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Every conflict we encounter, ultimately turns out to be a conflict within ourselves. Illustration: OpenClipart-Vectors

We need a certain amount of conflict and resistance in order to grow, develop, and thrive. If our home is so clean that it’s almost sterile, our immune system has nothing to do and grows weak. The same principle can be applied to us people, living in this marvellous world: without some conflict and resistance, we become weak, stale, and bored. Therefore, in this article we will discuss how some seemingly insurmountable conflicts actually harbour the seeds of joy, and why, ultimately, every conflict turns out to be a conflict within ourselves.

When I was a child, I was convinced that all human beings could be friends. Moreover, I never understood that when rulers declared a war, the military hardly ever told those rulers that if they wanted to fight, they could jolly well do it themselves.[1]

The Christmas Truce of 1914 comprised of spontaneous and unauthorized truces between a large amount of soldiers of the opposing forces. In the picture, a British soldier receives a light from his German counterpart. Image found on: bgindependentmedia.org

This was before the realisation that what we call ‘conflict’, actually seems to be an integral part of life. If, for instance, the immune cells in my body do not confront and eliminate harmful viruses and bacteria, I would not last long. We can therefore say that conflict on one level (e.g. cellular), actually constitutes harmony on another level (e.g. organic), and what might look like conflict on our terrestrial level, can prove to constitute harmony at a planetary level.

Two people who experienced conflict on a profound level, yet who managed to develop and cultivate an over-all joyful state of being, are the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu† and the 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. In The Book Of Joy, these two dear (and mischievous) friends discuss the challenges of living a joyful life. They’ve both endured great hardships: the Archbishop in his struggles against the apartheids regime in South Africa, and the Dalai Lama when he had to flee his native Tibet when it became occupied by the Chinese.

The documentary *Mission: Joy* portrays the same week as *The Book Of Joy*, and makes a wonderful addition to the book. Image: still taken from the documentary *Mission Joy*, where the archbishop joyfully boogies.

Both in this book and in The Book Of Forgiving, which Archbishop Tutu wrote together with his daughter, Mpho, he reveals the large amounts of anger he experienced whenever he was faced with blatant racism and injustice from white South Africans. Moreover, while chairing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in order to heal the collective wounds that apartheid had conflicted on virtually all South Africans, he was many times overcome with intense grief while listening to the horrendous stories from both victims and perpetrators.[2]

In The Book Of Joy, the Dalai Lama described to have been afraid when, on their way out of Tibet, they had to sneak by Chinese military camps. And when his beloved Buddhist teacher passed away, he felt intense sadness.

What both these sages and teachers agree on, however, is that ‘nothing beautiful comes without some suffering’. For Archbishop Tutu, one of the most important factors for his joyful state of being, has always been his family and the ever presence of his Christian community. He knew that despite all the hardships, he was never alone, which turned out to be a great source of his joy.

One of the Dalai Lama’s sources of joy can be traced to the profound Tibetan Buddhist teachings, where the cultivation of compassion, generosity and kindness for every human being are deeply imbedded. Moreover, he explains that his life in exile actually gave him much more opportunities to travel. He was free to meet people and learn from them, an opportunity which he would have never had if he would have been ‘living in a glass house’ in Lhasa. That reframing of a situation, of changing ones perspective, also proved to be a pillar of joy, as will be further elaborated on below.

Archbishop Tutu recalled the surprise reaction he caused many, when he stated that Nelson Mandela’s hardships during 27 years in prison had been necessary to turn him from a young and bloodthirsty rebel leader, into the revered and reconciling leader he became.

The Dalai Lama then told the story about one of his monk friends, Lopon-la, who was arrested and sent off to a gulag (work camp) at the time of the Dalai Lama’s escape to India. After 18 years of hard labour and having to endure constant tortures from the Chinese guards,[3] Lopon-la made it to India. When he left the camp, only 20 people had survived, and he said that he had faced some real dangers. The Dalai Lama assumed that Lopon-la referred to his own life, but upon asking, he replied that he had been in danger of losing his compassion for his guards.

These remarkable examples show that despite horrendous hardships, both Mandela and Lopon-la developed and cultivated a great sense of what can be called: warm-heartedness, or human heartedness. Both realised, one through experience, the other through profound Buddhist teaching, that underneath it all, their adversaries were human beings, with their own anxieties and hopes. Therefore, hatred towards them would inevitably mean: hatred towards oneself. Archbishop Tutu made that point clear when he stated that Mandela’s time in prison had been both necessary and cathartic:

“They [the hardships in prison] were necessary to remove the dross. The suffering in prison helped him to become more magnanimous, willing to listen to the other side. To discover that the people he regarded as his enemy, they too were human beings who had fears and expectations. And they had been moulded by their society. So, without the twenty-seven years, I don’t think we would have seen the Nelson Mandela with the compassion, the magnanimity, and the capacity to put himself in the shoes of the other.”

All the racism, injustice, and bullying that young Mandela endured, inflicted a deep hatred in his body and mind, and needed a long time to be processed, accepted, and reframed, so that he was finally capable of seeing his past enemies as human beings. Again, both religious teachers agreed that our ability to change our perspective is one of the main pillars of joy.

