Bodhi isn't a tree
what's spotless isn't a mirror.
Actually there isn't a thing--
where you get this Dust?
--The Sixth Patriarch, Hui Neng
Without an agenda, I don't think you can do harm.
--Mushin
Bodhisattvas, regardless of the phenomenon, understand that form and emptiness share the same body.--Deva (Aryadeva) supp. to the Tripitaka, vol 41
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Something About Religion
There's a conversation I'd like to continue. Until the angel comes back to talk to me again, I have this to say:
Nothing I have experienced has ever disproved or called into the question the omnipresence of G-d. Quite the contrary.
Nothing I have experienced has ever disproved or called into the question the omnipresence of G-d. Quite the contrary.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Can't See This Parade Without Crying
Life is something we barely comprehend. At its best, art tries to understand life.
A respected Flickr acquaintance in Northern Ireland has posted photos which carry a lot of meaning for me, even though I don't understand everything they symbolize-- to me, and even less what they mean to others. They are a snapshot of a complicated story; it's right to try to hold it all somehow; and right to share that complexity with the world.
Here's how I feel: The North has been trapped in time, even more so than the rest of Ireland. And it is poised to change very, very quickly. Life in this beautiful corner of Ireland will not be the same in a decade, with all the good and bad things that entails.
Men with fife and drum march past SUVs. Communities that have mistrusted one another for centuries do their thing, again. Maybe they hold off this year. Maybe one day, they will forget entirely what they used to be.
We in my mother's family were Jewish, before we weren't anymore. It all worked out fine, in spite of that Jewish-sounding surname..until a Holocaust memorial made things undeniable. That's the other side of the family.
Something of me came from Ulster, left Cavan; and was left again in Belfast.
I don't know the past. But I can tell you the future: One day, in Northern Ireland, there will be no marchers. There will be no opposition. There will be no one to remember this battle in World War I; no one to remember any long-ago life or death. Everything we love and everything that irritates the heck out of us will be gone. Vanished like a dream.
...gaté gaté paragaté...
Conmemorations keep an event alive: the conquest of Ireland; valor and slaughter on a French battlefield; the life and death of a beloved teacher.
How many lives are gone, remembered by no one? How many mornings, washing dishes, walking out into the cool air of a new day; how many evenings watching the fire, feeding the cows, finding a warm bed until dawn? Do you know anything about your great-great parents? Anything at all? And what of your life? Will anyone remember? You might end up a name on a piece of paper, a little genealogical entry, should anyone down the road think to capture your life as a bit of data.
Say you do create something. No matter how grand it is, one day, your brilliant poems; the quilts you pieced; the buildings you built; the books you wrote; will be gone, gone, gone.
...parasamgate...
This tiny personal life, with its tiny personal concerns, is so precious, so irrelevant, so approximately-nonexistent in the great span of time. This is not a reason to give up. This is a reason to live fully, greedily, savoring a wonderful meal of passing moments.
The world of twenty years ago is gone. The world of twenty minutes ago is gone. It was so complete and so beautiful, from what I recall.
The thing that keeps me crying about these pictures is not politics; I know who I'm supposed to be by birth and affiliation. It's that these men are
just
so
beautiful.
And every parade, every heartfelt demonstration of what we love, is over. So soon.
Robby Garbett's commentary is excerpted below.
...bodhi svaha!
This series of pictures was taken this evening in the village where I live. For those of you not familiar with the politics and culture of Northern Ireland we are now in what is known as the 'marching season' when bands formed from one sector of the community march to commemorate key events in Loyalist history culminating in the celebration of the anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne July 12th 1689 when the protestant King William defeated the catholic King James. The season is a time when, for some at least, the long term religious, cultural and political tensions surface - some years there are riots and an increase in sectarian violence.
So for some, these marches are far from neutral. They are symbols of a triumphalist, dominant and aggressive section of the community. From that point of view these pictures can be interpreted, focusing as they do on youth as part of this tradition, as a critique of an ingrained system that perpetuates difference and even intolerance. And that does happen.
But that would, to my mind, be a very narrow reading. This year on the 90th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme there is some sign of change.
The anniversary is important in Ireland because two divisions of Irish soldiers: the Ulster division formed mainly of men from the north and the Irish Division formed of volunteers from Ireland's other provinces (Ireland was nominally if reluctantly [and violently] part of the British Empire in 1916). In common with most other formations of the Empire and French troops on 1st July 1916, the Irish divisions suffered horrendous casualties. The social impact in the British Army was compounded by the recruitment strategy that had grouped men from the same towns and even factories together into units on the assumption they would fight better together. But the outmoded and flawed tactics of the British High Command meant that these close knit units were decimated. This naturally had a massive impact on those who survived. This was especially true or the Ulstermen drawn from a small community that historically had seen itself as a beleagured minority.
