MJ01 - 38 Blessings - Not Associating With Fools (02 Of 39)

Last time you saw me we looked at an orientation to enlightened living.

With the time we talk today we will continue our series on enlightened living with the blessing number one,

Not associating with fools.

But first before we embark on the first blessing,

Let's look at the first group of blessings of which it is a part.

Where the group is entitled,

Turning your back on unwholesomeness.

The theory behind this first group of blessings is that goodness doesn't come unpackaged.

It comes as part and parcel of the person who does good deeds and exemplifies them.

Goodness is transmitted between people by the example a good person sets for others and by a good person's advice to people whose level of goodness is not as developed as them.

Such guidance from good exemplars strongly influences our view and understanding of life in the world.

To begin with,

We have no idea what goodness is.

Some people tell us that such and such a thing is good.

Others tell us that something completely different is good.

Who should we believe?

And when we ask them why they consider something to be good,

No one seems to know the answer.

This is why if we want to learn how to do good deeds,

We need to be able to make decisions about our lives even from the time that we are still unable to tell a difference between good and bad.

Although we might be running blind,

There are certain indicators that allow us to tell a difference between people who habitually do good and those mixed up in unwholesomeness.

The first step on this path is recognizing people habitually mixed up in unwholesomeness so that we can make our first step towards goodness by avoiding such people.

Our next step towards goodness is to associate with people who are habitually well behaved.

The third step is to celebrate those who are habitually good so that we can start to overcome any faults in ourselves.

This is why the first group of blessings is almost entirely connected with being selective about our friends.

For the 38 blessings of life,

Although all the blessings are important,

All of the latter 37 hinge on the first.

This is why you could say that of all the blessings,

The first is the most important.

You can also think of this blessing,

Not associating with falls,

As being like the first step on a long journey without which the voyage can never begin.

It is hard to find a person who intentionally sets out to ruin their lives.

Everyone wants to feel that they are profiting from the years that pass them by to give them a sense of success and achievement in their lives.

However,

The way a person defines profit in life will dictate where they channel their efforts.

An entrepreneur defines profit in economic terms,

So they devote their time to earning as much as they can.

A criminal might define achievement by cracking the most impenetrable safe in the world or ripping off as many people as they can.

A criminal doesn't particularly want to live their life dishonestly,

But they think that being a criminal is either normal or at least good enough.

Although everyone seeks success in their various ways,

In the long run,

They may be left with regrets in their mind.

If you ask why a different perception of success in life can make such a difference to one's destiny,

It is because this common sense affects the decisions we make about the world,

And these decisions drive everything else that we say and do.

In the 38 Blessings of Life,

We call such common sense discretion.

It is the basic understanding by which we judge each experience and situation in the world.

It is what we consider normal about the world,

And it defines our perception of what each choice is likely to be,

Beneficial for us or harmful.

Discretion is a personal quality we acquire,

Test,

And calibrate as a result of the experiences we encounter in life.

It's not a quality we can get by reading about it,

Buying it,

Downloading it,

Or memorizing it.

It can only come as a result of our transactions with real people.

It's a quality often unspoken but easily picked up by example.

Discretion doesn't come unpackaged,

But is part of the character of the influencers advocating it.

There are two major influences on the formation of discretion in a person.

Nurture and Nature.

The first major influence that we call nurture is the example of those people we are closest to such as our family and friends.

The second major influence is our formation of discretion which you could call our nature,

Is ourselves.

Sometimes we refer to this latter ability as being a teacher to ourselves,

Or in Buddhist jargon,

Yo niso manasikan,

Even if you have been listening to good or bad advice from friends,

You always have to reflect on the value of the advice and to justify it to yourself before getting down to following it.

If you have accurate discretion when you reflect on advice given,

Even given faulty data,

You would have the common sense to see through the loopholes and come out with the right decision required by the situation.

Unlike the person with unreliable discretion,

Who even when given reliable data,

Will still get the wrong end of the stick.

More commonly though,

Discretion brushes often us from the example of other people through our transactions with them.

As we mature further,

We start to be able to fine tune our intuitive discretion and come to accurate conclusions independent of other people.

However,

Lacking such maturity,

In the beginning we have no idea what constitutes a sensible decision and what constitutes neglect.

This is why we are learning discretion.

We are at first very vulnerable to the examples set by others because bad or warped examples may derail the way we think for the rest of our life.

