Happiness, Health, Wisdom and Wealth ^™

There Are Tigers in the Jungle

There are tigers in the jungle.  If you lived more primitive existence you might spend time walking in the jungle.  As you walked through the jungle you might find that occasionally, you'd encounter a tiger.  If it was a hungry tiger, it might try to eat you.  Your survival would depend on your ability to effectively deal with the tigers.  In general, one is more effective when one has the clearest perception of reality.  Therefore it would not be helpful to think of the tigers as having any other motives than hunger.  It would actually be destructive to your effectiveness to begin to believe that the tigers hated you and wanted to hurt.  It would be destructive to hate them back and devote a great deal of emotional energy to your hatred of tigers.  I would be harmful to your being to feel badly about yourself, because the tigers were choosing you to attack.  But if you lived in this environment, you might indeed begin to feel that way.  The most helpful attitude to have would be the accurate one.  Tigers don't feel emotion toward you at all.  They feel the same way about you that you feel about your dinner.  Do you hate your dinner?

The world most of us live in today does not include being hunted by tigers.  It does include many similar things.  It includes people who are for the most part pursuing their own interests.  When you are in the way of their pursuit of their interests they may behave toward you much like the tigers.  They may try to do you harm.