Going Ahead

DAVID (Davy he pfeferred beind called "David" Crockett said:Be always sure you're right, the go ahead." That was his motto. Among other suggestions for a killer motto include: "Expect nothing, blame nobody, do something." And then perhaps: "Forgive instantly, and never hold a grudge". That last one is mine, thank you. Having preferences, even and especially among people, is inevitable, natural, unavoidable. Becoming angry, and staying angry forever, at anybody you otherwise like and consider a friend, at any time for anything, is pure posion, whose only real victim is the angry one. When we forgive others for perceived transgressions we relieve ourselves of a heavy emotional burden. Isn't it better to simply decide that you are not particularly fond of a particular certain person than to cling to a personal esteem that no longer exists, while holding that person accountable for meeting or not meeting your expectations of his or her behavior, including their treatment of you? We do not need, are not obligated to justify our dislike or lack of esteem for anybody by fabricating and enumerating justifications for it. Having personal peferences in anything, including people, is norml and acceptable. We are entirely responsible for our thoughts and actions. Nobody ever makes us angry. No force external to ourselves influences our thoughts and actions without our allowing it. Our permission is required. No matter what treatment we receive from others, our reaction to it is entirely an internal affair. As Gautama Siddharta says in The Dhammapada: "Mind foreruns all conditions. Mind is chief. Of mind are we made." We often say "He made me mad". NO, he did not. You allowed yourself to became angry, you made that decision. Blaming others for our thoughts and actions is nothing other than giving your power over ourselves away to other people, to the world. It is tossing our freedom out the window, and why, for heaven's sake, would anyone wish to throw away freedom? Heaven and government only knows that our freedoms are limited enough already, by the society in which we live, by its laws and customs. And this is how it should be. All good citizens should and must be cognizant of the fact that our freedoms are relative, not absolute. We do not want absolute freedom even when we delude ourselves into thinking that we do. We are horrified at the thought of a group of hunans, whether a band of paleolithic nomads or a modern city of ten million people, in which everyone has absolute freedom. Humans have never really found the proper, most evolutionarily successful level of balance between personal freeodm and limitations of personal freedom. Our rather recent invention of "democracy" complicates matters by making citizens at large sovereign. It has been suggested by more than one astute observer of human behavior that the best, most effective form of government is a benevolent dictatorship. The enlightned despot, or king. But until an enlightened entity like Joshua ben Joseph, aka Jesus comes to take charge, which would probably be satisfactory to us all, we demonstrably less than perfect little primates are left as always to our own devices, engaged in a seemingly endless struggle to find and implement the most perfect form of self governance. We choose democracy, the most inefficient, awkward, and chaotic form of all. We live with our choices, our choices being freedom and total responsibility for ourselves.