Musashi's Dokkodo (The Way of Walking Alone)

Teacher:
At the base, this is no different than the precepts against desire and
jealousy. When you have a preference, in and of itself, this is not a
big deal. But I think what Musashi was getting at here is the way we
lean toward demanding that things be just so. It is absolutely natural
to have a preference. I prefer to have cheese on my fries when I eat
a hamburger. I prefer to sit in the front of an airplane. I prefer to have
dinner guests not blow their nose at the table while I am eating. I
prefer that no one speak to me until after my third cup of coffee.
Preferences are really nothing more than what we want. I cannot
remember the number of times my Parents told me, “It ain’t what you
want that makes you fat, it’s what you eat.”

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In my recent experiences though, I think I can see some of what
Musashi might have been pointing at here. Just look around at the
number of people who prefer to not see or hear anything that offends
or upsets them. After being brought up in what amounts to a bubble,
there are masses of human adults out there who feel that anything
offensive, or anything that reminds them of a bad experience, or
anything that makes them uncomfortable in any fashion must be
hidden away. As long as you stay inside of that bubble, surrounded
by people who are willing to cooperate with your preferences, there
will be no issues for you.
But, there are many people in the world that will not cooperate.
There are some who will use your preferences for how the world
should tailor itself to your wishes as a way to get to you and destroy
you. In this sense your preference becomes a weakness. By using a
framework of your own creation as an outline of how the world is
supposed to be, you end up limiting your vision of what truly is. By
self-imposed weakness, you create an opening for others to take
advantage of you and possibly do you great harm.
This is an extreme example, but there are lesser variations.
When we would rather have things be this way than the way they
really are, we stress. Now, Musashi could not care less if we are
stressed about something, but stress is a distraction. Stress alters
our focus, interferes with our attention, and on and on.
Maybe we are certain that a trusted friend would never steal our idea
in order to cement their position within the company where we work
so we share this idea with them in the interest of getting the ball
rolling on making a needed improvement. Our very thought that
people we classify as “good people” would somehow never act in a
selfish manner is a weakness that will allow another person to steal
the idea and take the credit for the concept as well as build their own
reputation within the company as an innovator. They can still be a
good person, but even the best people are prone to acting selfishly
when they think there is a benefit that will outweigh the cost of losing
our respect or friendship. To not know this or acknowledge it under

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the guise of preferring to think that “good people would never do
that” is folly. Good people are still people, hence will act out of self-
interest at any time. Your preferred belief about how people should
act means nothing.
Having a preference is natural, but extending your belief in that
preference as being the way, or the right way, or the way things are
is asinine. It’s a fantasy. The real world doesn’t work that way.