Life

Put it right there on my chart

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I found myself at the gym last night wishing that there was a punching bag. What kind of gym doesn’t have a punching bag? I wanted to kick something, punch something, wrestle something to the floor. I could have done all those things to one of the three men who were lifting really heavy weights over on the other side of the room, I guess, but I didn’t. I’m thinking: wise choice.

No punching or kicking. I restrained myself, and channeled my anger into the Stairmaster. I bet I climbed to Saudi Arabia. “Stomped” would probably be a better word. The poor machine groaned when I finally stepped off it. Yes, I was a little tense.

Somebody made me angry yesterday, and the more I thought about it as the day went on, the madder I got. My hair was practically on fire by the time I got to the gym. What made me so mad, you ask? Just something thoughtless somebody said. Isn’t that silly? I got that angry over something I probably shouldn’t even care about. But I felt slighted, disrespected, and taken for granted.

I couldn’t let it go. It ate at me all day. All the things I wanted to say in response to this person ran through my head at light speed all day. Of course, at the time, I didn’t say anything, so the person doesn’t even know I’m angry. I’m the only one suffering here. Well, me and the poor Stairmaster.

So, the good thing in this tale of woe is that I marched to Saudi Arabia to get all that anger out of my system. I didn’t drink, I didn’t eat, I didn’t break or throw anything, and I didn’t blow up at the people (furry and otherwise) I live with. Those were my best ways of dealing with anger in the past…well, those and denial.

I didn’t hurt myself or someone else because I was hurt, and I didn’t pretend I wasn’t hurt.

Gold star for me, I think. Perhaps I’m growing up, after all.

Ins and outs

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Me (on the right) in college roughly 100 years ago.

I have never been cool. I’ve tried; but I just can’t pull it off. Not when I was a kid, not as a college student, not as a thirty-something, not now. I’m geeky, wear what I want, do what I want (currently within the bounds of my responsibilities at home), and I’m not at all interested in most of the things that American culture says I should be interested in.

In school, while other kids were passing notes and giggling about boys, I was reading every book I could get my hands on, and playing at home with my new microscope, or writing a new story or play. I put on puppet shows. My mother made me wear my hair cut very short, and she picked out my clothes until I was 14 or so.

Not good.

In high school I wrote poetry, and was on the student council. I was in the French club, and on the Drama and Debate teams. Total geek (or nerd, as we were called then). I worked and bought my own clothes, and my mother gave up on the hair thing. So I didn’t look like a loser anymore, but I still wasn’t cool.

Which is not to say I didn’t have good friends, and actually I got along okay with everybody in my class. I smoked, so there was common ground with the “burn-outs,” and my best friend was a cheerleader, so I had an “in” with the  “popular/jock” kids. True Aquarian–everybody was my friend. But I was still not cool, and I knew it. Sometimes it bothered me, sometimes it didn’t.

In college I was wild about computers and journalism. My roommate was cool, and I got a little “cool” benefit from her, but mostly I was really into school, but not really that into the social aspects of school. I didn’t have very many friends, but I didn’t really care that much. I got along okay with the girls on my floor, and later with my apartment-mates, and we had a lot of fun, but mostly I was more involved with the sort of obscure things that interested me, and not much into the things that went on around me.

My college boyfriend was a geek at heart, but was still trying really hard to be cool. Mostly we just did our geek stuff, and talked endlessly about computers and writing and how we were going to save the world from itself. But coolness was always very important to him. He was a “yuppie” before the term was even invented; and we just couldn’t bridge that gap. Ultimately we parted ways. It took me a while to get over it.

I have always been drawn to the people on the fringes. They were usually the people who were interested in the same things I was. The ones just trying to find their way; certain that there was more to life than all the superficial stuff going on around them. They accepted a lot in me that at the time was hard even for me to accept–depression and self-doubt, especially.