The anniversary is therefore an important one to remember. In the years following the first world war, civil war in the new Republic of Ireland meant that it was unpopular to remember the part played by Irishmen in the world war. But this year there will be events to commemorate their part (and their sacrifices) - something rare if not unique. At the same time news stories suggest that leaders within the Orange Order are making efforts to limit the tensions around the marches by negotiating routes that don't provoke nationalist communities.
So for me, there is another interpretation. These marches are militaristic. But they are an important part of cultural life and can exist more peacefully than they have in the recent past.
I've certainly become more aware of the complexity around the marches. And if you see them at face value you see pride and colour and a meaningful remembrance of lives given in war.
The tensions and ambiguities are still there. I was challenged by one of the marchers, while others were clearly suspicious.
But I'm glad I took them. It's a complicated history. In the past I have been tempted to see it in one dimensional terms, somehow taking pictures has helped me to look deeper.
Thank you, Robby.
Saturday, June 24, 2006
The Old One-Two
Moving has never been easy.
When I left San Francisco for monastery #1, my fingernails bled from shoving things down into boxes. There was so much stuff to deal with that it was really only by getting slightly soused on some mysterious woody Lithuanian liquor that Hikari and I were able to make the final push--getting everything packed away and cleaning up.
When I left monastery #2, I filled trashcan after trashcan with crap I'd accumulated: empty yogurt containers, pieces of tissue paper, and plastic grocery bags. Even when you have nothing, the urge to accumulate persists. I was like a homeless person with a shopping cart filled with little bits of useless junk.
And now...
On Friday I was at work, having spent the previous day packing 85% of my stuff away. (On schedule, in other words. Although you know the last 15% is the hardest, and the last 5% is harder still.)
Within the span of thirty minutes I went from a happy person helping customers on a warm summer morning to a wretched, fainting, vomiting wreck. A long-lost medical monster from my past, dysmenorrhea, was back. The hardest thing is the waves of pain: it's actually uterine contractions.
The county health clinic said they could see me tomorrow. I left a message with the director, got in a cab and went there anyway. I said I had no problem sitting in the waiting room until they could see me. They saw me.
By the time I saw the nurse practitioner, I was feeling better. Exhausted. But the contractions and my period had abruptly stopped.
The unparalleled joy of not being in great pain was
so
deliciously
wonderful.
I didn't fill the prescription for painkillers. I went home and slept.
I woke up sore all over, and with a big day ahead. The plan was to load almost all my boxes into Abby's car, drive to Portland, sign some paperwork, and begin moving in to the new apartment. And to eat enormous sushi at that place in Moreland afterward, if all went well.
It didn't.
The car had been more tempermental than I remembered, and it started really giving me trouble: not accelerating reliably; dying at lights; and putt-putting on the open road, as though the engine was misfiring. Not a good time to get on I-5.
I pulled over into the only sign of civilization: a big-box hardware store in outermost Keizer.
I was suddenly grateful that I looked like a cute girl, because I know diddly about cars. On a good day, I can check the oil, but I wouldn't know where to put new oil.
A nice guy, Travis, helped me check the oil. No prob there. I tried to start the car, and it was dead; not even a whirring ignition. I went back inside and the floor manger, Max, diagnosed a fuel system problem, and set me up with a phone book.
I called around and got moral support and automotive insight (from a few friends); and a picture of what not to expect on a weekend (from a few mechanics).
The tow truck driver was a fellow my age who from that parallel universe in which beer and fishing and big trucks are taken for granted as basic aspects of life. With all that, we had a peaceful and companionable drive back to Corvallis. He was from Albany originally, and was hoping to pick up some buffalo meat from the place on Hwy 34 on the way back to Keizer. I felt--or I though I could feel--his mind move when a hybrid car with a "saving the earth" vanity plate passed; and again when a dusty old Mercedes wagon "Powered by Used Veggie Oil" overtook us. Or I was projecting; sometimes you don't know where the thought comes from.
Culture wars are all well and good: but I was helped over and over by burly white guys on this day. Human to human. And if my tow truck driver has just bought a new Jeep Grand Cherokee, well..may it benefit all beings, somehow. I was pretty delerious--mostly dehyrdrated--or I would have chuckled when we parted and he told me his name: Darrell. (It's a secret, guilty favorite of mine.)
