Is Virtue Its Own Reward? Reflections on the Real Price and Value of Kindness...

 

L)) In My Own Words: Listen to Part 1 and Part 2 of a podcast episode I recorded where I talk about my experiences and how it changed the way I viewed society and the world around me for the rest of my life. 

"I want to be part of society. However, society must recognise my difference. Unfortunately, in spite of any rhetoric promoting inclusion, those who hold themselves to be the ‘norm’ persist in creating barriers that prevent us from being truly included. Our society , still silently, believes that the non-disabled, Maltese, Caucasian and straight man is the ideal […] this prize has reminded me that I am, and it seems, I will remain the ‘other’. For, even now, what I write may be interpreted to be the angry voice of that young boy who thought he was just like any other boy to discover that he must remain always an outsider."  

 

This week I have been doing some soul searching. I didn’t expect that I would react to this news as I did this time. Perhaps it’s because I’m more in touch with my thoughts and feelings. Indeed, the painful memories of a past long forgotten seemed to have come to haunt me again. I am sorry for being unclear but my thoughts and emotions are unsettled.

Let me take you back to a time when I was a boy of around 10. I was watching the local news in the evening when I heard the name of one of my best friends being mentioned. I admit that I was jealous at first. I was curious to know what had happened. I listen attentively… He was being awarded a prize for kindness… I listened more attentively now. A prize, for what? 

And then , I understand he was being rewarded for ‘helping’ his ‘poor handicapped friend’. Who? Then, it dawned on me as if I was struck by lightning. I was that boy he was ‘helping’. I was the boy described in terms of a ‘needy’ and even ‘helpless’. I felt that it seemed they were talking about another ‘crippled’ boy - not me! I felt betrayed.

At first, I was angry at my supposed ‘friend’. I was angry because I started to suspect that our friendship had been a charade. A ploy to be awarded such a prize or to look nice and popular with others. But, if I think about it, as a child himself, he really had no say in the matter. Undeniably, I did feel betrayed by my friend and while we sort of patched things up, from then on our friendship was never the same.

Why am I telling you this? The truth that this prize for kindness - also known in Maltese as “Premju tat-Tjubija” or “Premju Qalb tad-Deheb)”“ (Golden Heart Award) or “Premju Gwanni XXIII” (Pope John 23rd Award) is an initiative started off by a local NGO called the "Peace Lab”. Don’t get me wrong, I believe in the values expressed by this organisation, including the promotion of peace and dialogue between people. However, I believe that the ones who cane up with the idea of awarding a so-called “Prize for Kindness” may not be aware of what impact could have on the children who are being awarded this prize and the child who is ‘being helped’.

I don’t know what my best friend went through then and what he thinks of this experience today. What I can say that it left me with a sense of betrayal and forced me to mistrust others who sought my friendship for a long time. You know it is said that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions’. And I’m sure that my teachers and school had all the good intentions by nominating my friend. But while my friend achieved a certain prestige and recognition, I felt suddenly I was invalidated as a person. And the way the media portrayed me, again, was less than flattering. I was the taker and a burden. I knew that my friend didn’t see our friendship as a one-way thing. Yet, I was forced to question everything. Was I a ‘sacrifice’? 

Yes, it took years before I can say that I regained some trust. However, in spite of the terrible things they said about me. Defining me only in terms of my physical impairment. As if that was my problem. My curse. I have adapted to it didn’t I? Why do you need to deny that my body is part of who I am? Instead, you rob me of any claims to my individual identity. And so, deny my humanity. I know that these are hard words to write. But I can’t shout them out loud because I would gain nothing. For, even if we hate to admit it, such prizes only reinforce our social inequalities not just as disabled people but as human beings. We have to reward a friendship because we still perceive a disabled child to be always ‘less fortunate’. He or she is always taking. As if our friendship wasn’t based on mutual respect and understanding. As if we didn’t share our childhood together.

I want to be part of society. However, society must recognise my difference. Unfortunately, in spite of any rhetoric promoting inclusion, those who hold themselves to be the ‘norm’ persist in creating barriers that prevent us from being included. Our society , still silently, believes that the non-disabled, Maltese, Caucasian and straight man is the ideal. I am sorry to have to say all this but I can’t help feeling that this prize has reminded me that I am, and it seems, I will remain the ‘other’. For, even now, what I write may be interpreted to be the angry voice of that young boy who thought he was just like any other boy to discover that he must remain always an outsider. 