So I have been fortunate to know some extremely interesting and unusual people, and now I’m able to understand that they are the cool people, after all. They (and I) didn’t fit in with popular culture at any time, but that’s okay. For whatever reason, we had to make our own way, and when we were able to do it together that was great.

So, I’m a little past middle-aged now, and not worried anymore about being cool. I worry about being a decent human being and my health, and that’s pretty much it. I still have long hair and I still wear what I want, without worrying about whether I fit in. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.

It’s okay either way.

Maybe people should worry about whether they fit in with me. Who knows, maybe those of us who are a little bit “out of it” are the “in-crowd” after all. Ultimately I think we’re all okay, and there’s room for us all on this great big planet. Cool or not, in or out. We’re all just us, doing the best we can, and that’s what really matters.

This little light of mine…and yours

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An old Hasidic tale…

The rabbi asked his students: “How can we determine the hour of dawn, when the night ends and the day begins?” One of the students suggested, “When from a distance you can distinguish between a sheep and a dog.” “No,” said the rabbi. “It is when you can look into the face of human beings and you have enough light in you to recognize them as your brothers and sisters. Up until then it is night, and darkness is still with us.”

The student is never right in these stories, is he? You think you have the answer, but no, once again, you`ve got it wrong. All your study and striving in life means nothing, because you still don’t have it right. And you probably never will. At least, it feels that way.

Because, as always, the answer is within you — the last place we remember to look. Why? Perhaps because it seems to all be happening OUT THERE. That’s where the action is, the really interesting stuff. Out there. Not in here. In here there is only me, and I’m sick of me. I’m tired of being in the dark. I want to be out there, where it seems to be bright and interesting, warm and inviting. There doesn’t seem to be enough light in me. So I reach out there, out there, out there.

I reach out to you, because I think I can see your light, and I want to be warmed by it. I reach out to God, whatever I think that means. I reach out to anybody – like a plant, I turn to any light I think I see, in the hopes of receiving nourishment, fulfillment. I want reassurance, warmth and comfort. I reach out there, to the flash and pop of modern life. I reach for food, or drugs, or alcohol, or money, or sex – whatever I think will give me that buzz and blast of light. Come on baby, light my fire. When there is no real light, artificial light seems like it’ll work. And it does, for a while.

For a little while. Then you start to feel cold again, and you realize, yup, still in the darkness. Still in here. Still me. All of us/only me. All in the darkness together, but it’s too dark in here to see anybody else, so I think I`m alone. And really, I am.

Because there will be no real light in the world until I nurture the light within me, and you nurture the light within you. Find the light and protect it, build it up, until we can all see by it. Not OUT THERE. In here.

In me.

In you.

In us. All of us.

Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled—
to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.
I want to believe I am looking

into the white fire of a great mystery.
I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing—
that the light is everything—that it is more than the sum
of each flawed blossom rising and falling. And I do.
― Mary Oliver, House of Light.

A guiding light lost to us. RIP Mary Oliver 1935-2019.

 

The space between

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Disappointment

I was feeling pretty religious
standing on the bridge in my winter coat
looking down at the gray water:
the sharp little waves dusted with snow,
fish in their tin armor.

That`s what I like about disappointment:
the way it slows you down,
when the querulous insistent chatter of desire
goes dead calm

and the minor roadside flowers
pronounce their quiet colors,
and the red dirt of the hillside glows.

She played the flute, he played the fiddle
and the moon came up over the barn.
Then he didn’t get the job, —
or her father died before she told him
that one, most important thing—

and everything got still.

It was February or October
It was July
I remember it so clear
You don`t have to pursue anything ever again
It`s over
You`re free
You`re unemployed

You just have to stand there
looking out on the water
in your trench coat of solitude
with your scarf of resignation
lifting in the wind.

-Tony Hoagland, from What Narcissism Means to Me (Graywolf Press)


I love this poem. You have to just stand there. That`s just it, isn’t it? There`s nothing you can do with disappointment, but just stand there. Stand in the middle of it, watch it go by, over, around you, with only resignation to buffer its effects.

