Never Compare – In Gita Verse 18.47 It is better to engage in one’s own occupation, even though one may perform it imperfectly, than to accept another’s occupation and perform it perfectly. Duties prescribed according to one’s nature are never affected by sinful reactions.
Krishna says each person is born with a unique individuality, and each person has a destiny of his or her own. Imitation is crime, it is criminal. If you try to become a Buddha, you may look like Buddha, you may walk like him, you may talk like him, but you will miss. You will miss all that life was ready to deliver to you. Buddha happens only once. It is not in the nature of things to repeat. Existence is so creative that it never repeats anything. You cannot find another human being in the present, in the past, or in the future who is going to resemble you exactly. It has never happened. The human being is not a mechanism like Ford cars on an assembly line. Never imitate anybody…
In my Bhagavad Gita Verse 4.24, blog I wrote – If you are somebody you can be compared with others, and that which can be compared cannot be unique.
There is a beautiful story about a famous Zen master, Rinzai. Rainzai’s master died and before his death, he declared Rinzai his successor. There were other disciples also, who felt jealous of Rinzai, and also hurt that their master had not given this recognition to them. They started finding fault with the way Rinzai lived his life. He seemed to be totally unlike his master. One day, all the disgruntled disciples gathered together and had a brainstorming meeting, in which they concluded that Rinzai was not the right choice of the master as he was not following the lifestyle of his own master. How can he be a successor? It was beyond their understanding that he was chosen to be a successor. Observing all this, Rinzai remained cool and responded to the other fellow disciples: Beloved friends, you are mistaken, you are missing the whole point.
My master did not imitate the lifestyle of his master, and so he never expected me to imitate his lifestyle. This is the uniqueness of each master. I will be going against the teaching of my master if I imitate him. This is exactly the reason that our master did not choose any of those who are functioning as a carbon copy of the master – he chose me. I follow my own heart and my own spirit. This is the real secret of being a disciple. This is the real grace. This is authentic Zen insight which is in harmony with the last message of Buddha: Be a light unto yourself. And Buddha coined a beautiful word for this insight: Sammasati. Everybody should live with the right remembrance and realise enlightenment in his own way. To be just like another person requires a lot of effort, which is almost impossible. Deep down everyone continues to realise one’s own uniqueness.
This is the way life is. Each master who is really enlightened will not want anybody to be his imitation, as an imitation would be an insult to the master, and his teachings. So whenever some people are called the followers of any master, it is an insult to both the master and the disciples.
In my Bhagavad Gita Verse 6.32, blog I wrote – This is one of the greatest paradoxes of life, that we are not separate from the whole, yet each individual is unique. This is really difficult to comprehend, because the moment we think of uniqueness, immediately we think of the self.
Never compare. Comparison is a disease, one of the greatest diseases and we are taught from the very beginning to compare. Your mother starts comparing you with other children, your father starts comparing you with other children. The teacher compares you: ‘Look at Johnny, how well he is doing, and you are no good at all! Look at others!’ From the very beginning you are being told to compare yourself with others. This is the greatest disease; it is like a cancer that goes on destroying your very soul – because each individual is unique, and comparison is not possible. I am just myself and you are just yourself. There is nobody else in the world you can be compared with.
Do you compare a marigold with a rose flower? You don’t compare. Do you compare a mango with an apple? You don’t compare. You know they are different – comparison is not possible….
There has never been any individual like you before and there will never be again. You are utterly unique. This is your privilege, your prerogative, existence’s blessing – that it has made you unique. Don’t compare. Comparison will bring trouble.
Krishna says a man who understands the uniqueness of everybody can be religious, can only be religious because he feels immense gratitude for whatsoever life has given to him. If you don’t compare, then you are neither bigger nor smaller, neither ugly nor beautiful, neither intelligent nor stupid. If you don’t compare, you are simply yourself. And in that state of simply being yourself spring comes, flowers come, because a deep acceptance of life and a deep gratitude to existence helps to bring the spring.
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