Today, I understand that we are all co-dependent. We all need each other in today’s world. By pretending to be doing charity by simply sending money where, granted, it is needed will not solve the problems of poverty, lack of access, food shortage and the many problems that we all must share responsibility for. Awarding a prize for kindness will always mean that one is, in some way, inferior to another. And, worse, the fact that you’re telling children that a friendship between a disabled and a non-disabled friend is an act of kindness is telling them that such a friendship is a sacrifice where one party is always the less important - the less of value. Have we become so desperate for kindness that we need to reward even ordinary friendships by painting them using our own narratives of heroes and courage? 

Now, my last thoughts. I know that I have used strong language here. But, honestly, I don’t want other children to go through my experience. Yes, I have learned from it as well. Yet, I believe it is diametrically opposed to the principles of inclusion I believe in. A prize for ‘kindness’ is also a misunderstanding of charity. Charity requires us to practice compassion where we help others not out of pity and because we think we are better than them. Compassion and charity are about being with another human being and looking at him or her as your equal. It’s not and should never be a power relationship.

 And what about the idea of rewarding kindness?

“Virtue is its own reward”!

At least, it should be!

 

Related Entries:

Painful Memories of a Prize for Kindness 

> from: Gordon's D-Zone

The True Meaning of Charity

> from: ZoneMind 

 

Faith or Reason?

I am painfully aware of a growing division between the secular and the religious. Or, at least, between proponents who have chosen to adopt an extreme view of what they understand to be ‘secular’ or what they understand as being central to the ‘religious’. I think that it’s unfortunate to be witness to such a conflict. Indeed, as a child, I was inspired by people who came from both camps of faith and reason. I admired people ranging from Albert Einstein, Carl Jung and Isaac Newton to religious leaders such as Jesus Christ, Mahatma Gandhi and Lord Buddha.

However, this is not saying that I was an atypical boy. Indeed, in many ways, I obeyed convention. I tried to follow the precepts of Roman Catholicism and received the sacraments with a certain enthusiasm. I was deeply religious in many ways as a boy and was sincerely interested in living up to what I was taught was good and comply to the commandments, which I was told, would lead me to heaven. But, even as a child, I had many questions. I knew that I was physically different and this meant that I was also perceived differently than others. I was aware of death and the reality of impermanence when I was aware that one of my brothers had died when I was just a baby.

I sought answers in scripture and from reading books on science. I loved to learn about both science and religion. There were times when I rejected religion considerably and when I adopted a more rational and scientific view of the world. Eventually, I would take up a more political or ideological approach. I explored philosophy, psychology and language to understand the world. I have tried to answer the questions that plagued me. I was torn between a rationality that denied the value of faith and a faith that condemned doubt or asking questions.

I felt I had to choose what the truth was. I felt I had to choose between faith and reason. But were my conceptions of faith and reason correct? Was there a point where they could meet?

I don’t wish to oversimplify rationality or religiosity but I can speak about my own experience. For, it’s only our own experiences and understanding of what has been handed us that we can truly claim to have access to.

I find great value in spirituality and religious principles. Yet, I know that scripture was never meant to explain everything about matter.
I find a lot of knowledge and purpose in scientific rationality but I also know that even there we are limited. We cannot truly separate ourselves from the reality we are observing. We are bound, inevitably, to our own preconceptions and world view. Even in the hard sciences, we cannot truly separate ourselves from what we are trying to study. In order to measure matter, we remain dependent on our senses. Even the tools we use ultimately depend on our senses.

The truth of the matter - or at least, my limited current understanding - is that a question that expects us to decide whether we should prefer reason rather than faith or vice versa is a wrong question. For, in reality, our humanity places us in a position where we have to acknowledge our limits.

It is impossible to know all the answers to the questions of life. It’s impossible to claim we know everything about the cosmos. As long as we are part of the cosmos we remain confined to the cosmos as living beings. Our material bodies impose limits. But, yet, we can conceive things we haven’t seen ourselves. We can imagine things that aren’t real. We can be rational or superstitious. We believe we have a certain degree of choice. But, do we really?