I’ve been thinking about disappointment a bit lately. I am often disappointed – in myself, in other people, in the way things turn out in life. Who isn’t? Right or wrong, we all have expectations and hopes. I try not to have those expectations, but some small part of my brain, or heart, or left calf muscle, harbors secret ambitions – secret even to me, until the querulous insistent chatter of desire goes dead calm.

Disappointed. Again.

Disappointment fills in the space between What Is and What Could Be. I love What Could Be. I want to live there. My spirit does live there, or at least spends most of its time there. My spirit believes that everything is possible, and soars at the prospect of my potential, the potential of human beings, and this earth, and the mysteries beyond this earth.

But I’m always brought back to What Is, and all I can do is just stand there. Who I Am, Who Other People Are, The Way the World Works Now…What Is. That’s all there there is, really. All the rest or it lives only in my head. Just a dream. Not real. Not here. What Isn’t. And Won’t Be.

Can’t be?

But that’s the danger of disappointment–the excuse it gives you, the scarf of resignation–to give up, never to pursue anything ever again. What’s the point? I’m always tempted to wrap myself up in that scarf and just say, “No more.” Standing here on the bridge, I think, why not just give it up?

And the answer echoes off the water: Because that’s not how it works. Life is hard. People are hard, growing is hard, keeping going is hard. But there’s so much more: beauty and love and joy and music and poetry. And sometimes I am who I need to be, and the world is what it seems to be. It’s all mixed up; disappointment and joy, pain and love.

What Is is What Is Now, and What Could Be may be What Is someday. We don’t know. I don’t know. It’s that not knowing that is the other side of disappointment; the other side of resignation.

In the space between; that’s where we live.

Life is with people

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Life is With People is a book I read in college. I’ve never forgotten the title because it’s so true. The book was specifically about Jewish communities throughout history, and how the idea of community is woven so completely into the fabric of Jewish life that it never occurs to them to question the value of it.

I plodded through the book then – it was required reading for a Jewish Studies course I was taking; the course was great, but the book was not – and beyond the simple description I just gave, I don’t remember a thing about it, except that the cover was bright orange. I think of the title often, though.

Here’s the thing: my Aquarian heart knows that life is with people. I was born knowing that. Aquarians are hard-wired for brotherhood, sisterhood, neighborhood; whatever ‘hood you want to name. When in Sunday school they told me that Jesus asked me to love my neighbor as myself, I got it. I did then, and I do now. I embrace the idea of community, completely, wholly, happily.

Exclusion makes me angry. I can sniff it a mile away, and it always turns my stomach. The idea that some people are acceptable, and others are not – for any reason – is simply ridiculous to me. More than ridiculous, it is repulsive. Exclusion requires judgment, intolerance, and fear. People cite all kinds of reasons for exclusion – most often morality – but let’s be clear: it’s about ignorance and fear, and nothing else. There is nothing moral about prejudice. The Bible, supposedly the last word (no pun intended) on morality is pretty clear on this point, too: Judge not, lest ye be judged.

I don’t find any ambiguity in that statement at all. Same as “love thy neighbor as thyself.” Clear, concise; no room for misunderstanding. Is there?

Is there?

I was a card-carrying, singing-in-the-choir Episcopalian for most of my life. I explored every other religion/belief system/moral tenet out there when I was a young adult. Some resonated with me, others did not. I took what had meaning for me and left the rest. So I had sort of a hybrid personal religion, but I always maintained ties with Christianity in general, and the Episcopal church in particular.

Until 10 years ago, or so. I still love the Episcopal church in general, especially the little one in my tiny town. My parents were married there, I was baptized and confirmed there. I really did sing in the choir. When I got older, and understood the poetry and beauty in the liturgy, I loved it even more. I loved the community spirit of the congregation. I loved coffee hour. I looked forward to Sunday. I was a believer, baby!