So my stuff sits defenseless in the parking lot of an auto repair shop. Corvallis is a sweet and tiny town, but that's no guarantee this won't get ripped off. I worried. My head wouldn't stop hurting. I sat zazen on the front porch, watching the light fade, and went to bed.
I woke up this morning to find I'd left the front door unlocked; it had blown open in the night, and my wallet, camera, phone and keys were all sitting undisturbed, in plain sight just inside. Oh me of little faith! To have two major setbacks in two days, to be left really dependent on others' kindness, over and over... How could I possibly worry? I have no control at all; why should moving be easy this time? I can only do my best, keep going forward, and marvel at this life.
When I left San Francisco for monastery #1, my fingernails bled from shoving things down into boxes. There was so much stuff to deal with that it was really only by getting slightly soused on some mysterious woody Lithuanian liquor that Hikari and I were able to make the final push--getting everything packed away and cleaning up.
When I left monastery #2, I filled trashcan after trashcan with crap I'd accumulated: empty yogurt containers, pieces of tissue paper, and plastic grocery bags. Even when you have nothing, the urge to accumulate persists. I was like a homeless person with a shopping cart filled with little bits of useless junk.
And now...
On Friday I was at work, having spent the previous day packing 85% of my stuff away. (On schedule, in other words. Although you know the last 15% is the hardest, and the last 5% is harder still.)
Within the span of thirty minutes I went from a happy person helping customers on a warm summer morning to a wretched, fainting, vomiting wreck. A long-lost medical monster from my past, dysmenorrhea, was back. The hardest thing is the waves of pain: it's actually uterine contractions.
The county health clinic said they could see me tomorrow. I left a message with the director, got in a cab and went there anyway. I said I had no problem sitting in the waiting room until they could see me. They saw me.
By the time I saw the nurse practitioner, I was feeling better. Exhausted. But the contractions and my period had abruptly stopped.
The unparalleled joy of not being in great pain was
so
deliciously
wonderful.
I didn't fill the prescription for painkillers. I went home and slept.
I woke up sore all over, and with a big day ahead. The plan was to load almost all my boxes into Abby's car, drive to Portland, sign some paperwork, and begin moving in to the new apartment. And to eat enormous sushi at that place in Moreland afterward, if all went well.
It didn't.
The car had been more tempermental than I remembered, and it started really giving me trouble: not accelerating reliably; dying at lights; and putt-putting on the open road, as though the engine was misfiring. Not a good time to get on I-5.
I pulled over into the only sign of civilization: a big-box hardware store in outermost Keizer.
I was suddenly grateful that I looked like a cute girl, because I know diddly about cars. On a good day, I can check the oil, but I wouldn't know where to put new oil.
A nice guy, Travis, helped me check the oil. No prob there. I tried to start the car, and it was dead; not even a whirring ignition. I went back inside and the floor manger, Max, diagnosed a fuel system problem, and set me up with a phone book.
I called around and got moral support and automotive insight (from a few friends); and a picture of what not to expect on a weekend (from a few mechanics).
The tow truck driver was a fellow my age who from that parallel universe in which beer and fishing and big trucks are taken for granted as basic aspects of life. With all that, we had a peaceful and companionable drive back to Corvallis. He was from Albany originally, and was hoping to pick up some buffalo meat from the place on Hwy 34 on the way back to Keizer. I felt--or I though I could feel--his mind move when a hybrid car with a "saving the earth" vanity plate passed; and again when a dusty old Mercedes wagon "Powered by Used Veggie Oil" overtook us. Or I was projecting; sometimes you don't know where the thought comes from.
Culture wars are all well and good: but I was helped over and over by burly white guys on this day. Human to human. And if my tow truck driver has just bought a new Jeep Grand Cherokee, well..may it benefit all beings, somehow. I was pretty delerious--mostly dehyrdrated--or I would have chuckled when we parted and he told me his name: Darrell. (It's a secret, guilty favorite of mine.)
So my stuff sits defenseless in the parking lot of an auto repair shop. Corvallis is a sweet and tiny town, but that's no guarantee this won't get ripped off. I worried. My head wouldn't stop hurting. I sat zazen on the front porch, watching the light fade, and went to bed.
I woke up this morning to find I'd left the front door unlocked; it had blown open in the night, and my wallet, camera, phone and keys were all sitting undisturbed, in plain sight just inside. Oh me of little faith! To have two major setbacks in two days, to be left really dependent on others' kindness, over and over... How could I possibly worry? I have no control at all; why should moving be easy this time? I can only do my best, keep going forward, and marvel at this life.
Sunday, June 18, 2006
Photos of Note
Bart Aldrich is a flickr artist worthy of your attention, especially if you are interested in human beings living their lives.
