A few weeks ago I had one of those consciousness-shifting moments that come along all too rarely. I was doing the dishes, which I like doing by hand even though we have a dishwasher. Warm water and bubbles - what's not to like? So anyway, I was looking down at my hands, covered in suds, washing a plate when I was struck with the idea that if my eye were a camera that could record what I saw, then I would be the director of the film of my life. I looked again at the dishes in the sink. I saw the composition of the shot. I thought of how it could be better, more beautiful. Rearranging things, I made the sink a work of art and then mentally called, "Action!" I moved intentionally, gracefully, beautifully, my hands now dancing on the screen in my head. I considered each glass, plate or fork and how best to convey the essence of what it was. Everything became a prop and the sink became a theater.
It was then that I came to appreciate Ikebana. Bear with me. As a young teen, my family was host to two Japanese exchange students. There was a reception for the group and they performed some traditional music and Ikebana, the art of flower arranging. And I thought, "What?" How do "art" and "flower arranging" even appear in the same sentence? I watched as a diminutive girl dressed in a kimono stuck some flowers in a vase. At least that's how I saw it at the time. And then we clapped. Sure, they said something about the symbolism of heaven and earth and blah,blah,blah ... I was just a dumb kid. I didn't see how this was art.
And then, back at the sink, I saw that I was still only washing dishes, but now I was doing it with intention. Every fiber of my being was invested in making a beautiful experience. The way I moved my hands, the way I held the dishes, the way I used the sponge - it was all intentional. And because of the intention, it became beautiful - I was almost moved to tears.
So flower arranging was art because of intention. Every fiber of the arranger's being was similarly invested in making beauty. I so want to experience Ikebana anew. It is more than just a functional art - it is theater.
And then the dishwashing was through. But the concept broadened and I thought to myself, "What a beautiful way to go through life - seeing as if looking through a movie camera. In every moment you can register your intention. Be aware of the way your shot is composed, the other actors, the dialogue, the scenery, the music, even the lighting. You have control over the film of your life. You can make it look however you want it, as long as every moment is intentional.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Sunday, September 30, 2012
The other day, my partner and I were talking about how, when we go to the gym, we always find a certain someone who catches our eye and makes us want to keep looking. Today, I had one of those experiences, but to the Nth power. Before I go on, I'm in love with my partner and wouldn't even consider anyone else, but we are both appreciators of beauty and I know she would have agreed with me.
There was not a thing about this young woman that did not appeal to me in the deepest way. I'm not going to describe her here, because everyone has their own idea of perfection. It was not just my body screaming, "I need to have sex with this woman!" - it wasn't that. I'll tell you what I think it was.
From where do we get our sense of what is beautiful? Why do some people appeal to us in that deeper way? When we are born, we cannot see much. It takes time for our eyes to work at their best. So visual beauty is not a genetic inheritance. We have to learn what is beautiful as we learn how to see. Before we are running around the house like wild Indians (I hope that's not a racial slur these days, if so, I apologize, my brothers) we are held, hopefully by loving arms. We learn to look into the eyes of the people who are kind to us. We don't realize it, but a record of that face connected to that good feeling stays imprinted on our brain. Any time a person is kind to us, we get that good feeling and it is stored, along with the face associated with it. Over time, our ideal face becomes an amalgam of every kind face we've stored throughout our lives.
So, the beautiful face is nothing but a comparison with all the kind faces of our pasts. It's why some people can find beauty in fat cheeks, or droopy eyes or large ankles, or whatever. Beauty is only skin deep after all. Well, bone and tissue, too. We filter out all the too large noses and funny ears and what we're left with is an average human look - a beautiful face. But so many of us are not average - we have those large ears and funny noses. There's always someone who's going to be imprinted to like exactly what you have. Beauty is overrated as a reason to partner with a person. But kindness certainly is not rated highly enough.
Of course, many is the time when I've gotten to know a particularly beautiful woman who turns out to be less-than-beautiful in her soul. Or she has an annoying voice. Or is a Republican. I left the gym today not knowing a thing about her. I thought, on my walk home, if I weren't in a committed relationship, would I even talk to a woman like that? Most probably I would never have the nerve, unless I were manic, but if I did, what would I say? It was then that I came up with the greatest pick-up line ever:
"I've never proposed to someone on a first date before, but if you'll go out with me (sincere puppy-dog eyes)...I just might."
Thinking more about the idea of kindness, there are not that many people in our lives who are actually kind to us. I don't mean just the thousands of people who do no harm to us, but those who actually do positive things for us and give us that good feeling. If we are lucky, our immediate family will be kind to us. Aunts and girl cousins perhaps. Then babysitters (again, if we're lucky). And the handful of really good friends we make in our lives. Sure, there will be infinite instances of kind acts - someone holding a door for you, etc., but you're not going to imprint those things. The imprint of kindness happens when we are young and our minds and personalities are most energetically forming. Your idea of beauty may be an average of only a few dozen faces! It's why we often end up with people who resemble, even a little, our mothers and fathers.
When we act in a kind way towards others, we may be enacting an evolutionary mechanism that knows that if we imprint kindness on other people's brains that we are more likely to be chosen as a mate. It may go way back in our evolutionary history. The early primate who shared his food would be more likely to get sex. We would remember the face of those with whom we shared food and we would be more likely to be able to pass on our genetic code. That's the prime directive in all animals - pass on the genetic code. It's what we all have in common. So, we are kind to people because it makes us more attractive as a potential mate. Modern humans have evolved to where we can exhibit kindness to anyone, whether or not mating potential is involved. It's a beautiful thing about humans. We can be kind when it gets us nothing in return. We just like the feeling it gives us.
Be anything you want in life, but above all, be kind.
There was not a thing about this young woman that did not appeal to me in the deepest way. I'm not going to describe her here, because everyone has their own idea of perfection. It was not just my body screaming, "I need to have sex with this woman!" - it wasn't that. I'll tell you what I think it was.
From where do we get our sense of what is beautiful? Why do some people appeal to us in that deeper way? When we are born, we cannot see much. It takes time for our eyes to work at their best. So visual beauty is not a genetic inheritance. We have to learn what is beautiful as we learn how to see. Before we are running around the house like wild Indians (I hope that's not a racial slur these days, if so, I apologize, my brothers) we are held, hopefully by loving arms. We learn to look into the eyes of the people who are kind to us. We don't realize it, but a record of that face connected to that good feeling stays imprinted on our brain. Any time a person is kind to us, we get that good feeling and it is stored, along with the face associated with it. Over time, our ideal face becomes an amalgam of every kind face we've stored throughout our lives.
So, the beautiful face is nothing but a comparison with all the kind faces of our pasts. It's why some people can find beauty in fat cheeks, or droopy eyes or large ankles, or whatever. Beauty is only skin deep after all. Well, bone and tissue, too. We filter out all the too large noses and funny ears and what we're left with is an average human look - a beautiful face. But so many of us are not average - we have those large ears and funny noses. There's always someone who's going to be imprinted to like exactly what you have. Beauty is overrated as a reason to partner with a person. But kindness certainly is not rated highly enough.
