of thinking seems to temporarily relieve the pain of the fear. But, even this relief is fleeting,  and so I fling myself a new way, a new relief to be found.

“No, it my fault. I deserve this. I don’t take care of my car as I should. I don’t get regular oil changes, and I wait til the last possible moment to get repairs done. What has befallen me is my own doing. I am reaping what I have sown. Karma is true, my suffering is it’s validation. “

Just like one naturally prods a toothache, causing pain but curiously also causing relief, my mind takesme here again and again.

Always, by reacting to the fear in these ways, by living in a future of my minds making and by trying to create a narrative which casts me as saintly victim or self-destructive fool I make a fetish object of my fear. I do not simply live with the fear. I do not have dinner with the fear and come to peace with it. I dress it up in theses ornate clothes of future doom or moral and cosmic karmic justice.

This is the inclination of mind.

With only my newly acquired Kindle Fire I didn’t think I could really keep posting.

Well, tonight I found an app that allows me to return.  I expect the blog will be different. Likely the posts will be shorter – more tablet friendly.  Also, having stepped away from 12 Step meetings for nearly five months (I’ll discuss in a later post) the topics will evolve away from traditional recovery topics. Not that I’m abandoning “recovery” topics completely, simply that narrow topics such as specific steps will not be a priority. Additionally, I may get a little political.

I look forward to rejoining the blogging community.

HB

I had decided to take a bit of a break from the blog to explore some other forms of social media, and just generally decide if doing the blog is worth it.  Despite some encouragement, blogging is a little like shouting your ideas from the roof of a building… all while 10,000 other shout from their own. As such, it’s tad lonely.

Anyway, my experiment with other social media has been a mixed bag. Twitter has been fun, though terribly addictive. If you don’t know, I’m @habituatedbuddh on twitter. There I have found a great recovery community (who use the hashtag #xa – among others which I generally ignore). All very supportive and more or less tolerant of my heretical ways.  Being on Twitter has been fun, and has led to a great, though scary, opportunity I describe shortly. In addition I have connected with some really wonderful and intelligent Buddhists who have been great to get to know,

The other social media I checked out is the new Google +. As much as I’m enjoyed Twitter, G+ has been a truly disappointing and disillusioning experience.  On G+ I have had the chance to meet and interact with some very interesting and occasionally prominent Buddhists. Several whose blogs I frequent and link to from my own.

Unfortunately, it has felt at times like one long episode of “Buddhists Behaving Badly” .  Unbeknownst to those of us outside the e-Buddhist world, in cyberspace there is quite a history of, and active engagement in, the rudest, pettiest, most mean-spirited behavior by Buddhists, and under the banner of Buddhism, one can imagine. Now, I know I should not expect all Buddhist to behave a certain way, and bad behavior is not the sole domain of other faiths, but seriously the rude insulting and ego-centric behavior out there is enough to turn me theist (poor joke, but you get what I mean).

Perhaps I should not expect all Buddhist to behave better, but I feel no desire to engage with those for whom basic manners are not a part of their practice. If you disagree… well, I don’t care.

The great opportunity that has come up as a result of the social media experiment is that I am going to be starting a Dharma Punx inspired recovery meeting in the Atlanta Metro.  More details will be forthcoming but it appears I’ve actually got a space lined up and encouragement from some people at Dharma Punx in LA and elsewhere.

It’s a scary prospect, but it’ll be fun. I’ll get a web page and twitter account up once I get a name for the group.

As for this blog, in up-coming days I’ll finish my analysis of Step two, begin to explore what I consider the three stages of recovery (including “transcendence”) and begin introducing the Dharma Punx group.

Good to be back!

Came to Believe…

In Re-Imagining: Step 2 (Part 1) we proposed the following re-write: Came to believe a Power greater than ourselves could restore us provides us with a skillful path to sanity.

At the outset let me be clear that this installment will not attempt to define or discuss any re-imagining of the phrase “a Power greater than ourselves.” I will take that up in Part 3. Unfortunately, however, it’s dangerous to leave even this apparently innocuous phrase hanging out there while trying to discuss the topic of belief.  The problem is that even this idea of a “Power greater” may taint of influence how we define belief. Therefore, for the purpose of the following discussion we will temporarily replace this phrase with an arguably non-suggestive formulation and proceed with the following provisional re-write: Came to believe a Power greater than ourselves that there is something that could restore us provides us with a skillful path to sanity.

“Came to believe…” When this phrase is discussed the focus tends to be on how we came to believe. That is, that the birth of our belief, or faith, was not an instantaneous “burning bush” experience, but was of what some people call the “educational variety.”  This is certainly a wonderful and charitable way of interpreting the first part of this step.