He's a professional photographer based in Southern California, but from his work I'd say he's a true citizen (and lover) of the world.
Click on the photo to see his other work.
He's a professional photographer based in Southern California, but from his work I'd say he's a true citizen (and lover) of the world.
Click on the photo to see his other work.
Saturday, June 17, 2006
Away to the Wilderness of Pen & Paper
Our phone conversations are logged. Lasers from satellites can decode conversations based on vibrations in window glass. The sound of keystrokes can reveal the content of what's being typed with surprising accuracy. Is the only anonymity to be had in sheer numbers, in the miniscule chance that the laser will point this way? In leading a life devoid of notoreity?
A sangha member who is a foreign national glimpsed Chozen's dossier when she was asked by the HS folks at customs to provide a reference. (She had been entering the country too many times and staying for too long for their comfort.) A few keystrokes, and there were old photographs of Chozen, and data going back years. Years.
Of course you and I are not Zen masters, or the figureheads of brief but large worldwide peace movements. But still. I know I'm supposed to feel safer, but I don't.
The information is probably out there already, thanks to the internet. Google me and you can easily find my date of birth; and my parents' names and dates of birth (thanks to a family genealogy website-without-a-clue). You can see a petition I signed to halt the genocide in (current location). Plus publications, poster presentations, family photos...blogs.
Oh, hello!
To be known, but not too well. I suppose we all want that.
Things never turn out as you might think. Who could have forseen that writing a letter and dropping it in the mail would one day offer the best chance of a little privacy?
A sangha member who is a foreign national glimpsed Chozen's dossier when she was asked by the HS folks at customs to provide a reference. (She had been entering the country too many times and staying for too long for their comfort.) A few keystrokes, and there were old photographs of Chozen, and data going back years. Years.
Of course you and I are not Zen masters, or the figureheads of brief but large worldwide peace movements. But still. I know I'm supposed to feel safer, but I don't.
The information is probably out there already, thanks to the internet. Google me and you can easily find my date of birth; and my parents' names and dates of birth (thanks to a family genealogy website-without-a-clue). You can see a petition I signed to halt the genocide in (current location). Plus publications, poster presentations, family photos...blogs.
Oh, hello!
To be known, but not too well. I suppose we all want that.
Things never turn out as you might think. Who could have forseen that writing a letter and dropping it in the mail would one day offer the best chance of a little privacy?
Friday, June 16, 2006
"We Are Living in a Spiritual World..."
"...And I am a Spiritual Girl."
My experience of life has been almost entirely spiritual of late. In those moments when it's not, I'm inevitably in a dysfunctional state. Peace and happiness, in other words, correlate completely with a spiritual framework of experience. It's just true most of the time now; this has been going on for a couple of weeks. I intend to appreciate it, and try to put some words down, if only to aid myself in the future.
It's like there are glimpses--frequent ones--of bigger forces at work. Living in that perception of grace not only feels better, but it's better for everyone around me. It's easy to have a generous heart and a sense of wonder, even if things don't go quite as planned. This..just this..is the dharma glimmering and being; life is a complete gift, and it just moves forward, unfolding and unfolding.
Not knowing helps. I'm approaching a period of transition where it's impossible to know what's coming. I spent last weekend in Portland walking around, ringing intercoms, placing phone calls, looking for a place to live. And I met with friends, and made new friends, and thought about wealth and True Wealth. I had no idea what the next five minutes would bring, or when I would hit the "jackpot" of a promising studio apartment. No idea if the lady trimming her roses might know of place. I was open, receptive, listening for the call. And I got exhausted--just totally whipped--over and over, quite pleasantly emptied and refilled, over and over.
If all goes as planned, in ten days I'll be moving 100 miles away. Knowing that is coming, and knowing I have not yet begun to pack, renders most assumptions about reality pretty obsolete. Mantra practice has been instrumental to this curious, opening, whole-mind listening. OM MANI PADME HUM has been permeating my life and body lately.
To me, and probably to others, repeatedly invoking the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus is a constant reminder that the world is vastly more wonderful, complex, and (therefore) magical than I could possibly fathom. That it's all part of a great serene, roiling IS-ness. And that it's beautiful. It's beautiful all the time. Even when it's horrible, and people die terribly, in grief and rage, or not knowing what hit them. That this life, where the leaves bob in the wind and the raspberries are ripening like mad, is exactly perfect, flowing, and full of meaning.
Even saying "the world is perfect" set up a duality: the possibility of imperfection. Rather, it just IS. The trees emanante tree-ness, the birds shoot through the air, the water runs down the drain.
