Choosing Not to Fight

In this episode, Choosing Not to Fight, host Johnny Guidry examines the concept of “do no harm,” why it makes sense to turn the other cheek, and 4 foundational steps for any spiritual seeker aspiring to forgive and find acceptance when we are hurting.

Learn more about Johnny at www.RefractiveCoaching.com and www.RefractivePodcast.com.

For similarly-themed episodes, try The Ancient Truths of Acceptance & PLINKO, If I’m Angry w/You the Problem Is Me, and Spiritual Healing through Toxic Relationships w/Jean Atman.

Reach Johnny G at [email protected].

Episode transcript:

Welcome to a new episode of Refractive. I’m your host, Johnny G.  Look, I’m sitting here  in this amazing office and  I have this enormous mug of herbal tea and I have this incredible candle basil  and green tea scented candle. And look, if anybody tells you  I’m not living my best life, you can tell them they are mistaken. So. I’m just full of  gratitude, and I’m glad for you  showing up to listen to another episode, and I hope that today  this message will resonate.I had a conversation  a few weeks back with a friend of mine, and he is young, queer, Hispanic. He’s soft spoken. He has a nose ring. And he was telling me  about a particular incident that had happened a few days  before, he walked into a supermarket. And just after passing  through the front door, there was another customer  who was an older guy, this older white guy, and he looked at him and in a joking, loud way  said, Hey fella, it looks like  you got something in your nose. So commenting on his nose ring like that. And he talked about how hard it was to Be surprised like that  by that comment, to be shocked and to realize that other people are looking at him  and that he might not fit this mainstream definition of what a-I don’t know what a a certain  type of person is going to look like. And it was it was hard for him. It threw him into a bit of a  of a frustration. Now, to give you some context, this friend of mine,  I told you he’s Hispanic. He was raised in a traditional conservative Christian home. I said also that he is he’s not straight and that created some, I’ll just say complexity for him growing up and also white people and white culture  played an outsized role in this person’s development as a kid. More so than perhaps  in some other examples. And so he’s sensitive to how he fits into the white world and the mainstream world and the straight world and the conservative world. And it’s just a very  loaded experience for him. And so this comment identifying him as “other,” as not normal. It was really triggering for him and it made him feel so uncomfortable. And I have to say that The idea of being publicly and passive aggressively put into a box that you don’t want to be  in by a stranger In front of other strangers, That’s a hard experience to go through. And even if this person was teasing or joking, maybe it wasn’t direct,  really aggressive and hateful language. But it’s humiliating  and it’s meant to draw attention how different you are from me and what I see as normal. You are not mainstream. I am mainstream. And therefore it’s  OK for me to publicly comment on how different you are  and to make it a joke. And there will be no consequences  for me to make this joke. In fact, I expect you and everyone  around me to laugh about this. So it’s a really awkward situation. And look,  I’m not saying that this old dude had some kind of consciously  mean-spirited agenda. I’m not coming at this from, you know, the progressive left  perspective of wokeness and this. That’s not what I’m saying. What I am saying is that this guy felt it was his place  to publicly call attention o how a stranger’s appearance  didn’t fit into a traditional box. And he covered it up with some Febreeze of humor to make it OK.And he expected that everyone in earshot would be OK with it and support it  and find it appropriate. So me listening to my friend  tell me this story and my friend had no idea how how deeply  this story would resonate with me. So my friend’s telling me this,  even with all my spiritual work, all of my attempts  to elevate my perspective to a higher to a ,foot  view of things on this planet, I was still shocked  by the gall of this person. And I found myself  imagining what I would do and the sharp witted things  I might say if I got called out in that kind of public,  passive aggressive, fake joke kind of way. It’s it’s a complicated difficult experience to be in. Now, society  tells us that it is our right, but even more importantly,  it’s our responsibility to defend ourselves. It is my responsibility to speak up if someone disgraces me and protect my, I don’t know, protect my status, protect my ego, protect my place in the world, and that if I don’t defend myself, I’m even partially to blame  for the next time this guy hurts someone  because I didn’t speak up. So that is a common perspective  in our society. If someone pushes you around,  you have to push back if you don’t, Not only are you disrespecting  yourself, but you are approving for this person to continue to hurt others. I don’t think you’d be surprised  to hear me say that that’s a it’s a pretty common perspective  for us in the world we live in. You have to put him in his place  in order to serve the greater good. So I asked my friend,  how did you respond to this? What did you do? And he told me, Well,  I wanted to snap back. But you know what? I just don’t need to bring in  that kind of negativity into my life. So I didn’t respond. And I just went on my way. And it’s like, wow. This is our superpower. That’s exactly what I told my friend. That is where your power lies. That is your superpower,  the ability to be hurt. And yet choose to do no harm. Not only is this our superpower, this is exactly how we heal the soul. I want to say that again, not only is it our superpower, But the ability