The most ignorant is yourself, because you become identified with his stupidity, and started the fight:
The human being’s seventh mind-consciousness is the “I”. Because of “I”, it gives rise to “my”. Because of “me”, it gives rise to self-attachment, followed by attachment of perception such as “I like it this way …” or “I like it that way …” In the end, people become attached to everything, be it right or wrong. This is the root cause of distress and suffering. “Ignorance” means darkness and without brightness. People lose their temper because of ignorance. If we investigate the reason for being angry, at the beginning most people will blame it on others. On further investigation, we will discover that the anger stems from self-ignorance. When we have understood this principle, we will realize that these are due to this “I” (seventh mind-consciousness, transient-invisible body). Therefore if we allow it (the ignorance) to further develop and lead according to the wishes of this “I”, we will certainly descend to a lower realm of life, because the root of this “I” is ignorance.
- Ven. Shen Kai
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In reality, it is not due to the change in that person’s behaviour, although that looks like the actual cause for you to get angry. It depends on your mind. For example, when the other person is angry, if at that time your mind is filled with compassion wishing that person to be free from suffering and problems, especially if you have strong compassion thinking: “I want to make that person free from all of his/her problems”, then that helps to have a positive mind, to keep the mind in peace.
For example, when a person hits you with a stick, there is no point at getting angry with the stick, as it is in the hand of the person. There is no sense at all to get angry towards it. Like the stick, the person has no freedom. The person is completely a slave to anger, completely controlled by anger. So this person does not have the slightest freedom. The person is being used by anger. He/She is only the object of compassion. So when we think like this, compassion arises, pity, wishing for the person to be free from problems. Therefore generating compassion, especially taking responsibility to free this person from anger, thinking, “What can I do to help to free this person from being used as a slave by anger?” Even though you cannot help now, you can still pray to be able to do so. In this way, no matter how angry he/she is, it doesn’t affect you: even though they may constantly insult you. So how anger arises is not dependent on how the person behaves.
- Lama Zopa Rinpoche
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BTW i sent you an sms, but you didn't reply, have you changed your number?
