“The Middle Path in Daily Life"
Question : How can I apply the middle path in daily life? How do we know that we have strayed from the middle path? For example, some people take unfair advantage of us or have crossed the limit of acceptable behavior. How should I respond so that I am keeping to the middle path?
Tan Ajahn: In order to maintain the middle path, you have to learn to develop the four brahmavihāras, the four states of the Brahma, which are mettā, karunā, muditā, upekkhā. These are the four qualities to apply in your daily lives.
Mettā means to be friendly, to have no enemies. If people do you wrong, you should forgive them. Don’t hold a grudge. If you have something you can share with other people, share it; make friends, don’t make enemies. This is mettā.
Karunā is helping people when they are in need. When you see someone in need and you can help them, give them a hand and you will feel good, feel happy.
The third, muditā, is if someone has succeeded in whatever they do, you should be joyful and congratulate them.
Don’t be jealous of their success even though they might be your competitors. Like when you play sports, one side will have to win and the other side will have to lose, so the loser should be gracious and should be happy with the other side’s success.
If you can do this, then you will be peaceful and happy and have no enemies because you will not see anything bad in your opponents. You accept that in life there will be winning and losing. But you don’t have to get angry, sad, or mad when you lose.
And when you get angry or mad, you are hurting yourself, not your opponents. So try to be gracious when you lose or when people are more successful than you are, and feel happy with them.
The fourth is upekkhā. This is keeping your mind in a neutral position. When things go wrong or things go bad with you or with somebody else, and there is nothing you can do or help, then you should just have upekkhā, just be neutral.
Don’t react. Don’t feel bad, because feeling bad won’t change anything. Like when someone you love gets sick or may be dying. You don’t want him/her to die, but there is nothing you can do because this is the way things work. In this world people come and go. They are beyond your control. To feel sad or bad is only hurting yourself.
So sometimes you just have to remain upekkhā. And the way to have upekkhā is to meditate. When you meditate and your mind becomes calm, then you will have upekkhā. Once you have this upekkhā, when things happen and there is nothing you can do, you can bring your mind to upekkhā. You won’t feel bad. You just accept that this is the way things work.
So this is something you should try to develop and use in your daily life when you interact with people.
By Ajaan Suchart Abhijāto
Question : How can I apply the middle path in daily life? How do we know that we have strayed from the middle path? For example, some people take unfair advantage of us or have crossed the limit of acceptable behavior. How should I respond so that I am keeping to the middle path?
Tan Ajahn: In order to maintain the middle path, you have to learn to develop the four brahmavihāras, the four states of the Brahma, which are mettā, karunā, muditā, upekkhā. These are the four qualities to apply in your daily lives.
Mettā means to be friendly, to have no enemies. If people do you wrong, you should forgive them. Don’t hold a grudge. If you have something you can share with other people, share it; make friends, don’t make enemies. This is mettā.
Karunā is helping people when they are in need. When you see someone in need and you can help them, give them a hand and you will feel good, feel happy.
The third, muditā, is if someone has succeeded in whatever they do, you should be joyful and congratulate them.
Don’t be jealous of their success even though they might be your competitors. Like when you play sports, one side will have to win and the other side will have to lose, so the loser should be gracious and should be happy with the other side’s success.
If you can do this, then you will be peaceful and happy and have no enemies because you will not see anything bad in your opponents. You accept that in life there will be winning and losing. But you don’t have to get angry, sad, or mad when you lose.
And when you get angry or mad, you are hurting yourself, not your opponents. So try to be gracious when you lose or when people are more successful than you are, and feel happy with them.
The fourth is upekkhā. This is keeping your mind in a neutral position. When things go wrong or things go bad with you or with somebody else, and there is nothing you can do or help, then you should just have upekkhā, just be neutral.
Don’t react. Don’t feel bad, because feeling bad won’t change anything. Like when someone you love gets sick or may be dying. You don’t want him/her to die, but there is nothing you can do because this is the way things work. In this world people come and go. They are beyond your control. To feel sad or bad is only hurting yourself.
So sometimes you just have to remain upekkhā. And the way to have upekkhā is to meditate. When you meditate and your mind becomes calm, then you will have upekkhā. Once you have this upekkhā, when things happen and there is nothing you can do, you can bring your mind to upekkhā. You won’t feel bad. You just accept that this is the way things work.
So this is something you should try to develop and use in your daily life when you interact with people.
By Ajaan Suchart Abhijāto
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