When one practices vichara, one is essentially looking deeply into the question: who/what am I? After calming the mind to some extent, one says to oneself something along these lines (the gist here is more important than the details--try letting each of these sentences sink in before moving on to the next):
I have a situation, but I am not my situation.
I have roles, but I am not my roles.
I have a body, but I am not my body.
I have thoughts, but I am not my thoughts.
I have emotions but I am not my emotions.
When we get caught up in the stream of daily life, we most often act as one of these things. Professor Gates talked about different peoples' internal narratives--the thoughts that are paired with explanation, narrative, and feeling. When we identify as our narratives, our situation, whatever, it is like letting something else drive you or like being possessed for a moment. We even say, "I got caught up in the moment; I wasn't myself." Who were you then? Well, when we aren't "ourselves", we're usually responding to some basic drive and/or narrative. The interesting thing is that we also usually identify ourselves as the roles, characteristics, and narratives that we like or that benefit us in some way.
With vichara, we take a step into these identifications--into the process of identifying (forming a self-concept that is described or bounded by something). Instead of taking that step unmindfully, we take it mindfully. Vichara is one way of getting some space between and within the things that usually push you. Do you feel pushed by identifying yourself as a black man in America? If that is how you identify yourself, probably, at least at times such as when the cops show up at your house. Do cops identify with their roles? (Sorry for the horrendously rhetorical questioning here.) Of course they do, we all do to some extent. We also fall into identifying others as their roles. Did Gates respond to Crowley showing up thinking that here was a helpful race relations teacher coming to make sure his house and its owner was safe? It doesn't seem like he did. Did Crowley show up with the attitude about Gates that he expressed immediately following their rendezvous at the White House (which apparently went much better than their rendezvous at the yellow house)? It doesn't seem like he did.
Vichara "ends" with the question: who am I? We have plenty of time to mull this over in a contemplative manner if we take the time. But when we meet other people, we usually ask and have to decide to some extent, "Should I treat you as a who or a what? And if a what--some role--then which role or roles? If I should treat you as a who, then which who?" Certainly, just as with contemplative self-inquiry a contemplative and interested exploration of another who will tend to take time, and if we bring our good nature and take the time, we can usually get something valuable out of the experience. Essentially asking, "Who are you?" verbally or not allows the other who to answer for themselves rather than leaving us to choose from only our presuppositions and role responsibilities in determining who we think they are and thereby determining how we should treat them.
Beyond the neutral tolerance of other roles and potentially interacting in mutual self-interest, we deal in a greater degree of mindfulness and a greater degree of extending ourselves to meet others in this interesting world. Simultaneously, in exploring with others who they are, the equal "flipside" is inviting them into that mindful self-inquiry that we might practice with ourselves. And in a diversity of perspectives, we find a richer abundance to draw answers and experience from.
This is especially where it becomes important to bring up awareness of the self/other divide as well as our expectations. If I am used to people telling me I am very smart and of benefit to my people as well as "other" people, I'll come to expect that sort of treatment. It's human nature. I identify with my roles and status because it allows me to answer the question of how I should interact with others. If I am used to people showing some degree of respect or at least deference based on fear, I'll come to expect that sort of treatment. When the expected treatment (or "narrative" of treatment) is positive, I will begin to feel entitled to that status, protective of that status. It defines me as a social being; it is my precious. If you are my wife, brother, friend, etc., I may allow you close to what I hold dear. But if you are not, a sense of threat will mingle with fear and entitlement and possessiveness to present me a ready-made reaction to you being all up in my grill.
When that happens, I may be educated enough to know that you maybe aren't coming to take away my entitlements, I may be trained in not aggressing just because I am feeling aggressive. And, if I am not driving in the moment when we interact, the training and education go right out the window. The more often I am in the driver's seat, and the more often I bring my good and right self to the table, the more people will tend to form the general impression that I am mature. People who are not mature may be good in many ways, but if they aggress against others in order to protect the good show involved in their reputations, they will tend to come across as aggressive pricks.
The interesting thing is that it is appropriate to create laws around physical aggression but it is important to create customs around verbal aggression and social respect and appreciation. In a pluralistic society, we should be able to enforce laws against physical aggression, but we will never be able to enforce laws against feeling slighted. If the white man slights first or in retaliation, I call both men immature pricks. I don't mean that to say I am a better person; I say they are pricks for not acting as persons although that is their legal right to be pricks as long as it doesn't go too far.
What's more, people can feel when they are either pulled back or moved ahead by social interactions. Eckhart Tolle made the point that adverse situations tend to bring mostly conscious people to a greater degree of consciousness but that adversity tends to push mostly unconscious people into their unconscious ("ready-made") reactivity. Vichara helps us separate the people from their prickish actions. I can say, "You are being a prick now even if you aren't generally a prick." That is the truth of many situations in our lives. Mindfulness practice helps us gain some degree of dis-identification from our roles, narratives, etc. If we include appreciation in that practice, it can also help us become better at identifying as the good and right selves that we can be. And the more I am actually aware of deciding how I choose to act and acting well, the more I will support a mature and mindfully appreciative self as well as maturity and appreciation as social customs and part of my reputation.
Until we begin to move beyond tolerance and speak about as well as enact appreciation and maturity, we can throw stones from our glass houses until the "chickens come home to roost", to use a memorable phrase. If I want you to treat me as a mature and decent individual, however I choose to identify and whatever my roles are, I will have to be able to line up my intentions and actions during moments of adversity. Someone once said, "Only the tested can inspire the fearful." (Test yourself: are you really a prick to black homeowners or white cops? Is that genuinely who you are?) That seems a much better example to me than, "Do as I say, not as I do." We must teach one another to act from within roles or types while going beyond those types themselves. I may not be completely described by my body or emotions or roles, but they are what I have to work with for now!
Enforcement of laws needs the domination that literal power brings to a situation. Support of customs has a different feel than legislation and the execution of laws by folks in uniforms that show them to be the enforcers. Appreciation and the equanimity it takes to get through adverse situations is supported by mindfulness practice and experience with social diversity and a diversity of value systems. Without being present, we are not living in real time. When that happens, we lose ourselves for the moment and are left with potentially competing roles and narratives. In reality, we are not so socially and spiritually poverty-stricken.
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