In describing it as charitable I mean to acknowledge that this interpretation emphasizes an inclusiveness that is often missing from discussions of faith.  It emphasizes that the many ways or many time periods in which belief grows is irrelevant.  Step 2 includes them all.

However, while this interpretation welcomes all believers it masks a deeper and more serious question, perhaps the question that most vexed addicts facing this step: “What does it mean to believe?” Note, this is not a question of what to believe, nor a question of how long it takes to believe.  It is simply, “What is this act of belief?” I submit that belief actually comprises two acts.

Come to see…

In order to believe X, by definition, one must see X.  For example, one can not believe that Keanu Reeves is the greatest actor in the world without having a concept of Keanu Reeves.  As such, the first stage of belief (or belief in X) is having some concept of the matter believed.  Although this sounds simple this is not so simple a matter as it at first appears. 

Everyday each of us is exposed to ten thousand things to believe.  They can range from political ideas, to what is the better toilet bowl cleaner, to whether your friend really will meet you at 1:00 for lunch like she promised. Each of these are things we may “believe” and each of these can be ignored.

In order to “believe” any of these, or any other things, it is not simply enough to be exposed to these “potential truths.”  Most things thrown at us that we’re asked to believe are simply treated by us as stimulus to which we respond.  We curse the politician, buy the TidyBowl, and arrive early to lunch.  We rarely actually consider them. We rarely actually “see” the matter to which we respond before we respond to it.

Thus, when I say that the first requirement of “Come to believe” is “Come to see” I mean that one must actually go beyond being exposed to the “truth” and go being able to recite it. One must actually consider it.  One must actually pause, prior to reacting, and really contemplate the matter.

Come to acknowledge…

The term “acknowledge” is perhaps an unusual one to use in the context of “belief.” For many once you come to see that there is a skillful path the next step is to accept the path. Acceptance, however, is a much more mature state of belief, and here we are only considering the first stage.  I contend that the initial stage is much more one of “acknowledgement.”  

“To acknowledge” is a fascinating act.  Acknowledgement goes beyond the seeing or comprehending of a truth, it is almost a form of admission.  It goes beyond the simple internal cognitive state of knowing something and implies that ones extends to that truth a certain status or role.  I may, for instance, know that Bob is my immediate supervisor at work.  Intellectually I may see that this is true, and may respond to it in any number of ways.  However, it is only when I “acknowledge” it, and I take the truth of his supervisory position and really internalize it (whether I “accept” it or want it to be so) that an authentic truthful relationship to Bob is formed.  In so doing, it is by acknowledging this truth that I am affected and changed.  Likewise, it is when I acknowledge that there is a skillful path to sanity that I form an authentic relationship with that path.

In Conclusion

Therefore, while we can appreciate the charitable inclusiveness of the traditional emphasis in understanding the phrase “Came to believe…” we see that there is much more in this phrase to be appreciated.  By “Came to believe…” we understand the that there are the twin actions of coming to see and contemplate that there is a skillful path, and acknowledging, or getting into an authentic relationship with this skillful path (even before I fully accept it).  Therefore, we conclude by proposing the following re-imagining:

Came to believe Came to see and acknowledge a Power greater than ourselves that there is something that could restore us provides us with a skillful path to sanity.

Coming in Part 3 we tackle the elephant in the room: “a Power greater than ourselves”

Short form of Step 2:  Came to believe a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

“Came to believe”,  ”a Power greater than our selves”, “sanity”, each of the words and phrases evoke an almost magical and mystical awe. Questions like “How does one come to believe”, “who or what is this power,” and “so, I’m insane?” all leap immediately to mind.  But in this first part of the re-imagining of Step 2 I want to begin with what might seem to be the most innocent words in this step: “could restore us.”

Two Conceptions of “could restore us”

There are, in general, two ways to understand “could restore us”.  To understand the difference it is useful to take as a starting point the relatively innocuous sentence “X could take me to Dallas.”  The first way of understanding this sentence can be termed the agent model.  In this interpretation the sentence is understood to say that I could be transported to Dallas by some outside agency “X”.  That is, by the agent model, the sentence “X could take me to Dallas” means that there is some person (or other agency) ”X” who could drive me to Dallas.

The second understanding, which we will term the directive model, takes the sentence “X could take me to Dallas” to mean that there is a path, scheme or course of conduct that will take me to Dallas.  The obvious example is a map, or travel plan.  Thus, our innocuous sentence translates as, “If I take this route (or highway) it’ll take me to Dallas.”  Here, there is no outside agency, there is merely a proscribed course of conduct that lead to the desired result.

