Avidya (Ignorance - the soil of suffering) is the source of both the seeking after pleasure and the attempts to avoid pain. Practice of discrimination will assist us in obtaining freedom from our tendencies to react to these. Who knows what the alternatives were or what may be learned as a result of the current situation? It is possible that the observer does not know all possible outcomes. Perhaps the participants in the situation can learn and grow as a result of their experience together. Perhaps the bringing to light of the situation will assist them all in moving past an obstacle.
YS 1,33 advise us to avoid negative thoughts which accumulate as turbulence in the mind and instead to cultivate friendliness for the happy, compassion for the suffering, joy toward virtue and equanimity to vice. Judgement of your friend’s actions may result in negative thoughts in your mind which may lead to your own suffering. By cultivating these attitudes, the mind is purified of turbulent thoughts and becomes calm.
Therefore, as a yoga practitioner I must learn to approach my human condition with ahimsa, being tolerant of my own and other’s imperfections as we learn from our mistakes and move toward greater self-awareness. A wise yogi knows that even honest hearts make mistakes, and that those whose hearts are troubled, and those who stumble along making mistake after mistake, in the end are walking the same path toward self-realization as themselves.
The most important decision we can make is to love and to extend that love equally to all beings.
