You are sitting and meditating a million miles and 20 years away from what somebody in grade school said to you that hurt your feelings tremendously. But suddenly you remember Suzie Jones or Bobby Smith in fifth grade said, “Dada dada,” to me, and, “Ahhhhh! I’m so angry at him, he destroyed my self-confidence… He didn’t pick me to be a member of his team, and he told everybody why — because I was so awful.” You have been holding onto this for 20, 30 or 40 years.

Stop and ask yourself, “Am I seeing this situation correctly?” Why do I have to experience so much pain as an adult because Suzie Jones or Bobby Smith did such and such to me when I was in fifth grade? Is it happening now? No. Was it really such a catastrophe that nobody else on the entire planet has ever experienced? I think everybody in fifth grade has gone through something like that. Why am I, all these years later still so upset about it?

The mind responds, “Well he did this to me.” But then you start remembering the thought training teachings and reflect how he may have said or done that, but it happened to me because I created the karma in a previous lifetime (or earlier this lifetime) for that to happen. If I created the karma, why am I so mad at Suzie and Bobby? Why don’t I distrust my self-centred thought that made me create that negative karma that brought that suffering upon me?

Because Bobby and Suzie were kids, they were just the co-operative condition. Their minds were ruled by afflictions. The real cause is my karma which was caused by my self-grasping and self-centredness. Why don’t I point my finger at those? Why don’t I drop the anger at Bobby and Suzie, and put some energy into eliminating my self-centredness and my self-grasping? That would do me a lot better than holding onto these hurt feelings and hatred for Bobby and Suzie for another 10, 20, 30, 40 or 50 years. Because I really do not want to die with my last thought being of what somebody said to me in fifth grade. If I do not want to die with that being my last thought, why do I keep holding onto that now?

“365 Gems of Wisdom” e-book is out now!