On the other hand,

An upstanding example has the power to correctly calibrate our thinking for the rest of our lives.

To associate with a fool,

No matter how good we might originally be,

Is like building a palace next to a hovel.

Whenever the hovel catches fire,

No matter how great the palace's fire risk assessment,

As soon as the hovel goes up in flames,

The palace will burn down as well,

Just like the virtuous person destroyed by association with a fool.

Every time we have a transaction with a person,

It's like a tug of war between us to see whose discretion will brush off on who.

In a situation where people are unable to recognize good or bad examples of discretion,

Then the exchange of discretion will be like osmosis,

Flowing from the point of high concentration to a point of low concentration.

If person A has a lot of good discretion and person B less,

Then A's good discretion will tend to brush off on B.

If person C has a lot of bad discretion and person D less,

Then person C's bad discretion will tend to brush off on person D.

In practice though,

As adults with a certain degree of life experience,

We don't naively let others' habits brush off on us.

If we are able to recognize good habits and good discretion,

Then we will open ourselves up preferentially to absorb them.

Similarly,

If we recognize bad habits,

Then we will try to protect ourselves from picking those habits up.

This is why,

Normally,

We are selective and try to the best of our ability to pick up only good habits while avoiding the bad ones.

In this way,

We can have transactions with others without losing our own virtues under their influence.

You can compare it to visiting someone in hospital who has a fever.

You can visit them,

Talk to them,

And console them.

You can do all of these things without catching their fever,

But you would try to avoid having them sneeze over you.

There are,

However,

Certain sorts of patients and some sorts of illness that are so dangerous that we cannot afford to have any transaction with that person.

Such diseases,

Like for example the plague,

Are so contagious that it is not safe for healthy people to come anywhere near them.

Such patients,

By the nature of their disease,

Need to be quarantined in an isolation ward with no visitors.

Equally,

When considering the transmission of discretion,

There are some cases of those so contagiously infected with faulty discretion that,

Despite our immunity or our efforts to be selective,

We will nonetheless be infected by their faulty discretion.

And at this point,

You might bring to mind the phenomenon of grooming.

If we started with healthy discretion,

It would be undermined by the intentional or unintentional interventions of those people.

The danger to us is even greater if we are still inexperienced and impressionable,

Perhaps like children,

Who lack worldly experience and don't even know what it means to be selective.

Those purveyors of faulty discretion are the first and most fundamental obstacles that we will meet when we are trying to acquire blessings.

In the 38 Blessings of Life,

We call such people by the technical name of fools.

That's a translation from the Pali word,

Pāla.

And before going any further,

I'll tell a story to illustrate the sort of person I'm talking about.

In the time of the Buddha,

There was an elder monk of outstanding reputation named Mahakassapa,

A traditional picture of whom is shown here in the slide.

He was respected by all the other members of the monastic community,

Even by the Buddha himself.

It was the norm for elder monks of the community to accept novices as their attendants,

In order that those new monks could receive training.

Some of the elders accepted more than others in keeping with their ability as teachers.

The Venerable Mahakassapa accepted several novices,

But it turned out that amongst the number was a stubborn novice called Olungka Sadaka,

Who wouldn't listen to anyone's advice.

On winter evenings,

It was the duty of the novices to boil water for the elder monks to take a bath in comfort.

The stubborn novice would never boil water for Mahakassapa in accordance with his duty.

He would always leave the chore of boiling the water to his fellows while going himself to invite Mahakassapa to wash,

As if he had boiled the water himself.

One day,

In exasperation,

The other novices heated water for Mahakassapa's bath and then hid it in the back room,

Leaving only a little in the boiler.

When the novice Olungka Sadaka saw the steam rising,

He informed Mahakassapa that his bath was ready.

When the elder asked where the water was,

Olungka Sadaka dipped a label into the almost empty boiler and the ladle rattled,

And the novice's deceit became obvious.

The story spread around from that time onwards and he got stuck with the nickname Olungka Sadaka,

Which literally means rattling ladle.

Everything else the stubborn novice did was in the same vein.

Instead of going on an alms round,

If he fancied something special to eat,

The stubborn novice would claim to temple supporters that Mahakassapa wanted such and such to eat,

And when they bought such and such as a gift to offer,

He would eat it himself.

Mahakassapa knew what was going on and he warned the stubborn monk,

To be so lacky in respect is not in keeping with having taken ordination.

You must train yourself better than this in the future.

