It was drizzling that evening, and there are only a handful of things in the world I love more than a rainy twilight; the clouds casting their shadows, the breeze almost therapeutic and the thunder a crude symphony. I happened to be working then, thinking, ‘It’s great that it’s raining! This weather will boost my productivity.’ A little while later, I made an error in my work. It seemed the rain had made me so cozy that my usual vigilance had gone on vacation. “Ah, this rain is like the stereotypical mother-in-law – pleasant at first, but sometimes you see the catch!” I mused. And then, while correcting my error, I found another existing error that would’ve gone unnoticed if not for my original mishap. ‘I suppose the rain was good news then?’ I wondered, after fixing both errors. This had me revisit two important questions – 1) Are events ever objectively good or bad, or is it just the situation and context that makes them seem so? and 2) Are good and bad (or pleasure and pain) two sides of the same coin?
The Chinese farmer
Before we try to address these questions, let’s quickly go over the fabled story of the Chinese farmer, which goes something like this –
In ancient China, there lived a wise old farmer who possessed a farm and cattle. One day, one of his horses escaped from the farm. Upon hearing this, the villagers came to see the farmer and exclaimed, “What terrible news! How unlucky you are!” Unruffled, the farmer responded, “We cannot yet say if it’s good or bad news….” The following day, to everyone’s surprise, the runaway horse returned accompanied by three more horses. The villagers revisited the farmer, saying, “As it turned out, this was great news! How fortunate you are!” Once more, the farmer calmly replied, “We still cannot say if it’s good or bad news.”
Later that day, the farmer’s son fell and broke his back while attempting to tame one of the new horses. Concerned villagers approached the farmer and said, “This has turned out to be dreadful news! How unfortunate you are!” Yet again, the farmer answered with composure, “We don’t know if it’s good or bad news just yet….” A few days later, the Chinese military declared that all able-bodied young men were required to enlist in the army due to an ongoing deadly war. Since the son had sustained a broken back, he was exempted from joining. The villagers visited the farmer once more and exclaimed, “In the end, all of it resulted in wonderful news! How lucky you are.” As always, the farmer calmly replied, “We don’t know whether it’s good news or bad news yet….”
The two questions
There is a huge scope for misunderstandings to sneak in while we examine the two questions above. Therefore, I’ll include relevant excerpts from a source conveying widely acknowledged and scrutinized ideas. These ideas have guided me in the right direction while helping me form opinions. As always, I don’t ask you to believe whatever you read here (or anywhere else, for that matter.) Contemplate what you read/see/hear and find out for yourself what the truth of the matter is –
1) Are events objectively good or bad, or is it just the situation and context that makes them seem so?
The word good comes from the Old English gōd or the Proto-Indo-European gʰedʰ and actually translates to “suit/fit/well-suited.” The story of the Chinese farmer is a good illustration of how our perception of “good” heavily depends on the suitability of an event to our existing relevant (and perceivable) conditions. However, the suitability of something is ever-changing. It depends on the past, the present and the future, which we cannot predict or control. Is there meaning, then, to look at situations/incidents as good or bad? What’s an alternate way of looking at life? As Tolle puts it in “The Power of Now” –
Do you truly know what positive is and what negative is? Do you have the total picture? There have been many people for whom limitation, failure, loss or pain in whatever form turned out to be their greatest teacher. It taught them to let go of false self-images and superficial goals and desires. It gave them depth, humility, and compassion. It made them more real. Whenever anything negative happens to you, there is a deep lesson concealed within it, although you may not see it at the time. Even a brief illness or an accident can show you what is real and unreal in your life, what ultimately matters and what doesn’t. Seen from a higher perspective, conditions are neither positive nor negative. They are as they are.
The power of now.
Does this mean something is wrong with celebrating the “good” and avoiding the “bad” concerning the current situation? Absolutely not! It just means that one must realize the fleeting nature of good and bad and thereby not attach themselves to either. This way, neither will you get unhealthily attached to the good (a recipe for eventual pain) nor remain inactive or procrastinate due to fear of the bad. This neutral mindset towards good and bad is easier said than done.
2) Are good and bad (or pleasure and pain) two sides of the same coin?
