What’s Your Double Standard"?
There is an apocryphal story told about Gandhi in which a mother comes to see Gandhi with her son. She wants Gandhi to tell her son to stop eating sugar, and Gandhi tells the mother and son to come back in two weeks (in some stories it’s three weeks, in others three days). The mother and son dutifully come back in two weeks and Gandhi says some version of, “Stop eating sugar” to the boy. The mother asks Gandhi why he couldn’t just have said this two weeks earlier, and his reply is some version of, “Two weeks ago I was still eating sugar.”
It’s certain this never actually happened, but the story is used to illustrate the point that we shouldn’t ask other people to do what we’re not willing to do ourselves, and that somehow, we are more holy if we only ask others to do what we are already doing. The problem is we constantly ask others to do that which we either won’t or don’t want to do ourselves. In turn, we expect people to do for us that which we are not willing to do for them.
Take this example. If you make a mistake, even an egregious one, what do you hope for if another person is involved? Think for a moment.
If you are like most humans you want to be given the benefit of the doubt, to be forgiven for your mistakes, you want to be given a second, or even third or fourth chance. You want to be able to fix your mistake if possible, or move on if not, and you don’t want the other person to hold a grudge. Now, take a moment to think about how you behave when someone else messes up. Think. Be honest with yourself. I’ll wait. Have you cut through your sanctimonious notions yet?
Most of us, if we’re honest, get pissed off, upset, angry, or enraged when someone else makes a mistake, and we don’t want to forgive them right away. We may judge them, say nasty things either out loud, or in our heads, act like a victim, behave in a passive-aggressive way and so on.
Think it’s not true? Think about the last time someone cut you off in traffic or cut in front of you in a line in the grocery store or didn’t wear a mask during the COVID pandemic. How did you feel? How did you respond? Did you have instant forgiveness in your heart? Did you assume positive intent on the part of the other person? For those of you who say, “When that happens, I just say bless you”, or “I send them love, because they don’t know the truth of themselves” that’s just as bad, because the assumption is that their consciousness isn’t as developed as yours.
Now, think of the last time you weren’t paying attention when you were driving and accidentally cut someone off, or didn’t notice the line at the store and walked right up to the cashier, or forgot to wear your mask? How did you feel when someone gave you a look, or said something to you? Did you think to yourself, “Geez, it was a mistake, why is that person so pissed off at me?” Perhaps they’re thinking, bless that person they don’t know the truth of themselves. Now it’s you whose consciousness isn’t developed, isn’t’ it, because you messed up.
Many religions have some version of the tenet, do unto others as you would have done unto yourself. But most of us, if we’re honest, don’t practice that. We want forgiveness, respect, we want to be given an assumption of positive intent, we want to be given multiple chances, but we don’t do that for others.
So, I challenge you for the next thirty days, pay attention to the ways in which your double standard operates. Report back. Let me know how it goes. The life you improve may be your own.
