Buddha - Drop Your Pride, Overcome Anger

In The Dhammapada, Buddha says that a wise man is beyond anger. Anger poisons the mind, leading to a life of isolation and sorrow. So can I purge the mind of anger once and for all? That’s what I’m interested in exploring, and I’m gonna explore that idea through a dialogue.

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The following is a conversation between a monk (M) and a student (S).

M: Anger poisons the mind, turning you into a venomous snake. You start biting those around you, hurting them and causing them to avoid you. It’s a sad thing to be avoided by others. But as your poison becomes more potent, your anger turns into hate and then into resentment, and people avoiding you turns into isolation which turns into alienation. You’ll feel very lonely and separate from the world, from humanity, and this alienation will cause you great sadness or sorrow.

S: But anger is necessary for some things, isn’t it? Anger helps us restore justice and correct unfairness in the world, doesn’t it?

M: Does it? Let’s take a look. When you think of a good judge, do you think of someone who’s filled with anger? Or do you think of someone who’s calm?

S: Calm, definitely.

M: Why?

S: Because a judge who’s angry would be biased, uncareful, impatient, and unwilling to understand.

M: So we both agree: anger clouds our judgment. Anger wants to do nothing but reciprocate pain. But a good judge is interested in the end of all pain. Anger wants the other person to hurt. A good judge wants both people to flourish, to be without hurt, and that’s true justice. Do you understand? Anger doesn’t bring justice, and actually, it stands in the way.

S: How do I overcome anger then? How do I clear it from my mind?

M: Just like fear, to overcome anger, you have to pull it out completely from the root. So let’s get to the root of anger.

S: OK, where do we start?

M: Anger is produced by thought. The thought that someone insulted you, hurt you, betrayed your trust, belittled you, took advantage of you, and so on. So there’s one thought behind anger: you shouldn’t have done that. When the mind thinks, you shouldn’t have done that, then anger arises.

S: OK, but why do I have this thought?

M: Thought arises from desire, and your desire for people to fulfill your expectations creates anger. When people violate your expectations of them, you think, you shouldn’t have done that. That’s the source of your anger.

S: What’s wrong with having expectations of people? That’s a good thing, isn’t it?

M: I never said anything was wrong with it. If you wanna hold onto anger, then it’s a very good thing to have expectations of others. But as I said before, I’ve seen the fate of the angry mind. The angry mind doesn’t lead to justice. It leads to alienation and sorrow. At least, that’s what I’ve seen. That’s why I have no desire to hold onto my anger.

S: Hmm… then how do I let go of my anger?

M: Your anger leaves you when your desire for people to live up to your expectations goes away, and your desire for people to live up to your expectations goes away when you see the lie behind it.

S: What’s the lie behind it?

M: Why should anyone live up to your expectations? What makes your expectations so special? Why should they value your expectations over their own or someone else’s? How do you know what anyone else “should” do? Think about what the word “should” really means. Everything that follows should is a direction. It’s an instruction. Are you so special that you have the one set of instructions to life that no one else has access to? Are you so special that you know the destination everyone should walk to and the path they should take? Are you so special that everyone should live inside the boxes you put them in?

S: I guess, if I really think about it, there’s no reason for anyone to live according to my expectations other than it’s what I want.

M: And why do you want it?

S: Because I think it’s for the best.

M: Best for who? You can’t possibly know what’s best for anyone else, so you must think it’s best for you. But even then, expectations don’t even guarantee the best for you. If I expect the tree to give me fruit without giving it water, you would call me a fool, wouldn’t you? But I can have this expectation anyway. I can enforce this expectation on the tree. Then what happens? The tree dies because I didn’t water it, and now I have no fruit. My own expectations of what was best led to what was worst! It’s foolish to have expectations.

S: But how can I live without expectations? I need them to survive, don’t I?

M: Why would you need expectations to survive?

S: If I’m about to eat something, I need to have an expectation about whether it’s safe to eat, right?

M: Don’t you see what you just did? You changed the definition of expectation to something we weren’t talking about. An expectation, in the sense we were using it, is a “should” statement. What you’re talking about is a prediction. We can’t live without predictions, and you couldn’t stop your brain from predicting the future if you wanted to. That’s what the mind does. But you can live without expectations. And, in fact, when you let go of expectations, your mind can see the world for what it is, not what you think it “should” be, and when you see the world for what it is, your mind gets better at predicting, and when your mind gets better at predicting, you get better at navigating the world, and when you get better at navigating the world, you can find your way to true justice. But pride leads to expectation, and expectation leads to anger, and anger doesn’t lead to justice, and in fact, it’s a barrier to justice. Justice is when you water the tree and the tree gives you fruit. You both flourish and are without pain. But what’s anger? Anger is when the tree doesn’t give you fruit, so you don’t water it. And because you don’t water it, it doesn’t give you fruit. And so the cycle spirals downward until you’re both gone.

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In The Dhammapada, Buddha says that a wise man is beyond anger and that anger leads to sorrow, and I explored this idea more deeply through a dialogue. I was interested in the complete elimination of anger from the mind, and here’s where I’ve arrived.

The root of anger is pride. Pride is the belief that the world “should” be a certain way. Pride is believing that people “should” conform to my expectations of them. So when I’m prideful, I constantly think, you shouldn’t do that. And this thought leads to anger, anger leads to alienation, and alienation leads to sorrow. But when you drop pride, you drop your expectations of the world, and when you drop your expectations of the world, you see the world as it is, and when you see the world as it is, your understanding of it improves, and it’s only through understanding that we can move towards true justice—the mutual flourishing of all things.

As always, this is just my opinion and understanding of the Buddha’s words, not advice. Feel free to use this information however you like, and if you have a different take on the his words, I’d love to hear your perspective in the comments.