The Agent Model and it’s Deficiencies

As should be evident from the above, the key feature of the agent model is a subject/object relationship.  In the sentence “X could take me to Dallas”, “X” is that a subject or actor or agency acts upon me, the object. I am literally taken to Dallas by something else.  Thus, in the Second Step, following this model, when we say “a Power could restore us to…” we are conceiving of ourselves as an object that is acted upon by the outside agency (the “Power”).  We are thus in the role of that which is restored and the Power is in the role of the restorer (that is, the agent).

When I assert that this model has deficiencies I do not mean to imply that it may not work for some people.  There are many people in recovery that approach the second step from this orientation and are able to achieve sobriety.  To them I say congratulations.  However, the major deficiency of this model is the cost it extorts.

Accepting this model is to see oneself as merely an object.  Our salvation or restoration is something imposed on us from outside, and is completely outside of our own agency.  For many in recovery this is seen as a great plus.  They describe it as the height of humility.  The idea is that being truly humble is to accept that we are powerless, and can not save ourselves.  Thus, any success we appear to have is not ours to claim.  Instead, all glory goes to the one who restored us, and we, in total humility, accept none.

Unfortunately, and what is rarely admitted is that, if this is so, the converse is also true.  That is, sense a Power outside of ourselves is responsible for our restoration, the failure of our restoration must also lie with that power.  Remember, we are not an agent in this model, we are merely acted upon.  Thus, the failure for us to be acted upon is not our responsibility, but is the responsibility of the agent (Power).

Often, people in recovery will attempt to avoid this corollary truth by claiming that the agent (Power) will only act upon us if we take certain steps.  Further, many claim that if we take those steps the agent (Power) will necessarily act upon us and restore us.  This, unfortunately contradicts the original formulation that we are powerless and that our restoration lies outside of ourselves (since it is we who decide if and to some extent when the agent acts).

The Directive Model and the Descriptive/Normative Distinction

The key feature of the directive model is that there is no subject/object distinction.  That which acts, and that which is acted upon are the same.  Said is plain english: We cause our own restoration.  Note however, this is not the same as claiming that we restore ourselves through our own “will power”.  In fact, this model implies no claim about the exact method of restoration, merely it’s general nature.

To understand this point recall that in the directive model of understanding of our innocuous sentence “X could take me to Dallas” no actual travel route (or mode of transportation) is mandated.  Likewise, when considering the second step the directive model of understanding does not specify what the actual route to restoration is.  Instead, this understanding merely describes that the restoration is achieve through the application of some method or scheme.

Applying the directive model of understanding to the second step then would leave us with the following: Came to believe a Power greater than ourselves could restore us provides us with a path to sanity.  This re-imagining is enough to give us an understanding of the second step that avoids the personal debasement of the agent model without necessarily elevating “will power” to the status of a superpower.

Before settling on this re-imagining of Step 2, however, it is useful to reflect on another aspect of methods, plans, or schemes: the descriptive/normative distinction. All directive methods, plans, and schemes (if accurate) are descriptive.  That is, they each describe a way of reaching it’s respective goal.  Returning to our innocuous example, any accurate path to Dallas satisfies the “X” in “X could take me to Dallas.”  However, we all recognize that some paths to Dallas are superior to others.  For example, most concede that driving west from Atlanta is a superior path to Dallas than drive east.  Both will get you to Dallas, but one gets you there much sooner, and much drier.

When we say give some directive, some plan, scheme, or method, as a way of achieving our goal, and we mean not only that it is accurate but that it is a better way than others we describe it as a normative directive.  Thus in further understanding of our innocuous example of going to Dallas with a normative directive understanding it states that “X” is a proper or skillful (using a Taoist term) to get me to Dallas.  

That Step 2 implies, in fact requires, a normative understanding is self-evident.  The entire purpose of the twelve steps is to help a person get sober, and to show them not just any way, but the best (or at least one of the best) ways to do so.  As such our re-imagining ought to include some indication of this normative aspect.  Therefore we can finally state our re-imagined Step 2 (thus far):

Came to believe a Power greater than ourselves could restore us provides us with a skillful path to sanity.

Upcoming in Re-Imagining: Step 2 (Part 2) – “Came to believe”

As always, comments and debate are welcome, invited, encouraged and anticipated.

Forgiveness and Debt

I visited a Christian blog recently (Ginzo Talk) which offered the following definition of forgiveness:

Forgiveness – a : to give up resentment of or claim to requital for b : to grant relief from payment of

While this blogger expressed a preference for the second definition, I feel that they both have the same failing. That is they are each based on seeing human relations as essentially a series of fundamentally commercial relations.  As such, based on one persons behavior they either “owe” something to another, or are “owed” something from the other..

