Buddhist teachings

Alabama

Hi - I'm very new to boards.ie and to Buddhism. I am really only a few weeks into my study of buddhism and really enjoyed reading all the posts on here - it's really great so get so much insite!

I have a question that I hope you will be able to help with! I am wondering how under Buddha's teachings you should deal with someone who has wronged you?

I had a situation where a friend really let me down and I am very upset about it. I know she didn't do it intentially but she didn't take any steps to rectify it either.

I would like to stand up for myself and express that I deserve better. Is this in line with Buddha's teachings?

Asiaprod

I have a question that I hope you will be able to help with! I am wondering how under Buddha's teachings you should deal with someone who has wronged you?

I had a situation where a friend really let me down and I am very upset about it. I know she didn't do it intentially but she didn't take any steps to rectify it either.

I would like to stand up for myself and express that I deserve better. Is this in line with Buddha's teachings?

Firstly, welcome to the community Alabama.
Your first question here is a good one, and believe it or not was the first question I asked when I seriously took up Buddhism as a belief. The answer I propose is general in nature since I do not know the specifics of your argument with this friend, and as usual quite long:) It is loosely based on the Buddhist teaching of Compassion and is posted as a guideline to help you reach a different level of understanding where you can look at the situation from a different perspective and interpret events in a different way. Then you can act in a way that is productive to you both.

I think the main aspect of this teaching that can help you with this situation focuses on Anger. Anger was my biggest suffering and it came out in so many forms that most of the time I never realized that I was angry, but others did, and this really influenced how they dealt with me. My teacher taught me that there are are three main causes of suffering: Greed, Anger and Stupidity, or GAS for short. He considered Anger to be the most destructive as it could easily lead to Hate and this was a very bad life condition to end up in. In the case of Anger, most would recommend one of two courses of action:

1. Suppress it, and you run the risk negativity building up within that will cause one to suffer more
2. Express it, thereby preventing the above.

However, from a Buddhist perspective both of these are unhealthy. If you suppress anger, it is still there and that is not good for your health. If you express it, it could harm others and create more negative karma in the process and that is also not good for you. Buddhism tries to teaches us to look at the situation from a different perspective and to interpret events in a different way. If we can do this, we usually find that there is no reason to get angry in the first place. Then there is no anger to express or to suppress. Here are two examples of anger as they were taught to me in Buddhist study.

Someone tells us that we did something wrong or criticizes us.
Our instinct or reaction is to think that person is trying to harm/hurt us and we react with Anger. This is a natural survival instinct. Now try to look at it from a Buddhist perspective and consider that a) this person may actually be giving us some useful information and they may be trying to help us. or b) a situation has arisen that is custom made for us to learn something from (I noticed that once I started to study Buddhism these situation came with alarming frequency because they were lessons I really needed to learn). This is information that we can use to become more happy. By seeing the situation in this way, we can suppress the urge to get angry. In other words, what created anger is not so much what the other person said, but how we chose to interpret what that person said. If we interpret it in a different way, the anger will not arise. The life lesson to take from this is that before we get angry and react, stop and silently remind ourselves that "what creates anger is not so much what the other person said, but how we chose to interpret what he said." Take a deep breath, calm your mind, then say what you feel is the right response to that situation. With practice the time between stopping, processing the information, and formulating a correct response all takes place within the blink of an eye.

The second example I think plays right into what you are describing

Someone lies to, or tries to deceived, us.
Again our instinct or reaction is to think that person is trying to hurt us by taking us for granted and again our instinct is to react with Anger. If we look at it from a Buddhist perspective we should consider this is the fruit of our own negative karma. In a previous lifetime, under the influence of a self-centered attitude we deceived and betrayed others. Now we are receiving the result of this now. Instead of blaming others, we can now see that the cause of our being deceived or betrayed is our own self-centeredness. Then there is no reason to get Angry at others since we realize that our self-centeredness is the real enemy. Now we can make a strong determination not to act like that again because we know that self-centeredness brings suffering. If we want to be happy, we must release the self-centeredness, so we do not act so negatively towards others.

