Buddha celebrating Spring in my waterfall
CC Jean Stimmell

In our fraught times of Cancel Culture, Elizabeth Dias presents a better metaphor to live by in this excerpt from her article, "Repairing Generations of Trauma, One Lotus Flower at a Time:" 

"It is one of the oldest religious symbols: the lotus flower, blooming out of muddy waters.
The mud represents our suffering, pain and delusions, said Duncan Ryuken Williams, a Soto Zen Buddhist priest, retelling the ancient lesson. And the purpose of Buddhism is to rise above.
But there’s an even deeper metaphor: In pure water, a lotus flower will not grow.
It is in the mud that the nutrients are found. 
“And so our liberation is actually not about transcending or distancing ourselves from trauma or pain and suffering, but it is to acknowledge how we can transform ourselves, our communities, our nation, our world, from all that pain,” he said.
True repair goes beyond legislation, Dr. Williams explained. Trauma is in all of us, in our psyches and our bones, he said, some of it inherited and some of it our own.
“It is less about atoning for sin, and more about trying to take some responsibility based on awakening to the fact that we are multiple, we are interconnected, we are interlinked, and our destinies are very much intertwined, because that is how karma works,” he said.

 https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/05/us/repairing-generations-of-trauma-one-lotus-flower-at-a-time.html?campaign_id=2&emc=edit_th_20210506&instance_id=30210&nl=todaysheadlines®i_id=30753738&segment_id=57352&user_id=273ae8c1ede4fde7d59a2b0627accb92