Zhuangzi’s “Equalizing Things”: The Tower of Babel of Karmic Obstructions

Zhuangzi’s “Equalizing Things”: The Tower of Babel of Karmic Obstructions
Like the famous story of the “Tower of Babel,” in which Heaven toppled the tower, leaving people around the world unable to understand one another.
I. Karmic obstructions prevent people from understanding one another
Psychological karmic obstructions
People with the same karmic obstructions and defense mechanisms cannot stand one another. Those who oscillate between inferiority and arrogance cannot stand others who do the same.
People with different karmic obstructions and defense mechanisms cannot stand one another. Consider the torment of relationships between people with avoidant attachment and those with anxious attachment.
Class-based karmic obstructions
The middle and upper classes other than the petty bourgeoisie and the petty bourgeoisie despise one another, while the various middle and upper classes also exclude and belittle the micro-bourgeoisie and proletarians. The micro-bourgeoisie consider themselves proletarians, yet despise proletarians and admire the middle and upper classes. Apart from the proletariat, every class has its own class-based karmic obstructions.
See the earlier article “Petty-Bourgeois Malaise.”
Winning coalitions and vested interests attack and suppress others to protect their established interests. These established interests are “karmic obstructions” at the level of Marxism. We borrow the term “karmic obstructions” from Buddhism, but our central point remains the dialectical materialist principle that matter determines consciousness.
II. This is one reason for the progressive character of people at the bottom of society
Their karmic obstructions are lighter, and their degree of alienation in labor is lower than that of the middle and upper classes. Their connections are with the concrete, the real, simple goodness, truth and beauty, the masses, and their class brothers and sisters. See the earlier article “New Levels of Psychological Growth: Refining Maslow’s Model of Needs.”
Karma comes precisely from history and society: historical materialism.
The ability to move other people’s hearts therefore already exceeds our individual capabilities. We can only benefit others through stillness and attract people on the same wavelength.
III. Zhuangzi’s “Equalizing Things” is about how people cannot understand one another, yet their little egos, driven by greed, anger, and delusion, argue with and try to conquer one another
“Zhuangzi’s ‘Equalizing Things’: Discourse Is Meaningless; Forget the Self, Equalize Things, and Follow Nature”: Great understanding is broad and unhurried; small understanding is fussy and divisive. Great speech blazes forth; small speech chatters on. To toil all one’s life without seeing any achievement, to grow weary and worn through labor without knowing where one is headed—is this not sorrowful!
“Zhuangzi’s ‘Equalizing Things’: Surface-Level Linguistic Thought VS the Deeper Mind”: Every ordinary individual is an entanglement of countless complex contradictions.
“The Basic Contradictions of University Students”
IV. How Marxism helps with personal social relationships
How class analysis guides our understanding of others: “The Chinese People and Chinese Internet Users Are Different Groups and Classes” and “Petty- and Micro-Bourgeois Encirclement Syndrome.”
“How Ordinary People Can Connect with Innate Wholeness” and “Petty-Bourgeois Malaise”: To heal themselves, the petty bourgeoisie must break through their class-based karmic obstructions, cross the gulf of karmic obstructions, rediscover the equal luminosity and innate wholeness of everyone’s inherent nature, and connect with the people and history.
“The Vanguard Is Not an Indoctrination Squad: Debate and Propaganda Do Not Matter Quite So Much”: Many enthusiasts of Marxism and Maoism have strong elitist tendencies, hero complexes, and Napoleon complexes. They believe the people are ignorant and are waiting for them to exude the commanding aura of a sovereign, rallying everyone with a single call. They put enormous effort into trying to enlighten and indoctrinate ordinary people. This is not the view that the masses make history.