Mahakassapa warned the stubborn novice continuously,

But the only effect of the criticism was to make him feel as if his master was singling him out for unfair criticism.

The more advice he received from his master,

The more victimized he felt.

Instead of feeling grateful for all the patience his master had shown him,

He planned on getting revenge.

The next day,

Going out on alms round with the rest of the novices to gather the master's breakfast,

This novice stayed behind until no one was left at the accommodation and set it on fire,

Burning it down before running away.

Then Mahakassapa and the other novices returned from the alms round to find their accommodation reduced to ashes.

So,

This is an illustration of the dangers of associating with fools who get angry even when spoken to decently.

Namely the novice Ulungasattaka,

Who put his own master's accommodation to the flame,

Even though his master had only ever spoken kind words to him.

This is one of the identifying features of a fool and is the reason why we have to beware of this sort of person and why,

Even though it would seem compassionate to give everyone an equal chance,

The Buddha suggested that Mahakassapa would have been better not to take on the novice of such a character in the first place.

A fool by definition is someone perceived as wicked,

Weak or feeble.

They are made feeble by the fact that they habitually think,

Say or do things which are unwholesome.

The gap in common sense that allows them to justify such unwholesome behaviour derives from them not having their mind centred or under their control.

To call such a dangerous person a fool might seem like an understatement because some fools might be psychopaths or even clever manipulators.

But how can we use the term feeble or a fool?

A fool is weak like a person with a serious disease is weak.

We do not fear them on the basis of their strength or knowledge or ability to think but because their habits are contagious.

Human beings have four potential sources of power.

The first of these is physical strength.

Any healthy person with plenty of muscles possesses the first storehouse of power.

The second is the strength of knowledge which is derived from education and life experience.

Having the ability to apply educated reasoning in useful subjects is the second storehouse of power.

The third is the strength of thought.

Some people go through the same number of classes together,

Have the equal amount of knowledge but their ability to think through things using their knowledge may not be equal.

Someone may know how to fix a car engine but they might sit idle all day long.

Why don't they offer their services as a mechanic or go into manufacturing instead of sitting around all day long waiting for someone else to find them a job?

The reason is that they have knowledge but they lack the ability or inclination to apply their knowledge.

This is why if anyone uses both their strength of knowledge and their strength of thought they are at a great advantage because they are endowed with that third storehouse of energy.

The fourth and final strength is the strength of virtue.

When one has both the strengths of thought and mindfulness and applies those strengths to forge benefit for oneself and others,

One can be said to be endowed with the fourth storehouse of power,

The strength of virtue.

Every person has the potential to be endowed with all four storehouses of power of strength,

Knowledge,

Thought and virtue.

Even if someone is endowed with some of these storehouses of power,

If their judgment is faulty they will not be able to put their potential to the full use.

If for example a foolish guy may be physically strong,

May have a chemistry PhD and the inclination to apply their knowledge but if they apply their knowledge of chemistry for dishonest purposes such as the breaking bad characters,

Cooking up meth,

They undermine their potential.

They are like a four piston car which is running on only three.

This is why if you know you're not firing on all four pistons,

Especially the last of the four,

You need to make some urgent repairs before your whole engine seizes up.

In conclusion,

A fool is defined as feeble because they are weak at doing good deeds.

Now that we know about the risk fools present to the discretion of those around them and know a little about the reason for a fool's weaknesses,

The next challenge that faces us is how to protect ourselves from them.

As we shall see the first of all we need to be able to recognize fools so that we can more easily protect ourselves from their influence.

So when trying to identify whether someone is a fool or not,

We cannot base our judgment on external appearances.

The things we should avoid basing our judgment on are things that include gender,

Age,

Provenance,

Nationality,

Connections,

Knowledge,

Job or wealth.

Instead we need to base our judgment on internal features.

Although fools are characterized by their habitually unwholesome actions of body,

Speech and mind,

Because all of these come from within,

They might not be obvious to us especially if we have still not honed our observation skills.

External aspects of a person's identity are only indirectly connected with the quality of the mind.

When we want to identify a fool,

We need to look for deeper aspects that betray that person's underlying quality of mind.

The sort of behaviors that are most telling are those that come out in the context of our interaction and friendship with them.

Since we can't tell what others are thinking,

The best we can do is try to notice the things which others express openly.

In other words,

Their words and actions.

Even fools can have chinks in their armor which will be revealed as we interact with them.