I believed in God, though probably I defined that more broadly than even most of my pretty broad-minded-as-Christians-go fellow Episcopalians. And I believed in people – the power of the human spirit. The Episcopal church was the first to appoint an openly gay man as a bishop. Further evidence to me that these were my people. 

Then our beloved priest retired, and we got a new one from out east. He was a bigot, misogynist, and a homophobe. A man of God. Believed in Christ. Believed that people of color, women and LBGT people were less than God’s cherished creatures. He protested the appointment of Bishop Robinson, openly and vehemently. When our bishop came to visit the parish, he embarrassed us by spewing his hate following the Bishop’s speech to the congregation.

Yikes.

So I’m thinking, okay, this is a test of my belief that everyone has a place at the table. God has a sense of humor. He’s testing me.

All are welcome?

Okay, how about this guy?

I failed the test. I didn’t condemn the priest as human being, but I couldn’t deal with him and his hypocrisy every Sunday. The worst part was that I discovered that some of the congregants, many of whom I had known and loved since childhood, shared his beliefs.

It broke my heart. I stopped going.

Years later we got a new priest and I started going again, but it was different. It was tainted. I gave up after a couple of years. I realized finally that I no longer trusted any of it, including God.

Mainly I didn’t trust myself, and that’s what I had the most trouble with. Confronted with people who didn’t believe what I believe, I crumbled. Judge not, lest ye be judged. I couldn’t do it. I’m as much a hypocrite as that priest. I judge him for judging others.

Ack.

I believe there is a place for us all in our community, and yet, when it really comes down to it, there are people I would exclude, maybe. Ideas I would exclude, certainly. Clearly I have more to learn, more work to do. I’m challenged to accept intolerant, judgmental people as readily as I welcome people who think as I do, or I am just as intolerant. That’s the paradox. There’s no way around it.

Life is with people. They only way for us all to survive is to accept and live that. Everyone must be welcome, no matter what. We are each of us unique, and our challenge is to find our common ground and work together to benefit us all. Community.

No small thing.

And yet, everything.

 

The thing with feathers

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Several years ago I decided to purge my closet of all the clothes that didn’t fit anymore. I had heard of a local program that helps welfare women dress for first-time job interviews – the kinds of jobs that might help them improve their financial situation. I had a bunch of clothes left over from a former life and a former body, including business suits and other suitable attire for job-interviewing. I packed them all up and took them downstairs and put them by the door to be taken away.

Every time I went out the door for months I’d walk past that box of clothes, and think, “I should take those with me and drop them off.” But I didn’t. Over and over I didn’t. So I started wondering why. I knew I’d never wear them again – at that point they were all 3 sizes too small, and the business that required me to wear them was long gone. That part of my life had ended three years prior, so why it was so hard to get rid of those clothes?

Because I had not fully accepted that that wasn’t still going to be my life. Some part of me was hanging on to the hope that it had all been a mistake; a bump in the road, and that I would have that life I loved so much again. It took a long time to come to terms with that loss.

This is not, of course, the rational part of me. It’s a part of me that says “no.” No to loss, no to powerlessness, no to reality. This is not the best part of me, but is a part nonetheless. That part of me occasionally still doesn’t understand why trying as hard as you can makes no difference. That part of me thinks life should be fair. That part of me really believes all that stuff about working hard and succeeding.

I’ve finally accepted that the reality is that you can do all that you can, have faith, work hard, believe completely that everything will work out, and still fail. I know that life is not fair. I know that life is about struggle and loss and finding joy and strength in spite of it. But there’s still a little bit of me – that part that couldn’t get rid of those clothes – that doesn’t want life to be like that.

I want life to be fair.

When I tell people about my past, I say that I lost my business. Like I don’t know where it is right now, but I’m sure it will turn up. It also implies that I really didn’t have anything to do with that loss; I was just working along and it wandered off, or maybe, was abducted by a group of marauding business stealers.

