Challenges, Tests and Justice

“God’s Justice Has No Time Limit”

Since 2014, I have been having difficult experiences in Turkey.  Along the way I have grown, learnt a lot, explored, and questioned myself.  I have found it hard to stick to “the straight path” but have somehow managed to do so. I’d like to share it briefly as it may help others in different ways.

With my father’s passing in 2008, I inherited a smallholding with a house and hazelnut trees on the land. For a few years, I let my immediate family care for it but after a while I saw it was deteriorating and that a few things weren’t quite right. So I decided to look into it and spend more time in it. I love the countryside – after all it’s my land and my house. In the Black Sea region one can experience all the four different seasons and enjoy them all fully. 

My neighbours at the farmland are my cousins who I thought would be pleased to have my company. My default setting is to try to do good, be good, respect all people, and also respect nature and animals both wild and tame.

Little did I know that these neighbours would be the worst people I have ever encountered.

As I started to investigate things, I realised that the Land Registry had also made errors.  I had border issues with one adjoining property, plus the family graveyard and the main access road to my house and some pathways weren’t even registered by the land registry. On top of that, one of the neighbours was running his waste water into the land which is behind my house. 

Since that time, another neighbour has deliberately blocked the road to my house with metal bars encased in concrete.  They feel they can do this as it’s not registered as an access yet by the land registry.

To cut a long story short, at the moment I can’t go to my house by car, the road is closed so that as things currently stand I have no way of going to my house, not even by a registered walking path. As these neighbours discovered what I was doing to legalise and clean my property, one by one they blocked me and did the worst things a human being can do to another person. It reached a peak this summer.

I have experienced lying, jealous people who are ungrateful,  egomaniac and bearing grudges and worse just in this little village. As one can imagine, it has shaken me mentally, and been a huge challenge. How can  some people sink this low?

These neighbours have even tried to attack me in front of the city health department officers, who were there to check my complaints for the 5^th time.  They approached me with sticks & farm tools etc. in order to make a show in the hope that I would be scared!!! 

They were surprised to see that I didn’t move an inch and instead very calmly waited for them with my home-made Kali Stick in my hand. Thank God the officer pushed them back. Otherwise, I had been determined to protect myself in front of my house and land and had he not done this, some of them, if not all, would have been badly injured. 

There is a saying in Turkish “A soft horse kicks hard.”. These people lack every humane attribute and the only language they understand is violence and law enforcement. 

If I was to sum all my experiences, it would be as follows:

1. I questioned myself. Have I done anything bad to anybody in the past that this karma has hit back?  I examined every possible relationship, friendship business or personal and even sent out messages to some. Asked for forgiveness if anything had bothered them. I got some pleasant surprises with people saying I was a good man with good deeds which kept me morally on the right path. So this was a very good exercise.  
2. Some people are inherently bad and evil. No matter how good you are or how nicely and politely you behave, it won’t change them. I found confirmation of this idea in a small book by Arabi. It was enlightening to see that I wasn’t alone in thinking this. 
3. I have been using The Daily Stoic Journal with daily readings which teaches the ideas and practice of the Stoic philosophy. At times I have found it hard to agree to the ideas in it. But it kept me checking my actions and somehow trying to relate the ideas. Good practice.
4. I increased my meditation from 15-20 minutes a day to 40 minutes. I got pretty good at it. Both in meditation itself and the benefits it provided me with mentally, emotionally even physically.  This was also a refuge in the other dimension. 
5. No matter what others do, I won’t allow myself to be dragged down to that level. I’ll deal with them within a legal framework and never compromise my good nature and deeds. Once I reached this conclusion, I felt good. Imagine you walk past the idiot who has been provoking you, and you know that with a side kick from martial arts training you could send him 3 meters away. It’s very tempting and would calm your anger but you don’t do it. You know that with a snappy punch you could smash the ugly face of that idiot who is swearing your family loudly, but you don’t do it. That is the level of control I am talking about.
6. Bad people provoke you every way they can to pull you down to their level.  If you don’t they really get mad and increase their ugly deeds. Always follow the law, let them have small wins, it will never satisfy the evil which possesses their souls. They will always make mistakes. Big ones.

I can write more but I think overall one can get the idea. Being good and following the right path is not easy. If the challenges are used properly, they make you stronger, and solidify what you stand for. And finally, justice always prevails.  I like this quote someone once wrote on Facebook “God’s justice has no time limit.”.