In the case of the second of these two definitions this is obvious: “to grant relief from payment of”.  Thus, if I forgive you, I am relieving you an obligation you have to me.  The assumption of a sort of commercial activity between people is explicit.  You did X and as such you owe me Y.  You can either pay Y or I can “forgive” that debt.  This I would term “restorative debt”, and thus “restorative debt forgiveness/”

The second part of the first definition, “giving up a claim to requital for”, is slightly more subtle, but amounts to the same thing.  A “claim to requital for” is just a fancy way of saying I gave you X and as such you owe me X in return. This often takes the form of “I love you so you should love me.”  Again, a sort of commercial transaction.  This then constitutes what I’ll term “reciprocal debt” and “reciprocal debt forgiveness.”

Next, lets consider the first part of the first definition: “give up resentment of “.  Now to those in 12 Step recovery the term “resentment” has a special and sinister meaning.  Resentments are described as the chief offender, certain to lead one to drink again. As such, understanding what a resentment is is doubly important because it helps us understand both that part of the “program” as well as forgiveness.

A simple definition of resentment is “the feeling of displeasure or indignation at some act, remark, person, etc regarded as causing injury or insult” (Dictionary.com) In short, we might say its a feeling caused by another, seen as causing injury or insult.

Now at first glance this definition of forgiveness does not seem to follow the debt model laid out above. One might say that since I’m just giving up my own “feeling” there is no debt at issue. However, this ignores the most basic reason for this “feeling.”  That is, we each have a basic belief that we are entitled to NOT feel that displeasure.  Thus, If you caused my displeasure X then you have harmed me.   This I would term “rehabilitative debt.”

Now, If it is simply a matter of giving up the feeling of displeasure then the question must be asked “Who are we forgiving?”  The answer is that we are forgiving ourselves for feeling that way, or the other for causing the feeling.  If we conceive of it as forgiving the other the commercial nature of forgiveness is again obvious.  What if we are forgiving our selves?  Again, this is a commercial relation, we are feeling X; we see that we inappropriately are causing in ourselves X (we resent ourselves); and so we owe ourselves some sort of relief.

Another Model

If one encounters an injured animal, one that’s scared, one is not surprised if one gets bitten.  In this instance we understand that the animal’s action of biting (or clawing or scratching) us is not a malicious act.  We also understand that when we come across an injured animal, and we are injured by it, the animal owes us nothing.  We have no claim against the animal for requital (we don’t expect it to love us for any aid we offer, or if we do it is easy to see the foolishness of this attitude), we have no claim of repayment from the animal, and we recognize the foolishness of resenting the animal.  This is all true because we recognize that the animal’s action arise from it’s own suffering.

Thus, when we recognize that the animal’s action is from it’s own suffering, and that it owes us nothing, not even for any aid we render, we see that we have no need to forgive that animal.  Neither restorative, reciprocal, nor rehabilitative debt is owed.  The same is true of other people.  When we see that their actions are merely their reactions to their own suffering we can feel compassion for that person.  Part of that compassion is the understanding that since it was born of their suffering, and they owe us nothing, forgiveness is not necessary.

Living the Model

Living this model means that one need never forgive, because there is nothing to forgive.  The benefits of this approach is twofold.  First, in specific relationships, one need not spend time, energy, and emotion in the constant economy of emotional debt.  One does not focus energy on “you owe me this” or “you owe me for that”, or even “I’m in debt to you for this or that”.  One escapes the overlay this crude economy places on relationships, and concern for how and when these debts get paid, whether our payment is accepted or theirs is acceptable.  We escape all of this emotional bookkeeping.

Secondly, and more importantly, we escape the more general attitude of seeing people merely as economic actors.  By learning to see their slights and injuries to us as manifestations of their own suffering we no longer are centered on ourselves.  We are now are able to focus on their pain, their suffering and thus how to serve and assist them.  We move away from an ego-centric way of being in the world and become other-centric.  If one must, one can see that such a shift does in fact aid us because if their injuries to us arise from their suffering, then alleviating their suffering will dismiss these slights.

In Sum – A Prayer

Forgiveness is unnecessary because no debt is owed.  I will endeavor not to forgive you, or myself, because all the “wrongs” I experience are nothing more than evidence of your, or my, pain.  I will endeavor not forgive what is not owed.  Instead, I will endeavor to see instead the suffering that gives rise to these slights, and work always to aid those who suffer, whether myself or others.