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Right Speech
Invincible_summer
Heavy Metal DhammaWe(s)t coast, Canada Veteran
"What is right speech? Abstention from lying, slander, abuse, and gossip; this is called right speech."
SN 45:8; DN 22
One of my greatest shortcomings has to be practicing Right Speech. I spent 5 years of my life pursuing a sociology degree in university, where being critical of pretty much everything is expected. I've learned to turn that down a lot over the past year. However, with the new year, I'm trying to gossip less and slander less.
But I'm wondering about some situations that may cause contradictions, or at least mild confusion for me. Okay, say someone asks for your opinion of something - e.g. what you think of a mutual friend's new significant other - would it be Wrong Speech to give your opinion, even if it's not harmful? It is, after all, gossip. But then, what if you actually think negatively of the person, but then say that you find them agreeable - that would be lying. What would the most "right" action be? Just not saying anything?
Has anyone who sincerely practices the Eightfold Path (which I guess should be everyone here) noticed that practicing Right Speech has resulted in speaking a lot less? After all, i feel that a great deal of the topic matter that we talk about in our societies tend to be idle gossip. How has praciting Right Speech affected your life/work/etc?
SN 45:8; DN 22
One of my greatest shortcomings has to be practicing Right Speech. I spent 5 years of my life pursuing a sociology degree in university, where being critical of pretty much everything is expected. I've learned to turn that down a lot over the past year. However, with the new year, I'm trying to gossip less and slander less.
But I'm wondering about some situations that may cause contradictions, or at least mild confusion for me. Okay, say someone asks for your opinion of something - e.g. what you think of a mutual friend's new significant other - would it be Wrong Speech to give your opinion, even if it's not harmful? It is, after all, gossip. But then, what if you actually think negatively of the person, but then say that you find them agreeable - that would be lying. What would the most "right" action be? Just not saying anything?
Has anyone who sincerely practices the Eightfold Path (which I guess should be everyone here) noticed that practicing Right Speech has resulted in speaking a lot less? After all, i feel that a great deal of the topic matter that we talk about in our societies tend to be idle gossip. How has praciting Right Speech affected your life/work/etc?
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I think one of the main points of "right speech" and gossiping can be explained the the below, a teaching of the Zen 6th Patriarch, Hui Neng
He who treads the Path in earnest
Sees not the mistakes of the world;
If we find fault with others
We ourselves are also in the wrong.
When other people are in the wrong, we should ignore it,
For it is wrong for us to find fault.
By getting rid of this habit of fault-finding
We cut off a source of defilement.
When neither hatred nor love disturb our mind
Serenely we sleep.
Gossip is essentially focusing your attention on others faults. Focusing your attention on what you don't like about other people, which is essentially the opposite of Metta and has the opposite effects. Whereas Metta is love and kindness and the opposite leads to hatred and ill will. If you think negatively of someone, the problems is really with yourself and your lack of Metta, not the other person. If you think negatively of someone else, you should look at yourself first.
In a situation that is apparently contradictory, the "right action" IMO would be the action that does not lead to the arising of ill will, hate, etc. The action that supports Metta is the right action and right speech. Each particular situation should be individually evaluated IMO. Some people think "what others don't know won't hurt them". So they feel it's ok and not harmful to gossip of other people behind their back. But it is harmful, it's harmful to yourself because it kills your own universal love and kindness. Even if you haven't cultivated this great kindness yet, it's still harmful, to yourself, because it prevents that from arising to begin with. The non-harming speech aspect not only applies to causing harm to others with your speech, it also applies to causing harm to yourself and your own internal cultivation of love and kindness.
Easily seen are others' faults, hard indeed to see are one's own. Like chaff one winnows others' faults, but one's own one hides, as a crafty fowler conceals himself by camouflage. He who sees others' faults is ever irritable--his corruptions grow. He is far from the destruction of the corruptions.
Dhammapada 252-53
As always, Buddhism doesn't have simple, black-and-white answers. It's up to us to discern how to apply guidelines, from one situation to the next. Just as situations are unique, our responses must be nuanced, and tailored to the situation.
