Out of the Ordinary

We are used to thinking of the world in black and white terms, of things being either right or wrong, up or down, one thing or another. A good example of this would be the popular but mistaken understanding of kamma as either good or bad. The Buddha by contrast, said that kamma can be good, bad or a mixture of the two (vītimissā dhamma), which of course accords much more with reality. In fact, few things are either 100% good or 100% bad. When it comes to gender we commonly assume that people are either male or female whereas the categories are not always that clear, a truth that the Buddha recognized centuries ago.