Seen this way, it is impossible to be bored with anything. I have chafed so incredibly against things in my life! And yet, I realize, I have never been bored by my body or my mind. The things I hated were experienced as externals. But if world-consciousnes takes over... then everything is myself...and what I do is done with the entire mind and body. If my life circumstances aren't sequestered outside myself, I don't think I can become fed up with them....
And what would that mean?
So OM MANI PADME HUM is the key, the ongoing reminder, that transforms the mundane, boring, irritating, unexciting world into unencumbered grace, light, and significance.
I am not the first or the last to see this. For example, Mary Jo in her fabulous fashion blog describes Joseph Campbell's realization, at the end of his days, that the life which had seemed so haphazard had actually unfolded in a rich and perfect order, as if guided by an unseen hand. Challenges and crises were the catalytic events that spawned great richness and transformation.
Mary Jo is a designer, and her quest for personal understanding has to do with making things of beauty, with creating something that moves us in ways we do not understand. Shopping isn't some aberration of modern postindustrial life. It's gathering, as in "hunting and gathering." And it's just as satisfying today as it was millenia ago to find the perfectest most wonderful thing! And bring it home! Only now, instead of baskets and pointed digging sticks, we have handbags and..um, stiletto heels?
Campbell was a mythologist, of course. But Mary Jo is also a mythologist, because she understands that what she does, and loves, is of a significance that cannot really be grasped with conventional language or ideas. We can talk about "why we shop," but we can't describe how it really feels to be enchanted by a new toy. But we do know the feeling, because we are human. And we all have access to mythological reality, somewhere down there beneath the mundane self-centered stories about life in the world.
Whether the world is none other than an expression of a consciousness too magnifcent to grasp; whether time and awareness are far more nuanced than generally imagined--these are not things we can debate. We can't know our life while we're in it, and reducing it to a materialist event-- seeing it as the meaningless adventures of a biological machine--is the silliest conceit of all: an arrogance born of profound insecurity.
I'm trying to express something, and it's possible to express that something incorrectly. But what I'm trying to say is not a rational argument--something that one believes after one has been convinced. Rather appropriate, considering that this is a positition arising from deep orientation rather than declarative knowledge. I am expressing (in my own limited way) a conviction, not an "argument" that "convinces." Nothing I say will persuade a skeptic, but if you know what I mean, you know. And you might find a more clear and useful way to express it.
One of the most bittersweet days of my life was when the person I loved and was--to all appearances--"made for" said to me, after a spirited (and of course fruitless) debate over the nature of human life/time/the world, "I know this (the deeper spiritual view) is true,"
but
I
cannot
accept
it.
Because to do so would entail living in a world out-of-control. And he couldn't do that.
This is the point where I have to stop. Too much feeling.
My darling, darling! I'll meet you on the other shore.
My experience of life has been almost entirely spiritual of late. In those moments when it's not, I'm inevitably in a dysfunctional state. Peace and happiness, in other words, correlate completely with a spiritual framework of experience. It's just true most of the time now; this has been going on for a couple of weeks. I intend to appreciate it, and try to put some words down, if only to aid myself in the future.
It's like there are glimpses--frequent ones--of bigger forces at work. Living in that perception of grace not only feels better, but it's better for everyone around me. It's easy to have a generous heart and a sense of wonder, even if things don't go quite as planned. This..just this..is the dharma glimmering and being; life is a complete gift, and it just moves forward, unfolding and unfolding.
Not knowing helps. I'm approaching a period of transition where it's impossible to know what's coming. I spent last weekend in Portland walking around, ringing intercoms, placing phone calls, looking for a place to live. And I met with friends, and made new friends, and thought about wealth and True Wealth. I had no idea what the next five minutes would bring, or when I would hit the "jackpot" of a promising studio apartment. No idea if the lady trimming her roses might know of place. I was open, receptive, listening for the call. And I got exhausted--just totally whipped--over and over, quite pleasantly emptied and refilled, over and over.
If all goes as planned, in ten days I'll be moving 100 miles away. Knowing that is coming, and knowing I have not yet begun to pack, renders most assumptions about reality pretty obsolete. Mantra practice has been instrumental to this curious, opening, whole-mind listening. OM MANI PADME HUM has been permeating my life and body lately.
To me, and probably to others, repeatedly invoking the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus is a constant reminder that the world is vastly more wonderful, complex, and (therefore) magical than I could possibly fathom. That it's all part of a great serene, roiling IS-ness. And that it's beautiful. It's beautiful all the time. Even when it's horrible, and people die terribly, in grief and rage, or not knowing what hit them. That this life, where the leaves bob in the wind and the raspberries are ripening like mad, is exactly perfect, flowing, and full of meaning.