I have trouble saying that the business failed. Businesses don’t fail, people do. And so if I’m going to use that word, I have to admit that I failed, and I was no more ready to do that than I was to give up the clothes, the files, and the business cards for a long, long time. It’s still hard.

The weight of that loss – of my belief in myself, in possibility, and in the universe’s willingness to support me – was more than I could bear. So I stuck it in the closet for years. What do you do when everything you believed about yourself, other people, the world, and God all turned out to be false? How do you go on after you’ve discovered that truth about yourself, other people, and life – that you can rely on nothing, ever?

Life just is what it is – sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s difficult, but no matter what you do, how you live, how hard you try, there is no guarantee. Without diluting that knowledge with drugs or alcohol, or the distractions of the world, how do we go on?

We just do. We have to. You come to rely on yourself, be true to yourself, and you just keep going. Every now and again you drag the past out of the closet and decide whether you can finally let it go, or whether you want to hang on to some things a little longer – just in case.

In between you hope. Just hope; that the world might accidentally sometimes work out like you want it to, or that you’ll become the person you need to be to keep going without stumbling when it doesn’t.

Or maybe you just hope that the sun is shining tomorrow.

Maybe that’s enough.

Finding my way

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Is the American Dream still a thing? Do kids still believe in it – the belief that you can be anything you want to be, if only you try hard enough? I admit I used to believe it. I grew up in the 60s and 70s and I think we all believed it.

Maybe it’s just a youth thing, and isn’t unique to this country at all. Everybody thinks they know how to do it; everybody thinks they have the secret to life when they are young, and that they will be successful. It’ll be different for me. But some of us – I would venture to say most of us – have learned the real secret of life: it’s about failure, not success, after all. Success is easy. It’s failure that stretches us and helps us to grow.

I read stuff all the time about people who have risked everything to follow their dreams and who have succeeded big time. Yay for them! The message I get from these stories is that I should do the same; all I lack is courage. My lack of courage is the only thing stopping me from living the life of my dreams. Hesitating, or stopping to consider things like money or time or the rest of the world has more to do with my lack of courage than actual reality, because, after all – here it comes: I create my own reality. Right? So all I have to do is create what I want. Presto! If what I have in my life is not what I want, then I’m just not doing it right.

Well…I just don’t believe it’s that simple.

I have to say, I do believe in the esoteric truth of this principle. I think someday (if we and the planet survive long enough) we’ll have a better grasp on our ability to manipulate matter at the molecular (energetic) level. I believe thoughts have power. I believe in the collective unconscious, and I believe that everything on this planet and in our bodies ultimately comes down to the balance of energy and the power of the human spirit. But I do not believe that I create my own reality by simply changing my mind, or wishing harder, or dreaming bigger. Nor frankly, do I want to.

I have learned the hard way that when I try to “make things happen,” or create my own reality – I get kicked in the teeth. On the other hand, when I let things flow, everything turns out pretty good, or at least not horrible, most of the time. Not exactly what I had cooked up in my grandiose little ego-mind, but okay nonetheless. I think if I hear one more person say “Let go and let God,” I’ll have to spit on something, but that’s exactly what I try to do now, though I would substitute Tao for God.

Here’s all I know for sure: Life is hard and wonderful. The range of stuff that can happen to human beings on this planet goes from short-lived really terrific to longer-than-you-think-you-can-endure really horrible.

So I think the trick is not to dream bigger or try harder, but to be happy with whatever is the reality right now. Be grateful everyday for all that I have and all that I’ve been spared. We have to honor our struggles and our pain, and then just get on with it.

Stop trying to “create” the life you want. Live the life you have.