Beyond pleasure and pain, there is peace
Life is an infinite game. The objective is not to win. The objective is to keep playing.
Simon Sinek, world-renowned author and speaker.
The mind, guided by its subconscious survival instincts, chases after pleasure in external entities while trying to avoid any potential pain. “What is sometimes wrongly called joy is the usually short-lived pleasure side of the continuously alternating pain/pleasure cycle. Pleasure is always derived from something outside you, whereas joy arises from within. The very thing that gives you pleasure today will give you pain tomorrow, or it will leave you, so its absence will give you pain.
Love, joy, and peace are deep states of Being and as such, they have no opposite. This is because they arise from beyond the mind. Emotions, on the other hand, being part of the dualistic mind, are subject to the law of opposites. That is, seen from the mind’s perspective, you cannot have good without bad.”
Qualitatively, they are different; but as far as our attachment to them is concerned, they are two sides of the same coin.
As long as a condition is judged as “good” by your mind, whether it be a relationship, a possession, a social role, a place, or your physical body, the mind attaches itself to it and identifies with it. It makes you happy, makes you feel good about yourself, and it may become part of who you are or think you are. But nothing lasts in this dimension where moth and rust consume. Either it ends or it changes, or it may undergo a polarity shift: The same condition that was good yesterday or last year has suddenly or gradually turned into bad. The same condition that made you happy, then makes you unhappy. The prosperity of today becomes the empty consumerism of tomorrow. The happy wedding and honeymoon became the unhappy divorce or the unhappy coexistence. Or a condition disappears, so its absence makes you unhappy. When a condition or situation that the mind has attached itself to and identified with changes or disappears, the mind cannot accept it. It will cling to the disappearing condition and resist the change. It is almost as if a limb were being torn off your body.
THE POWER OF NOW.
Many “love” relationships, after the initial euphoria has passed, actually oscillate between “love” and hate, attraction and attack. Real love doesn’t suddenly turn into hate, nor does real joy turn into pain.
Summary
Nothing out there will ever satisfy you except temporarily and superficially. Things and conditions can give you pleasure, but they will also give you pain. Things and conditions can give you pleasure, but they cannot give you joy.
The Buddha taught that even your happiness is dukkha. [“Dukkha” is a Pali (a variation of Sanskrit) word used to describe, among other things, anything that is not permanent and subject to change.] Thus, happiness is dukkha because it is not permanent. Great success, which fades with time, is also dukkha.
This doesn’t mean you should no longer appreciate pleasant conditions and/or avoid unpleasant ones. “But to seek something through them that they cannot give — an identity, a sense of permanency and fulfillment — is a recipe for frustration and suffering.” You can enjoy them, don’t cling to them, because eventually, they too shall pass.
Your pain and pleasure are, in fact, one. Only the illusion of time separates them.
Eckhart Tolle.
As someone phrased it, true well-being is not freedom from the conditions we find ourselves in. It is the freedom within them.
Having a bad day? Eventually, this, too, shall pass. Having a good day? Eventually, this, too, shall pass. The mind cannot perceive and experience “good” without its polar opposite, “bad,” to implicitly contrast with. Beyond pleasure and pain, beyond good and bad, there is a state of peace. A state beyond the level of mind and thought. Create it Uncover it.
I’ll leave you with a beautiful verse from Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching, the foundational text of Taoism –
天下皆知美之为美，斯恶已。皆知善之为善，斯不善已。
故有无相生，难易相成，长短相形，高下相盈，音声相和，前后相随。
是以圣人处无为之事，行不言之教；万物作焉而不辞，生而不有。为而不恃，功成而弗居。夫唯弗居，是以不去。
P.S: I don’t know Chinese either. It translates to something along the lines of –
Under heaven all can see beauty as beauty only because there is ugliness. All can know good as good only because there is evil. Therefore having and not having arise together. Difficult and easy complement each other. Long and short contrast each other. High and low rest upon each other. Front and back follow one another. Therefore the sage acts without doing anything and teaches without saying anything. Things arise and she lets them come; things disappear and she lets them go. She has but doesn’t possess, acts but doesn’t expect. When her work is done, she learns from it and forgets it. That is how it lasts forever.