Of course, many is the time when I've gotten to know a particularly beautiful woman who turns out to be less-than-beautiful in her soul. Or she has an annoying voice. Or is a Republican. I left the gym today not knowing a thing about her. I thought, on my walk home, if I weren't in a committed relationship, would I even talk to a woman like that? Most probably I would never have the nerve, unless I were manic, but if I did, what would I say? It was then that I came up with the greatest pick-up line ever:
"I've never proposed to someone on a first date before, but if you'll go out with me (sincere puppy-dog eyes)...I just might."
Thinking more about the idea of kindness, there are not that many people in our lives who are actually kind to us. I don't mean just the thousands of people who do no harm to us, but those who actually do positive things for us and give us that good feeling. If we are lucky, our immediate family will be kind to us. Aunts and girl cousins perhaps. Then babysitters (again, if we're lucky). And the handful of really good friends we make in our lives. Sure, there will be infinite instances of kind acts - someone holding a door for you, etc., but you're not going to imprint those things. The imprint of kindness happens when we are young and our minds and personalities are most energetically forming. Your idea of beauty may be an average of only a few dozen faces! It's why we often end up with people who resemble, even a little, our mothers and fathers.
When we act in a kind way towards others, we may be enacting an evolutionary mechanism that knows that if we imprint kindness on other people's brains that we are more likely to be chosen as a mate. It may go way back in our evolutionary history. The early primate who shared his food would be more likely to get sex. We would remember the face of those with whom we shared food and we would be more likely to be able to pass on our genetic code. That's the prime directive in all animals - pass on the genetic code. It's what we all have in common. So, we are kind to people because it makes us more attractive as a potential mate. Modern humans have evolved to where we can exhibit kindness to anyone, whether or not mating potential is involved. It's a beautiful thing about humans. We can be kind when it gets us nothing in return. We just like the feeling it gives us.
Be anything you want in life, but above all, be kind.
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Stranger in a Strange Land
I've never felt like I fit in. Sometimes this has been something to celebrate and sometimes to cry about. There are times when you want to fit in as a child - at social events, playing sports, at school. But even though I was a very active child, busy with countless extracurricular activities, I always felt alone. It was as if I wasn't having the same experience as everyone else - I was processing it differently. I always excelled at the things I did solo, like music, art, shot-put. And I just became average when I played team sports or did music with other people. I just felt I never got what life was all about for people. I just knew they weren't living in my head.
It wasn't until I was about thirty that I was diagnosed as having bipolar disorder, but it made much of my life make sense. I really wasn't having the same experience as everyone else. My brain was processing things differently. Knowing this put me on a path towards understanding how my brain worked and why I felt, thought and experienced the things I did. Here I am almost twenty years later, and I really am feeling like I've solved the puzzle that is me. Meds and therapy helped immensely. So did my constant day-to-day attention to the workings of my mind.
We, as human animals, are products of our need. We need food and shelter from the elements. We need attention and love. We think we need a lot more, like new shoes and a killer stereo system, but that is mostly what advertising tells us we need to be as good as others. When we wear sunglasses when it's not even sunny, we're filling the need to be thought of as cool or pretty. When we drive an expensive car, we're filling the need to be thought of as wealthy. When we do Yoga, we're filling the need to be thought of as spiritual and healthy. We do so much so that other people will think of us in certain ways. Our needs define us.
Recently, After starting a new job that pays my bills, gives me free time, and never feels like work, I began to think about my own needs. I used to have a need to make art and music and to write stories. Now I realize that I wanted to be thought of as intelligent, and those were ways in which I could make my intelligence manifest. If I write this song, people will like me. If I paint this picture, people will like me. If I write this story, people will like me. My need was obviously for people to like me. I think it is a universal need. But I have come to like myself, and anyone who really pays attention to who I am will probably like me too. I'm sure of it. So I no longer have the same degree of need to be liked. I suppose I still have it a little.
Realizing how few my needs really were was liberating. I need food and I need to be loved, and I have those things. So I'm at an important crossroads in my life. I am as happy as anyone could be, and my only real need is to teach it, to share it as best I can. I realize that there is no formula I can teach to be happy. I learned only how I can be happy with the life I have led. It doesn't mean you can do the same with your life. My solution took 49 years of living to come to. But maybe we are all more similar than I imagine. Maybe you need just a few words to help you on your journey.
First - You're going to die. You have to embrace that. Your life is a very finite thing. I don't believe in an immortal soul, so for me, these 49 years have been a singular miracle and I hope to continue the miracle for as long as I can. But I know I may die today. Any minute. They talk about "making your peace with God" before you die. I think this means opening up the vault of your mind and examining every action and finding the things you've left unfinished and either letting them go, because they won't mean anything after you die, or taking action to remedy them. We have a need to be forgiven. Whose forgiveness do you need? Ask for it now. Then you can embrace your mortality, not merely accept it.
Second - Examine your needs. How many needs drive you to act in ways other than your true nature? How many needs are driven by hunger? By sex? By anger? Try not to be a slave to your needs. You are an animal, and you can just look at other animals and see how very few their needs are. Embrace your animal nature and see that food and sex sometimes do drive all animals. But be aware of your human nature, too. It is human nature to want status and money and acclaim. These are wants, not needs, but they're closely tied to our need to mate. Even if we have no children and never plan to have any, our brains are programmed to find mates. We try to attract them in everything we do, even if we are in committed, monogamous relationships.
Third - Don't live in the past. Everything you've ever done is a part of who you are in the present. Take some time to let those things catch up with you, they are all weights dragging behind you and impeding your progress. Either cut them loose or find the strength to carry them. Do not let them weigh you down. I think everyone's biggest weight is their relationship with their family, and most often, their parents. Your parents didn't appear out of thin air. They are the product of other parents who were also just doing the best they could with what they'd been given. We are part of a long line that reaches back to when no one really knew anything at all about life. We all just learn a little bit and pass it on, and hopefully life keeps getting better with every generation. Your parents might have been lousy parents. Or they might have been abusive or neglectful parents. It was not their choice. Their generation just had not learned enough to be better parents. At some point, if you didn't have the perfect parents, you have to cut the line and not let their actions color everything you do. They just gave you a push, and now you're pedaling your own bicycle and can go where you please. You are in charge of your life, not them. So when you feel you should turn left, because your father is making you feel that way, know that you can turn any way you want. They are behind you, and even if they gave you a shaky start, you now know how to ride.
Fourth - Feel the connection. We all evolved from the same initial life form. Whether that was God or just some random happening, all life is related and interconnected. Every person on the planet is your relation. We have the same life within us. People might act like strangers, but that's because they take life for granted. Every interaction with a stranger is a reconnecting with the spirit of life. We all want the same thing - for life to continue. It's all every life form wants. We just keep making more life. And as humans, we get distracted by material possessions and think that that's what we really want - that will make us happy. But that's not where happiness comes from. Happiness comes from letting go of all desires. Cut the past off as if with a knife and do not project into the future. You are alive. That's all. That's all there is. In the present moment, you have no identity, no personality, no baggage, no fear. You just are. And you are on a planet of living things. And they are all a part of your experience of being. Just stop life in this instant, and realize that everything right now is perfect. Right now, you are without needs of any kind. You don't even need to eat right now. Just let your body breathe - you don't even have to try. Watch your breath. Feel the life.
