By Linda Modaro
I’m feeling something akin to remorse around the actions of our political leadership—deep pain for the course they’re taking. Maybe it’s better named ethical sensitivity: feeling pain at the pain others give out. That word—remorse—has been with me for a long time, though I haven’t always known what to do with it.
I was idealistic in my spiritual searching, and also very literal—maybe not so realistic. By the time I found Buddhism, I was mature enough to understand that a spiritual practice is developed. The teachings are training. We won’t do them perfectly. But honestly, it’s only in the last ten years that we’ve started to language the dharma in a less idealistic way. Imperfect and provisional has been running alongside our translations, and that has made a positive difference in that way I integrate dharma and meditation into my life.
In Buddhism, the teaching of Remorse plays an important role in ethical sensitivity. Regret and remorse are sometimes distinguished—some texts say regret spins stories, while remorse learns and moves on. As reflective meditators, I don’t want to draw that line too tightly especially in meditation practice. I often see them operate in similar ways. They alert us that something has been handled less skillfully than we wanted, or to where greater harm was done.
Yesterday, when I brought this topic up, I had a surprising memory surface. Years ago, I ended work with a physical therapist. She was very upset. I didn’t handle it skillfully, though I did my best at the time. She’s still in proximity, and I felt the pang of that again in meditation. But something was different this time. Along with the discomfort was the knowledge that I’m more conscious now about endings—taking more care when things shift, acknowledging there’s more unknown than I can see at the moment. I had learned something that has stayed with me.
Yesterday, I mentioned how the Buddha talked about remorse as wound cleaning. I said you don’t have to keep poking a wound to prove you care. You can move on and integrate what you’ve learned. This round didn’t feel like poking a wound. It felt like another round of cleaning. This distinction works for me because in a receptive meditation practice, we don’t consciously choose when remorse or regret comes up. Past wounds and hurts arise in surprising ways. Most of the time I pay attention to them, but I also have to discern when it’s not necessary or it’s just too much cleaning. This is not always a quick and easy process.
What I’m trying to get at, though, is something a little outside the traditional teaching on remorse. Because I also feel this sensitivity in relation to others. I’m deeply affected by hypocrisy and ill will. I feel upset and pain, not only for the people who are hurt but also for the people who are creating it. Many times it starts with shock—I can’t believe this is happening—along with fear and alarm. And then I find myself feeling the dukkha of their actions, especially as I did growing up close to people with aggressive tendencies. I feel pain not just for what they’re doing, but for where it may lead. In my childhood religion it was to hell, and even religious Buddhism uses that terminology. Hell seems to be a simplified version of living in ignorance and continuing to cause suffering with no desire for transformation. Anyway, not going to go too far into pinning this down!
So this remorse I’m talking about feels akin to remorse for my own actions—but this time, it’s remorse on behalf of others.
We have a word for resonating with someone’s joy—mudita, a brahmavihara. This feels like something like that, but in reverse: a sensitivity to the suffering that actions are going to generate, even when the people acting don’t seem to feel it themselves. It’s not a sublime feeling or attribute but it is something that’s distinct: some knowledge reveals pain, more pain than seen on the surface.
In fact, I would say this kind of ethical sensitivity often pairs with a powerless, helpless feeling—standing by and watching dukkha unfold. I used to say knowing what will happen, but I try not to lean that way anymore. What I feel now is the weight of uncertainty, and the pain of not being able to intervene in the way I might want to, the anguish of things getting worse before they get better.
I went back to the sutta on remorse Kimatthiya Sutta (Anguttara Nikāya 10.1) and decided not to use it today. It started to lead me in a direction looking for something too idealistic and perfect – looking to be freed from remorse rather than what I consider the Buddha’s intention of using remorse as a functional role. I prefer to leave it as a kind of healing wound, which may turn into a scar—but something you can refer to in choosing how to act next. Could it work the same with our collective history? Many historians are speaking to that and offering their ideas on how we learn from the past now. I want to integrate their knowledge into what we know from our dharma practice and teachings. This is one such attempt, albeit provisional and imperfect.
