*smack smack smack*. And now is the time to hate me.

It's funny the things you think about on the long walks home or the drives back to our houses. Sometimes they're deep, othertimes they're mundane. I'm not sure which one this thought goes to:

I don't mind being an ass hole and being hated for it if I feel I did my best to make someone more aware of their own actions.

Let me give you an example. There's an old Zen story about how an enlightened master would always answer raise his finger into the air to answer questions. It was succint, to the point and direct - the meanings of it are varied, but he never did it out of habit. One day he hears how a child in the local village began to imitate him and would raise his finger up as well. Infuriated, he sought out the child and cut his finger off. When the child began to run away, crying, the master called out to him. Curious, the child looked back and saw the master raise his finger. The child was then enlightened... so the story goes.

I think most people dismiss this story as a blatant cruel depiction that is elevated to a spritual level. I see it as a master seeing that the child was imitating form without meaning and keeping him from continuing in this way. In any case, it's supposed to be a story about how what seems to a cruel act that ultimately results in a benevolent outcome.

I don't mind doing things to piss off / anger / upset people if I feel I'm doing the right thing for them (usually this means just making the other party more aware of something in their actions). In fact, I'm sure I've been cursed and hated behind my back. I'm not saying I have all the right answers or am a saint - I prefer to merely open people's eyes and let them live with the consequences of their actions when they knew full well what they could / couldn't do.

It just makes me wonder how many people have misunderstood why I was harsh with them when I could otherwise have been mercifully silent. Oh well - like I said, I don't mind being misunderstood if I did what I felt was necessary at the time.