Even saying "the world is perfect" set up a duality: the possibility of imperfection. Rather, it just IS. The trees emanante tree-ness, the birds shoot through the air, the water runs down the drain.
Seen this way, it is impossible to be bored with anything. I have chafed so incredibly against things in my life! And yet, I realize, I have never been bored by my body or my mind. The things I hated were experienced as externals. But if world-consciousnes takes over... then everything is myself...and what I do is done with the entire mind and body. If my life circumstances aren't sequestered outside myself, I don't think I can become fed up with them....
And what would that mean?
So OM MANI PADME HUM is the key, the ongoing reminder, that transforms the mundane, boring, irritating, unexciting world into unencumbered grace, light, and significance.
I am not the first or the last to see this. For example, Mary Jo in her fabulous fashion blog describes Joseph Campbell's realization, at the end of his days, that the life which had seemed so haphazard had actually unfolded in a rich and perfect order, as if guided by an unseen hand. Challenges and crises were the catalytic events that spawned great richness and transformation.
Mary Jo is a designer, and her quest for personal understanding has to do with making things of beauty, with creating something that moves us in ways we do not understand. Shopping isn't some aberration of modern postindustrial life. It's gathering, as in "hunting and gathering." And it's just as satisfying today as it was millenia ago to find the perfectest most wonderful thing! And bring it home! Only now, instead of baskets and pointed digging sticks, we have handbags and..um, stiletto heels?
Campbell was a mythologist, of course. But Mary Jo is also a mythologist, because she understands that what she does, and loves, is of a significance that cannot really be grasped with conventional language or ideas. We can talk about "why we shop," but we can't describe how it really feels to be enchanted by a new toy. But we do know the feeling, because we are human. And we all have access to mythological reality, somewhere down there beneath the mundane self-centered stories about life in the world.
Whether the world is none other than an expression of a consciousness too magnifcent to grasp; whether time and awareness are far more nuanced than generally imagined--these are not things we can debate. We can't know our life while we're in it, and reducing it to a materialist event-- seeing it as the meaningless adventures of a biological machine--is the silliest conceit of all: an arrogance born of profound insecurity.
I'm trying to express something, and it's possible to express that something incorrectly. But what I'm trying to say is not a rational argument--something that one believes after one has been convinced. Rather appropriate, considering that this is a positition arising from deep orientation rather than declarative knowledge. I am expressing (in my own limited way) a conviction, not an "argument" that "convinces." Nothing I say will persuade a skeptic, but if you know what I mean, you know. And you might find a more clear and useful way to express it.
One of the most bittersweet days of my life was when the person I loved and was--to all appearances--"made for" said to me, after a spirited (and of course fruitless) debate over the nature of human life/time/the world, "I know this (the deeper spiritual view) is true,"
but
I
cannot
accept
it.
Because to do so would entail living in a world out-of-control. And he couldn't do that.
This is the point where I have to stop. Too much feeling.
My darling, darling! I'll meet you on the other shore.
Monday, June 12, 2006
Parents
I'm really appreciating my parents lately. I come from them, on so many levels--generated by their bodies; carrying their DNA; raised and influenced by them. And yet I am for some reason surprised at how much I resemble them in appearance and attitude, in attitude, predilection and tendency.
It's taken a while to see myself in these people. Family so often don't see one another clearly, and they push one another's buttons so deeply... and it would all degenerate into weirdness and stay that way, except... you have to deal with them!
That forced association seems like anything but an advantage. When things are difficult with nonfamily, you can just phase the person out of your life. If they're being strange, you ditch 'em. Family, however, are yours forever, bless them. They're often the type of people you wouldn't associate with otherwise; and interactions with them are charged in a way that casual associations can't even aspire to. In family, we mean things to one another, and we don't really understand why we react the way we do.
To continually return to interacting with someone you'd otherwise shut out seems counterintuitive..and yet that's exactly why family members are so wonderful. Forced contact affords some hope for resolution. If you cut them off--or they die-- you part ways knowing that they've never seen you the way you yearn to be seen.
When I was little, my parents were on rough terms with some of their family members, and my small self wondered if these other people were "bad." It was all a bit perplexing. But reconciliation--to the extent it happened--was wonderful. I can't speak for my parents, obviously, but I'd like to think that they understood something about themselves by coming back into relationship with their problem relatives.
Perhaps you still think of your parents the way you used to? As much as you have changed; as much as your view of the world has transformed; have they changed too? Have you revised your view of them since your teen days--have you seen them with adult eyes?
