If we only identify with what we think is right, we cannot see our true selves. Attaching our self-worth to our idea of what is right prevents us from accepting who we really are. If we are stripped of these beliefs, we may then discover a different reality. Chasing after an unobtainable ideal leads to a battle between who we are and who we think we should be. By accepting ourselves for who we are we can then extend that kindness to others, regardless of whether they fit into our own limited worldview. Only then can we truly be happy and connected with humanity.

Having a vested interest in our own idea of what is “right" prevents us from being able to observe our true self, if that’s where our worth, value, and validity of self come from - Getting to say "well at least I can control myself, at least I’m not so needy, at least I’m not so emotional" or whatever it is you value.

But what would happen if you were suddenly stripped of these "rights?" What if you discovered some awful secret about the world - that by believing your values are the ubiquitous answers for existing correctly in the world, you have been tricked?

A rainbow is an optical artifact that occurs when the sun, moisture in the air and an observer exist in a particular angular relationship to one another. But if you were to pursue this artifact, the angular relationship would change, and not only is it unobtainable, at a certain point in your pursuit the very thing you're chasing ceases to exist in your worldview. There is no longer balance, in the case of the rainbow there is no longer balance of physical perspective, and in the case of light vs. dark there is no longer the defining boundary giving one or the other proper context. 

Our beliefs, based on our continued observation of messaging we receive from the world, inform our conception; meaning of artifacts (objects) as symbols. When we identify only with the light, with the "right" we see in the world, and run away from the darkness, we create a battle in favoring one over the other. Always thinking about who we "should" be, what we "should" be doing, how we "should" act. If we leave these values unexamined, when invariably we fail to live up to these expectations and refuse to accept who we are, and where we are, we create a war between who we are, and who we "should" be.

My question is this: What if you no longer had the refuge of going "well at least I'm this or that, and I don’t do that or the other?"

Not because you're a bad person. But because the structure that was supporting your theory of a valid self has been torn down? And instead you witnessed a person who falls short of your ideals, like those who you’ve cherry-picked to judge yourself so favorably against? Could you extend to that person the loving kindness of being a valid and worthy human being? The truth for most of us is, sadly not. 

Obviously, there is disconnection between self and other when this happens of course, but the tragedy about it - is that a person like this can not extend that loving kindness into themself without "proof" that they are a good and worthy human being. Proof that they have earned the right to feel good about themself, and judge themself favorably in the eyes of society and the world at large. And by believing themself a good and righteous person they believe they are only capable of doing good and right.

Because their values are unexamined they have unintentionally given themselves the "right" to preach, and otherize and victimize those who do not align with their own view of how the world "should" be, even if that person is their sensitive self. What I posit then is that you can either stare at the light and drive yourself blind, or you can view both the light with the dark and enjoy a beautiful and balanced perspective. All you have do is ask yourself : "Who Needs You Chasing Rainbows?"