Three sacred respects: respect for the World, respect for Others, respect for Self
It covers everything i consider important to at least a slight degree, it’s quick and simple enough for me to remember under any circumstances, and who can argue against a triad format?
I kind of wanted to make it a three-triad code but the best alternatives i’ve developed thus far are:
Three sacred duties: Duty to the Gods, duty to Others, duty to Self – which is pretty much the same thing, but swapping ‘the World’ for ‘God(s)*’, and i’m perfectly comfortable considering ‘Others’ to be ‘any other beings, human or otherwise’, so while it would be nice to give spiritualism it’s own category it’s a bit redundant as a triad. …I may change my ‘respect’ triad to be ‘duty’ instead, though, it sounds a bit better and more active.
*is it necessary to define ‘God(s)’ here? I generally use the ‘any spiritual entity significantly more powerful than humans’ definition. Which would redefine most ‘monotheists’ as polytheists because angels/demons/etc. Though i probably count as polytheist by other standards, too. Supernatural beings are not easily defined. At any rate it’s not staying in my final triad, respect for any other living being is, and supernatural beings count whether they be God(s) or not.
Three laws of Time: Respect the past, seek what is best for the current era, work to improve things for the future – which feels really good in theory but i have trouble following any casual ‘respect the past’ stuff. ‘The past’ has some fucked-up shit in it. (As does the present and as will the future. And there was/is/will be good stuff, too. I just… want something more specific than ‘respect the past’.)
I also spent way more time than i should have worrying about the order of respecting the World/Others/Self, particularly World/Others. It feels like First should be Most Important, yes? But it’s not going to be an all-or-nothing thing anyway, so screw order.
(Random tangent: I do not trust anyone who tries to say you should always prioritise Others over Yourself, whether it be for religious or general ethical reasons. Mainly because there are an awful lot of ways it can end badly, and also because an awful lot of people who have very harmful attitudes towards others just reframe their bigotry as ‘speaking out in love’ or ‘only trying to help’ or ‘well yes it sucks for [minority X] but what about [majority Y], things are not ABSOLUTELY PERFECT for them!’ or some other nice-sounding supposedly-other-people-centred bullshit. /end tangent)
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