I Am No Different

"I am no different." This thought appeared in my head a couple years ago in a rare moment of attempted meditation. Naturally, on some levels it is not true at all—on all the unimportant levels. However, on the most fundamental level, it is very true.

In our ceaseless attempts to prove to others, or to ourselves, that we are good enough (see previous post), we typically are not really trying to prove that we are as good as other people. We are trying to prove that we are better. That we belong in the "good person" camp and others, for various reasons, belong in the other group.

There must be people who call themselves "a bad person," but I would venture that a solid 95% of people consider themselves "a good person." When such a good person does a bad thing (an affair, a crime, a physical attack, a rude gesture), they consider themselves "a good person who did a bad thing." Hmm. I see. So what is a bad person then? Also someone who did a bad thing, and that is why they are "bad." Then how can a person do a bad thing and still be a good person? Hmm. Oh, because it is you, and by definition you do not consider yourself a bad person, even with the evidence (your bad act) to the contrary. So, then, what is it that distinguishes you, the good person who did a bad thing, from a "bad" person who did a bad thing?

This is really a fruitless discussion, and in that last paragraph I am being facetious. At its root the issue can be boiled down to "me, good; other person, bad." Just as you will never meet someone who believes someone else's religion is correct and his own is wrong, just as you will never meet a nationalist who believes that someone else's nation is superior to his, just as you will never meet, for example, a black white supremacist, when it comes to dividing the world up into good people and bad people, or right and wrong, it is virtually a 100% certainty that you, or anyone, will put yourself in the "good people" group and the "right" camp.

This ugly tendency, this lack of imagination, is precisely where so much conflict arises. This is where our wars come from, our massacres, our injustices. "Me good, you bad. Me right, you wrong. Me better, you worse."

B.S.!

So unnecessary, too. So avoidable.

I do not believe in "good people" and "bad people." I believe in people. I don't say that everyone is the same, because everyone is at least a little bit different than everyone else. I do say, though, that I am no different from anyone else. What does that mean, really?

It means that I recognize that I, like everyone else, sometimes behave in "good" ways and sometimes in "bad" ways. It means that everyone has certain fundamental needs for attention, recognition, and most importantly respect and love. It means that there is not a contrast between "good" me and "bad" other people. "I am no different" means that I am also imperfect, I also sometimes fall short, I also struggle to do what I know I should.

Most importantly, it means that I do not feel superior to anyone else or better than anyone else. I do have a few talents. I am more skilled at some things than some people. But that is separate and different from being better than anyone, fundamentally, as a person.

At its deepest level, it means that I can connect with virtually anyone, and feel connected to everyone. I have empathy for whatever they are going through. Because I do not need to be better, or to be considered "good," I am freed to fully recognize and fully accept their humanity, which while unique in its own way, is at heart, the same.

I am no different.