A Practical Solution

“When one’s ego is touched,” an eminent psychologist once observed, “it turns into super-ego, and the result is breakdown.” Much the same thing was said some thirteen hundred years back by Umair ibn Habib ibn Hamashah. During his last days, this Companion of the Prophet Muhammad gave some advice to his grandson, Abu Jafar al-Khatmi, part of which was about patience: “One who does not bear with minor harm from a foolish person shall have to bear with major harm.”

The gist of both these remarks is the same, namely that the only way to avoid being harmed by others is to keep out of their firing line as much as possible, to keep as far away as one can from those who show themselves to be potentially harmful.

Every human being is born with an “ego”. More often than not, that ego is dormant. It is better to leave it sleeping, for the ego can be like a snake which, when aroused, will harm all within its reach.

It is a commonplace in any society for one to be put out, and even aggrieved, as a result of someone else’s foolishness or willful malice. Usually the best way of avoiding great harm from mischief-makers is to put up with their initial offensiveness, for, if one does not, one will set off a chain reaction in which things will go from bad to worse. Instead of having to bear a relatively small injury, one will be subjected to much greater suffering. And if one has not been able to bear a pelting with stones, how will one fare when great rocks descend upon one’s head?