Just when you think you have eradicated all traits of dishonesty and greed, up pops a poor choice based on rationalizations.
I work as a construction superintendent. Part of my work is maintaining a balance between being fair with my subcontractors and maintaining the bottom line for my employer.
I pride myself as being fair and just, sometimes refusing change orders from my subs, other times taking heat from my employer for signing them—both based on my sense of fairness and equanimity. I try extend this attitude into all aspects of my interactions with others, both public and private.
The neighborhood I am building in now is not the best. There is a large population of Homeless people and drug addicts. In fact, the ground that I am building on is in the Inner City and part of the initial process of starting the building includes evicting people who where living in cardboard shelters and tents, old chimneys and hollows in the ground, the remnants of dilapidated homes that were torn down to make way for renewing the neighborhood.
One group of people with their own karma and circumstances has been displaced to make room for 61 subsidized apartments specifically designated for starving Artists.
A construction site, drug addicts, and recycling center one city block away—tempting combination for the hungry, be it hunger for food or drugs.
Surprisingly, I have so far had very little problem with theft in the 11 months this project has be underway. Especially considering the constant milling around and searching eyes of the less fortunate.
Until recently, the only items that have been stolen, now three times, are heavy gauge temporary power cords, which are unidentifiable, and I am sure end up across the street at the recycling center, sold for their copper—a 100 cord weighs about 80 pounds.
Last Saturday, I found a man, a former inhabitant of one of the old chimneys on this site, transferring a 100 ft power cord from a large garbage bag that had broken from the weight of the cord into a stolen grocery store shopping cart. I confronted him, and an argument of where the cord came from ensued.
He insisted the cord did not come from my job, that it had been given to him by a friend. In his words, “This is a godsend! I really need the money.”
He swore to God that it did not come from my site. With this proclamation, I just stood there and looked straight into his eyes. After a minute, he rolled his shoulders, extended open hands and spread his arms while looking up into the heavens and said “Yeah, I know, I’d say the same thing if I had stole it!”
My dilemma: What do I do? I have circumstances, but no proof. I can call the Police, but what would the outcome be? Would I be falsely accusing this person based on the common perception that all of the less fortune are liars and thieves? Where does one find fairness and equanimity in this circumstance?
What I decided to do was take his picture, along with the ‘stolen by someone from somewhere goods’, and told him that if I found that I was missing another power cord I would send the Police after him. I took my picture with my cell phone and he continued on the well-trodden path, across the street, on his way to the recycling center.
Then a thought occurred to me and I asked, “How much will the recycling center pay you for that?” His reply, “Twenty or thirty dollars.” Knowing that I have to pay $300 to replace stolen cords, surprised that a theft of this nature gleans so little in comparison, I asked “How much?!”, to which he replied, “Well, OK, maybe twenty.”
Split second Rationalization: “I’ll buy it from you, here is twenty dollars”.
Thinking in that moment that even if I were buying back property stolen from the company that I work for, it would still be a savings of $280.
What I wasn’t thinking of in that moment was that whether or not the cord was stolen from my site or someone else’s, I was creating karmic retribution for myself by trafficking in stolen goods—if not the person at hand, the cord was stolen by someone from somewhere and knowing this I bought it at a discount—which is exactly the action that lets thieves profit from thefts.
I logged this incident in my daily report to my employer. The consensus was that $20 was better than $300.
Instant Karma: Five days later, when I left the jobsite for two hours to attend a meeting at our Home Office, a thief got into my job site office and stole a company camera and my personal laptop.
I have a list of suspects, but that is not my point here:
Ouch! The Universe has spoken!
I still have work to do.
I am not as honest and upright as I believed myself to be. I take fully responsibility for this material loss.
In a monetary sense, the Universe has spanked me ten times over the amount I thought to save. In context of the interrelatedness of all actions and rewards shared by all living beings, by having facilitated the deepening of heavy karma which results in the suffering of another person by purchasing stolen goods for personal gain, I unwittingly cast aside my responsibility to persons other than myself.
I must be diligent in polishing my own character so I can manifest in my actions the wisdom appropriate to the ever-changing circumstances of the present moment.
Sincerely, chikushonin 智倶諸人
大求道心,妙覚,命時僧倶經.
南無妙法蓮華命時儈倶經