If there’s something you really feel called to do, do it, or at least set your sights in that direction and plan a route. Just know and accept that nothing’s guaranteed. Life is just going to be what it is, no matter what we do or want or think. You will succeed or fail or experience something in between. Don’t be surprised, though, if they all look like the same thing. Our ideas of success have nothing to do with the way success is defined in universal or spiritual terms.

Clearly, some people are here to dream big dreams and to do big things, hopefully things that improve life on this planet for all of us (including the furry, feathered, buzzing, growing, and swimming things, too). That’s their path. But most of us are called to live smaller lives, to tread a less celebrated path, and we must learn to live as sweetly and as gently as possible along the way.

I’ve given up on my American Dream grandiosity, and am now concentrating on what I believe are the truly important things; the challenges that have been put in front of me right now, right here:

Be kind. Tread gently on the planet. Be of use, help out whomever and wherever I can. Be a good friend. Do good work.

I’m still riding along on training wheels for all of that stuff, and probably will be all my life. I started out on a tricycle, though, so I’m doing better, and I’m grateful for that. I remember writing a few years ago that I was in training for greatness (yes, I confess: affirmations seemed like a good idea at one point).

Now I believe I’m in training for not-greatness.

And that’s just where I want to be.

 

Kindness matters

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When I was in business, I had a client who used to make big speeches about “random acts of kindness.” He had read a book, and was convinced that the secret to life required only these unexpected gestures; even the smallest act could yield enormous results. He was very excited to think that each person could make a difference. He always made a point of relating every such act he had performed recently in order to illustrate the theory and how well he was adhering to it. The upshot of the speech was, of course, what a great place the world would be if everyone was as thoughtful as he was. What a great guy.

The truth is he was a good guy, but he evidently was only committed to random acts. Anything as structured and regular as paying invoices on time didn’t seem to qualify. He didn’t pay me, he didn’t pay his employees, and presumably he didn’t pay his other suppliers. His delinquency was one of the contributing factors in the loss of my business, and certainly caused hardship for his employees. He was aware of the effects of his actions, but was not able to take responsibility for them.

He was causing other people pain, but kept talking about kindness.

The reality of who we are is often divorced from who we think we are. Most people see themselves as either far better or far worse than they really are. Not many people see the truth: that most of us are just doing the best we can. Sometimes we get it right, sometimes we don’t. We are both the best and the worst that we think we are, and a lot of stuff in between.

I remember a conversation I had once with friends at a Chinese restaurant. Someone’s fortune said: “Everything will now come your way.” Everybody oohed and aahed over it. How great! Everything is going to be terrific! I pointed out that it doesn’t say “Everything will be terrific.” It said, “Everything will now come your way.”

Big difference, but it took them a while to see it. Everything is simply…uh…every thing. All things, good and bad, welcome and unwelcome. And that’s life. Everything does come our way, but we reject some things as being “bad,” and rejoice at the rest. Where there is light, there is shadow. We forget the shadow part — forget that it is a normal part of life — that without the shadow there can be no light. Light is defined by shadow, and vice versa. Black needs White, Good needs Evil. They both have to be present.

Often we can’t accept the shadow in ourselves. We don’t even see it most of the time. It’s there, believe me. In everyone. No one is perfect, and I think, actually, that is the point. The shadow — our own, others’, the country’s, and the world’s — the shadow side of life in total, is our path to freedom, but because it’s strewn with big ugly rocks that are difficult to pass, and guarded by big hairy monsters, we’d rather not go down it. We keep thinking there must be another way.

I would like to believe there’s an easy way, too. But I just don’t think there is. There is just the one path, this “human life” road, rocks and monsters and all. The thing is, though, that it’s an exciting journey; for better or worse, and sometimes it’s a lot of fun. Sometimes beautiful, sometimes arduous. But it is always worth it.

Yes, I believe that. Even when people let me down. Even when life lets me down. Even when I let myself down. We’re all just here, and we’re doing the best we can, and that’s okay. Be kind to yourself, be kind to others. It’s hard for everyone.

