Hurt People Hurt People

I heard this in a movie I saw recently: "Greenberg" starring Ben Stiller.  It's a very succinct way of describing personal Karma (Ch. 1 and Ch. 3), and putting hurtfulness into a perspective where compassion comes a little more naturally for the one who does the hurting.  Of course, it's easy to have compassion for the victim, but often we overlook the reality that the perpetrator is often a victim as well.  For example, it is well known that parents who abuse their children were themselves abused, and that ending that cycle of violence is not as simple as giving into one's wish to "be different than my parents were".

There is an element of karma, of powerfully motivating emotions that we do not choose to feel, and would gladly evict from our minds if we could, that drive acts of cruelty.  Whether it is the alcoholic harming himself, in reaction to his addiction, or a bully tormenting smaller children in reaction to his own sense of helplessness at the hands of an abusive parent or sibling, there is always more to the perpetration of harm than the perpetrator in question being "an asshole".  Harming others is invariably part of a cascading chain of karma, each new creation of suffering being inspired by one that came before it.

To end those evolving chains, it is essential to look beyond your anger at those who hurt others, and try to see the pain that drives them.  There may not be much there to indicate what that pain is, but you must try.  After all, we are all one.  And any pain inflicted, when all is said and done, is just pain that 'I' feel, with that 'I' being the same one that says, "'I' am reading this right now."  Any compassion is no more than a reaction to not wanting to suffer.  Remember who that other person really is, and why he causes you or someone else to suffer, and you will replace a seed of pain with a seed of an entirely more benevolent kind.

Jim