Fifth - Confront your fears. We most often try to ignore our fear so it will go away. But it lives in an unconscious part of our mind and is present in everything we do. We avoid facing fears with the hope that they will somehow magically diminish. But the only way to get past fear is by confronting it head on. You need to admit to yourself what you're really afraid of: You're afraid that people will not like you. That is everyone's basic, fundamental fear. "People may not like me if they know the things I've done. People will judge me and I will be considered less-than." Our egos want to be big. They can only be as big as our most shameful action unless you divorce yourself from your actions by letting fear drop away. Recognize your fear, then go on without it. If you don't take the time to recognize it, it will live like a little imp inside of you, poisoning all your best intentions. We all just want to be loved. No one loves the little imp. Let it go and let people see who you truly are.
Sixth - Let people see who you truly are! You are an amazing amalgam of experiences, unique in all the world. There is every reason on earth to celebrate that! Find the things in life that make you feel alive and explore them. Learn new things. Grow your brain. And communicate! No one will ever know everything about you, but after you've let go of fear and shame, you are a magical being and you need to let that being out in the world. If you just wake up each morning and don't feel instantly alive, then you're missing something. Tomorrow, when you wake up, let this be your first thought: I am alive! It is a miracle! Then take that attitude out to the the world and share it with everyone you see. You don't have to say or do anything different. Just feel the miracle every second, and other people will feel it with you.
I am living my own miraculous life. I feel as if I've won the game. All I had to do was think about it for half a century. Now I just want to share it. This is too good a feeling not to share. Life is so much sweeter when we're connected to other people. I hope that I have connected with you. Sometimes I feel like a stranger in a strange land. There are people all around me who seem miserable. And they're all just trying to fit in. And I want to tell them all how easy happiness is. How easy life is. I want to live in a world full of happy people, and I don't think that's just a pipe dream. For now, I may not fit in, but the way in which I don't fit in is definitely something to celebrate!
It wasn't until I was about thirty that I was diagnosed as having bipolar disorder, but it made much of my life make sense. I really wasn't having the same experience as everyone else. My brain was processing things differently. Knowing this put me on a path towards understanding how my brain worked and why I felt, thought and experienced the things I did. Here I am almost twenty years later, and I really am feeling like I've solved the puzzle that is me. Meds and therapy helped immensely. So did my constant day-to-day attention to the workings of my mind.
We, as human animals, are products of our need. We need food and shelter from the elements. We need attention and love. We think we need a lot more, like new shoes and a killer stereo system, but that is mostly what advertising tells us we need to be as good as others. When we wear sunglasses when it's not even sunny, we're filling the need to be thought of as cool or pretty. When we drive an expensive car, we're filling the need to be thought of as wealthy. When we do Yoga, we're filling the need to be thought of as spiritual and healthy. We do so much so that other people will think of us in certain ways. Our needs define us.
Recently, After starting a new job that pays my bills, gives me free time, and never feels like work, I began to think about my own needs. I used to have a need to make art and music and to write stories. Now I realize that I wanted to be thought of as intelligent, and those were ways in which I could make my intelligence manifest. If I write this song, people will like me. If I paint this picture, people will like me. If I write this story, people will like me. My need was obviously for people to like me. I think it is a universal need. But I have come to like myself, and anyone who really pays attention to who I am will probably like me too. I'm sure of it. So I no longer have the same degree of need to be liked. I suppose I still have it a little.
Realizing how few my needs really were was liberating. I need food and I need to be loved, and I have those things. So I'm at an important crossroads in my life. I am as happy as anyone could be, and my only real need is to teach it, to share it as best I can. I realize that there is no formula I can teach to be happy. I learned only how I can be happy with the life I have led. It doesn't mean you can do the same with your life. My solution took 49 years of living to come to. But maybe we are all more similar than I imagine. Maybe you need just a few words to help you on your journey.
First - You're going to die. You have to embrace that. Your life is a very finite thing. I don't believe in an immortal soul, so for me, these 49 years have been a singular miracle and I hope to continue the miracle for as long as I can. But I know I may die today. Any minute. They talk about "making your peace with God" before you die. I think this means opening up the vault of your mind and examining every action and finding the things you've left unfinished and either letting them go, because they won't mean anything after you die, or taking action to remedy them. We have a need to be forgiven. Whose forgiveness do you need? Ask for it now. Then you can embrace your mortality, not merely accept it.
Second - Examine your needs. How many needs drive you to act in ways other than your true nature? How many needs are driven by hunger? By sex? By anger? Try not to be a slave to your needs. You are an animal, and you can just look at other animals and see how very few their needs are. Embrace your animal nature and see that food and sex sometimes do drive all animals. But be aware of your human nature, too. It is human nature to want status and money and acclaim. These are wants, not needs, but they're closely tied to our need to mate. Even if we have no children and never plan to have any, our brains are programmed to find mates. We try to attract them in everything we do, even if we are in committed, monogamous relationships.
Third - Don't live in the past. Everything you've ever done is a part of who you are in the present. Take some time to let those things catch up with you, they are all weights dragging behind you and impeding your progress. Either cut them loose or find the strength to carry them. Do not let them weigh you down. I think everyone's biggest weight is their relationship with their family, and most often, their parents. Your parents didn't appear out of thin air. They are the product of other parents who were also just doing the best they could with what they'd been given. We are part of a long line that reaches back to when no one really knew anything at all about life. We all just learn a little bit and pass it on, and hopefully life keeps getting better with every generation. Your parents might have been lousy parents. Or they might have been abusive or neglectful parents. It was not their choice. Their generation just had not learned enough to be better parents. At some point, if you didn't have the perfect parents, you have to cut the line and not let their actions color everything you do. They just gave you a push, and now you're pedaling your own bicycle and can go where you please. You are in charge of your life, not them. So when you feel you should turn left, because your father is making you feel that way, know that you can turn any way you want. They are behind you, and even if they gave you a shaky start, you now know how to ride.
Fourth - Feel the connection. We all evolved from the same initial life form. Whether that was God or just some random happening, all life is related and interconnected. Every person on the planet is your relation. We have the same life within us. People might act like strangers, but that's because they take life for granted. Every interaction with a stranger is a reconnecting with the spirit of life. We all want the same thing - for life to continue. It's all every life form wants. We just keep making more life. And as humans, we get distracted by material possessions and think that that's what we really want - that will make us happy. But that's not where happiness comes from. Happiness comes from letting go of all desires. Cut the past off as if with a knife and do not project into the future. You are alive. That's all. That's all there is. In the present moment, you have no identity, no personality, no baggage, no fear. You just are. And you are on a planet of living things. And they are all a part of your experience of being. Just stop life in this instant, and realize that everything right now is perfect. Right now, you are without needs of any kind. You don't even need to eat right now. Just let your body breathe - you don't even have to try. Watch your breath. Feel the life.
