Where’s One When You Need One

Have you ever witnessed someone running a red light or stop sign and said to yourself, gee I wish there was a cop here to nail that guy? If the answer is yes you have demonstrated a trait that is very common to Homo sapiens –justice must be served. If the answer is no I hope you’re on my jury some day if I ever should need one.

People like to think of life as simple exchanges where there is a cause and effect relationship and karma reigns true. Do good, get good. Do bad, get bad. Do me bad and get way more bad than would be fair. This thinking applies not just to laws and society it’s also about personal and individual situations and relationships. It’s the feeling that somehow, someone or some group that has done you harm doesn’t really understand you. If they truly knew you they would never have dumped you, fired you, ignored or shunned you. How could they?

So when you find yourself in a dumped, fired, ignored, shunned or any other distasteful or painful situation caused by someone that just “does not get it” there is the temptation to make things right. Or in other words not merely walking away but leaving your mark. To somehow convince the source of the situation that there is a better and more enlightened way to see the world – your way, or perhaps our or my way but certainly not “their” way. This way of thinking can easily and unwittingly be expanded and extended to the concept of getting even. We all know someone that wanted to get back at someone or something and spent a lot of time sharing their fantasies about the perfect reconciliation and retribution. Boy, we really can sell it when we think we’re right can’t we? Fortunately, I believe that deep down inside we all have a sense that revenge is not ours to exercise and that’s why we want the cop to do it for us.

It all comes down to appreciation. If for some reason you feel that you are not appreciated you may begin asking yourself why not. And of course the answer is not about you it’s about “them”. “They” this and “they” that and “they” whatever: You’re fine, “they” are the idiots. People get to this point a lot when they are talking about their government or boss or coach or teacher or anybody that exerts power over them. Power is the key and just like we can’t arrest those traffic law violators ourselves we can’t always fix other people, companies, institutions or situations because we don’t have the power or the control we need to effect change. Fixing things is a function of wanting to keep life in nice, little, easy to label and understandable axioms: What goes around comes around, just wait and see, you’ll be sorry, and other familiar rationalizations that attempt to distill situations we don’t like into situations we can live with. And our ability to do just that is one of the great gifts of life – to call upon that imaginary traffic cop and mentally give the source of our grief a big fat ticket. We somehow are able to pass the baton of strife into the hands of life and get on with it. Sometimes by letting go we hold more of life.

It turns out that we really had the power we needed all along. It’s just a matter of perspective and things like having wealth often feel exactly the same as not needing wealth. Having recognition is similar to not needing it either. Yes I know that it’s complicated in some ways but pretty simple in others, especially when we consider that each of our worlds is ours alone. Nobody is living your life just the way you are. And thankfully we’re not all trying to live exactly like each other. We have differences in how we see the world and in how we deal with the world. And thus we use our power in the way that best suits us. Happiness it seems is custom made.

Armed with this simple insight that we can see exactly whatever it is we want and yet be blind to things that may hurt us. It gives each of us a chance to carve out our own perfect scenario for happiness. A way to be thankful for everything we have no matter how small. To be giving when there’s not much to give, to celebrate and see the abundance of life. To take the shunning, dumping and firing that life deals us with resolve and courage. To be forgiving when someone causes us pain. To know that we can’t always have it our way and be okay with that. To know in our hearts that there is a reason for everything and that the gift of this moment coupled with our own power to change our perspective is often all we need to change our world and we never really needed the cop in the first place.
Gary
From the Book of Szen