Step into your shadow. Examine it. Understand it. It really is everything coming your way.

Ultimately, it’s the only way.

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No joke

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Why don’t cannibals eat clowns?

Because they taste funny.

Ba dump ba!

That’s my favorite joke. It always makes me laugh. Now you know: I’m really rather easily amused!

I’m trying to cheer myself up. I had a less than perfect day. Waaaaaay less than perfect, as a matter of fact, and I’m beat. Still I have to remember: the reality of my life is that my worst day is still usually better than the days at least 50% of the people on the planet experience.

I have a job. I have enough food, and I have teeth with which to chew a warm nutritious dinner. I have a warm, cozy house to come home to at the end of this less than perfect day. I have a car that runs, money to pay my bills, good health, eyes to see, and two legs to carry me where I need to go. I haven’t lost my home to a tsunami or forest fire, or my life to a murderous dictator.

I love this poem by Wendell Berry:

What We Need is Here

Geese appear high over us,
pass, and the sky closes. Abandon,
as in love or sleep, holds
them to their way, clear
in the ancient faith: what we need
is here. And we pray, not
for new earth or heaven, but to be
quiet in heart, and in eye,
clear. What we need is here.

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The trick is to remember that, especially on less than perfect days, because sometimes it seems like something’s missing, or something is out of place, or not right. If only I had…If only it was…I wish I could…

It depends on where we choose to look, I think. At least, that’s it for me. Not that the problems aren’t there, and not that they’re not difficult sometimes. Life is not easy. Not for anyone. But it is definitely harder for some than others, and I don’t ever want to lose sight of that. My life is sometimes challenging, but it has never been really horrible. It doesn’t even register on the scale of human suffering. I have what I need, though I may not always have what I want.

I think that’s a distinction we’ve lost sight of in this country. Want vs Need. They are not the same thing. We have an idea that we deserve better. I hear people say that a lot – that they have rights; that they deserve attention because they think someone is getting something better than what they have. Better stuff, more stuff, better treatment, whatever. Entitlement is an idea that has taken over our culture. Why do we imagine we’re entitled to anything? Aren’t people in Bangledesh or Afghanistan entitled, too? What do they deserve? Is it just people in this country? Have we done something to “deserve” special consideration?

What about people in Rwanda, or China, or Russia or Liberia? Does our American citizenship make us more deserving? A certain color skin? A religion? A way of life? Are we entitled to a perfect life because we work, or don’t work, or give to charity, or disapprove of the homeless? Are we better because we haven’t landed on the street or in a shelter?

No! Of course, not. It’s all just us, folks, and until we really understand that — that we are all in this thing together, and that nobody wins until everybody gets in the game — we aren’t entitled to anything.

A Jewish parable: “There were some sailors in a boat, which started to ship water. One sailor began to dig a hole under his seat to let the water out. The others stopped him at once. He was very surprised and rather angry. ‘What right have you got to stop me?’ he said. ‘I was digging a hole under my seat, not yours.'”

This life doesn’t come automatically with fresh air and good schools, good food, big houses, let alone freedom. A good share of the human beings on this planet have no idea what it is, or can only dream of what it might be like.

We got lucky, if we were born white in the United States of America, were able to get an education, keep all our teeth, work to feed our children, and have time and money left over with which to get fat. It was just luck, plain and simple. Why was I lucky and someone in India was not? I don’t know.

I don’t think why matters. I think only how matters now. How are we going to make it right?

How can we ensure that everybody has the luxury of thinking about a less than perfect day?

