Letting go of opinions

January 14, 2019

“Don’t keep searching for the truth. Just let go of your opinions.” Seng Ts’an

At a dinner party recently, I listened to some political views that eventually veered into conspiracy theories. I said nothing. Eventually I was asked about my perspective on the topic at hand, and I mentioned the complexity of the issue before changing the subject.

This week I rejoined Facebook after an absence of several years. Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised to see on that site a couple of old friends venting their political anger. I did not comment upon their posts.

I can be quite opinionated about politics and about a lot of things. In high school and college I wanted to become a career politician because in my idealistic naivete I thought that I could fix the world’s problems. Fortunately for me and for the world I never ran for office, because I realized that I would eventually have been corrupted by power, ego, and maybe money. I needed to fix myself before I would be qualified to fix society.

As my friend Phil once said, “Whenever there’s an argument about politics, it’s not really about politics. It’s about feeling powerless.”

So while I regularly vote and occasionally pontificate to a friend or two, I’m trying to minimize my social and political commentary, even in my own head. My judgments erupt frequently, but I try to just notice them and then let them go. Opinions seem to be mostly expressions of the ego, whereas wisdom and insight apparently arise from a deeper level of our psyche.

Perhaps the world isn’t broken after all, and maybe it doesn’t need fixing. True, there are serious environmental threats and social problems, and they must be addressed by all of us. That’s why I vote. And that’s why I write. But I believe that the planet and humanity are evolving, slowly and with much turmoil, but evolving nonetheless. Sometimes it seems that things are out of balance, and that there is great injustice in the world. But in the long term I think that the law of cause and effect will ensure that lessons will be learned by individuals and by the human race. Earth is our classroom, and our souls will learn what they came here to learn even if we do it the hard way.

Do I like population growth in this country or elsewhere? No. Do I think that war, racial tensions, poverty, and economic upheavals will continue indefinitely? Yes. But while I feel that political discourse and processes have their place in society, and I’m quite willing to put my two cents worth into the public sphere every once in awhile, I also need to remind myself that spending my energy and attention resisting certain politicians or political beliefs is not in my best interest. I would rather have compassion for my fellow deluded beings than attempt to convert them to my social or spiritual philosophies.

Dinner parties and Facebook are more fun when they aren’t battle zones. The truth of my life and the lives of others will emerge when I allow all of us to be just the way we are. But if I don’t, that’s OK too.