Fifth - Confront your fears. We most often try to ignore our fear so it will go away. But it lives in an unconscious part of our mind and is present in everything we do. We avoid facing fears with the hope that they will somehow magically diminish. But the only way to get past fear is by confronting it head on. You need to admit to yourself what you're really afraid of: You're afraid that people will not like you. That is everyone's basic, fundamental fear. "People may not like me if they know the things I've done. People will judge me and I will be considered less-than." Our egos want to be big. They can only be as big as our most shameful action unless you divorce yourself from your actions by letting fear drop away. Recognize your fear, then go on without it. If you don't take the time to recognize it, it will live like a little imp inside of you, poisoning all your best intentions. We all just want to be loved. No one loves the little imp. Let it go and let people see who you truly are.
Sixth - Let people see who you truly are! You are an amazing amalgam of experiences, unique in all the world. There is every reason on earth to celebrate that! Find the things in life that make you feel alive and explore them. Learn new things. Grow your brain. And communicate! No one will ever know everything about you, but after you've let go of fear and shame, you are a magical being and you need to let that being out in the world. If you just wake up each morning and don't feel instantly alive, then you're missing something. Tomorrow, when you wake up, let this be your first thought: I am alive! It is a miracle! Then take that attitude out to the the world and share it with everyone you see. You don't have to say or do anything different. Just feel the miracle every second, and other people will feel it with you.
I am living my own miraculous life. I feel as if I've won the game. All I had to do was think about it for half a century. Now I just want to share it. This is too good a feeling not to share. Life is so much sweeter when we're connected to other people. I hope that I have connected with you. Sometimes I feel like a stranger in a strange land. There are people all around me who seem miserable. And they're all just trying to fit in. And I want to tell them all how easy happiness is. How easy life is. I want to live in a world full of happy people, and I don't think that's just a pipe dream. For now, I may not fit in, but the way in which I don't fit in is definitely something to celebrate!
Monday, May 28, 2012
How to be Free from Emotional Pain
It is a nebulous statement to just say that I'm happy. Happiness is such a vague notion and can mean so many things. There is no common scale to say I'm 93% happy or 350 degrees happy. So when I tell people that I'm happy, it really doesn't mean much. But I've realized that for the last 10 years or so of my life, I've been free of emotional pain. Maybe that is more concrete.
Emotional pain is worse than physical pain because it colors every conscious moment. It also exacerbates physical pain and I think it sometimes even causes physical pain. I've had two bouts with debilitating back pain in my life - the first while I was still feeling emotional pain, the second when I was free of it. The first made me miserable for several years and seemed incurable. I had cortisone shots and physical therapy and was taking 1600mg of ibuprofen a day. I eventually got better, but it wasn't until my second incident that I realized that it was fear I was feeling more than pain.
The second incident left me unable to even support my own weight standing up. The pain was incredible. But because I had beat my emotional pain, the physical pain didn't bother me that much and I was able to separate my mind from my body. It was as if my car just needed a new alternator or something. You don't feel psychological or emotional pain about your car. My body was just like my car - it got my mind around in the world, but It wasn't my mind. My mind was in tip top shape. I think I could have very serious physical problems and still be happy, because I'm free from emotional pain.
So how do you get free from emotional pain? First, I think I had to forgive my parents. So many of us blame our parents for our current lives. My parents did the best they could. Yes, they could've been better, they could've paid more attention to me, could've not spanked me, could've helped guide me into adulthood. But they did not have the tools, probably because they didn't have examples in their own parents. I take responsibility now for who I am, instead of blaming them. I have the power to be whomever I want and to act in ways that I think are best. I have taken what my parents gave me and molded it into a shape that I like. I have total power over my life and my parents have no sway anymore. I love them for the good things they taught me, and don't blame them for the things they missed.
Second, You have to stop identifying with what Eckhardt Tolle calls "the pain body." We have all suffered emotional pain in our lives. We tend to carry that pain with us and let it inform every activity. When we have a new situation that may cause pain, we lump it together with our previous pain and it becomes a super-pain. We let our pain accumulate into a giant snowball of pain, keeping pain from the past as part of our present. This amplifies what might be trivial pain into something which makes us say, "Woe is me! I have soooo much pain!" Our pain bodies are of tremendous size and weight.
If we can live in the present, then we can leave all of our past pain behind and meet every new pain as just a tiny thing that we can brush aside and go on with our lives. Of course, we still will face monumental pains - breakups, deaths, injuries. But these pains will be tolerable and only last for the time that they need to for you to learn their lesson if you don't add them to the previous pain body. Every pain has a lesson to teach. If you can see the pain for what it is, and not add it to your emotional pain, you can learn the lesson and become stronger for it. In the present, everything is perfect, even if you're in pain. If you can accept your pain as a passing thing, then it is just like being on white water rapids - they're challenging and you have to be 100% present to keep the river from taking you, but you know that there is smoother water ahead and soon you'll have to paddle to keep going.
Some people say pain is an illusion. When something is emotionally painful, our psyches feel threatened, just as when something is physically painful, our bodies feel threatened. Physical pain tells us that something in our body needs attention. Emotional pain tells us that something in our psyche needs attention. When we were babies, we were born without personalities - we had genetic predispositions for certain reactions, but those weren't expressed right away. As we grew, we experienced outer stimulus, mostly warm, soft, nurturing stimulus. But then we began doing things innocently that brought negative reactions from our parents or caregivers. They responded with raised voices or physical violence. Some were also exposed to sexual abuse. We also did not get 100% attention every moment, so we felt neglected. This was our only experience of life, so we didn't think anything was out of the ordinary.
Our emotional pain has deep roots. We feel so much of it because we don't always see its cause. It started to grow before we could identify it as wrong. Then later, as adults, when we would feel emotional pain, we didn't see the connections with our early childhood experiences, and so were mystified why it hurt so much. If you can see that fear of pain is at the root of pain itself, you can get over it. We are afraid that we will feel abandoned, or physically or sexually threatened, or neglected. These are the things we felt as babies and they established a base-line for our pain. Every pain we feel as adults is compared to those pains, even though we may not see the connection.
We are much stronger people as adults. But if we are still attached to our infantile pain, we remain weak. We can now choose how to respond to pain. We can separate physical pain from emotional pain. We can feel pain and then learn its lesson and move past it. We can live without fear of pain. Fear is worse than actual pain. Fear keeps us from experiencing a thing fully. Fear keeps us from learning the lessons of life. It keeps us from growing. When we fear pain, we don't take risks, and it is when we take risks that we grow.
So, third, you have to let fear fall away. Easier said than done? Not really. The way to conquer fear is to face it. Dive off of that 40 foot cliff into cold, clear water. Consider the consequences, but then do what you think is best. Live in the present. In the present, everything is just how it ought to be. Learn to accept the way the world is, the way your life is. Don't bring fear everywhere you go. Live bravely. Recognize that your fears are ancient - they are fears of a child inside of you. Instead of reaching that inner child, say goodbye to him. Thank him for teaching you valuable lessons, but then part company saying, "I am a new person, and I have no emotional fears." Start you life right now. You are equipped to handle any situation. Identify your childhood fears and see how they have presented themselves in your adult life. The same fears have probably surfaced time and time again. You fear abandonment. You fear physical or sexual pain. These are the fears that keep occurring over and over in your life. There are not a countless number of fears or pains. There are just a few.
