How often do we make something huge out of a simple problem, and blow it all out of proportion? How often do we mistakenly assume false motives to someone’s actions - but later we find we are completely wrong? How often do we stereotype this one or that one - or a group of people because of how they look, dress or the color of their skin?

All of us at times make these misunderstandings, but I think to understand their source (where they are coming from) is important if we are to grow spiritually.

Let me tell you a story from the Buddhist teachings. This is one of the Jataka Tales - and it goes like this….

This is an account of one of the Buddha’s previous lives, and tells of the time he was born as a lion who lived on the edge of a deep forest. “One autumn day a tremendous commotion broke out and all the animals began to stampede. The lion saw them, in their hundreds and thousands, running for their lives without daring to look behind them. He knew that if they were not stopped they would run as far as the sea and drown. Quickly, he leapt up onto a hill that overlooked their path and roared three times. The animals all stopped at once, one pressed against the next in a huge, trembling mass. The lion walked down from the hill and asked them why they were running so fast.

“The end of the world is coming!” they cried. “Who said so?” asked the lion.

“The elephants,” they said.

“No it wasn’t,” said the elephants indignantly. “It was the lions.”

“No, it was the tigers who told us,” said the lions.

The tigers said it was the rhinos; the rhinos said it was the buffalos; the buffalos said it was the antelopes; the antelopes said it was the gazelles; and the gazelles said it was the rabbits.

The rabbits said: “It was this little rabbit here who told us!”

The lion strode over to the little rabbit and asked, “How do you know it’s the end of the world?”

“I heard it, sir, a terrible cracking noise, and I saw something out of the corner of my eye.”

“Where?” said the lion. “Tell me exactly what happened.” “I was sitting under a fruit tree, thinking about what would become of me when the end of the world came, and all of a sudden I heard this cracking noise … as if the earth itself was splitting apart.”

“Let’s go and have a look,” said the lion, and the rabbit climbed on his back and showed him the way. When they got near his tree, the rabbit jumped off, because he was too scared to go near the crack in the earth. The lion went up to the tree and saw where the rabbit had been sitting, and he saw the fruit that had fallen and crackled as it crushed the autumn leaves. He called the rabbit and showed him, and then they told the animals that their terror had all been for no reason whatsoever. And that it was not the end of the world.”

From the Buddhist teachings everything in this phenomenal world is the result of “causes & conditions that arise.” So when these causes and conditions arise and we like them - we then call that auspicious - or it is a good event. On the other hand when these causes and conditions arise and we don’t like them - we are like the animals in the story - we may think it is the end of the world. The important thing is to realize that all of our experience - all of our reality is simply dependent arisings - “causes & conditions.” If we can view the world in that way, then we can see that these things as not substantially real, but simply causes and conditions that are arising.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama says:

False conceptions are exaggerated modes of thought that do not accord with the facts. Even if an object–an event, a person, or any other phenomenon–has a slightly favorable aspect, once the object is mistakenly seen as existing totally from its own side, true and real, mental projection exaggerates its goodness beyond what it actually is, resulting in lust. The same happens with anger and hatred; this time a negative factor is exaggerated, making the object seem to be a hundred percent negative, the result being deep disturbance. Recently, a psychotherapist told me that when we generate anger, ninety percent of the ugliness of the object of our anger is due to our own exaggeration. This is very much in conformity with the Buddhist idea of how afflictive emotions arise.

At the point when anger and lust are generated, reality is not seen; rather, an unreal mental projection of extreme badness or extreme goodness is seen, evoking twisted, unrealistic actions. All of this can be avoided by seeing the fuller picture revealed by paying attention to the dependent-arising of phenomena, the nexus of causes and conditions from which they arise and in which they exist.

He goes on to say:

Love and compassion also involve strong feelings that can even make you cry with empathy, but they are induced not by exaggeration but by valid cognition of the plight of sentient beings, and the appropriateness of being concerned for their well-being. These feelings rely on insight into how beings suffer in the round of rebirth called “cyclic existence,” and the depth of these feelings is enhanced through insight into impermanence and emptiness…. Though it is possible for love and compassion to be influenced by afflictive emotions, true love and compassion are unbiased and devoid of exaggeration, because they are founded on valid cognition of your relationship to others. The perspective of dependent-arising is supremely helpful in making sure that you appreciate the wider picture.

Yet how often do we think our perceptions of these dependent arising are real?

The Buddhist scriptures have their own favorite example. Imagine, they say, you were out walking one evening at dusk. Suddenly on the path in front of you, you see what seems to be a snake. You are transfixed with fear; you begin to sweat; your heart pounds and your mind races for some way of escaping the snake, and death. An impulse tells you to switch on your flashlight, and to your amazement and relief you see that your snake is only a piece of mottled rope. You sigh and cackle nervously. But where was the snake?

Sogyal Rinpoches says, “In the Dzogchen teachings, we speak of dissolving everything, in the state of meditation, into the primordial purity of natural simplicity. You will notice moments when everything becomes transparent and you can actually see that natural simplicity is truly how things are. How ridiculous it seems then to stake our happiness and let our confidence hang on some casual, trivial event of dependent arisings that aren’t even real.”

This is where the practice of meditation can be so powerful-because it can inspire in us the realization that we can actually let go, and if we let go, we’re free. And when we feel free that is the real result of practice; that is the sign that our practice is accomplishing something. Then everything will prove much easier for us, because we will be so much easier with ourselves. We will discover confidence within: an authentic, natural, indestructible confidence, which will render us fearless.