Musashi's Dokkodo (The Way of Walking Alone)

Teacher:
To my knowledge, jealousy is regarded as a sin in every religious
tradition. This begs the question of why. Why is jealousy regarded as
being sinful? What harm can this feeling possibly cause?
Jealousy causes a lot of harm in that it is a very powerful emotion.
Jealousy is a negative emotion too. It speaks directly to our base
feelings and the reactions which follow are very deeply scripted in
our brains.
People will kill other people over wishing they had what the other
person has. In the cases of teens who rob other people of their
shoes, it started as a feeling of jealousy over what the person in
question did not have. In the cases where people will ransack and
loot stores, it often starts as a feeling of jealousy over the perceived
privilege that another group is seen as having over the group that is
acting out in violence. People will murder over jealousy, as in cases
where someone finds out that their spouse is having an affair. They
will rob, loot, destroy, and murder over this strange emotion.
Never be jealous is an admirable bit of advice. It is harder to put into
practice because of the way it seems, for all intents and purposes, to
be woven into our DNA. So, where would one begin if they were
going to put this into practice? The beginning of not being jealous is
going to start, like everything else, within ourselves. We first have to
gain control of the impulse to see what others have that we do not
have, and look instead at what we have.
If you are reading this book, I am going to assume that you have
been the beneficiary of at least some education. More than likely,
you have had the benefit of a considerable amount of education, but
we will just stick with the assumption of, at the very least, some
formal training in the art of reading. If you spent your own money to
purchase this book, I will further assume that your needs for food
and shelter are also being satisfactorily met. While I will admit that in
the past I have bought books when I really needed the money for
other things, such as food, I am going to assume that I am the

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exception that tests the rule. If your needs for sustenance and
shelter are being met, I will further assume that you are employed. It
may or may not be your ideal job, or you might feel that it is not your
calling, but you are probably working. You do have an income of
some sort.
Here’s the deal: If you survived gestation, birth, and childhood,
became educated enough to read, have reliable food and shelter,
and an income that at least minimally meets your needs, you are
better off than most of the people on the planet.
Right here we have a good basis to begin to appreciate what we
have.
As a youngster who was heavily influenced by anything and
everything martial arts related, I was in front of the TV every
Saturday around lunchtime for the reruns of the Kung Fu television
series. A line stuck with me for many years from an episode where
someone asked Caine about not wanting to be rich. His reply was
something like, “I have work to do, a place to sleep, food to eat, and
friends. I am already rich.”
I grew up impoverished. I am not joking when I say that we were not
poor, we were broke, and had the hope to one day become poor.
Poor would have meant that we did not have enough money. Broke
meant we had none. But I was able to find contentment in what we
did have anyway.
When we had baking powder biscuits for dinner, I was happy—
especially when we had gravy to go with them. The times we had
pancakes for dinner, I felt lucky because I knew that my school
friends would be jealous to know that I was eating pancakes while
they were eating meatloaf or pork chops. I grew up in a mobile home
in a trailer park in central Texas. We had no air conditioning. As a
child, it was hard for me to understand how other kids did not notice
the seasons changing sooner than they did. I knew the season was
changing for more than a week before my AC-trained classmates. I
knew when it was not really spring yet and I knew when winter was

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really over. They did not. It made me feel smarter than them, which
was a rare thing in my life!
When you are able to reach a level of contentment where you are
confident that other people would trade places with you, it is easy to
not be jealous of what they have. So, this precept is great advice,
and while it is challenging to put into practice, the payoff for the hard
work of putting it into practice is an incredible peace of mind and a
powerful contentment and appreciation of what and who you have in
your life. It is well worth the effort.