What is right, What is wrong?

An untroubled mind, no longer seeking to consider what is right and what is wrong, a mind beyond judgments, watches, and understands.
- Buddha

There are so many moments come into our lives when we name our situations right or wrong. Sometimes we feel good about our situations and sometimes we feel so bad and shattered. So in this article, I am trying to give my opinion about those moments. I will share my thoughts about how our mind can handle these situations. Hope you will like this post. So let’s get started.

So, If you ask me about what is right, what is wrong in life then my answer will be there is no such thing. For me right, wrong, good, bad, true, false etc are just some meaningless words. For instance, suppose you are a vegetarian and you can’t stand around people who eat meat. Sure I can understand that but think about a lion or a tiger or any wild animal whose nature is to eat flesh. They can’t survive if they won’t eat. So are they doing wrong? Maybe or maybe not, why to judge? Let’s have some other example.

Example

There was a couple who were getting married and they booked a palace with an open beautiful garden for their marriage ceremony. They were so happy about their marriage. But in the middle of the ceremony, the rain started and everything got messed up. Bride started crying. This is not right. This is wrong. This is bad. What do you think? I guess pretty much like her, pretty much everyone in the marriage was thinking same. But let’s have a look across the street, there are few kids playing in the rain. Look at their heavenly smiles, they were so happy and joyful like they found what they were looking. One of them said, thank you for the raining. Another one said this is so awesome.

Discussion

So now let’s look at this situation a bit closer. The situation is same but few people were considering it bad and few were saying it is awesome. How come one thing has two different aspects. See, it is not you who judge the situations, it’s how we brought up in our current society. It is our conditioning which we inherit from our parents and our society. In simple words, we can say that situations are not good or bad, it is how we feel. We name situations, what we feel. If we are feeling happy we will say this is good, this is best. If we are feeling low we will say this is very bad. Maybe it seems no big difference right now, but that is the main part. Because if we figure it out then we already won half battle.

Let me share how my mind handles situations which don’t work out well for me. First of all, I don’t change with situations. Because at first place I don’t expect from situations and peoples. Fewer expectations, less regret. I only try to be mindful and aware of the situations. No matter what comes next I try to be open and welcoming for the outcome. If something I was trying to do bring positive results I say thank you and if not I still trying to look into the situation and accepting it as I was going to expect a positive result. Because in reality, we don’t know what is hidden in the future. Maybe a new job brings less fortune in your life or maybe a job loss brings an opportunity to start something new and bring lot’s of good into your life. The truth is we really don’t know, what’s hidden into the future, so why worry. Look at this quote from my favorite book.

Upon disaster depends good fortune; within good fortune hides disaster.
Where will it end? For nothing is certain;
what is correct goes astray; what is right goes wrong.
Our confusion goes on and on.
- Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

Solution

There is no one solution to these problems. Because each of one has our own unique kind of problem. But we can try and keep on trying until we find our peace of mind and calm in our lives. From my point of view, A non-judgmental mind could be a great start for the solution. If we accept people and situations as they are then we will suffer less and live more. Wanting different from reality is the main reason for suffering. If you ask me then I will say, there’s only one person who can act completely according to you and it is only you no one else, not your spouse, not your child no one but you. But the funny thing is in this modern era we ourselves don’t follow what we really want to do. If we ask anyone they will say they want to be happy in their lives but still most of them are struggling. Sure we cannot control situations but we can change our way to look into those situations.

So for a non-judgmental mind, I highly recommend trying some meditation. So many researches already proved meditation helps us in so many ways. If you ask me then achieving a non-judgmental mind is not easy. But meditation can help us with that. By meditation, I am not saying you need to wake up early or go to mountains or any special camp. For me, meditation is presenting at the moment. Awareness about what I am doing, why I am doing, where I am doing. If you are new with meditation then I highly recommend with the breathing exercise. If you want you can follow these steps.

• Find a place to sit or stand for the next several minutes.
• Maintain a comfortable yet wakeful posture.
• Close your eyes if possible.
• Now start breathing with awareness. When you breathe in feel you are inhaling energy, calm, relaxation in your body. Then hold your breath for one moment and then slowly release it and also release all the tension, rigidness in your body and mind.
• I highly recommend counting the breath for starting. When you inhale mentally count one and while exhaling count two. Keep on doing until ten and then start again from one.
• Maybe the middle of this breathing exercise you will find yourself somewhere else. Maybe you will find out after one or two minutes that you were not counting instead thinking something else. Just let go this thought gently and start counting the breath. Don’t feel bad about distractions, it’s normal, keep on practicing it.
• Again found yourself distracted, simply come back to here and now and start counting from one.

I do breathing exercise whenever I found the time, doesn’t matter I am in my office, home or in commute. If I got a minute or more then I will start focusing on my breathe. This will help me stay calm and focused. When I got distracted, I don’t judge myself, I don’t judge my thoughts. I simply let go and with compassion again starting counting my breath. So I hope this will help you get started on your non-judgmental journey. I will continue on these topics in my next posts. So let’s finish today’s topic by saying this prayer.

May I has peace and joy in my life.
May everyone has peace and joy in his or her lives.
May I has a healthy and happy life.
May everyone has a healthy and happy life.

Photo by Faye Cornish on Unsplash. Compressed by Compressor.io

Originally published at yeshu.in on December 11, 2018.