“Today, I will call to check on the patient who went to buy cytotec to take yesterday, to see if they are still safe. If they had a miscarriage, guess how she would feel.” Many years ago (definitely more than 10 years), I just started writing notes on Facebook. I had very few friends on social media, and it was kind of like this, like a caption.
Then someone wrote a comment.
‘Hey Ve!!’ This person was a friend from elementary school and was the first to write in.
‘Not bad, this is real life, real people struggling for their survival,’ I replied to her.
‘If the patient understands that, it would be good.’ The conversation continued.
‘The truth is that the ability to understand in each person is set by many factors. Why are some things so easy to understand, but people see them in a hundred different ways? The issue of abortion is a good example to show us that understanding is profoundly difficult. Importantly, we often see people who think differently from us as wrong or bad, right, Koi?’ This name, we have been friends since I was in grade 1.
‘Everyone has a hundred different reasons… but the word “abortion” feels bad somehow.’
‘Koi, that feeling of unease, try to think about what it stems from. Are we judging the right and wrong of others? I used to do that often until I had to step back and think about or try to think about the suffering they had to face to come to us. It took a long time to come to terms with it.’ This was the last comment from her and me on that post. Today, we still like each other’s posts.
‘True, professor. Working in rural areas, I realized that health might not be the most important thing as we want it to be. People still have to struggle a lot. Sometimes we have to adjust our treatment plans to fit the reality of their lives. We cannot impose our standards on others. Like when I took my dog for a walk at the walking street, someone said I was crazy. So I told them, “You must be crazy too because you can understand me, haha.” This person is a student, a medical student of mine when I was confused about abortion. He has seen the development of my thoughts all along.
‘Whenever we feel “somehow,” it’s a great opportunity to study ourselves to understand why we feel that way. And when we know and understand, that’s a good starting point to begin to know and understand others. The best way to prevent guilt from gradually accumulating and festering when we are at our weakest is to face it directly as soon as possible. Learn from it, don’t avoid it, even if we find ourselves not as beautiful as we thought. But that’s the first lesson: facing the truth.
In many matters, facing this truth (that we are not beautiful) is very scary because the virtues we believe we have (or the image we create, deceiving ourselves and others) will be struck right in the face. That’s the time and space for good friends to come and nurture, not doing much, just saying they still love, forgive, and stay with them, creating new energy to move forward. Another duty of a doctor is to be a “good friend,” not to act as a prosecutor or judge. Our job is to heal, not to be an executioner.’ My teacher always gives beautiful opinions.
‘And do you think between being a healer and an executioner, which is easier or more suited to people?’ An older colleague wrote to ask the same teacher, who replied immediately.
‘I don’t pay much attention to the difficulty because I don’t think it’s the main motivator of human behavior. It’s more of a secondary factor. But the issue of “suitability” is interesting, and I also think that there is no universal suitability, like a common one. In fact, suitability should be as diverse as the diversity of egos. Of course, there are people with a healing nature and those with an executioner nature. Whether there are more of one than the other might be a futile exercise. But the most important thing in this matter is that no matter the nature, habit, or whatever, humans still possess the “right to choose” throughout their lives about what they want to be.
The idea of no choice or strong currents or whatever is dictated by FEAR, which is mostly self-created.’ Do you see my teacher’s skill?
‘But what if a doctor doesn’t want to be either a healer or an executioner but wants to be indifferent, like it’s not our business, not wanting to tune in or empathize, is that okay? Because it feels light and clear-minded.’ Hmm..
‘Heh heh, is it really light? Humans are endowed with the six senses, not something we can “cut” or “switch off” as expected. Moreover, everything we do will always have repercussions. If we detach from emotions, do you think our descendants will do the same? If they do, we will receive the results of our actions when we need emotional support the most when our time comes. By then, it might be too late to regret. The thread of karma, once we choose to weave it, we must always accept the fabric woven from our own thread.’ I quickly looked up the meaning of the word “six senses.”
The six senses are the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind, one of the causes in dependent origination – because name and form are conditions, there are the six senses. Because the six senses are conditions, there is contact. See internal senses.
‘When Pae comes back, he might post… keep going… better go to sleep, dear brother.’ They must have been chatting late at night.
“Amazing, professor’s and brother’s ideas. I read and understand easily, but sometimes it’s hard to do. My abortion issue has been tuned in for a long time before I started to understand what to do. In the past, every time I had an abortion, I was sad.” I was the one who closed the comments that time.
Conversations like this, I think, are very enlightening.
Thanaphan Choobun, who loves enlightenment
January 17, 67
Thanks to: Asst. Prof. Dr. Thanaphan Choobun https://facebook.com/thanapan.choobun