About ten years ago now, with the help of meds and some great therapists, I became free of emotional pain and have remained so. When fear comes up, I recognize it, learn its lesson and then let it float down the river. I recognize where the pain or fear comes from and that helps me put it in a little compartment that is separate from me. It's as if you can put the fear or pain in a little boat and let it float away. You don't have to keep it all with you. Your pain body may be huge. But if you can separate yourself from it, you can face any challenge. You are a strong, intelligent, fully capable adult. Start your life now. Free from pain. Your old pain is past. Go forward without fear.
Emotional pain is worse than physical pain because it colors every conscious moment. It also exacerbates physical pain and I think it sometimes even causes physical pain. I've had two bouts with debilitating back pain in my life - the first while I was still feeling emotional pain, the second when I was free of it. The first made me miserable for several years and seemed incurable. I had cortisone shots and physical therapy and was taking 1600mg of ibuprofen a day. I eventually got better, but it wasn't until my second incident that I realized that it was fear I was feeling more than pain.
The second incident left me unable to even support my own weight standing up. The pain was incredible. But because I had beat my emotional pain, the physical pain didn't bother me that much and I was able to separate my mind from my body. It was as if my car just needed a new alternator or something. You don't feel psychological or emotional pain about your car. My body was just like my car - it got my mind around in the world, but It wasn't my mind. My mind was in tip top shape. I think I could have very serious physical problems and still be happy, because I'm free from emotional pain.
So how do you get free from emotional pain? First, I think I had to forgive my parents. So many of us blame our parents for our current lives. My parents did the best they could. Yes, they could've been better, they could've paid more attention to me, could've not spanked me, could've helped guide me into adulthood. But they did not have the tools, probably because they didn't have examples in their own parents. I take responsibility now for who I am, instead of blaming them. I have the power to be whomever I want and to act in ways that I think are best. I have taken what my parents gave me and molded it into a shape that I like. I have total power over my life and my parents have no sway anymore. I love them for the good things they taught me, and don't blame them for the things they missed.
Second, You have to stop identifying with what Eckhardt Tolle calls "the pain body." We have all suffered emotional pain in our lives. We tend to carry that pain with us and let it inform every activity. When we have a new situation that may cause pain, we lump it together with our previous pain and it becomes a super-pain. We let our pain accumulate into a giant snowball of pain, keeping pain from the past as part of our present. This amplifies what might be trivial pain into something which makes us say, "Woe is me! I have soooo much pain!" Our pain bodies are of tremendous size and weight.
If we can live in the present, then we can leave all of our past pain behind and meet every new pain as just a tiny thing that we can brush aside and go on with our lives. Of course, we still will face monumental pains - breakups, deaths, injuries. But these pains will be tolerable and only last for the time that they need to for you to learn their lesson if you don't add them to the previous pain body. Every pain has a lesson to teach. If you can see the pain for what it is, and not add it to your emotional pain, you can learn the lesson and become stronger for it. In the present, everything is perfect, even if you're in pain. If you can accept your pain as a passing thing, then it is just like being on white water rapids - they're challenging and you have to be 100% present to keep the river from taking you, but you know that there is smoother water ahead and soon you'll have to paddle to keep going.
Some people say pain is an illusion. When something is emotionally painful, our psyches feel threatened, just as when something is physically painful, our bodies feel threatened. Physical pain tells us that something in our body needs attention. Emotional pain tells us that something in our psyche needs attention. When we were babies, we were born without personalities - we had genetic predispositions for certain reactions, but those weren't expressed right away. As we grew, we experienced outer stimulus, mostly warm, soft, nurturing stimulus. But then we began doing things innocently that brought negative reactions from our parents or caregivers. They responded with raised voices or physical violence. Some were also exposed to sexual abuse. We also did not get 100% attention every moment, so we felt neglected. This was our only experience of life, so we didn't think anything was out of the ordinary.
Our emotional pain has deep roots. We feel so much of it because we don't always see its cause. It started to grow before we could identify it as wrong. Then later, as adults, when we would feel emotional pain, we didn't see the connections with our early childhood experiences, and so were mystified why it hurt so much. If you can see that fear of pain is at the root of pain itself, you can get over it. We are afraid that we will feel abandoned, or physically or sexually threatened, or neglected. These are the things we felt as babies and they established a base-line for our pain. Every pain we feel as adults is compared to those pains, even though we may not see the connection.
We are much stronger people as adults. But if we are still attached to our infantile pain, we remain weak. We can now choose how to respond to pain. We can separate physical pain from emotional pain. We can feel pain and then learn its lesson and move past it. We can live without fear of pain. Fear is worse than actual pain. Fear keeps us from experiencing a thing fully. Fear keeps us from learning the lessons of life. It keeps us from growing. When we fear pain, we don't take risks, and it is when we take risks that we grow.
So, third, you have to let fear fall away. Easier said than done? Not really. The way to conquer fear is to face it. Dive off of that 40 foot cliff into cold, clear water. Consider the consequences, but then do what you think is best. Live in the present. In the present, everything is just how it ought to be. Learn to accept the way the world is, the way your life is. Don't bring fear everywhere you go. Live bravely. Recognize that your fears are ancient - they are fears of a child inside of you. Instead of reaching that inner child, say goodbye to him. Thank him for teaching you valuable lessons, but then part company saying, "I am a new person, and I have no emotional fears." Start you life right now. You are equipped to handle any situation. Identify your childhood fears and see how they have presented themselves in your adult life. The same fears have probably surfaced time and time again. You fear abandonment. You fear physical or sexual pain. These are the fears that keep occurring over and over in your life. There are not a countless number of fears or pains. There are just a few.
About ten years ago now, with the help of meds and some great therapists, I became free of emotional pain and have remained so. When fear comes up, I recognize it, learn its lesson and then let it float down the river. I recognize where the pain or fear comes from and that helps me put it in a little compartment that is separate from me. It's as if you can put the fear or pain in a little boat and let it float away. You don't have to keep it all with you. Your pain body may be huge. But if you can separate yourself from it, you can face any challenge. You are a strong, intelligent, fully capable adult. Start your life now. Free from pain. Your old pain is past. Go forward without fear.
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Free Time
I've never liked the phrase, "Time is money." We all have a finite amount of time on Earth and, like money, we can spend time or waste time, save time or invest time. So maybe the phrase should go, "Time is like money." But to equate the two is to devalue time, because money is an artificial construct.
There was a time when there was no money. There was nothing but time, and it was always free. Our time had value when we used it to get food or make love. That was all we were about as we evolved as proto-humans. Food and sex, like most animals. But, eventually, we started to trade things we did with our time for things others did with their time. I spent my time hunting this deer which I'll trade you for those wool blankets you made. We had to decide how much hunting equaled how many blankets. Things and time began to have value.
