Love Beyond Duality ~ Sulak Sivaraska

Queen Malika, the wife of the King of Kosala, was one of the first ladies to convert to Buddhism. The King wasn't a Buddhist, but he loved her very much. One day on the full-moon night, they were very romantic - you know Buddhism is very romantic- and the King asked her, "My dear, who do you love the most?", expecting that she would say, "Of course, your majesty, I love you most."

But being Buddhist, she said, "You know, dear, I love myself, most." And the King said, yes, come to think of it, I also love myself most."

The next day they went to see the Buddha, and the Buddha said, "Every being love's herself or himself most. If you love yourself best, understand other beings also love themselves best. And the best way to love yourself is not to exploit yourself. If you cultivate greed, hate and delusion, you exploit yourself most."

I think perhaps in the West; they could learn a bit of that. I feel people have a lot of hatred for themselves. Loving yourself is the first step to freedom.

The next step, the Buddha said, was not to feel that you are superior to others. For me, that is part of freedom. If you practice the feeling of not feeling superior to others, then you must also practice not feeling inferior to others. And ultimately, you are taught not to feel equal to others. Then you can go beyond dualism, and once beyond dualism, inter-being is possible. And that is the true freedom: freedom beyond duality, beyond you and me, beyond I and thou.