In fact there are five in all.

Firstly they are likely to persuade others to do unwholesome things.

Not only does a fool persuade others to do unwholesome things,

They will also provide an example of unwholesomeness for others to follow.

They might skip work on the slightest trivial pretext and persuade their colleagues to do the same.

Secondly they like to interfere in things that are none of their business.

A cleaner has the duty simply to keep the office presentable.

But if instead of doing their duty they leave their work undone and spend their time rummaging through the waste paper baskets for trade secrets,

This would be a telltale sign that they are a fool.

Similarly an office worker who tries to teach the cleaner how to do their job would be regarded with similar suspicion as interfering beyond their remit.

Thirdly a fool will like anything that is improper.

Fools have a dislike for anything that is right and proper.

They like playing with fire,

Drugs,

Gambling and cage fighting.

They like any opportunity to throw a monkey wrench in the works or as they say here in England a spanner.

But you can be sure that anything they like leaves a trail of enemies.

Even if they join the monkhood they will end up causing a schism in the monastic order.

Their attitude to the world is the same as the one illustrated in the traditional tale I'd like to tell you about an angel and a worm.

Once upon a time there were two young men who were friends.

How they came to be friends no one knew because one was outstanding and enjoyed helping with charitable work while the other one did only unwholesome things all their life long like cock fighting,

Fish fighting,

Taking drugs and coming home drunk.

When the latter was a storekeeper he would sell only rip-offs or stolen merchandise.

When he was a teacher he wouldn't teach normal subjects to his pupils.

He would teach them how to get away with murder.

Even with such different tastes the two guys managed to keep up their friendship until both of them passed away.

When the good guy died he was reborn as an angel in heaven.

One day the angel was wondering what to become with his friend.

The angel surveyed every level of heaven but couldn't find him.

Then he checked the human realm but again his friend was nowhere to be found.

The angel made a further check and was surprised to see that his friend had been reborn as a worm in a toilet.

The angel wondered what he could do to help his friend and tolerating the sickening smell of the toilet out of compassion to stand at the edge of the toilet bowl and he made himself known to his friend.

He changed himself into his original human appearance and announced,

Old friend do you remember me?

Of course said the worm we used to be friends a long time ago.

Oh worm said the angel today I have come to do you the biggest favor of your life.

I have come to invite you to join the heavenly host.

However there is one condition.

If you want to be an angel you have to keep all the precepts without breaking any of them from this day onwards.

You must only think meritorious thoughts and do meritorious deeds and before long we will be able to live in the same level of heaven.

What's so great about being an angel?

Asked the worm.

The angel explained patiently you can get whatever you wish instantly simply by thinking of it.

As soon as you think of food then ambrosia manifests itself.

If you think of clothing then instantly you're clothed in angelic raiment.

If you think of heavenly mansions then a heavenly mansion will arise instantaneously.

All you have to do is make the intention and hundreds of good things will come your way.

In that case I don't want to be an angel I'm better off as a worm thank you.

What do you mean?

Asked the angel.

The worm continued if you're an angel then you have to make the wish before you get what you want.

But as a worm people come along they raise the toilet lid and give me exactly what they want all day long.

Just leave me alone because I'm better off as a worm.

Because of the fixed idea a fool has of what is normal and desirable in life it is beyond any effort by a rational person to convince them otherwise.

So to come back to the remaining telltale signs of a fool the fourth one is that rather like Ullunga Sattaka of my previous story they get angry even when spoken to decently.

Suppose a well-intentioned parent advises their son that he should be revising instead of going out in the evening with the friends so close to his examinations.

The boy might shout back how can you say that?

Didn't you go for outings when you were younger?

Often the other person knows that they are in the wrong but when they are found out and their fault is discovered then they lose their temper which is a mark of a fool.

A fool is like a person covered in open wounds.

If they bump into something even undelightly it hurts them.

For a fool their mind is covered in open wounds and when confronted with the truth it hurts them.

Sometimes even just a glance in their direction is enough to provoke aggression.

Lastly they refuse to comply with rules and regulations.

Fools heed neither laws of the land nor local customs.

If you meet someone who refuses to comply with regulations you can be 99% sure that you're dealing with a fool.

If it wasn't for the law there would be a lot more opportunity for fools to express themselves unashamedly.

In fact you could say that it is probably because of fools existing in the world that laws had to be laid down in the first place.

