„Every morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most." Quote Buddha.
Once upon a time, there was a businessman who angrily approached Buddha and spat at him because his children, who should have been spending their time making money, were instead meditating with Buddha.
When the businessman insulted and spat at him, the Buddha simply kept silent and smiled. He showed no reaction, said not a word. He just smiled. The businessman was surprised and walked away, startled. He lay awake all night because he could not handle the Buddha's reaction. It was the first time in his life that someone smiled after being spat on by someone. His whole world was turned upside down.
For this reason, he went to see Buddha again the next day. He bowed deeply before him and asked for forgiveness.
"Please forgive me! I did not know what I was doing yesterday." That was all he could manage to mumble. Buddha looked at him with a questioning look. "I cannot forgive you, why should I when you did nothing wrong?" The businessman reminded him of what he had done the day before.
Buddha merely replied, "Oh, the person you spat on yesterday? He is not here now. If I ever meet him, I will tell him to forgive you. You have not done any wrong to me."
This story shows us the wisdom of Buddha. He says identity is like water and can change form at any moment. One's own identity as well as that of the other. This means that neither he nor the businessman were the same the next day as the day before. And in fact, the businessman had already learned something that made him feel, think and act in a new way.
We can learn a lot from Buddha.
"Identity is liquid like water, today we are someone new and all that matters is only what we do in this moment."
Often we worry about how to change our unwanted behavior (or we expect someone else to change). Sometimes we think that we will never be able to do it anyway, for such and such reasons, and because we tell ourselves that the behavior is already fixed in our system.
Most of us have the illusion that everything that defines us is set in stone. We say things like, "My Human Design is this, my Zodiac sign is that, my Reading spelled out this for me, and my mother has called me that since I was little." And we feel the same way about others. If the other person behaves "badly," we quickly make him an overall bad person. And if he belongs to a certain group or culture or community of faith, then all the other members turn into that too.
If we were to find ourselves in the Buddha's position as such a person, we would see the same angry man of yesterday today, even if he fell on his knees and asked for forgiveness. And we would still be hurt by what he did yesterday. Oh, we might not have remained silent and smiled from the beginning. But maybe we had. And if not yesterday, maybe we would today. It is up to us, and all the beliefs that wind like highways through our brains can be replaced today by other roads. Small roads that get bigger the more we use them.
Therefore, let us strip off the old labels from ourselves. Release ourselves from beliefs that block our personal growth. Allow ourselves to venture into the darkness in order to find new paths and turn them into luminous roads.
DYFH.