Then our symbolic powers evolved enough to say that a symbolic object such as a coin was worth a given amount of work or goods. Looking back through history we can see that monetary value is arbitrary because a dollar now is not what a dollar once was, or a pound or a shekel or what have you. Once, a day's work may have been worth a dollar, but that dollar would buy you a lot of things. If you worked 8 hours and slept 8 hours that left you with 8 hours of free time. If the work was worth a dollar, then the time must have been worth a dollar. But you weren't earning a dollar for it, so we considered it free time. We were also free from the enslavement that our jobs might have been. 8 hours to be free. It was as if we had a gift of time.
Until recently I felt as if I had very little free time. My work hours were such that on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday, I got home too late to use any time. I had Thursday off, but I was teaching a class in the middle of the day and the evening's were devoted to couples time, which, while pleasant, was not free. My Saturday off went all too quickly, because that was when I painted and wrote and made music and worked out and went shopping and did laundry, and there was always so much to get done, that the time never felt free and I always ran out of it before I could do all that I wanted to do.
Now, all of a sudden I find myself in a new job which has an odd schedule, and I find myself inundated with time. I deliver express mail in the morning and then have 4 1/2 free hours until I have to do the reverse route in the afternoon. I stop at a truck stop, so my options are limited, but the time is such a gift! I read a bit, study for the MCAT because I still have the idea of medical school in my head, have my lunch, and then I write. I've already finished the second draft of a novel I'd been working on for a long time. And now I'm working on my philosophy book, writing down all the things I think about the process we call life. I'm not sure what its eventual fate will be, but I realized that I've been in conversation with myself about the nature of reality all my life and I've come to certain conclusions. But they just exist in my head. I feel like they will never have a value unless they're expressed and I guess writing them down is the first step. If I just die and never express my thoughts then what was the good of thinking them? So it feels like I'm getting paid to have a few hours of structured writing time 6 days a week. That's like a dream!
And then, I'm home by 5:30 or six every day, giving me even more free time. I'm finding that I can now choose what to do with my time - a luxury that I don't remember ever having. Time to me is worth so much more than money, so I feel like a rich man. A person needs time to reflect. When we are so busy with life that we don't have a moment to even appreciate time, we become mechanical. I see so many people who live for their jobs because they can't see how to survive otherwise. And then they squander whatever little time they have. Stop right this moment and be aware of it. Take in your surroundings. Feel the air, hear the sounds, really look at where you are. Check in with your body, your breathing, your pulse. Calm your nervous energy for a moment. Relax. Just for a moment. Doesn't it feel right? That moment can be so valuable - worth so much more than money. It is beyond price. That time you just took is my gift to you. It is a gift you can claim again and again. And it is free. A moment of real awareness is worth many days of hard work. If you step out of the stream of time for just a moment and appreciate all of creation, you will be rich too.
Money is just an idea. But free time is worth so much more.
There was a time when there was no money. There was nothing but time, and it was always free. Our time had value when we used it to get food or make love. That was all we were about as we evolved as proto-humans. Food and sex, like most animals. But, eventually, we started to trade things we did with our time for things others did with their time. I spent my time hunting this deer which I'll trade you for those wool blankets you made. We had to decide how much hunting equaled how many blankets. Things and time began to have value.
Then our symbolic powers evolved enough to say that a symbolic object such as a coin was worth a given amount of work or goods. Looking back through history we can see that monetary value is arbitrary because a dollar now is not what a dollar once was, or a pound or a shekel or what have you. Once, a day's work may have been worth a dollar, but that dollar would buy you a lot of things. If you worked 8 hours and slept 8 hours that left you with 8 hours of free time. If the work was worth a dollar, then the time must have been worth a dollar. But you weren't earning a dollar for it, so we considered it free time. We were also free from the enslavement that our jobs might have been. 8 hours to be free. It was as if we had a gift of time.
Until recently I felt as if I had very little free time. My work hours were such that on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday, I got home too late to use any time. I had Thursday off, but I was teaching a class in the middle of the day and the evening's were devoted to couples time, which, while pleasant, was not free. My Saturday off went all too quickly, because that was when I painted and wrote and made music and worked out and went shopping and did laundry, and there was always so much to get done, that the time never felt free and I always ran out of it before I could do all that I wanted to do.
Now, all of a sudden I find myself in a new job which has an odd schedule, and I find myself inundated with time. I deliver express mail in the morning and then have 4 1/2 free hours until I have to do the reverse route in the afternoon. I stop at a truck stop, so my options are limited, but the time is such a gift! I read a bit, study for the MCAT because I still have the idea of medical school in my head, have my lunch, and then I write. I've already finished the second draft of a novel I'd been working on for a long time. And now I'm working on my philosophy book, writing down all the things I think about the process we call life. I'm not sure what its eventual fate will be, but I realized that I've been in conversation with myself about the nature of reality all my life and I've come to certain conclusions. But they just exist in my head. I feel like they will never have a value unless they're expressed and I guess writing them down is the first step. If I just die and never express my thoughts then what was the good of thinking them? So it feels like I'm getting paid to have a few hours of structured writing time 6 days a week. That's like a dream!
And then, I'm home by 5:30 or six every day, giving me even more free time. I'm finding that I can now choose what to do with my time - a luxury that I don't remember ever having. Time to me is worth so much more than money, so I feel like a rich man. A person needs time to reflect. When we are so busy with life that we don't have a moment to even appreciate time, we become mechanical. I see so many people who live for their jobs because they can't see how to survive otherwise. And then they squander whatever little time they have. Stop right this moment and be aware of it. Take in your surroundings. Feel the air, hear the sounds, really look at where you are. Check in with your body, your breathing, your pulse. Calm your nervous energy for a moment. Relax. Just for a moment. Doesn't it feel right? That moment can be so valuable - worth so much more than money. It is beyond price. That time you just took is my gift to you. It is a gift you can claim again and again. And it is free. A moment of real awareness is worth many days of hard work. If you step out of the stream of time for just a moment and appreciate all of creation, you will be rich too.
Money is just an idea. But free time is worth so much more.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Epiphanies
Life is full of epiphanies. Sometimes they hit you subtly, sometimes with a bang to the head. Childhood is chock full of them, as everyday brings a new wonder. But we didn't see them as revelations then - we were just filling up our empty heads with whatever came our way. As adults, the epiphanies are more spread out and poignant. When you just instantly know something or realize it in a new way it can be transforming. I've had several life-changing revelations lately, if I can call them that.
The first I wrote about previously in a post entitled, "My New Religion." It struck me like a thunderbolt that my beliefs were not the beliefs I grew up with. The change happened over decades, but the realization was instantaneous. I was brought up Catholic and went through 12 years of Catholic school. I was an altar boy and always did well in my religion classes. I was pretty immersed in what Catholics believed and though I questioned a lot of it, even as a child, if there were such a thing as a Catholic test, I would pass it with flying colors. But then I had the epiphany that outside of the general morality of Catholicism, I really shared very little with Catholics in terms of belief. I don't believe that Jesus was God except in the way that everyone is part of God (see earlier post). I don't believe he rose from the dead. I don't believe in a Father in heaven or that Mary was free from sin or was a virgin. I basically don't believe any doctrine of Catholicism at all. I wholly accept Catholics, as long as they are loving people, but I share very little with them.
