If a man is crossing a river
And an empty boat collides with his own skiff,
Even though he be a bad-tempered man
He will not become very angry.
But if he sees a man in the boat,
He will shout at him to steer clear.
If the shout is not heard, he will shout again,
And yet again, and begin cursing.
And all because there is somebody in the boat.
Yet if the boat were empty.
He would not be shouting, and not angry.
The parable of the empty boat, written around the 4th century BCE by Chuang Tzu, has many variants that appear in Taoist and Buddhist writing. Whether the protagonist is a fisherman, a monk trying to meditate, or simply a man crossing a river, it lays bare the intuition that it makes sense to get angry with a person but not an empty boat.
Others as empty boats
An empty boat can’t be other than it is. Its course will be determined by how it’s properties (shape, weight, material construction and so forth) interact with the external properties of water, wind and tide. So, what if we view other people as empty boats? They are not free to be other than they are. Their actions are determined by the interactions of biology and life experiences that have brought them to this moment. More complex than the boat no doubt, but bound by the same principles.
Friends, family, work colleagues or those we encounter at random in a day. What if we understand them all as empty boats? Importantly, this does not mean that anger is never justified or that we simply allow others to do what they will. Rather such a view might allow us to be less reactive and hold the actions of others in a wider, more empathic frame. This then can support us to respond with more skill and consideration; something that could benefit ourselves and others. The parable makes it easier to see that whether or not anger rises in me is not determined purely from external events. Rather it is the events interaction with me and the meanings that I make from this that may lead to anger.
Myself as an empty boat
What then might follow from thinking of oneself as an empty boat? Again, a space for compassion can open up here as I appreciate the internal and external constraints that I operate within.
Without sinking too far into philosophical questions of free-will, the metaphor of the self as an empty boat suggests that there is a mistake we tend to make in how we conceive of ourselves. If I think of myself as something existing beyond the limits of biology, experience and context, then I can blame this self for making the decisions it does. I might feel that whatever internal and external influences are operating, the “self” of the other who hits my boat lies outside these influences and was thus free to choose not to hit my boat. It is this self that I get angry at and who I might wish to punish in some way for the choice they made. Similarly, I may be angry with my own self, believing that I could have chosen differently than I did in a given situation.
The language grows messy, but it is like we place our “self” outside of ourselves and thus can hold it morally responsible for its actions or inactions. As my “self” only operates within myself, I am never free to choose other than I choose. For me to choose differently I would either have to be someone different, a different self, or some of the influencing factors would have needed to be different; that is the choice itself would be different one. If my young son is refusing to put his shoes on to leave the house, I could promise him a treat if he does so. If he then puts his shoes on, he has not changed his mind, rather I have changed the choice I am presenting him with.
In conclusion, I am free to be myself and you to be yourself. But neither of us if free to operate outside of our own bounds and thus should not be judged harshly for, of necessity, acting within our own bounds.