Why Are We At Odds With Others?
This is a delicate subject, as it’s to do with the ability to understand. It’s not possible to be too specific here as people may misunderstand and become upset, so we’ll have to generalise, but you’ll get the picture …
Even as Buddhists, we’re at odds with each other – as well as with everyone else 🙂
There are paths which are called ‘inferior’, ‘middling’ and ‘superior’. They all use the same words, but the experience and meaning refines.
Here is the conundrum:
There are those on an inferior path whose attitude is actually superior, and those who think they are on a superior path but who display an inferior attitude. Our path depends on our ability to understand, and on our attitude to others ie empathetic compassion; so-called Dzogchen students can display an arrogant attitude. What we call ourselves is just an advertising display.
It doesn’t matter which path we find ourselves on – this is due to karma – we can still arrive at the shore of realisation. The words ‘inferior’, ‘middling’ and ‘superior’ are misnomers.
A diamond is just a crystal in a rock. Then people find a value in it, write about it, fashion it, tool it, wear it, bank it, show it off … but it’s still just a crystal in a rock. In the same way, the basic teaching is not-two: it is the beginning and the end. In the beginning, it’s just words, and ultimately, it is our absolute reality, nothing more. Humility is like that.
Anyway, as long as we think that one size fits all – that we should all think the same way – we will be at odds with everyone, trying outsmart them.
If we haven’t gone through discipline, study and practice, we do not have the ability to understand the subtleties of the complete picture. And so we argue, with passive aggression – if we don’t understand, we become angry with others, and it shows.
Compassion is the ability to understand.
BUDDHA IN THE MUD is a blog - a living book based on the Dzogchen teachings. Our teacher is life, and life is karma. We are all Buddhas in the mud of concepts. 
Well said, Tony. I see, I think, how the different paths lead to the same shore. It’s the bickering and name calling that sinks the raft, no matter how well “crafted” it is by discipline. Buddhism is the same regardless the method, but we think there is a lesser and greater vehicle, Mahayana vs Zen, Dogenism versus Ch’an, Theravada versus Mahayana—to complete the circle of dualism. Is that the right word—dualism? The “other” outside of our “own”.
Thank you for posting this.