My second recent epiphany was that I want to become a doctor. It was an early ambition of mine, but was squelched by this and that, and overshadowed by my strong desire to be a creative person. I don't know why those two things had to be mutually exclusive. And my mother didn't help with saying often, "We're not the Kennedy's" whenever I had some grand design.
(I was doing some research on Brian Boru, the first king of a united Ireland from whom all O'Brien's descend and I found out that his father was from the clan of O'Kennedy. So, mom, you might not be a Kennedy, but I am, in name and spirit).
So my ambition to become a doctor came directly from the epiphany about religion. The only thing I know about what a God might possibly want is that He wants life to continue. It's the only theme that is present in the world. All life, from microorganisms to the great whales, wants to continue. It is programmed in us. We'll never know why, but I want to be a part of that. We want our own individual survival and we want the survival of our species. Some of us further want the survival of every species because we see how interdependent we all are. But sometimes I wonder, if the polar bear were to go extinct, that would be sad, but it wouldn't affect our survival. Maybe the grand design doesn't need every species. Obviously, many didn't make it. No one misses the dodo. Or the mammoth.
So, as a doctor, I see myself helping life to continue. I'm thinking about psychiatry, since it has already had a profound effect in my life. Since I didn't have kids, and am not helping life to go on in that way, I want to help other people live the best lives they can, be as happy and healthy as they can be and be a richer part of the world we're in.
My most recent epiphany stems from the first two and has had such shock waves that I'm still in awe of what I've found out. All my life I have felt the need to make art. In school I used to draw all over my desk all the time. I would draw in text books and on scraps of paper. And musically I felt I wanted to perform at every chance, from school plays to church choirs to writing my own music to playing in bars and clubs. I felt the need to create so strongly that I never questioned it. I didn't know why I had to, I just had to. As an adult artist there came a time when I decided that I would make a point to paint every day. It would not be just a hobby, it would be like a religious practice. My identity was cemented when I made that decision. There were times when friends would want to go out and I would say, "No, I've got to paint." It was my vocation, my reason for living. I was always searching for ways to make my work better and settled on the idea that it was a life-long quest, and that I would always be learning.
But then last week, I had the epiphany. I no longer have the need to paint. I still have the desire to paint, because I thoroughly enjoy the quest for better expressions of myself. But I don't have the need. I think my need was for people to pay attention to me, to think me intelligent and talented. I grew up fourth in a family of five kids where I didn't get that much attention. So as I grew, I craved it and the itch was scratched by art. It became part of my identity and I felt a sense of self-validation when I would do something I considered worthy. But that need for attention is gone. Painting doesn't really help anyone - it's just entertainment. I will still paint, but my painting will be different. It will be more intentional. I used to think that everything I did was so brilliant, but I just don't see that anymore.
We all have genius - we just have to recognize it and nurture it. My genius is not about painting or writing or music, as I thought it was for so many years. My genius is in communication. And in my life, I don't use that genius enough. I have amazing dialogues with myself, but so rarely do I have them with anybody else anymore. What good is a head full of knowledge and novelty if it isn't shared? So psychiatry seems to be the avenue where I can put my knowledge, and hopefully the wisdom it has engendered, to good use.
I feel free from the shackles of my own making. I used to feel that if I didn't keep painting, I would lose my identity. And some day, I felt, if I kept learning, I would truly make a masterpiece. Now I see that painting is just one of the tools in my box. Just as music is. And writing. If I were suddenly unable to do any of these things, I wouldn't lose my identity. I suppose that is what the epiphany was all about - that my self-identity is fully formed. I know who I am. I know what my tools are. And I know what to do with them. I know what I believe. It has taken 49 years, but I know who I am. And I am pleased to meet me.
The first I wrote about previously in a post entitled, "My New Religion." It struck me like a thunderbolt that my beliefs were not the beliefs I grew up with. The change happened over decades, but the realization was instantaneous. I was brought up Catholic and went through 12 years of Catholic school. I was an altar boy and always did well in my religion classes. I was pretty immersed in what Catholics believed and though I questioned a lot of it, even as a child, if there were such a thing as a Catholic test, I would pass it with flying colors. But then I had the epiphany that outside of the general morality of Catholicism, I really shared very little with Catholics in terms of belief. I don't believe that Jesus was God except in the way that everyone is part of God (see earlier post). I don't believe he rose from the dead. I don't believe in a Father in heaven or that Mary was free from sin or was a virgin. I basically don't believe any doctrine of Catholicism at all. I wholly accept Catholics, as long as they are loving people, but I share very little with them.
My second recent epiphany was that I want to become a doctor. It was an early ambition of mine, but was squelched by this and that, and overshadowed by my strong desire to be a creative person. I don't know why those two things had to be mutually exclusive. And my mother didn't help with saying often, "We're not the Kennedy's" whenever I had some grand design.
(I was doing some research on Brian Boru, the first king of a united Ireland from whom all O'Brien's descend and I found out that his father was from the clan of O'Kennedy. So, mom, you might not be a Kennedy, but I am, in name and spirit).
So my ambition to become a doctor came directly from the epiphany about religion. The only thing I know about what a God might possibly want is that He wants life to continue. It's the only theme that is present in the world. All life, from microorganisms to the great whales, wants to continue. It is programmed in us. We'll never know why, but I want to be a part of that. We want our own individual survival and we want the survival of our species. Some of us further want the survival of every species because we see how interdependent we all are. But sometimes I wonder, if the polar bear were to go extinct, that would be sad, but it wouldn't affect our survival. Maybe the grand design doesn't need every species. Obviously, many didn't make it. No one misses the dodo. Or the mammoth.
So, as a doctor, I see myself helping life to continue. I'm thinking about psychiatry, since it has already had a profound effect in my life. Since I didn't have kids, and am not helping life to go on in that way, I want to help other people live the best lives they can, be as happy and healthy as they can be and be a richer part of the world we're in.
My most recent epiphany stems from the first two and has had such shock waves that I'm still in awe of what I've found out. All my life I have felt the need to make art. In school I used to draw all over my desk all the time. I would draw in text books and on scraps of paper. And musically I felt I wanted to perform at every chance, from school plays to church choirs to writing my own music to playing in bars and clubs. I felt the need to create so strongly that I never questioned it. I didn't know why I had to, I just had to. As an adult artist there came a time when I decided that I would make a point to paint every day. It would not be just a hobby, it would be like a religious practice. My identity was cemented when I made that decision. There were times when friends would want to go out and I would say, "No, I've got to paint." It was my vocation, my reason for living. I was always searching for ways to make my work better and settled on the idea that it was a life-long quest, and that I would always be learning.