It's so devilishly important to feel "seen" by these people, and so incredibly easy to feel otherwise. In that dismay and anger, you might consider that perhaps you do not see them clearly either. That they have loved you since before you were born, with the selfless blind ferocity that parents have. Before you ever knew yourself, they watched you discover the world, gravitate towards food and comfort; and be stunned in bewilderment and incomprehension. They wondered why you were the way you were; they had ideas about you; and they confused you with their sisters and mothers and their younger selves. To yourself, you are just this person, but to them you represent a past and a future infused with associations.
When adults see children, they know that they will grow up. When you're a child you can't appreciate this.
This past weekend, I attended my 15-year class reunion at Catlin Gabel. As I got reacquainted with other members of the class of 1991, I marvelled at what lovely people they have become. We are certainly all a lot more sufferable than we used to be! As teenagers we had no idea where we were headed, and we didn't understand how precious and felicitous our environment was. Until later. Now, all of my classmates who are parents want to send their kids to the school as well!
Twenty years ago, my own parents tore their lives and finances apart so I could go to Catlin for eighth grade. By "tore their lives apart", I mean a literal rearrangement of lifestyle into a stressful and disjointed new state. My mother found a job at the school, and the next year my sister went there as well.
My father recently told me, "Watching your joy at learning was the most wonderful thing. There was no way I could see you go to C__ (the local public high school)." I think my now-adult classmates must feel the same way: here you are charged with the care of a precious little human. You want them to have the incredible experience you had. Even if they won't appreciate it for years.
So: I love my parents. I can't imagine anyone else giving rise to this very unusual daughter. Deep bows to you both.
It's taken a while to see myself in these people. Family so often don't see one another clearly, and they push one another's buttons so deeply... and it would all degenerate into weirdness and stay that way, except... you have to deal with them!
That forced association seems like anything but an advantage. When things are difficult with nonfamily, you can just phase the person out of your life. If they're being strange, you ditch 'em. Family, however, are yours forever, bless them. They're often the type of people you wouldn't associate with otherwise; and interactions with them are charged in a way that casual associations can't even aspire to. In family, we mean things to one another, and we don't really understand why we react the way we do.
To continually return to interacting with someone you'd otherwise shut out seems counterintuitive..and yet that's exactly why family members are so wonderful. Forced contact affords some hope for resolution. If you cut them off--or they die-- you part ways knowing that they've never seen you the way you yearn to be seen.
When I was little, my parents were on rough terms with some of their family members, and my small self wondered if these other people were "bad." It was all a bit perplexing. But reconciliation--to the extent it happened--was wonderful. I can't speak for my parents, obviously, but I'd like to think that they understood something about themselves by coming back into relationship with their problem relatives.
Perhaps you still think of your parents the way you used to? As much as you have changed; as much as your view of the world has transformed; have they changed too? Have you revised your view of them since your teen days--have you seen them with adult eyes?
It's so devilishly important to feel "seen" by these people, and so incredibly easy to feel otherwise. In that dismay and anger, you might consider that perhaps you do not see them clearly either. That they have loved you since before you were born, with the selfless blind ferocity that parents have. Before you ever knew yourself, they watched you discover the world, gravitate towards food and comfort; and be stunned in bewilderment and incomprehension. They wondered why you were the way you were; they had ideas about you; and they confused you with their sisters and mothers and their younger selves. To yourself, you are just this person, but to them you represent a past and a future infused with associations.
When adults see children, they know that they will grow up. When you're a child you can't appreciate this.
This past weekend, I attended my 15-year class reunion at Catlin Gabel. As I got reacquainted with other members of the class of 1991, I marvelled at what lovely people they have become. We are certainly all a lot more sufferable than we used to be! As teenagers we had no idea where we were headed, and we didn't understand how precious and felicitous our environment was. Until later. Now, all of my classmates who are parents want to send their kids to the school as well!
Twenty years ago, my own parents tore their lives and finances apart so I could go to Catlin for eighth grade. By "tore their lives apart", I mean a literal rearrangement of lifestyle into a stressful and disjointed new state. My mother found a job at the school, and the next year my sister went there as well.
My father recently told me, "Watching your joy at learning was the most wonderful thing. There was no way I could see you go to C__ (the local public high school)." I think my now-adult classmates must feel the same way: here you are charged with the care of a precious little human. You want them to have the incredible experience you had. Even if they won't appreciate it for years.
So: I love my parents. I can't imagine anyone else giving rise to this very unusual daughter. Deep bows to you both.
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Trusting and Leading
People working together can accomplish incredible feats.
