Toxicity

As-salamu alaykum, sabah al-khayr — that’s good morning in Arabic in case you didn’t know. Welcome back to POV Zero. This is episode seven.

I got up this morning and actually, yesterday I told myself I’m not going to record anything else. But this morning I felt like recording something about a topic that is very relevant for Ahmed, and that’s also relevant for many other people. It’s something that has a lot of negative impact on our human experience: toxicity. Toxic people, toxic behavior, toxic attitudes.

From the point of view of the zero, everything is perfect as it is. Even toxicity is divine in a sense. It’s perfectly absorbed by the zero, it collapses into it, it has no negative weight from that perspective. But for the human experience, toxic people are taxing. They use energy, they use space, they oppress others, they hurt. So it’s relevant to talk about this from both the human and the zero perspective.

If we think about toxic people, what we see from the point of view of the zero is that these are human beings who are overidentified with their ego. Overidentified with shapes, forms, concepts, ideas, identities. And they make others pay the price for that.

Toxic individuals are very judgmental. They measure other human beings by a certain standard over which they have authority. They judge, they criticize, they can be very mean. They yell, scream at others. They exclude, they hurt.

They’re overidentified with certain ideas of how things should be. Let’s say they have a specific idea of how a household should be organized. If the other person does not comply, the toxic person is going to hurt them — make them feel they’re doing something wrong. They might yell, criticize, say things like “you never learn, you don’t change, you’re so consumed with yourself.” They criticize others for being lazy. They tend to have very strong opinions about others, and their positionality is always turned outward, looking for the deficit on the outside, with rarely a proper introspection.

From a positionality of love, you look inward. You don’t take the easy road and vent your frustration outside, risking hurting others. But toxic individuals are limited in their ability to look inward, and they choose the easier way of looking outward and identifying the source of their discomfort somewhere on the outside.

That behavior is very hurtful — getting yelled at, gaslit, criticized. Sometimes there’s the idea that “I’m criticizing your behavior, not you.” That’s a fallacy. The energy that comes with criticism of behavior, if not formulated with utmost care and from a place of love and mercy, will always function as a fundamental criticism of the other person’s entire being.

Toxic individuals are overidentified with shapes and forms. And the interesting thing is that they know their behavior — yelling, punishing, withdrawing love, badmouthing — is in a sense unacceptable. So they attribute to themselves a sort of moral high ground, a moral authority to judge and correct others. They justify the toxic behavior through recourse to big principles — loyalty, honesty, productivity, being hardworking, contributing to society. These principles serve to silver-line the behavior.

From the point of view of the zero, it’s a clear sign of overidentification with the ego. If our essence is in each and every one of us, if we’re all expressions of the same, then these individuals are so overidentified with shapes and forms that they constantly have to distract themselves from their actual essence. They have to constantly fight against their deepest intuition, which is that they want to be loving and should be loving.

They also bring ideals into the equation — “my behavior serves in the long run to prevent you from becoming a bad person, a dishonest person.” They always bring these ideals in because it’s unbearable for them to stay in the toxic entanglement with shapes and forms.

If we think about the zero as the point towards which everything gravitates, then from the perspective of shapes and forms, there is always an inertia towards zero gravity, a constant drive towards the essence, towards unconditional love. But toxic individuals have to constantly push away from that point. That’s why they’re usually dissatisfied, unhappy, constantly frustrated — because it’s so taxing to stay in that space, carrying all the shapes and forms.

They have to say things like “there’s no such thing as unconditional love.” They ridicule people who are kind, call them naive, blue-eyed. They laugh about them, judge them. Because to somebody so entangled with shapes and forms, carrying that weight constantly, it is unbearable to see someone who is not carrying the same weight. “How can you be living in that space? It’s a sort of mindlessness. How can you be so disconnected from the things that are important in life?”

For them, the zero is unbearable. They know deep inside that our essence is good, kind, gentle, caring. And they know they don’t correspond to that essence. So they have to maintain the narrative that their position is necessary for a greater good.

I have to laugh, because from the point of view of the zero, it’s very ridiculous. As Ahmed, I was very much identified with the ego. When you’re identified with the ego, everything the toxic person does is very hurtful. As a human being, I have my identity, my idea of dignity, of masculinity, of how I want to be treated.

But that’s the only thing toxic people can feed on. They see that they have some control over you because they can get you at the level of your ego. I was in situations where I was constantly exposed to toxic behavior. And I have to laugh because it feels so light from the point of view of the zero. It truly feels like just a lot of noise.

