Treatment (inspired by Sunday Scribblings)

Treatment

“Treat others the way you want to be treated”.

That’s sometimes easier said than done. Especially if THEY don’t treat us the way we want to be treated. We like to think that certain negative behaviours cancel out the above rule and justify an equal response. Wrong! Why? Well, first of all there’s karma to consider: somehow we created the causes for this to happen – even if we can’t remember anymore - and reacting in a negative way will only create more causes for future shit to come our way. However, this train of thought doesn’t always work – for the simple reason that we just can’t believe that we really created this situation (we just can’t remember!). Therefore I tend to argue along the lines of one of my “things” in order to look after myself and my karma: I tell myself that no one but myself controls my behaviour and that I always have a choice. If I treat someone else badly just because they treated me badly, that means I’m just reacting rather than acting - which means they are in control: they MAKE me behave that way. Now this goes completely against the grain of what I believe in (my “thing”): No one makes me do anything – so I try and choose my response and when I take the time to think I also remember karma and then I often do actually manage to rise above the petty ping pong game. I might still think “Fuck ‘em” but I don’t act it out and I don’t say it.

So still some work to do - but I am getting there ;-)