In his book Meditation: The Buddhist Way of Tranquility and Insight, Kamalashila focuses primarily on two forms of Buddhist mediation, mindfulness of breathing and development of friendliness:

...of all the different methods [the Buddha] taught, there were two he particularly emphasized. One was the Mindfulness of Breathing. The other was known as the Metta Bhavana--'the development of friendliness'.

...Certainly the Buddha's own first step towards Enlightenment was taken in a spirit of friendliness--in his desire that people should find true happiness. There is probably no worthwhile human development without that spirit.

...A hate-filled person can never become very wise...

By meditating on metta, or loving-kindness, we can cultivate healthier states of mind whenever we wish.

Linking generosity to wisdom and anger to ignorance makes sense. If we're honest with ourselves, we'll recognize that the accomplishments of which we're proudest were undertaken in a spirit of good will and the incidents by which we're most embarrassed came about through aggression. But as with so much in Buddhism, there's great profundity available through that commonsensical mundanity. We cannot change reality, but we can change our experience of reality. Perhaps the most persistent feature of our view of reality is our exclusive identification with a single, finite self. But to meditate on metta, we must achieve a broader, less exclusive identification:

Concentrate on all four people--that's yourself, your friend, the neutral person, and the difficult person--and develop metta equally towards each of them, so that you feel no less friendliness for any one of them.

To develop friendliness towards a friend is simple, but it's much harder to do so towards a neutral person, a difficult person, or (perhaps hardest of all) oneself. The practice of shifting our orientation such that it's the same towards each member of this group will, over time, force us transcend our exclusive identification with a single self.

The Internet offers no shortage of neutral and difficult people to include in this practice. I've certainly managed to find challenges to my ability to develop friendliness. Such incidents have been painful, not least because I've had no idea how to resolve them. I found more or less successful conclusions, but never resolution. I was never able to overcome my sense of a self seeking validation. For me, these weren't simply abstract exchanges of words--they were my self suffering under attacks from another self. Though I did manage to extend my identification beyond my bodily self, I did so in the wrong direction: I made myself smaller and more abstract (or less real). My guess is that the answer lies in the other direction--a larger, more tangible identification. But what does this mean in practical terms? Is this anything more than an empty injunction to love others as we're to love ourselves?

I've contemplated this over the last few weeks as I've read Jacob's Chatter, which is best described by Kyle:

He is Essence of Slashdot Troll. And the funniest part? His detractors have gotten so exercised by him that somebody even spent money on a domain just to make fun of and debunk this fictional geek.

Kyle's right that, beyond being a spot-on Onion-style satire of the vitriol that the Internet has spawned, this site has also managed to attract detractors who attack Jacob in exactly the tone he has taken. In their minds, the distinction between themselves and Jacob is that they're justified and he's not. They don't seem to realize how little that matters, how arguing with a crazy person will make you crazy yourself. I've undertaken my own Quixotic tiltings against the descent of the discourse, with little success.

Perhaps the personification of the suffering to be found in the comments on Jacob's site is Jay Little. Jay (who's married) started with the expected geek insults about Jacob's presumed inability to get laid. But a quick visit to Jay's Web site--where, for instance, a decidedly unprofessional rant about a former employer can be found next to a message to prospective employers and his resumé--suggested that all may not be well. And as Jay wrestled with the chimera of Jacob, he descended into a spiralling madness that culminated in this sad, confused admission:

I'm of the personal opinion that Jacob is in fact not real...

...I've even gone so far as to waste my time putting up a page of Jacob rumors designed only to annoy the piss out of him (yes I made up the majority of the information on that page).

Who would make an effort "to annoy the piss out" of someone, particularly if that someone "is in fact not real"? This is deeply troubling--far more troubling than the twisted construction of Jacob. And I'm not saying this to take Jacob's side against Jay or to denigrate Jay or claim some superiority over him. I feel sympathy for him. I know his suffering, but I also know the path leading to the cessation of that suffering. I hope that Jay is able to find that path, that he comes to realize that nothing he posts in the comments on a Weblog or anywhere else on the Internet will ameliorate his suffering. To create and develop a self on the Internet is to identify with that which is smaller and less real. We must aspire to more in our identifications if we want to stop suffering.