How does one live in a world full of devilry?

[7thLetter]

It’s so easy for us to theorize about this topic when we’re the ones sitting comfortably behind a computer or smartphone, and not the one experiencing the devilry in my situation. Not saying I have an extremely terrible situation but it does bother me to some extent.

I live in a city where a good portion of the population, are asian people. I’m asian myself, I’m filipino. Throughout my life out here, I’ve encountered a handful of Chinese people. I’ve made friends with them, and worked with them. In my experience, I’ve found them to be the most manipulative people out of any other race. I believe it is the way they grew up. In my opinion and observation, asian parents tend to think that verbally harassing their kids is a good way to get them to learn. Then this grows onto their kids, and they grow up to be a psychologically dysfunctional adult.

Last year I dealt with verbal harassment from a Chinese boss in my workplace, then was illegally fired. Now in my current situation, I started working for a stage green vegan company, but we recently hired a Chinese guy and I still experience the same subtle manipulative bullshit. His insecurity leads him to try and make me feel stupid. If he does something to make himself seem stupid, then he seems to feel the need to make me look stupid too.

How does one live with all this? Does years of spirituality and self-actualization work really give you the ability to be fine with this in YOUR experience, or only from an outside perspective?

 

 

[ivory]

You need to set boundaries. Call them out on their bullshit. Just a part of life

[7thLetter]

@ivory Honestly I usually do stand up for myself and call them out. I’ve always sat down with managers at previous workplaces to express my thoughts and feelings about my problems with other co-workers. In fact, my last workplace I was illegally fired for being a whistleblower basically. Now handling some stuff against them.

[mikelyons]

Consider "face culture" and it's implications, you're not going to change anyone's mind. These things develop very early on in childhood and are hard to change, the best you can hope to do is prevent it by staying in communication with your boss and or getting the hell out to a better work environment.

I apologize if this advice is not useful outside the western 1st world.

[7thLetter]

@mikelyons Helpful, thanks.

I live in canada by the way.

[ttom]

@7thLetter As you've pointed out, devilry is everywhere. Duality makes it so.

Personally, the only thing that has reliably helped with the existence of devilry has been my spiritual practice. As my attachment to my identity dissolves, so does fear. Through the space this creates, I find it easier to gently guide myself towards unconditional love. Every time I've tried to force acceptance or Love it has backfired. The barriers between us and these fulfilling states must be dissolved to allow them to arise naturally.

Fundamentally, the manipulation you've been experiencing is threatening your identity. Loosen your attachment to your identity and you loosen the grip of fear. Loosen the grip of fear and the devil looses its power over you.

 “When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: the people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous and surly. They are like this because they can't tell good from evil. But I have seen the beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own - not of the same blood and birth, but the same mind, and possessing a share of the divine. And so none of them can hurt me. No one can implicate me in ugliness. Nor can I feel angry at my relative, or hate him. We were born to work together like feet, hands and eyes, like the two rows of teeth, upper and lower. To obstruct each other is unnatural. To feel anger at someone, to turn your back on him: these are unnatural.” - Marcus Aurelius