Since the law forces fools to go underground with their inclinations we generally have to recognize fools from the first four sorts of behavior in the list.

In conclusion fools are people who assume the world owes them something.

If you come across any of these five features then it should already be ringing warning bells in your head.

Some people who may appear outwardly to be friendly may in reality be fools masquerading as friends.

The Buddha called such people false friends and categorized them into four types each with four characteristics giving a further 16 warning signs to look out for with friends like these who need enemies.

In overview the main types of false friends are firstly the mercenary,

Secondly the man of empty promises,

Thirdly the flatterer and lastly the one who leads you down the road to ruin.

To expand on these four characterizations a mercenary or selfish friend is one who tries to appropriate your possessions,

Sacrifices little in the hope of gaining much,

Helps others only when threatened by the same danger and only makes friends to serve their own interests.

A man of empty promises is the sort of false friend who tells you how sad they are not to have been able to share with you something that has already run out,

Who promises to share with you things they don't have yet,

Who tries to win your favor with empty promises and who has excuses every time you call upon them to help.

Flatterer is the sort of person who sucks up to you indiscriminately whether you're doing good or bad things,

Who sings praises to your face but who gossips about you behind your back.

Final sort of false friend is the sort that leads you down the road to ruin by being your loyal drinking companion,

By being at your side when you roam the streets at unseemly hours,

By frequenting games and shows with you and by accompanying you to the gambling table.

Thus behaviors illustrate 16 ways in which a fool will unwittingly reveal their malevolent intentions in friendship.

Besides leading us to ruin,

Such people pull society unfortunately in a direction of deterioration in a way which is hard to remedy.

If you come across any of these 16 features then you should already be looking for friendship elsewhere.

In the old days the word grooming had quite a positive connotation rather like pampering a pet or preparing someone for a leading position in office.

Lately however the meaning of the word grooming has started to take on a more scary meaning which imparts some of the same foreboding as that implied by associating with fools.

There's a traditional proverb that teaches always keep a safe distance,

Keep a hound at arm's length,

Give a monkey six feet but for a fool a hundred thousand miles may not be enough.

As mentioned earlier when a person has such a dangerously contagious disease as faulty discretion we have no alternative but to isolate them.

However as we shall see it's not physical distance which we use to isolate a fool it's more how we maintain psychological distance.

When we talk about associating with others what is the best way to patrol our psychological boundaries?

In fact there are seven different stages by which we might unwittingly put ourselves in harm's way with fools.

It starts from the moment we meet up with fools.

This could be called associating with fools but only in its most rudimentary form.

Of course such association may not lead to anything after all it's just us visiting them and them visiting us.

We may not even particularly enjoy each other's company but before long we get closer to them.

This is once you start to get more familiar with the fools you meet up with and start lending things to one another talking on subjects of common interest and following a particular common past time.

Thirdly we feel admiration for them.

This is once you start to get more familiar you start to believe that you have common tastes.

You start to believe that you like anything that they like.

Fourthly you end up emulating them.

Fifthly after a while you start to find that you are bending your ideas of the word normal to fit that fool's idea of the normal.

Sixthly you start joining in with them.

This is the part in the grooming process where they might ask you to perform small rebellious tasks to prove yourself worthy.

Seventh and last you get instilled with their habits.

In the final stages of association to the casual observer it would be impossible to tell you apart from the fool.

It's also come to the stage where it is impossible to reverse the effects of the fool over you.

As for anyone who is in the orbit of a fool they should realize that even casual contact can lead to something more serious.

There will be an unavoidable escalation of intimacy even without realizing it.

If we know someone is a fool but we are forced into a situation of contact with them what can we aim for is limiting the relationship to interaction without transaction.

An easy way to avoid going a step too far with fools is to remember three danger words namely joining,

Receiving and giving.

Joining up with fools means eating,

Residing and investing with them.

Receiving fools means dating them,

Adopting them,

Employing them or otherwise letting them get their feet under your table.

Giving things to fools might mean giving them consideration,

Praise,

Encouragement,

Lodging,

Food or payment.

If you're associating with fools at any of these three levels then you should try to redraw your boundaries before sustaining any further damage.

In conclusion relating to fools we are likely to come across in the outside world although there is a temptation just to shun anyone with the unsavory characteristics of a fool that we've listed.