For, at the end of all things, I can’t help being struck by a sense of awe and wonder by the very fact that the neurones firing up in my brain right now are permitting me to type this entry. Where are my thoughts when I perform these acts? Do they have a physical basis? Maybe they do and we might find the biological basis one day. But, even then, would we find the thoughts and emotions that were going on in my mind?

I don’t presume to offer secularists or religious people who hold extreme positions on matters of faith and reason. I can only appeal to those who sincerely seek to find truth to remain open to the possibility of dialogue. To be open to the other, however irrational or irreverent one may appear, because none of us can claim to have all the answers. I wish to end this lengthy entry with just a quote and a few paragraphs.

Let me start with a quote. It’s by Albert Einstein, a character I greatly admired as a child and who remains an influence today. Einstein once wrote:

"Science without religion is lame,
Religion without science is blind.”

I admit that it’s perhaps ironic for me to choose this quote I encountered as a child because, apart from the physical impairment that I was ascribed as a child, now I have also acquired a visual impairment. Moreover, it’s perhaps more ironic since this quote has been abused and misappropriated by people holding a radical secular and fundamentalist religious views alike. But, whatever your interpretation, it would be a mistake if we didn’t try to first get to know who Einstein was and what he stood for.

In this sense, Einstein has entered the popular imagination and has often acquired many stereotypes. He has been defined as a Jew who was an atheist, a scientist and, ironically, he has also been put across as a deeply religious person with his famous quote: “God doesn’t play dice with the universe” interpreted out of its proper context or when Einstein was finding it difficult to accept the randomness of the subatomic world where the laws of physics appeared to break down.

But, yet again, Einstein’s ‘God’ is neither the Jewish nor the Christian one. Rather, he was probably upset by the fact that there were things that couldn’t be explained by the science of his time. I can identify with Einstein’s feeling of not knowing. As I got to know more about this man, something else strengthened my admiration for the man. You see, while Einstein did admit that religion could be a form of ‘childhood superstition’, he did not totally reject the human value found in religion. He was defined as being a scientist but little people know he also played the violin with artistic passion..

Unfortunately, many of us see him from a limited perspective. You must read about the man before you can truly begin to understand. But, even then, you will never know who he was - even if there was the possibility of meeting him face-to-face in this lifetime. There are limits to knowledge that are part of our experiences of being human. It’s the same if we consider the debate between the secular and the religious, the sceptic and the faithful.

We may think we can find all the answers in science. On the other hand, we may lay our complete trust in faith. Yet, whatever we choose, I think that we can neither find all the answers in science nor in religion. For, reason and faith are essential for our very being.

I admit that I, myself, have taken up various identities over this short lifetime. I aspired to be a scientist. I am spiritual and can also be rational. I feel, I think and I believe. I hope, I despair and feel sadness and joy. I am disabled and I am impaired. I am a lot of things. I am nothing compared to the immensity of the universe. I know but I don’t really know.

I remain beyond the restrictions of a ‘lame’ rationality and ‘blind’ faith. I can’t keep away from the everyday reality of life but, whatever I think or believe, I still depend on matter to live. I am, at the same time, apart from the universe and, paradoxically, a part of it!

I can’t provide you with any certain answer to the question of why there is pain and suffering in our life. I can’t even assure myself there is such a place as the after-life. I can’t even prove or disprove the existence of a god I cannot see or measure.
I only know that I am human. I only know that there is very little I really know - if that can count as knowledge. I believe that I’m writing this - even if I can’t measure or prove the existence of my thoughts.

We don’t even have to choose between faith and reason. For life cannot be neatly fitted into either extreme views of reality. Indeed, those who think so may be deluded.

For how can I ever truly separate what I believe to be real from what I think is real when these are intrinsically linked together?

For I can say that I ‘have faith’ in the laws of physics. But, then, if I look at the quantum world, all my theories break down. For the very fact that I need light to study light means that as observer I cannot be independent from the observed.

I must be humble enough to accept my limitations. As a human being.

I must seek value in everything that makes our lives as human beings better and richer.

I need to pay more attention to the present.

To the now!

Even if such a realisation is uncomfortable or even painful.

For the future is just a promise and not a guarantee.