In order to do this, we voluntarily put ourselves under the leadership of someone we trust. They fill the role of leader, and we fill the role of the led. The leader directs everyone's energy, physcial and psychic, toward the goal.
People will always differ on the details, and will always have their issues with authority. Fortunately, the group energy, based in trust, is propulsive.
If, however, the leader is untrustworthy, the shared work cannot be done. No one will willingly give herself to the agenda.
If I deeply trust myself-- if I have confidence in the process of identifying the truths in my life-- then the foibles of those appointed to lead are not deeply threatening. And the shared agenda has a chance to continue.
In order to do this, we voluntarily put ourselves under the leadership of someone we trust. They fill the role of leader, and we fill the role of the led. The leader directs everyone's energy, physcial and psychic, toward the goal.
People will always differ on the details, and will always have their issues with authority. Fortunately, the group energy, based in trust, is propulsive.
If, however, the leader is untrustworthy, the shared work cannot be done. No one will willingly give herself to the agenda.
If I deeply trust myself-- if I have confidence in the process of identifying the truths in my life-- then the foibles of those appointed to lead are not deeply threatening. And the shared agenda has a chance to continue.
Thursday, June 08, 2006
Coming To It All In Time
Diary entry of May 4, 2006
A couple days later, this:
I don't know if it happens that way, exactly. In searching for a sense of purpose, I suspect I'm straining to find something under my very nose. So it goes.
The karmic theme of adulthood--resisting it and yet yearning to be a grownup--is really gaining steam these days. I've always been slow to mature: l learned late to drive, to ride a bike, to walk. In my own time, when ready, I have cut the crap and easily nailed the milestone...sometimes years after all my peers have demonstrated it to be possible.
So maybe this is coming too: a solid partnership with a happy and open-hearted fellow; a house with a columned porch and an oval window in the door; time to plant a tree and watch it grow; to keep koi until they reach a grand size, until we know one another by a sight that goes beyond sight.
No guarantees, though. I still haven't mastered parallel parking, and without a car of my own, I may never learn it. I carry torches well, although I don't think it something to brag about: this ardor that flags only because love means wanting someone to be peaceful, and I know we feel on another--
--So many stories, as if I have the damndest idea about what I do and what I am. As if the stories I tell myself are at all related to the apparent subject.
A couple days later, this:
When committed
there are no "deal breakers." One has a sense of purpose and is not stopped by fear.
I pray
let me see my best life in a dream
Then I will aim there.
I don't know if it happens that way, exactly. In searching for a sense of purpose, I suspect I'm straining to find something under my very nose. So it goes.
Sunday, June 04, 2006
Heartbeat
When I was a shiatsu practitioner, I learned to breathe in unison with the client, setting a subliminal rhythm that would help them to relax. By mid-session, our pulses would usually be in synch as well. (If our hearts weren't beating together, it meant things weren't going well-- we were not connecting, and the person was not relaxing at all.) By the time I came to holding their head and sliding my fingers up into the connectors at the base of the skull, our shared heartbeat would be like a tiny earthquake, shaking the world in a slow thumping vibration.
Last night Rob came to hug me goodnight, and then fell asleep on top of the covers. In the dim light of dawn, I reached out to hold his dozing body--the bed is very narrow--and I felt the matching pulse in his chest and my arm. All night, our hearts must have been stabilizing, and resonating with, one another....He and I have always matched heartbeats well; whenever I have occasion to notice, they're in synch. When they're not, we're invariably having some difficulty.
Suddenly, a commotion erupted outside: a loud yowl, and hissing. Cats. Our two hearts sped up and beat quickly, and then gradually slowed to normal. All in unison. Even watching it happen, feeling it in his sleeping body and my curious one, did not disturb the synchrony.
This reminds me that I should look into The Heartmath Solution. I think we barely understand the very real effects we have on one another.
Last night Rob came to hug me goodnight, and then fell asleep on top of the covers. In the dim light of dawn, I reached out to hold his dozing body--the bed is very narrow--and I felt the matching pulse in his chest and my arm. All night, our hearts must have been stabilizing, and resonating with, one another....He and I have always matched heartbeats well; whenever I have occasion to notice, they're in synch. When they're not, we're invariably having some difficulty.
Suddenly, a commotion erupted outside: a loud yowl, and hissing. Cats. Our two hearts sped up and beat quickly, and then gradually slowed to normal. All in unison. Even watching it happen, feeling it in his sleeping body and my curious one, did not disturb the synchrony.
This reminds me that I should look into The Heartmath Solution. I think we barely understand the very real effects we have on one another.
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