The Buddhist tradition gets regarded as pacifistic. It definitely emphasizes not creating harm–not resorting to aggression in speech or physical violence. But anyone who’s spent real time on the meditation seat knows that aggression often shadows thoughts in some form or another. Over the decades you can see what a refined game it is. Even pretty subtle thoughts can arise purely for the sake of dodging your direct experience and any raw feeling that goes with it. There’s a fundamental aggression in discursive thought habituated to rejecting your own naked experience, and that tendency goes deep.
But then, when I consider what inmates routinely go through, unraveling your own subtle aggression seems like a boutique activity in the face of the very real possibility that someone will try to beat your face in because they don’t like your tone. Or maybe they’re threatening to kick your ass if you don’t hand over your chocolate bars. Whatever it is. It can get a lot uglier from there. [Read more…]