If you disidentify from the ego stuff — from your identity, even from concepts like justice, fairness, dignity — and realize you’re just one with the oneness, then what they’re doing is fighting a shadow. Fighting a ghost. And that looks ridiculous, because they’re putting so much effort into fighting that ghost and making it pay, getting so frustrated with their inability to finally achieve what they wanted. Up to the point where they kill the other person, and they’re still not satisfied. It’s just a place of restlessness.

Because it’s such a place of restlessness, so taxing, so painful, they have to make others pay for it. They have to draw others into that same space. Otherwise it feels unjust to them — “Why am I sacrificing all these things, not enjoying life, and the other person is just enjoying life?”

These individuals put themselves at the level of the divine. They become gods over other individuals. And that’s why it looks ridiculous from the point of view of the zero.

But on the receiving end — I could never say to anybody that you have to disidentify from your ego and stay in that position. It doesn’t make sense. There’s the point of view of the zero, and we know we’re going back there anyway, and that’s a place of solace. But we are still stuck in human bodies.

The thing is, you can never fully defend yourself against a toxic person. And you can never achieve a sense of justice. When that’s the case, all you can do is stop identifying with these ideas. Say, “Okay, let her talk to me in that way. I disidentify from the idea of how a man should be talked to.” Let that concept go. For a human being, that’s very complicated. Big concepts like dignity, human rights, fundamental rights — they sound universal, something we should aspire to. But when we cling to them, that creates friction for ourselves on the receiving end of toxic individuals. The best thing we can do for our peace of mind is let go of these concepts.

When you disidentify from the concepts and the ego stuff, there’s nothing for toxic individuals to attach themselves to. That’s the only way you can truly defeat toxicity — by not playing its game, the game of numbers and shapes and forms, the ego game.

Even at the collective level — decolonization, fighting against racism, patriarchy. These are fights we see as incredibly important, because from the point of view of the zero, we are non-dual, there’s no reason to put one human being over another. So if as a society we move towards equality, that makes perfect sense.

The question is just the energy with which we are fighting that fight. If we’re overidentified with the ideal of justice or equality, we will realize we will never get there. We’re seeing how democracies can just reverse all of that. We see democracies funding genocide, built on capitalist systems exploiting resources from outside. There’s no space where there’s absolute justice and equality. It’s always a place of restlessness, always fighting towards something.

That doesn’t mean the fight isn’t worth it — you’re still fighting for an ideal. The question is how much you identify with it. The more you identify, the bigger the frustration.

The best thing you can do as you’re fighting an oppressive system, fighting toxic individuals, is be in a place where you accept that this is all a playground. These individuals have actually no power, and neither do you. You just choose to fight this fight because it’s the only thing that makes sense from the point of view of infinite and unconditional love.

And the good thing is, when you fight this way, you’re fearless. What can be taken from you if you are disidentified? If you realize you’re one with the oneness and you’re gone already? That positionality of fearlessness, of utter liberation at the individual level, can be so powerful at the collective level. You’re not afraid to stand up to dictators, to individuals who exploit and hurt others.

At the individual level, the best thing you can do for a toxic individual is isolate them — not play by their rules, disidentify from the shapes and forms they try to inculcate. At the collective level, it’s more complicated. It’s a valid fight to pick, but we should not make it dependent on the result. The result is already there. It’s zero. It’s nothing. Playing from that positionality is the most powerful place from which you can play the game.

Why do people stay in toxic relationships? Often these relationships look like a place where you’re not truly happy, where you’re often hurt. Others tell you, “What exactly are you doing there?” And you know deep inside that something’s off. But you’re so identified with noble concepts — loyalty, not wanting to hurt the other person. “If I leave, I’m going to destroy them.” And so it feels good to stay. But you do that from a positionality of overidentification with a concept that estranges you from the essence.

Unconditional love is also for you. You are as divine as the other person. If you stay stuck with a concept, a slave to it, and that makes you stay in the relationship, you’re estranged from the essence. You’re saying you can put the other person over yourself, create a hierarchy, suffer, prove your loyalty. These concepts keep us in a space alienated from the singularity.

Look at your own situation and ask: what are the concepts that keep me here? Why am I stuck? What principle am I upholding as I remain in this situation where I know deep inside something is off? You don’t have to be anything. You don’t have to do anything from the point of view of the zero. There’s no past to take into account, no debt towards another person. Just overidentification with shapes and forms keeping you in a space estranged from the essence. And the only thing you will eventually have to do is go back to that essence. So you might go back during your lifetime as well.

I know it’s complicated, abstract, theoretical. But look at your situation and try to dissect it from that point of view. Let me know if you come up with new insights.

That was a long episode. Sending you a lot of unconditional love. You’re perfect as you are. You don’t have to become anything. You are already nothing and everything at the same time. Be gentle, be kind — to others and to yourself. That’s the only thing you can do on this planet. Peace out.