to be hurt and to choose not to hurt back, Is how we heal the soul. This is a concept we hear in Lots of religious contexts across across spiritual paths,  all throughout history. The idea of doing no harm. Choosing not to fight. And I want to  maybe take a second to clarify. You know, It doesn’t count as soul healing if the reason we don’t hurt back the person is because we’re scared and we just go to cower. Because we’re shocked by the shame and the hurt  and the fear of what’s happening. I’m not saying that it’s wrong  for us to to experience it that way. But that’s not the spiritual growth  I’m talking about. If someone, let’s say, attacks us verbally and we retreat out of fear or shame,  hey, that’s fine. Like,  that’s a totally reasonable response. But that’s not the spiritual growth  that I’m talking about when I say choosing  not to fight and doing no harm. I mean, in the moment in the split second, weighing  the options of how we can respond and intentionally proactively choosing  love over fear, choosing love over chaos and discord  and hurting other people. Choosing love over vengeance and ego protection. Doing no harm Is taking the hit and seeing the situation  from a higher perspective, realizing that you know what,  the only thing that’s in danger right now is my ego and my ego doesn’t need to be protected. If my safety was at risk, maybe that’s a different situation for me. But if the only thing at risk is looking powerful in front of strangers, Then you know what, I can choose the higher perspective  of this and simply remove myself from further painful Interactions with this person And choose not to put him in his place. Choose not to make a show of my own power. That is revolutionary for us in our world! Out of compassion for both this guy, And compassion for me, And my soul and my spirit. Simply moving away. And finding the love To wish him and me peace. I already mentioned that we see this guidance against vengeance, against continuing the cycle of harm. We see this across  lots of spiritual traditions. Maybe the most common that comes up in our world is the idea of turning the other cheek from Jesus’s sermon on the Mount. And but, you know,  we see it elsewhere in the twelve steps, which is part of my experience  in the twelve steps. There is what we call a promise  in the literature that says we have ceased  fighting everyone and everything.in Hindu, There’s actually a concept called Ahimsa,  which declares that fighting is the last option that we are willing to resort to, that we are going to try to work this out  every way other than fighting  before we get to that point. And then we also have  this concept of karma where when I do things,  it has to be balanced. It’s coming back  and that when I don’t balance my karmic energy in this life,  then I’m going to get another life, which will give me an opportunity,  the same soul to balance it again. So the idea is,  if I’ve hurt someone, then you know, I need to have  that experience poured on me. But I can’t hurt someone back again. Right? I’ve got to stop the cycle of the pain. And, you know, one of my favorite writings on this idea of doing no harm, choosing not to fight  comes from Byron, Katie and you know, I talk about Byron  Katie in almost every episode. She is amazing. I am reading a book of hers right now  called Names for Joy. I strongly recommend it. But one of her quotes  that she uses in a lot of her books is that no one would ever hurt another person if they weren’t confused. No one would ever cause pain for another person  if they weren’t confused. And so this idea of vengeance  is not necessary because the people who hurt us are doing so from a place of confusion. They don’t understand what’s happening. They don’t understand the ramifications  of what’s really going on. And so can we take a higher view? Can we take a higher view that whether someone realizes it or not, even when someone doesn’t realize it, that if they do something harmful to me, they too, they are in some sort of spiritual, physical, mental or emotional pain, that they would not be hurting me  if they weren’t suffering in some kind of way. So can I remove myself From the possibility of being hurt again. So that’s protection, right,  because choosing not to fight doesn’t mean  standing there and getting beaten. Choosing not to fight  doesn’t mean I’m an emotional doormat. But can I distance myself from this without retaliating, without needing to cause pain to this other person,  without needing to have the final word so that my ego feels that I’m man enough, that I’m powerful enough? You know. I believe that The experience of being hurt Is a powerful gift. I heard once that Pain Is an exquisite gift. So I believe that being hurt is a compassionate right, get this, right? So being hurt is being treated with compassion. By the Universe, by the Creator, by God, by whoever,  whatever word you want to use to remind us that we ourselves are sparks of the creator that we are pieces of God. In these human bodies, so being hurt is an opportunity for us to realize, hey, this Earth body stuff is small potatoes. This is small potatoes, low stakes poker that we’re playing here on Earth. OK. Because what’s really important is this eternal part of me, what really matters is this the soul? This soul that is a part of God, it comes from God,  it’s a drop of the ocean that is God. And this soul is not subject to mean jokes from a stranger in the supermarket. And this soul is not subject to being humiliated  when my spouse walks out on me and this soul is not subject to Having my ego  stepped on by another person, that’s small stuff, that’s small stuff. That’s life with a lowercase L. And so when we are hurt, when we experience tragedy, pain, loss of a loved one, when we go through this global pandemic, that makes everyone uncomfortable, It is an opportunity. To look into our