Do No Harm

I had an email at the end of last week with a link to a website called Do No Harm. A nice idea, simple and uncontroversial, and the Internet is an ideal place for it. Who knows, it might be catching...

Actually, it's Buddhism in a nutshell. The Ten Commandments? Who needs them, when they can be condensed into this exquisitely simple injunction, much easier to remember and less forbidding than all those "Thou shallt nots." I think it's probably the best of all religions in a nutshell--at least of the original spirit of all religions, if not their interpretation by fanatical followers.

All it involves is a certain measure of consciousness. Too often, the harm we do comes from our thoughtless acts, or actions when raw feelings--anger, for example, or fear--surge up and overpower the natural balance of the conscious mind. Road rage provides us with an excellent, if perhaps overly dramatic example. I don't know about you, but the same kind of things tend to happen in small scale all the time in my daily life--as when I hurt a friend with a casual, thoughtless remark.  Or think about gossip--a by no means harmless habit that most of us indulge in without giving our words a second thought.

So doing no harm becomes a continuing series of choices, an exercise of the will, a practice, the results of which is--guess what?--not only better relationships with those I chose not to hurt and greater well-being for that which I choose not to harm, but greater happiness for me! I feel more at ease with the world, less stress, more comfortable in my skin. I recommend the practice to anyone wanting to improve the quality of their life. Try it out this Monday morning: Do No Harm! And see how much better the week will be...