We Are All on the Same Bus

I sometimes think of this country I live in as being like a bus, and it seems like the bus is heading straight for a cliff at high speed and nobody can do anything about it.  It is an unsettling thought.  But perhaps a very useful one as a thought tool.  Suppose you are riding on a bus and some disaster strikes--perhaps a flood, earthquake, or huge snowfall--and you are trapped on the bus for a very long time and you need to work together to survive.  What would you do?

Would you refuse to work with or help someone because they didn’t agree with your political or religious beliefs?  Or because of their income level, race, ethnicity, or gender?  I think most people in these circumstances would drop their differences and work for the good of everyone. 

If someone is hungry, we would feed them.  If someone is having an anxiety attack, we would try to calm them down.  We might not like everybody on the bus, or approve of them—but we are going to be together for a good long time, so we need to get along, take care of one another, and acknowledge that our lives are linked. 

When we begin to look deeply, we see that living on planet Earth—our spaceship home—is very much like being on the bus.  Our lives are linked and we must work together to overcome injustice, avoid environmental collapse, avoid wars, and solve the problem of life-threatening climate change.

Like it or not, we are all connected. We are all riding on the same bus and it’s the only bus there is—our planet home.  When we finally see this, it becomes more possible to begin to be genuinely caring for the wellbeing of everyone.  It becomes less possible for some to continue the reckless pursuit of more and more personal gains related to greed at the expense of others.  We can then learn to navigate social living in a radically different way. 

You do not have to like someone or approve of them as a person in order to care about them and work side by side with them.  Focusing on caring for everyone creates powerful connections that challenge the idea of an “us and them” world by giving us a way of seeing everyone as included in “us.”

Related to this is the idea of getting in the habit of looking for the good in people.  If you look for what is wrong with someone or what is wrong with the world you will certainly find it.  If you look for the good in someone or in the world you will certainly find that as well.  Which habit is more likely to bring about cooperation and happiness for myself and others?  Finding fault in others is a waste of energy and does not help at all. And it will prevent us from finding solutions to our share predicament and danger.  

In the Buddhist tradition, there is a practice called Meditation on Seeing the Good which can help us connect and work with other people.  It begins by going somewhere quiet and then bringing to mind someone you have a lot of difficulty with.  Imagine this person standing in front of you, and see if you can bring to mind something good they do or have done in the past.  Perhaps they helped some stranger by giving them directions to find an address they needed, or opened a door for someone.  Can you recall other good personal traits or actions in connection with this person?

 Now move on and do the same thing for another person you find fault with or avoid.  Try doing this for several moments and at random times throughout the day and notice how your attitude changes.  It becomes harder to see the person as only bad—there is more to them than that, and seeing some good in them helps us to feel more connected, open, and caring.

I have a neighbor who has political views that I strongly disagree with.  But when I look deeper, I see someone who gives his time without being asked to maintain our shared gravel road with his tractor and never asked once for help with his gasoline costs.  He is friendly and stops to chat with people he encounters on the road.  He is much more than his political orientation, and we have been able to work well together on issues impacting our neighborhood.

This meditation can also be done as you move through your day.  When you are standing in line at the grocery store, you can look for good qualities in the cashier, for example.  Perhaps this person has a warm and friendly smile.  Do the same thing for the other people you encounter at times during your day.

If you cannot find any good qualities for a person right now, simply acknowledge that you actually have much in common with them.  Both of you want to be safe, to love and be loved, happy, and do not want to suffer. 

You might try saying to yourself “Just as I wish to be happy, so-and-so wishes to be happy.”     “Just as I wish to be loved, so-and-so wishes to be loved.”   “Just as I wish to be safe, so-and-so wishes to be safe.”  Use the person’s name as you say these phrases silently to yourself.  This helps us behave and feel better toward them. 

And…  We can remind ourselves and others that: We are all on the same bus, and it is the only bus there is.

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            If you have questions, comments, or ideas for new Blog topics please contact Dale at ahimsaacres@gmail.com.