We humans tend to cherish our opinions. Sometimes, we’ll do anything to either protect them or make them known to the world. It can get so bad that people will destroy relationships and even kill each other over their differences.
It doesn’t have to be this way. 
“If you wish to see the truth,
then hold no opinions for or against anything.”
–Trust in Mind (Xinxinming), Zen Master Seng Ts’an
Having no opinions at all about anything is the opposite of being strongly opinionated. On the surface, it appears that these words are directing us to have no opinions, which really isn’t a much better position.
However, that’s not what the poet is advocating here.
Take a look at the first sentence: “If you wish to see the truth…” How often do you truly wish to see the truth? And how often do you do everything in your power to turn away from it?
This sentence seems to point to the choice that’s required of each of us, in every moment, to want to see the truth. We have to aim ourselves in the right direction. Or, more accurately, allow ourselves to be aimed in the right direction by life itself. If we’re too busy being obstructionists or propping arguments up against ourselves and others, there’s no room for the truth to seep in.
In the second sentence, the word hold stands out to me. Recently, I was in a conversation about politics and felt myself holding tightly to my particular opinion. I noticed how that tightness manifested in my shoulders and lower back, and how the guy I was talking with seemed to be mirroring me – tightening around his own opinion. So, I decided to pull back and let go of the point I was trying to make. As we continued to talk, I experienced an uncoiling of that tightness fairly quickly as my breath calmed and my need to be right diminished. This letting go didn’t mean I gave up what I thought or that I went along with his view. It meant that I stopped trying to control the outcome of the conversation, which allowed for our differences to be present in the same space.
How can you treat all opinions like this? Let them be like birds, floating across the mind’s landscape – accessible, able to be conveyed, but also free to pass on through at any time. If you do so, it’s more likely that whatever truth contained within will be able to come forth and shine.
Photo Credits
Photo from flickr – some rights reserved
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