Monday, September 22, 2008

If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is part of yourself. What isn't part of ourselves doesn't disturb us.

Herman Hesse

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I simply doubt about it!!

Reza said...

Look at it this way: if you don't care about that thing/person at all--meaning that you don't have any kind of emotional association with it--would their being bother you at all?

Reza Mahani said...

I have thought about this for quite some time and I broadly agree with you that when someone's actions particularly disturbs us, the actions are resonating with something inside us.
That being said I have some doubts about its generality, it may be more applicable to certain people and situations than others ...

Nazy said...

Oh, please, say it isn't so!!

I have a colleague who gets on my nerves to no end. These days his status as "the bain of my existence" is equal to no one else's around me. What you just said worries me soooooooooo much all of a sudden! What if I'm just like him, a jerk, a moron, and a baffoon all wrapped together?!! May I add illiterate, insensitive, and incompetent, too? What if he is mirroring ME?!! How very frightening OADP Jan!
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Naaaaaaa, can't be! I couldn't possibly be like him and have as many friends as I do....could I? Jeez, I'm not going to be able to fall asleep now. Thanks for nothing! (Just kidding, it was fun to read and to comment!)

Reza said...

I'm sorry to have made you trouble ;-) Hope you could go to sleep and slept well :-)

The way that I understand this is a little different. I interpret it as Buddhists do: Why things bother us? The reason is, "the thing" has some kind of association with me. That doesn't mean that I have "it" in some amount or shape in me. It means that I am not totally neutral about it or the characteristics it has.

For example, let's talk about your co-worker. All the adjectives you described them are "man-made", accepted by Nazy. For a tree, none of them mean anything. For you and me, they mean a great deal and have values attached to them. This is the part which "is part of us".

I, as a human being, have some preset value system. I "interpret" actions of the others and I "like" or "dislike" them. The part from "interpretation" on, is inside "me". I produce those feelings. And I am the only person who could change it or not.