What Is Fair And What Is Unfair?

The adjective of fair refers to the idea that everything works as we want it to work. When this happens, we say that there is justice and we feel happy and calm, but when not, we get angry with the world, we tell ourselves that we are unhappy and that life is very unfair. Seeking justice is something like seeking the elixir of eternal youth. It is simply something that does not exist, it is a concept invented by humans.

To demonstrate this, we just have to take a look around us, at nature itself. We will observe that lions hunt antelope for food and that orchard plantations are lost if there is not enough rain that year.

Antelopes might complain and say to themselves, it’s not fair! I should have claws and fangs like lions, to be able to defend myself! and also the plants, they could say that it is unfair that it does not rain, since that will cause them to die. It would be absurd if they did, wouldn’t it?

In short, we can complain, lament and think that we are unfortunate when life does not smile at us, but that will not make us smile more. The fact that you feel more or less unhappy and angry with the world in which you have lived responds more to a personal choice than to the nature of life itself.

Your discomfort comes from you, who decide to name things as unfair and get angry with them, but not from the injustice itself that you can observe around you. Are you going to let your happiness depend on aspects that you cannot control?

How he is not fair! your relationships are loaded

In personal relationships, the issue of what is fair or unfair is the order of the day, as people have the tendency to compare ourselves with others, to try to be better, compete and surpass them in some way. Although in reality it is a habit that serves little, other than to make us very anxious and serve as an element of pressure. Thus, even knowing its damages, we continue to do so.

Since we were kids, we got into the habit of saying it’s not fair that you can watch TV until late and I can’t! or it’s unfair that they bought you more gifts than me! From a very young age we learn to believe ourselves to be the center of the Universe, to fatten our ego because if others have things or they can do things that we cannot, that is already unfair and must be solved in some way.

This attitude is a real waste of time, as well as a relationship bomb. If we are continually comparing what we do with what the other does, be it our mother, brother or partner, we will be taking time away from enjoyment with those people in the present moment, in addition to generating a good dose of discomfort for ourselves.

It is much more beneficial for our emotional health, taking care of ourselves, our thoughts, emotions and behaviors  and trying to make projects, relationships and things in general, go better for us. Doing so without wasting time on unproductive comparisons, which in turn create recurring thoughts as destructive as envy, resentment, or revenge.

Keys to free yourself from the trap of justice

If you want to stop complaining about what is out of your control and you have decided to take charge of your life, without deciding if the world is more or less unfair, I congratulate you because you are going to take the step to a more peaceful and happy life. Some keys and exercises by which you can start to get going are:

• Make a list of what seems unfair to you and ask yourself the following questions: Just because they bother me, are they going to disappear? Do I have any control over it? If you answer yourself no, the best option is to stop thinking about it and accept things as they are.

• Stop comparing yourself with others since this is another person different from you and as such, their life is also different. It is neither fair nor unfair, just different. Sometimes things may turn out the way you want, but sometimes they may not. The same is going to happen to that person with whom you compare yourself, even if you can’t see it because you only look at the good that happens to him and the bad that happens to you.
• Change your dialogue, both internal and external, for a more realistic one. If you are about to say, it is not fair that this happens to you and not me! Give yourself a mental stop sign and immediately change it to: I do not like that what I want does not happen to me, although I am glad that life smiles at you right now. These phrases heal the spirit, protect your relationships and will not waste time or energy.

The Ego and Egocentrism in what is fair and what is unfair

As Lama Rinchen Gyaltsen says, we tend to classify what happens to us from our own perspective, which comes from the ego. How do we classify our environment and how does it affect us?

• Positive.  Within this category we would qualify as fair what we like. “It is fair that I win the lottery”, “It is fair that good things happen to me”, and so on.
• Negative. Here we put everything that we do not like. “It is not fair that they steal ten euros from me”, “it is not fair that they sneak into the supermarket queue”.
• Neutral. In this section would be everything that does not seem fair or unfair to us. Which does not mean that in the future it cannot change.

Where does self-centeredness come in here? Egocentricity is born from the ego. When our ego is very large, we are more self-centered and tend to see the world only and solely from our point of view. From here starts what seems fair or unfair to us. For me it may be neutral for someone to sneak into the bakery queue, for someone else it may be unfair and cause for discussion.

So we must bear in mind that much of what we qualify as fair or unfair is just one more way of looking at life. So in most cases, it is enough to expand our way of seeing and accepting what happens around us and we will be much freer and happier.