If we are parents and we suspect our own children are mixed up with or turning into fools we still have the special responsibility to put ourselves in harm's way in order to show our unconditional love for our children and we shouldn't worry about overreach in things like the sort of friends our kids associate with and we might even intervene to choose a school or a teacher for our children to help them avoid associating with fools.

I'll come back to this subject in more detail in blessing 13.

Nevertheless a little extra attention from the outset of our study of the blessings can help to ensure a bright future for our family preventing tears when it's too late to reverse the problems for something like drug addiction.

Some people think that they already have enough discretion to choose their friends and thus overlook the importance of the first blessing.

In fact even though we might be experienced and worldly wise there is a fool with whom we have to associate cautiously throughout our life and that is our inner fool.

Just as there are many fools in the outside world the danger doesn't end when we close our front door.

We still have our inner fool to contend with which is like a little devil that seems all too ready to justify every unwholesome temptation in our mind.

Inner fool is the erroneous discretion that creeps into our heads and our only protection is to avoid listening to the ravings of the fool still lurking in our mind.

Particularly as meditators already working with our mind it will be increasingly obvious that we need to avoid listening to the foolish part of ourselves otherwise it will spill over to get us to latch on to fools in the outside world.

In order to avoid encouraging the inner fool you need firstly to steer clear of involvement with any sort of unwholesomeness and stay away from all of the forms of roads to ruin.

Don't go thinking that the odd game of poker amongst friends just to keep your hand in can surely be no harm to anybody.

Draw a line of the temptation right from the start this way you will save yourself from tears in the long run.

Even if you are someone with weak tendencies in the direction of being a fool such as liking to get up in the morning or ignoring the alarm clock you should get tough with yourself right from the start by walking away from even the most minor unwholesome deeds.

Secondly make a break from any unwholesomeness that you may have done in the past.

Doesn't matter what sort of bad habits you might have had in the past don't give yourself even the smallest chance to relapse.

Don't even speak of those things anymore.

Thirdly make sure good deeds become your habit.

There's no need to think over your past failures or entangle yourself in the guilt concerning your past demons.

Starting with today you should practice generosity,

Self-discipline and meditation continuously.

In this way any scars left by our old way of life will gradually heal leaving only good behavior instead.

Fourthly in the case you have to associate with a fool be especially careful.

Sometimes we are put in a situation we are forced to close proximity with fools even though we don't choose it.

Sometimes for example we find that even our own boss is involved in corruption.

If we refuse to have any part in their dealings that we might get sacked.

What should we do in such a situation?

If we do everything they ask for in the end we might pick up their bad habits.

Traditional advice for such a situation is that we should be as careful as if we were warming ourselves before a fire.

If you get too close to the fire for too long then you will get burned.

If you keep too much distance then you will be left shivering in the cold.

Just as with the fire you need to keep the appropriate distance from the fool not too near and not too far.

Lastly you can associate with a fool only in the case that you are sure you have the tenacity to help them.

Jumping into the water to save a drowning person is only sensible if you're able to swim yourself otherwise you'll get two drowning people.

Whether you can really help a fool or not depends whether your own virtue is sufficiently steadfast to allow you to help them while remaining unscathed.

If you don't have that tenacity yet then keep your distance even if they are your own relatives.

If you come across a friend who takes no heed of your warnings however many times you might tell them then you might have to wait until they recognize their own mistakes before you can intervene at which point they might be a little bit more ready to listen to you.

It's not that you should be cruel but you have to know your own limits and if helping a fool is beyond your capacity then you may have to run away to help you fight another day.

Also if you realize that the fool might be you bear in mind the advice given the Anguttara Nikayas at Chhiyasutta.

The ways we tend to behave when our inner fool gets the upper hand is that we tend to overlook the danger in small things.

Worse than this even if we know the danger of something then we still do nothing about it.

Worse still when well-intentioned people go to the trouble to point out the danger of something to us we refuse to accept it.

You can become a wiser person only if you have all the opposite characteristics namely remaining alert to the danger in small things,

Being proactive in avoidance when we recognize the danger in something and graciously accepting advice when well-meaning others point out dangers that we've overlooked.

So this session I have introduced blessing number one not associating with fools to you.

My next session I'll move on to the second blessing on the topic of associating with the wise.

Hopefully as a result of today's session you will be equipped now to recognize fools in the outside world and in yourself and you will now have a strategy to avoid associating with them.

So today this is me Praniklis Tainisro signing off for this session so long folks and stay safe.