Satyagraha

Satyagraha is Gandhi’s name for holding to what is true and refusing to answer a wrong with a blow. It is a method. You state the fact, you decline to cooperate with the wrong, and you take the cost on yourself rather than pass it on.

It is not a mood. Anger, certainty, and the feeling of being on the right side do not turn a force into truth-force. If you skip a fact because the cause feels pure, you have left the truth out of the method.

The two moves stay together. Keep the fact in view, and refuse the blow. You do not have to agree with the wrong, and you do not have to hide what happened. Striking back and calling the strike a defense of truth is the move this lesson refuses.

The public insult

An insult is public and false. One reply corrects the record and accepts the social cost. Another matches the insult with a harder one and calls the matching a defense of the truth.

Only the first reply is satyagraha. The fact was kept. The blow was not returned.

Try this today Next time you are wronged, state the facts calmly and decline to hit back.