How do we choose to handle conflict when it arises? We often harden against it and suffer through it. Spiritual teachers tell us that conflict (discord, anger, resentment, violence) is always the result of a belief in separation – I vs. Other.
The first time I heard this it stunned me. It’s a profound idea, a notion that is hard for our human mind to grasp. We are so enamored with our “I”: our sense of self, labels, identity. We believe that all we have accumulated – education, relationships, wealth – is a result of my efforts, hard work, discipline, good fortune. But our fixed “I” is also what causes us to steal, cheat, lie and hurt others. “I” is at the heart of conflict. This doesn’t invalidate the experience of trauma or abuse or neglect. We still have a right and a need to protect our “self,” to resist injustice.
But there does exist some space in the interstice. Between self-care and enacting harm there is an opening. There’s a choice to be made about whether or not to pick up the sword and attack. There is also a question to be asked: Is this person truly separate from me? When we perceive the other as enemy our wisdom is obfuscated. We cannot see clearly. All we see is self (right) and other (wrong). But what we’re actually experiencing is self as victim and other as perpetrator. This leaves us feeling defenseless and hungry for retaliation.
There is an alternative approach, and an alternative question: What am I witnessing in them that is actually a reflection of me? If they are (or appear to be) lying to or stealing from me —when have I lied or stolen. It’s rarely easy to muster compassion for someone who has wronged you. It’s easier, or so it seems, to hate the other as the object of your suffering. When we do this we don’t have to turn the gaze inward. We simply abandon, humiliate, attack, kill. There is an exit, a way out of the painful trap of “I” and “Other” which so often fails us. At the root of conflict there exists a split; with practice, and with or without the participation of the other, we can return to an experience of wholeness.