“Understanding and love are not two things, but just one.  Suppose your son wakes up one morning and sees that it is already quite late.  He decides to wake up his younger sister, to give her enough time to eat breakfast before going to school.  It happens that she is grouchy and instead of saying, “Thank you for waking me up,” she says, “Shut up!  Leave me alone!”  and kicks him.  He will probably get angry, thinking, “I woke her up nicely.  Why did she kick me?”  He may want to go to the kitchen and tell you about it, he may even want to kick her back.

But then he remebers that during the night his sister was coughing a lot, and he realizes that she must be sick.  Maybe she behaved so meanly because she has a cold.  At that moment, he understands, and he is not angry at all anymore.  When you understand, you cannot help but love.  You cannot get angry.  To develop understanding, you have to practice looking at all living beings with the eyes of compassion.  When you understand, you cannot help but love.  And when you love, you naturally act in a way that can relieve the suffering of people.”

– Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace Is Every Step

This passage always reminds me of something Mark Twain once said:  “Everyone is fighting a dark and terrible battle, and most of them are losing.  Be nice to others, who can know what kind of day they could be having.”

One Response to “Understanding”

  1. 12:47 am, 23 August, 2008 р.
    t says:

    “Looking deeply is the medicine most recommended for anger. If you look, you will understand the other’s difficulties and their deepest aspiration that they have never been able to realize. Then compassion is born in you and compassion is the antidote for anger. if you allow compassion to spring from your heart, the fire of anger will die right away.”

    -Thich Nhat Hahn,
    Anger-
    Wisdom for Cooling the Flames
    (The Relief of Understanding pg 114)

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