Some think that Tiger Woods’ greatest gift to the American public has been in showing us his skill as a golfer. While entertaining and, for a while, inspiring this aspect of his gift to us pales in comparison to a much greater gift.
He is a great mirror for many of us. With mirrors, we get to see our self. Some aspects of this mirror:
The Pre-Apology Mirror:
- The feeling of entitlement. He thought he deserved to be treated differently, that given his fame he could play by a different set of rules than the rest of us. This is a facet of arrogance. In what ways might we be acting in arrogance?
- Pretending to be something he was not: a faithful husband. Woods projected a squeaky clean image as a family man. What masks do you wear to hide your inner world from the outer world?
- He has also reminded us of our capacity for blindness as a choice. If we let the egoic mind run our lives, we can convince ourselves not to see what is right in front of us. In taking on multiple sexual partners, given the nature of his popularity and the nature of the media’s and public’s interest in his personal life, he chose to be blind to the idea that his infidelity would be exposed. He let the craving and the arrogance blind him to the consequences of both.
The Mirror in the Apology
- He sees himself as a victim of media invasiveness in his life. How often do we see ourselves as victims of life, and what does that sense of victimhood really do for us?
- Concurrently, he asks the media and the rest of us for his privacy, and that of his wife and children. Can we respect this, or do we feel entitled to learn what we want to learn of his private life. Is it our business? No. Yet in this society of addicts that we are, we are also addicted to gossiping about and judging others as a way of feeling falsely superior to someone else. It is not anyone’s place to judge Tiger Woods or anybody else. You may not want your son to emulate this man’s off-course behavior, but damning Woods doesn’t do anything other than drain your own energy.
- He took responsibility for his actions. This is the mirror of positive example. How often do we do the opposite, blaming our children, parents, friends or co-workers for our challenges?
- He shared with us his perceived solution to his challenge with craving: the learning of restraint. This is a teaching he had learned as a part of his Buddhist upbringing. In this American age of excess self-indulgence, low self-esteem and marketers hawking of all kinds of unnecessary “stuff” as being important to buy and use, the realm of restraint is taboo. We want more. What we get is an artificial sense of power that does not last long before it needs to be propped up again.
It is curious, too, that many now seem to be wanting more from Woods. We want to see him express remorse, which is defined as deep and painful regret. To demand remorse from another is to demand that they have pain. This requirement does not give one much of a boost in the positive karma department. What good can come out of the intent for another to suffer? Do you really want to emulate some wrathful god? Does that make you feel better?
Many do not relate to Buddhism. What we do not know, we often foolishly attempt to belittle. Some news commentators have expressed disappointment and surprise that Woods did not invoke Christian values, rather than what he learned as a youth.
While much of the Eastern world may be governed in harsh and godless authoritarianism, the East has given the world so much of great value in many arenas from the spiritual to healthcare innovations and philosophical insight.
In contrast, the vast majority of the Christian world---along with the Jewish and Muslim religions---has devolved into the diametrical opposite of what any worthy religion would be. Any religion with integrity is one which empowers and unites people. Most religions today do exactly the opposite. It takes very little study of the confirmed history of the Christian bible to understand how its most Christ-like content has been removed over the centuries. There are so many contradictions and so much unloving content in both volumes, that believers in the Christian bible or the Muslim Qu'ran must fall into one of these categories:
1) They have not read it.
2) They believe in loads of blatant contradiction within these texts, which would characterize them as schizophrenic.
3) They are OK with God, Allah or the authors of these scriptures being dangerously schizophrenic.
When one studies the history of religion, the inescapable conclusion is that religion has been developed as a primary tool of the wealthy to disempower the majority of the population of our planet. If we are willing to wake up, there will be no apocalypse, just an awakening to the potential we have to be a planet in harmony.
Anyone paying attention today who is willing to see religions’ history and what is going on right now in the world comes to the most obvious and truthful of conclusions: The most grave threat to the safety and peace of our world comes in the form of our generally insane religious convictions: that redemption can come from killing in the name of some god, that we might fry in some eternal dungeon, and that we are unworthy or deserving of shame. Communally, how stupid can we be to buy this stuff? What will it take to wake us up?
As we communally move closer to the age of true harmony in the world, more and more will see the destructiveness that defines most of today's popular religion. Tiger Woods’ apology on the world stage may very well be a significant step in that direction.
His greatest gifts to the world have nothing to do with the quality of his golf swing. They have to do with the ways he is showing us to ourselves.
We can spend the rest of our lives teed off and stuck in the bunkers of delusion and self-destruction or we can open up to a more loving way of being. I think Tiger Woods is giving a new way of living his best shot. And when it comes to that, it may be wise for us to be like Tiger.
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Next in Part Two: Tiger Woods and the End of Golf