Another pillar of joy is the choice to be kind and generous. The Dalai Lama put it like this:

“A self-centered attitude is the source of the problem [of suffering]. We have to take care of ourselves without selfishly taking care of ourselves. If we don’t take care of ourselves, we cannot survive. We need to take care of ourselves. We should have wise selfishness rather than foolish selfishness. Foolish selfishness means you just think only of yourself, don’t care about others, bully others, exploit others. In fact, taking care of others, helping others, ultimately is the way to discover your own joy and to have a happy life. So that is what I call wise selfishness.”

Being kind, generous, and helping others, are a few of the quickest ways to experience immense joy yourself. Image: beasternchen

With that statement, the Dalai Lama unknowingly touches on a phenomenal conflict which so many of us face, yet don’t regard as a conflict: the widespread conviction that we ought to take care of others, before we take care of ourselves.[3]

Recently I was contacted by a wonderful friend whom I had not spoken to in over 25 years. It was a wonderful surprise, yet she described her current physical condition as that of an elderly lady, despite being only 49. She found it difficult to put herself in the first place, being convinced that her children, work, house, etc., were more important to maintain than herself.

This is the opposite of what the Dalai Lama calls foolish selfishness, or too much selfishness. It often rests on convictions deeply buried in our subconscious, and makes many of us feel guilty if we have the audacity to do something for ourselves, while our to-do-list is not yet finished (spoiler alert: it never is). Thus, eventually, both too much and not enough selfishness are conflicts within ourselves, and inevitably become causes of energy leaking and suffering.

If we only think about ourselves in an egotistical, narcissistic way, we eventually become susceptible to ulcers, heart diseases and strokes. Yet if we don’t take care of ourselves, we become susceptible to ulcers and disabling diseases like ALS, as the story of Lou Gehrig aptly, yet sadly, illustrates.[4]

Lou Gehrig was an American baseball player nicknamed ‘The Iron Horse’. Healthy or sick, with or without broken fingers (which he didn’t even notice himself), he never missed a match. In the 1930’s, when there was no modern physiotherapy or sports medicine, he played 2130 consecutive matches – a record that stood for more than six decades. Lou’s conviction was that he had to be loyal to his boss, teammates, mother, and literally everyone else who called on him, at all costs. In doing so, he almost permanently overstepped his own boundaries, making him physiologically a walking talking stress response. Disregarding himself in such an extreme manner eventually led to ALS – the disease that would come to bear his name. When he passed away a few weeks before his 38th birthday, he couldn’t be loyal to anyone, anymore.

What these examples reveal, is that without a healthy body and mind, it becomes increasingly difficult to be kind and generous. Yet when a healthy body and mind provide us with the opportunity to become kind and generous in a sustainable manner, so our spiritual teachers tell us, the amount of joy we’ll encounter can be infinite. However, keeping body and mind healthy requires training, which is what resistance and conflicts are all about.

That adversity and conflict are necessary components for growth, is wonderfully described by Joseph Campbell in his book The Hero With 1000 Faces, where he uncovers similar story- and plotlines in many myths from different parts of the globe. They all have one thing in common: there is a hero who leaves the common world to venture into a region of supernatural wonder, in order to encounter fantastic forces and win a decisive victory. Then, according to Campbell: “The hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.”

What we need to realize, is that we already have everything we need to face and overcome any ‘dragon’ we will ever encounter. Image: MythologyArt

In other words, in order to develop and grow as a human being, we need a certain amount of conflict, of resistance, as it were, and our biggest conflict is the conflict within ourselves. That is exactly the point that Campbell is trying to make, because the hero’s journey is as much about unlocking inner truths as it is about ‘slaying’ dragons. Along the way, the hero inevitably discovers they already had everything they needed to overcome adversity and find enlightenment the whole time.

Why would we get off the couch if there is no conflict? There has to be some kind of incentive for us to embark on a journey, if we wish to find our innate, joyful state, and that incentive usually arises from a conflict within ourselves. We feel broken, alone, un-whole, and that’s exactly the prerequisite for looking beyond the boundaries of our emotional comfort zone.

To sum up: conflict harbours the possibility of unknown joy and physical, mental, and spiritual growth. We need a certain amount of resistance in order to thrive, and the art lies in our ability to engage in those conflicts which are conducive to our development. For me, that is exactly what is meant by the proverb: ‘Choosing one’s battles wisely.’

Jolly greetings,
Erik Stout

[1] “Just think, war breaks out, and nobody turns up.” Great mental picture, taken from the extended version of Two Tribes by the band Frankie Goes To Hollywood.

[2] Just like a trip to an old Nazi concentration camp harbours the potential for salvation through the recognition of profound human suffering, so does the video footage of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission which you can find on YouTube.

[3] It is not without reason that at the beginning of every flight, we are told that if the pressure drops and the oxygen masks drop, we must put on our own mask first, before helping anyone else.

[4] Lou’s story, and many others, are described by Gabor Maté in his revealing book: When The Body Says No.

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Finding Joy In Conflict

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