Buddhists neglect to warn people of danger a fair amount. I'm thinking specifically of the abuse issues that arise in sanghas. In some sanghas a conspiracy of silence prevails, and whistle-blowers are shunned, told they're dividing the sangha and practicing wrong speech, etc. That's why a correct understanding of Right Speech is crucial. Many practitioners interpret it as simply never saying anything negative. That's an erroneous view.
That's not to say I haven't had to lower the boom a few times -- like when a science teacher taught a concept completely wrong, and I caught it because I had been a science teacher myself. It was such an egregious content error, I had to order her to go back and reteach it the following day...and observe her doing so. But conferences -- even when teachers screwed up -- usually could be done humanely and in a way that progress was made. But that's where the being mindful came in.
I find myself not really saying things but I know that I think alot of things that I should not. As many people know it's quick to judge someone even though they may not deserve it. Thankfully lately I have been catching myself on it.
Something that helps me when I'd like to let go of some of my critique and judgment is to acknowledge what I found underneath that tendency to be critical - a lot of fear about how I'm being judged. When usually, I wasn't being judged at all.
And yeah, I find that practicing right speech results in a lot less speech sometimes!
You're trying to gossip and slander less? Why would you slander anyone? Who goes around slandering people?? I'm having trouble relating to this OP, even though Right Speech is an important topic to me.
Sometimes Right Speech means we talk more, not less. It means we speak up if someone is being treated unjustly, we speak up to defend someone against a bully. Right Speech impels us to speak in situations in which we otherwise may have remained silent.
That somehow stuck with me.
Now often when I talk about someone, I think it’s possible that the person in question is secretly listening to what I’m saying. I try to speak my mind, but in a way that if the person would be hearing it, that would be okay.
He would be unhappy about it maybe, but – the way I talk about him - I can look him in the eyes. Or her...
And, why do you think that critiquing is not "right speech"?
Have you done that before? I think most people have done that at least a handful of times, if not do it on a regular basis. Not saying that it's permissible, but rather that I'm surprised that you're shocked.
Yes, what you say is very true. But I was mainly curious about the aspect of Right Speech that may involve not saying anything. At all.
If you desperately need one sentence to understand the topic, then I suppose it's this:
Where is the line between critiquing and being divisive? How can one practice Right Speech but still say something true and factual that may cause anger in others?
When you lapse that is par for the course. Don't be too hard on yourself just remember your commitment to improve and when it comes to you work with the newfound intention in practice.
That would be a good example of how critiquing can be designed for a greater good.
I looked up "slander" in the dictionary back when a discussion came up between friends a few years ago, about that precept. First of all, "slander", I discovered" refers to untruthful statements. It's not slander if it's true. And that's one of the Buddha's criteria, that a statement be true and factual . Another is that the statement be beneficial . So you can see that sometimes critiques can be beneficial. Whether or not it's pointless gossip, potentially harmful even, or potentially helpful, depend entirely on the situation. It may be important to warn people about douchebags. But if it's just idle chatter, it may turn out to be helpful to no one, and harmful the the douchebag himself. Only you can discern one way or another. Secondly, not all traditions word the precept the same. Some only prohibit slander. Others prohibit talking about others when they're not present. There are many versions to the precept, I discovered.
Maybe you feel like your academic training has set you up to be negative. You can make efforts to counterbalance that, without abandoning the skills you learned. Try to find the joy in life, work on spontaneity, being genuinely happy for people (or when something good happens to you, too). Try to recapture a certain innocence. Enjoy a beautiful sunset. Do something fun, just for the fun of it. In the spring, go to the beach or a stream and run and splash around, and be goofy, and laugh. Maybe because of your intense academic experience, you got used to living in your head all the time. It's time to cultivate the heart.
Critiques aren't bad or wrong speech. Think about a book reviewer. His job is to critique books and publish his comments in the newspaper. Hundreds of people read his articles. He's performing a public service by letting the public know what the book is about, how well-written it is, how well-researched it is, if it's non-fiction, did the author get his facts right or not, etc. Based on the critique, people can decide whether or not to buy the book. The author may not be thrilled with a negative review, but it would be wrong to write a dishonest review just to spare the author's feelings. The greater good is served by being honest.
I guess living in my head got me to this point of confusion too... :P
Martin Luther King, Jr.