To become good is to sustain evil
Good and evil are traditionally considered to be opposites. Good banishes evil. Evil battles good. This is the pattern in many religions, and also in our daily life. There is the evil of war, and also the good war which eliminates evil. There is the evil of murder, and also the good punishments which will stamp out the evil tendencies in the human psyche. This eternal battle is the pattern of human history, and it has not succeeded, because this very battle is what sustains evil. The battle is the evil.
What is suppressed simply becomes resistant. When there is the punishment of what is called evil tendency, that tendency is only suppressed, and becomes resistant. It will find ways to survive, either in the so-called unconscious, or in secret, in hiding, and when it suddenly surfaces it becomes surprising. Genocide is surprising precisely because people wonder how such evil acts on a massive scale could ever be conducted by neighbors who grew up together. They are not surprising, because our everyday life is this very process of suppression. What is suppressed will explode. When it does explode, the mind which is ignorant will see surprise. Ignorance is in the mind's misconception that any suppression can ever work. Suppression gives the evil food to sustain itself, because suppression is the very tool of the evil.
Evil is power. Power only suppress. Power is to dictate what is right and wrong, and to proclaim that everything must follow said order. This is the process of law and order in human society, and it can only work through suppression. One might argue that rewards are also given. Rewards are only voluntary suppression. The human being suppresses its own evil tendency to obtain the reward. Such suppression is self-willing, but the nature of suppression does not change, which is that what is suppressed will always explode. The explosion is the outburst of violence.
Therefore, the idea that one can become good is utterly illusory. There is no good to become. Any becoming is the process of power and suppression, and there is no real goodness in this process. The process of power is the process of fear. There is no goodness in fear. The very fact that satanic beliefs have risen in the recent decades is a testament to the utter failure of power, suppression, and the desire to become good.
Goodness is the ending of becoming. This is why goodness is not the opposite of evil. When it is the opposite, it is the same as evil. The opposites are simply different measures of the same quality. It is like black and white. They seem to be opposites, but they are simply colors. They are opposites only because the mind has dictated them as such. In reality, there is no opposite to goodness, because goodness transcends the field of the opposites. When there is the ending of becoming, there is also the ending of the battle. When there is no battle, goodness flowers. When there is battle, there is only ugliness, brutality, and all that is entailed in evil.
How does one become good? One does not become good. One can only through that very becoming act in evil ways. The becoming is the battle. Goodness is the total, nonjudgemental, unprejudiced perception of what is.
Cover photo by Aman Upadhyay on Unsplash
