LEARNING FROM NATURE
Dealing With Opponents
ANIMALS face two very big challenges: finding food, and defending themselves. Animals have enemies in the animal world, and so every animal has to arrange for its protection.
The diverse methods that animals use to protect themselves hold great significance for human beings, because these methods are natural methods, bestowed by God. Nature teaches these methods to animals directly. It is as if they are students who have received this training in the school of Nature. Their ways of acting and reacting are lessons that Nature has schooled them in. These methods testify to the Creator who made them.
Consider some examples in this regard.
Elephants and tigers are among the largest of animals. If an elephant and a tiger clash, it can cause the death of both. They both are well aware of this, and so they always try to avoid each other. It is very rare that they allow themselves to enter into a conflict.
A war in which the contending parties do not have the power to eliminate each other always ends in mutual destruction. Tigers and elephants know this, and they act accordingly.
One of the best responses amongst mammals before danger from a more powerful enemy is to run away. Rabbits, deer and many other mammals use speed as a very effective means of escaping predators. Thus saving themselves, they are free to carry on their constructive activities.
Another common defence mechanism amongst animals is camouflage or protective coloration. By blending with the environment these animals avoid detection from their predators.
The opossum has an effective method of protecting itself from harm. It feigns death when threatened; it collapses to the ground, drools as if very ill, and then remains motionless, with its mouth open and teeth bared.
Insects such as the millipede curl up and freeze motionless on touch. This is the primary defence mechanism it uses to protect itself from its enemies. Even some mammals such as the pangolin when threatened coil into a ball so tight that it is almost impossible to unroll. Animals that live in burrows constantly face the threat of enemies entering their homes. That is why such animals construct their burrows with a second tunnel opening which they can use to escape in emergency situations such as when they find a predator has entered their homes.
The diverse methods of protection that Nature has schooled animals in hold important lessons for humans.
These diverse methods of protection that Nature has schooled animals in hold important lessons for humans. For humans, too, the best policy to adopt vis-à-vis their opponents is to save themselves from directly clashing with them, and, instead, to try to move ahead by avoiding confrontation. One’s opponent should not get the opportunity to feel that one is interfering in his domain. If one happens to confront one’s opponent, one should appear to be inactive, in this way saving oneself from his aggression. Or, one can keep oneself carefully confined to one’s own domain, and, in this way, convince one’s opponent that one will not cause him any harm.
Animals did not invent these above-cited methods of protection by themselves. It was God who taught these to them. These methods have Divine sanction. They are not a form or expression of cowardice. Rather, they indicate a very necessary pragmatism. They teach us humans that we, too, should avoid unnecessary confrontation with others, and, instead, should focus on our own growth.
Some animals roam about in search of fodder; others in search of their mates. Some busily run around building their homes. Some hunt for food for their babies. While engaged in these and other such tasks, they may suddenly confront an enemy. If they enter into a fight with them, the work that they had set out to do would be completely disrupted. That is why all animals abstain from direct confrontation with their enemies, unless they find themselves in a situation where they feel absolutely compelled to do so. In order to continue their own constructive work, they simply avoid conflict and move ahead.
Animals use this wise approach to dealing with opponents on the basis of instinct. Humans must use the very same approach, but based on conscious choice and awareness.