#56 - The Company We Choose

By SG              

Sometimes I struggle with what I am doing with my life, the relationship of those around me and their influence on me, and the balance between my needs, wants, and what the right thing is to do. I recently came to a definition of courage separate from foolhardiness. Courage is about choosing to do the right thing even though it may inspire fear, different from foolhardiness or recklessness which ignores potential risks and charges into dangerous situations.

               I have sought and found reasons to value and engage with the world with the belief that it makes the world a better place, even as I may teach others ways to harm an attacker, or take money in exchange for a connection to a company that promises to cover expenses of illness, accident, or death while knowing that the company needs to pay out less than it takes in to stay in business. These rationalizations make me wonder if I am engaging with the universe in a healing manner, or instead being self-serving in such a way to feed my core sins of fear and greed. I’ve come to believe that sins or human tendencies to miss the mark of an idealized self can be boiled down to those, just as virtues can be boiled down to various expressions of lovingkindness.

               It is because of the literature I read and a few individuals whose company I keep that I came to these beliefs. We become like those around us, which is why some people say that if you are the smartest one in the room, you should find a different room. Nurturing behavior is how we can rise to the potential of our nature – which cannot be changed. As such the only one of importance is the way we nurture others and ourselves. What world do we want, one of individuals afraid of differences, or one of individuals who love the diversity of individuals that is inherent to the grand universe we find ourselves in?

               The way that we encourage others to have an abundance mindset or scarcity mindset – seeing either what is had or what is lacking – helps to create an attitude of fear and greed for needs and wants or lovingkindness and generosity of what one has, which could be as small as the company and comfort of one’s presence. Of course, in some situations the lack can lead to perception of a threat to one’s livelihood or more directly to one’s survival. If there is not a foundational belief in the interconnected nature of life and the permanence of matter and energy as it is recycled in the universe, it is easy to slip into this fear. Even with that, with the subjective nature of existence it can be hard to avoid by itself.

               This makes it all the more important to set up life in such a way as to be an individual that improves the community you are with and find the company that will help you rise to your fullest potential. If you were at that point, what would be the best use of that potential to increase the lovingkindness of the universe around you? I think about how much potential is wasted by sending young men and women to die even before they even have the opportunity to choose whether to go to college or not. Another phrase for dangerous tasks in war is to send old men and bachelors. As we drift closer to a conflict of fear that could end the Anthropocene with weapons of mass destruction, I pray we never institute the draft. I also consider what I have in my immediate family and wonder if perhaps I could have served in the past in such a way to put this off, or if I should now as I get older and more alone.

               It takes courage to maintain peace, and occasionally a willingness to stand and engage in conflict to help less loving individuals see that there are consequences of the belief of might being right. Even if one believes oneself to be the superpower of the community (whether global or local) when another stands up against another minor or stray blow in self-defense can weaken a so-called superpower enough to lose that mandate of strength. This can occur even if in the end the superpower triumphs.

--SG