On the trail of the talking dog

wsquared2 Comments

I love this:

A guy sees a sign in front of a house: “Talking Dog for Sale.” He rings the bell and the owner tells him the dog is in the backyard. The guy goes into the backyard and sees a black mutt just sitting there.
“You talk?” he asks.
“Yep,” the mutt replies.
“So, what’s your story?”
The mutt looks up and says, “Well, I discovered my gift of talking pretty young and I wanted to help the government, so I told the CIA about my gift, and in no time they had me jetting from country to country, sitting in rooms with spies and world leaders, because no one figured a dog would be eavesdropping. I was one of their most valuable spies eight years running. The jetting around really tired me out, and I knew I wasn’t getting any younger and I wanted to settle down. So I signed up for a job at the airport to do some undercover security work, mostly wandering near suspicious characters and listening in. I uncovered some incredible dealings there and was awarded a batch of medals. Had a wife, a mess of puppies, and now I’m just retired.”
The guy is amazed. He goes back in and asks the owner what he wants for the dog. The owner says, “Ten dollars.”
The guy says, “This dog is amazing. Why on earth are you selling him so cheap?”
The owner replies, “He’s just a big liar. He didn’t do any of that stuff.”

Talk about missing the point!

I got a fortune in a Chinese restaurant a couple of years ago that said essentially the same thing: “Stop searching forever. Happiness is just next to you.” I have it taped to my desk, because I have trouble remembering that. Sometimes you just can’t see what’s right in front of you (or next to you). Happiness is just as difficult to find sometimes as a talking dog. Not because it’s not there, but because we don’t recognize it for what it is, or because we’re not looking in the right place.

Sometimes we don’t realize we’re happy until we’re unhappy. The Buddha taught that it is not things or events that make us unhappy; it is our attachment to things and events that causes us always to be dissatisfied. It appears that it is not human nature to simply  be present fully in the moment and experience life directly.

Most often I suffer the same problem as the dog owner in the joke: my expectations get in the way. Things don’t come to me in the form I expect or think I want, so I don’t recognize an opportunity for what it is. By the time I understand, it’s long gone. Then I regret my mistake, I get attached to “what could have been,” and I’m unhappy.

~Sigh~

It’s very hard not to expect things to be a certain way. It is our nature to want to understand our world.  The human brain is wired to fill in gaps, to make patterns, and to find meaning in what the senses perceive. We spend years in school learning about “absolutes” in the world; laws of nature and physics that cannot be broken. Things we can expect to always be the same. 2 x 2 is and always will be 4.

If we couldn’t expect some things to be the same at least most of the time, we would be under constant stress. Expectation makes us feel safe; gives us a feeling of security that we know where things fit in – where we as individuals fit in. The world would be way too scary if nothing had any meaning; if we approached each moment as if it were our first.

In human history it has been to our advantage to exchange spontaneity for constancy; wonder for safety, variety for control. However, that exchange has brought us and our planet to the brink of destruction. That way of thinking,was useful for a long time, but it is not useful now. If we aren’t willing to be surprised we miss joy, we miss beauty, we miss love. We miss life.

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Helen Keller said, “Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is a daring adventure or nothing at all.”

Nothing less than a rebellion against brain chemistry is required. No small thing. At some point each of us has to make a choice: do I go on trying to feel safe, or do I choose to live fully? The second option requires letting go of expectations and seeing the world  and everything in it as it really is, in every moment, and trusting that it’s all good, no matter what it is. Roses have thorns, after all that. That’s just the way things are.

Go forward into that daring adventure. Look for the talking dog. Smell the flowers, accept the rain. It’s not easy, but it’s the only way.

The alternative is nothing at all.

May you listen to your longing to be free.
May the frames of your belonging be large enough for the dreams of your soul.
May you arise each day with a voice of blessing whispering in your heart…something good is going to happen to you.
May you find harmony between your soul and your life.
May the mansion of your soul never become a haunted place.
May you know the eternal longing that lies at the heart of time.
May there be kindness in your gaze when you look within.
May you never place walls between the light and yourself.
May you be set free from the prisons of guilt, fear, disappointment and despair.
May you allow the wild beauty of the invisible world to gather you, mind you, and embrace you in belonging.

~~John O`Donohue