None of the above means that you cannot stand up for yourself and express that you deserve better, and none of this excuses the other person and says that they are right. You should stand up for yourself. It is a valued friend you are dealing with. What the above does say is to approach the situation in the right frame of mind. Instead of anger, adopt the approach that this is a friend that you value, that you feel hurt by the situation (not angry) and you want to give some useful information that will help the friendship.

One of the key Buddhist practices we are encouraged to do is to memorize and study small quotes that you can pull up in your mind as guidelines to help you understand, then deal with, situations encountered in every day life. Most of us never stop and take time to understand what is happening, we just react. This is a very nice quote, not written by me, to remember when you are faced with this type of situation you mention.

“Sentient beings do what sentient beings do.”

That is, sentient beings are under the same influence of ignorance, afflictions, and karma and these influences lead to harmful actions. Living beings are imperfect, so any expectation from us that they be perfect is totally unrealistic. Once you can accept this and understand the mechanics you can be more compassionate regarding what they do. They too are suffering when they act in mistaken ways and you don’t want to inflict more suffering on them, and on yourself, by getting angry. Its counter productive at best.

Hope this helped, please feel free to ask any questions.

Alabama

yes that has really really helped! Thank you so much!

I have really enjoyed reading your posts - you are very wise!!

Asiaprod

Alabama wrote: »

I have really enjoyed reading your posts - you are very wise!!

No, I have just made many mistakes and am now learning to think before I put my foot in it.:) Glad the community could help you out. Buddhism can sometimes appear confusing and it is easy to get lost in some of the dialogues. Look forward to hearing more from you

bou

I agree with Asiaprod's advice. Definitely, take a deep breath and let go a little of the "I" in analysing the situation. Yes, stand for what you feel is right but be diplomatic, reasonable and not aggressive in how you respond. Sometimes "giving way" to the other can be good too. It all depends on circumstances and your motives.

I find that anger/annoyance is often arising out of pride, jealousy and things like that. It helps to bring a little mindfulness and analysis to the causes of the anger. The 'object' of you anger is the person who did or didn't do something. You can look at the causes and conditions that gave rise to the situation. Was it all entirely due to that person or were there other things involved? Also, maybe the person was and is entirely unaware of there being a problem. It could be possible that they were reacting to some irritation which you had caused them in the past and maybe are continuing to cause them.

Another angle is to look at the impermanent nature of things. We get annoyed and angry when things and people don't behave in the ways we expect them to. But we live in an interdependent changing world where things do not work out the way we expect. Why be annoyed with things which are bound to change.

Some teachings talk about beings being by nature unreliable and subject to their negative karma. As such, they will often bring us problems. We should try to let go of being annoyed and see that they are subject to negativity and try to have a compassionate attitude towards them. If they act negatively, they may not see or understand the harm they cause. If they do then they are actually causing themselves great suffering in the future.

I find it interesting how even when I see that I am annoyed and that the annoyance is a little irrational and unjustified, I still find it hard to let go of the resentment. I think it shows how irrational our emotions and behaviours can be and how hard it can be to let go of them even when we see how useless or harmful they are.

“The Way of the Bodhisattva” by Shantideva has a chapter on patience. One verse says:
No evil is there similar to hatred,
Nor austerity to compared with patience,
Steep yourself, therefore, in patience -
In all ways, urgently, with zeal

KamikazeKenny81

I find these difficult situation very helpful indeed in my study of Buddhism.

The first thing I would say is that you are going to react in whatever way you react. Its not about trying to react as a Buddhist should, i like to try to mindfully observing how I react.

As you begin to learn more and more about yourself, it is these difficult situations that can teach you the most about yourself. Anger is my own vice, and observing it I can see how it takes control of me and effects my whole thinking pattern. Just learning these things is enough to start positive change.

I hope you and ur friend can overcome this I would say keep practicing the meditation to hone ur mindfulness skills but Im as bad as anyone for neglecting this

Blackhorse Slim

Two monks were walking along the bank of a swift river. They met a young woman who could not cross alone. One of the monks picked up the young woman and carried her to the other side.

Some time later, the other monk said to his companion, "Did you forget that it is forbidden to touch a woman? Have you forgotten the vows you have taken?"

The other monk answered, "Brother, I left the young woman on the bank of the river. Are you still carrying her?"