true essence And remember that our ultimate goal, despite the density of this illusion that we have,  that we are just Earth creatures, that our ultimate goal is to awaken  to the fact that we are so much bigger than this short life on Earth that this that in the span of eternity, These years or so that we live are less than a blip. And can we find the wonder And the perfection and the excitement of this experiment? We’re in this Earth experiment that we’re in, and   even in the face of tragedy. Can we remember our true identity? And anchor our serenity in that true identity? When we’re able to do that,  that is our superpower, the ability to pull from a higher perspective  and say, no, I will not retaliate. I will not cause another person pain even if they deserve it  by society’s standards. I don’t need to do that because every time I hurt another person, I hurt me too. So I will find the place of love  that is deep inside of me, and I will wish that person peace  and healing, not in a sarcastic way, But in a genuine way that I will see that this other person is also a spark of the Creator, that this other person  is also a sliver of God who is in this Earth  body and who is confused. And it don’t need to make things worse. I will just move on and I will find the love. Now, look, I talk a big game, and this is I mean, this is advanced stuff, right? This is not easy. This is the hardest thing. I’m talking about like advanced level spirituality in order to have this be our response in the face of hardship. And it requires a solid foundation of spiritual work. In order to have this natural response of choosing intentionally Not to continue a cycle of harm, but rather to See every other personas innocent Sparks of the creator  and respond from a place of love. It takes a solid foundation. So what’s required, right? What do you have to do in order  to have the spiritual muscle, the spiritual fitness  to respond in this way? Well, there’s a couple of things. first of all, this concept has to resonate  with you and I, as I was coming up with the outline for this episode, I’m like,  Oh my God, I’m going to lose listeners. I’m going to have people walk away from Refractive Podcast-because our whole lives. We are told  that it is not only appropriate, but it is necessary to defend ourselves. And I’m telling you today that that is B.S.. If this does not resonate with you, then you know what? That’s fine, that’s fine. That means that this just might not be  your episode. Your experience on this planet is wired in a very particular way. To allow you to accomplish whatever your mission is in life,  so it’s fine. Infinite Intelligence arranged our series of experiences on this Earth so that you have a chance to respond. In just the right way. So listen, if you disagree with this, that’s totally beautiful and it’s perfect, and that’s fine. Now. If this does resonate with you, then in my opinion, here’s a couple of things that are Helpful in building a spiritual life that is capable of finding perfection in what we would typically call  painful experiences. So number one, you need to have faith  that there is something larger. You have to believe in something  larger than this Earth life. If there is nothing larger than this Earth life, then why on earth should  you ever hold yourself back from Earth? Security and Earth security can be ego that can be finances  that can be whatever, right? So if, if, if, if, if it all ends with death,  which is a perfectly valid perspective in our society, I’m  not criticizing that perspective at all. But if it all ends with death,  this is not going to make sense and it’s not going to be  worth your trouble. So in order toto choose not to fight, you have to have faith  that there is something bigger going on. So that’s, in my opinion, the first step. Another important perspective is a belief that my value. My validity on this planet is not contingent on other people. If I believe that my value is contingent  upon other people and their perspectives, how they see me,  what they do, how they treat me, then this doesn’t make sense. So cultivating a perspective that your value is independent. Of other people is essential to coming to this point. Another important  foundational element, in my opinion. And of course, you may have other ideas, I would love to hear that in the show comments, but that. It takes a certain perspective to experience the emotional response to whatever happened,  whether that is rage, shame, sorrow, humiliation, you know, whatever emotional response rises up. So to have a perspective that, OK,  I see this emotional response happening inside of me and I realize that that emotion  is not a trustworthy guide. For how to react right now. So again, the perspective to realize that my emotions are not necessarily trustworthy guides for how to behave. And then willingness to forgive. Willingness to forgive, To acknowledge that we are all fractured souls, we are all, Imperfect, hurt beings, damaged beings  who are executing our life missions, and that while we do that,  we hurt other people. It’s just what we do, right? It’s just what we do. So. Willingness to forgive others  when they hurt me, because hurting people is just part of what Earth life is. You can’t you can’t be perfect in that. So these are the four foundational steps to this:. Faith that there is something larger than this, just this Earth life,. A belief that my value is  independent of other people,. A perspective that my emotions are not trustworthy  guides for my behavior. And . A willingness to see beyond, to forgive other people when they hurt me Because they don’t understand. And we all do it. That’s a lot. Like I said, that’s  that’s a advanced spirituality. This is not spirituality , right? This is like the level classes and It’s tough. It’s tough. You know, a topic that you’ve heard me talk about before, And that’s