by Ono Kono

Recently it occurred to me that when our ego gets in the way, we could help put it back in line with a new perspective. A little saying that I like to remember is, “Be kind; everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” I don’t know what is going on in your life, but perhaps that frown on your face and your abruptness is just you lost in thought, worrying about your father who has cancer, or the argument you had with your wife this morning. It has nothing to do with me, yet my ego tends to think the opposite. My ego thinks it knows best, yet I can’t know what is the greatest course of action for you, although I can give plenty advice based on my own experience, it may not be the path you need to take. So, I must be compassionate and patient with you, just as I hope you will be compassionate and patient with me.

In addition, here on the internet, you don’t know me personally, who I am, what my experiences are, even how old I am-the same goes for me knowing you. We see through our life—filter, which unfortunately doesn’t always get it right, especially when we try to interpret truth about right or wrong.

There is much wisdom in Jesus words about judging another. I believe he is also pointing out that the speck in our brother’s eye is actually the gigantic log in our life. Only we don’t want to see it. We desperately try to hide it from our awareness, yet there the log lies in front of us mirrored in another. Jesus could very well mean that the judgment may not be just his, but our own judgment of our own failings. Besides, we don’t see the complete picture, our judgment comes from a finite life, with the bias of many filters.

The following paragraph offers yet another perspective, from the book Mystery Girl by David Gordon.

“It is one of the simplest, most difficult truths: the amazing fact that other people are real and thinking all day about their own complex lives, just like we are. In a restaurant, a store, and office, look around: each one of those random brains is a whole world, same as yours, a spinning globe of worries, desires, memories, and fears, with families and friends, enemies and half-forgotten faces, reaching back deep into time, and somehow existing right across the bus. Now multiply that by 6.7 billion. That is our reality: an endless number of universes, each one dancing about the others, changing and evolving, blinking out and shining on, appearing and dying, forever, an infinite darkness alive with brief little stars.”

Discrimination thrives whenever and wherever we park our egos. Take away the ego and the want to be correct, the desire to keep a group of people locked in a box of inequality disappears.