Doing no harm: check in number 2
It becomes clearer each day that doing no harm requires a real attentiveness to what’s going on in me. It also requires that I keep the “do-no-harm” thought before me. As I have noted before, I keep catching myself AFTER I have done harm, especially with my words and thoughts. I thought the “do-no-harm” plan was about catching myself BEFORE I did the harm.
And what about catching myself doing nothing when the situation requires action? Is it doing harm when I do nothing when something is called for? Those are more rhetorical questions than actual questions; I am coming to see that not doing something thought ought to be done is just as harmful as doing something that ought not to have been done. Ugh! So I am trying to pay attention to both my action and inaction, the words or lack thereof, and my thoughts (and non-thoughts?). Rather than getting easier over time, I am realizing just how complex it is to try and do no harm.
All this said, I am not giving up just realizing that sometimes what appears simple become more complex the deeper one goes.