very dear to me, I think acceptance is a big part of this -acceptance. I see acceptance as another word for love. You know, I’ve mentioned this before, that acceptance is love. Seeing a person or a situation as it is and not wishing it were somehow different. Whew! It’s hard. You know, I had a, I had someone that I used to be close with pass away a few, a few, maybe about two months ago, and this person died under-well, this person committed suicide in a jail after a lot of struggle With addiction. And not…I don’t know what went through  this person’s mind. Before he killed himself. But, You know…Anyway, this person, You know, in the aftermath of his death, I sat there and I looked for My acceptance. How can I accept this? What do I do about this, like  how can I find the perfection of this? And you know, Acceptance is hard. Seeing a situation or a person exactly as it is  and not wishing it were different. Not thinking: I have a better idea! You know? Imagining how things should have been In my view, is an argument with God. And when I argue with God, I lose every time. Every time. So can I accept the pain in my life? Can I accept that the person who might have used me to make himself feel better,  some stranger in a supermarket, This other self, This other spark of a creator,  can I accept that this person used my friend  as the butt of a public joke? Can I accept that that person Is a beautiful, perfect child of God? Can I see the opportunity for my own healing when I’m hurt Instead of focusing on how I was wronged? Instead of focusing on how unfair things feel? Can I see the opportunity  for my own healing? Can I see my opportunity for the healing of the person  who hurt me? Not just me, not just my feeling. Can I see how the person who hurt me now has a beautiful opportunity  for healing too? Can I see the impact on the people who witnessed? Can I see the impact on the people  in that supermarket Who heard this person yell out a joke  at the expense of a stranger and might have expected my friend to rage Or to cause chaos? And yet saw him peacefully walk away. Can I see the impact on that  and the value, the opportunity for healing that posed  not just for my friend, not just for the other guy,  but also for everyone who was watching? Were they moved to then be kinder to other people having seen what happened? Were they inspired by my friend’s willingness to seek his worth from inside rather than from the view of a stranger And to go further? If I put myself in my friend’s shoes, can I find a time when I too made a public joke at the expense of another person  and got away with it? Oh, you better believe it. There are so many times where I used other people as punch line. That’s my experience. So if I put myself in my friend’s shoes. Walking through the door and having someone call out some comment about my appearance  as a joke, some stranger. Can I check my self-righteousness  for a moment? And say, yeah, I did that too. And I got away with it, too, and I,I hurt those people when I did that. The way he hurt me. Can I see the grace that I was afforded when I hurt those people  and got away with it? Can I see the grace I got? Right? Because justice means  I would have been put in my place. But I was treated with grace. And now I have an opportunity to treat someone with grace. Can I see? That despite The confused, hurtful behavior, there’s an opportunity  to lovingly and intentionally pay that grace forward. And can I see how justice has now been served? If I hurt someone publicly, Now, I have been hurt publicly. And now I understand what I did. I understand that what I considered no big deal in the moment was painful For the target of my joke. Can I see the service that this guy, this gentleman  who made this joke at my friend-Can I see the service  that this person has done? This person has opened up a doorway to healing for him, For the people who watched, For me. And now for the listeners of this podcast, what a wonderful teacher. What a glorious benefactor this person has been In his confusion. To me, to my growth, to my healing. Can I see how things are restored to balance? Can I see how it all makes sense on God’s scale? We are balanced. My perspective is enhanced. And I can move on in peace with grace and forgiveness for him and for the past version of myself, who was also callous and careless with the feelings of others. Wow. I want to let this sit for a second. Can I see how it’s balanced and how it all makes sense on God’s scale? Yes. That is our superpower. That’s what I’m telling you about. That’s what I’m talking about here to be put in a position where things hurt and to decide to do no harm. The cycle of pain and hurt stops here. It stops with me. I see things from a higher perspective. It stops right here that is healing, that is healing,  that is service to the world, that is healing for you,  that is healing for the world. That is acceptance. That is love. That is everything that is not weakness, that is not laying down  and being a doormat that is power. That is your superpower. That is our superpower. And so thank you, thank you to so many  who have hurt me in my life. Thank you. And I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry For all the times I hurt other people When I was confused. When I was scared. Thank you for the grace Those victims of my ego showed me. Thank you for the grace My creator Poured on me. And thank you to my friend who shared this story  with me having no clue  how deeply it would stir me. And thank you, sir, to that stranger in a supermarket somewhere who created such a rich, beautiful, perfect, powerful scenario for learning. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And, of course, to all of you, thank you For listening. Remember  that you are a spark of the creator. You are made from the same stuff as the stars. So aim your light. Take care.