Tolerance: The Way of Nature

ARTICLES OF WISDOM It often happens that a person finds a situation unpleasant and begins to fight it—only to end up in ruin. Why does this happen? Because, out of short-sightedness, the person believes the choice is between what is pleasant and unpleasant. He fights the unpleasant in the hope of gaining the pleasant. But the outcome shows that the choice was not between pleasant and unpleasant. It was between unpleasant and destructive. In reality, it is very rare in this world that a person’s choice lies between pleasant and unpleasant. More often, the choice is between less unpleasant and more unpleasant. In such cases, wisdom means accepting the less unpleasant to avoid the greater one. Most people destroy themselves because of this misunderstanding. They take action, thinking it will remove an undesirable situation and bring about a desirable one. But when the present situation ends, they discover that the new situation contains the same unpleasantness in even greater measure—the very thing they could not tolerate in smaller measure before. This is the wisdom called tolerance. In this world, patience leads a person toward life, while impatience leads only toward death. Tolerance gives us the chance to act. It allows us to adjust to unfavourable circumstances and still continue our journey of life in a balanced way. On the other hand, if we abandon