It resides beyond faith and cannot be explained through reason alone.

This is our human condition.

Nine Haikus in Memory of David

1
The star of David.,
The light of my dead brother
Whom I never knew.

2
It shines still today
During my darkest hours
Bringing back a hope.

3
Not to be afraid
To question what people say,
For life is vanity.

4
Life comes and it goes,
Our bodies deteriorate
And our minds do too.

5
David, where are you?
You died before I could know
What death really meant.

6
I never forgot
You were one day here with us.
But I never knew.

7
I still search for you
In my own ways I still seek you
My unknown brother.

8
Yes, I was too young.
To remember who you were..
Or get to know you

9
Your are the reason
I never stopped asking "Why?".
You're my guiding star.

A Witness to the Dark

I’ve been going through a rough time lately as I have to face some health issues again. I’m experiencing this ringing in the ears again. And, now, I’m also having occasional blackouts. There were times when I really feel scared and helpless. I don’t claim that my experience is unique or that my pain is excruciating. But, whenever I am disoriented either by my tinnitus or my temporary blindness, I feel as if I’m alone and helpless. There is, I admit, a degree of physical pain in my experience. But, that’s not the primary cause of my suffering.

Indeed, even if I write this wondering if I’ll have an attack as I try to describe my feelings, I also know that no matter how well I describe my experience, it will remain just words. Yes, words that express a thought, a feeling and a state of mind. But, nevertheless, these words I type are simply a trace… an image… an imitation of an experience. Our memories are so short and fragile. I will probably forget myself what the actual experiences I’m going through were like. I don’t know if all this will ever end in my life. I do feel abandoned when I am vulnerable, when it’s like being in a state of living and non-living.

No light without dark

But, as I read the haiku “In the Dark” I wrote last time, I realise how true it was. In spite of the darkness I feel around me at those times, I know that there’s no darkness without light. Would you know what darkness was if you never experienced it? What you understand what light is if you never experienced darkness.

There’s no hope without despair

The same can be said of the moments of despair that are haunting me. I know that these moments will, one day, end. Even if life may be leading you nowhere, and you are plagued by a sense of hopelessness, there is still some hope. There’s no hope without despair. I know that these hard times I struggle with are the source of much doubt and resignation. But, as I am reminded of the buddhist idea of impermanence, I am reassured by the fact that there will be one day when this will end. As light cannot exist without darkness, so there can be no hope if there is no despair. If our life was devoid of any suffering, then there would be no reason to hope in a better tomorrow. It wouldn’t really a human existence at all.

No life without death

Finally, I do wonder whether I will survive to see a tomorrow. I have wondered about death since I was young. I may sound strange but I was always aware of my own mortality but I knew it had to happen one day. As death had taken one of my brothers away, it could take me at any point. Yes, I was scared but if this was a state similar to sleep, I wouldn’t mind that much. For who are we really in a dreamless night? And while our death may be a sad and tragic event for those who love us and, as we live, we probably dread the prospect of dying, it’s inevitable. But, like light and darkness, hope and despair, there can be no life without death.

Concluding Reflection

This is the cycle of existence. The nature of life. Things can only exist in relation to other things. There is nothing intrinsically bad about darkness, despair and death. They’re part of our experience. We suffer because we cling to the what makes us comfortable and what makes us feel safe. However, my experiences of life has taught me that I don’t have to worry too much about tomorrow. It’s good to plan ahead and live for a purpose. Yet, ultimately, we have to accept that we should appreciate moments of darkness as much as those of light, times we feel desperate as much as we hope for a better future and appreciate our life as we are aware of the impermanence of life and the inevitability of death.

An End?

With this I end this reflection. Still, as I end this post. But is it really an end? Isn’t darkness an opportunity to search for the light? Isn’t darkness an opportunity to rest and sleep? Isn’t despair a chance to discover yourself? Isn’ despair an invitation to hope? 

And isn’t the awareness of  of death, a reason to celebrate this life? To appreciate life with all that it brings? Isn’t an awareness of death a call to appreciate the today, to rejoice in the now? And, isn’t death not just a loss but also a hope for the renewal of life. Isn’t death giving a new life to start?

An end is also a beginning. Every beginning will one day end.

Life  is not good or bad. 

Life is simply what it is.