But then last week, I had the epiphany. I no longer have the need to paint. I still have the desire to paint, because I thoroughly enjoy the quest for better expressions of myself. But I don't have the need. I think my need was for people to pay attention to me, to think me intelligent and talented. I grew up fourth in a family of five kids where I didn't get that much attention. So as I grew, I craved it and the itch was scratched by art. It became part of my identity and I felt a sense of self-validation when I would do something I considered worthy. But that need for attention is gone. Painting doesn't really help anyone - it's just entertainment. I will still paint, but my painting will be different. It will be more intentional. I used to think that everything I did was so brilliant, but I just don't see that anymore.
We all have genius - we just have to recognize it and nurture it. My genius is not about painting or writing or music, as I thought it was for so many years. My genius is in communication. And in my life, I don't use that genius enough. I have amazing dialogues with myself, but so rarely do I have them with anybody else anymore. What good is a head full of knowledge and novelty if it isn't shared? So psychiatry seems to be the avenue where I can put my knowledge, and hopefully the wisdom it has engendered, to good use.
I feel free from the shackles of my own making. I used to feel that if I didn't keep painting, I would lose my identity. And some day, I felt, if I kept learning, I would truly make a masterpiece. Now I see that painting is just one of the tools in my box. Just as music is. And writing. If I were suddenly unable to do any of these things, I wouldn't lose my identity. I suppose that is what the epiphany was all about - that my self-identity is fully formed. I know who I am. I know what my tools are. And I know what to do with them. I know what I believe. It has taken 49 years, but I know who I am. And I am pleased to meet me.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Identity
Who are you? On a high school retreat, we paired off with a partner and were asked to write 1) how we perceive ourselves, 2) how we think others perceive us, and then our partner would write how they actually perceived us. Needless to say, these descriptions were not identical. It is safe to say that, though there are generalizations about us on which everyone would agree, we are perceived differently by each individual with whom we come in contact. So, in addition to working on our inner selves, we must also work on our public relations or no one will ever know who we really are.
When we meet someone, we size them up without thinking. We take in their clothing, their hairstyle, their general appearance and demeanor, their stance, their speech, their sexuality, even the shape of the muscles on their face which tells us what mood they're in and how their facial habits have affected their affect. We can sense if someone is an angry person, a joyous person, a serene person, an anxious person, and we approach them and treat them as such without any consciousness of it. There are people who draw us in and people who push us away.
I am reminded of this as I think about the way in which I think my co-workers would describe me. I think my boss would think that I am absent-minded and flighty. The people I used to supervise would see me as self-assured and implacable, even in the tensest situations. People in other departments might see me as quiet and thoughtful. My current co-workers would know me as creative and friendly.
I am all of these things, but if I were to write a description of myself, these are not the things on which I would focus. How do I want you to know me? I am a person who feels very intensely his own presence. I am living consciously and celebrating each moment I'm alive. Even when there's pain, I am thankful for being able to experience it, thankful of having the human experience of it. (Don't get me wrong - I'm thankful for pain relievers too!) I feel the connection between all things, and understand that all I know about matter is what I can perceive with my senses. I think there is more to reality than what we can sense. I feel that the arts are a way to transcend the prison that our mind and senses create. In making art, music, dance, writing, we are allowed to take what is otherwise un-sayable in our minds and give it manifest form. When we do this, we allow others into our minds and can more fully share our experience of being human.
If you were to listen to some of my songs, read some of my stories, or sit with some of my paintings, you might get a better sense of who I am than I could ever tell you. When we visit museums, we don't get descriptions of painters' day-to-day existences, we get the nuances of their souls. If a painting is good, it's because you know how the painter felt making it. And better still, how they felt about life - what it was like in their mind. If you looked through my oeuvre, you would see a mind that has never been at rest, a mind that has had explosions of energy and emotion, a mind that saw the world with new eyes every day. This is what I want you to know about me. That I am not a static, describable being - none of us are. I am a process that has continued for almost 49 years and continues to unfold every day. You can never know me, you can only know what I have affected.
So our identity is defined by what we affect. Like with the energy that we call light, we can't see it, we can only see its effect on matter. Our self-consciousness is built by the reactions we see in other people. We cannot judge any action good or bad without the reactions of others. We see negative reactions and we may change the way we act. We see positive reactions and we may repeat whatever action brought it about. From the time we are little, we are constantly seeing ourselves mirrored in other people's eyes and building the thing we call personality. We are an accumulation of all the reactions we've gotten. We think we can choose who we are, but we are largely a series of forks in the road - good reaction, one way; bad reaction, another way. It's why no two personalities are the same. They diverge as soon as we take our first action and then follow their own unrepeatable route.
I'm picturing an infinite game of Pachinko, where God drops a chip and it plinks and plunks its way down the pins of our lives, sometimes bouncing left, sometimes right, ending up making a path that is uniquely ours, and no other can follow it in the same way. Where our chip is dropped is our genetic predisposition for certain things, but where we go from there is a zillion decisions of right or left, yes or no, and random bounces based on where we've been so far.
Who am I? It is impossible to say. But you are invited to watch which way I bounce.
When we meet someone, we size them up without thinking. We take in their clothing, their hairstyle, their general appearance and demeanor, their stance, their speech, their sexuality, even the shape of the muscles on their face which tells us what mood they're in and how their facial habits have affected their affect. We can sense if someone is an angry person, a joyous person, a serene person, an anxious person, and we approach them and treat them as such without any consciousness of it. There are people who draw us in and people who push us away.
I am reminded of this as I think about the way in which I think my co-workers would describe me. I think my boss would think that I am absent-minded and flighty. The people I used to supervise would see me as self-assured and implacable, even in the tensest situations. People in other departments might see me as quiet and thoughtful. My current co-workers would know me as creative and friendly.
I am all of these things, but if I were to write a description of myself, these are not the things on which I would focus. How do I want you to know me? I am a person who feels very intensely his own presence. I am living consciously and celebrating each moment I'm alive. Even when there's pain, I am thankful for being able to experience it, thankful of having the human experience of it. (Don't get me wrong - I'm thankful for pain relievers too!) I feel the connection between all things, and understand that all I know about matter is what I can perceive with my senses. I think there is more to reality than what we can sense. I feel that the arts are a way to transcend the prison that our mind and senses create. In making art, music, dance, writing, we are allowed to take what is otherwise un-sayable in our minds and give it manifest form. When we do this, we allow others into our minds and can more fully share our experience of being human.
If you were to listen to some of my songs, read some of my stories, or sit with some of my paintings, you might get a better sense of who I am than I could ever tell you. When we visit museums, we don't get descriptions of painters' day-to-day existences, we get the nuances of their souls. If a painting is good, it's because you know how the painter felt making it. And better still, how they felt about life - what it was like in their mind. If you looked through my oeuvre, you would see a mind that has never been at rest, a mind that has had explosions of energy and emotion, a mind that saw the world with new eyes every day. This is what I want you to know about me. That I am not a static, describable being - none of us are. I am a process that has continued for almost 49 years and continues to unfold every day. You can never know me, you can only know what I have affected.
So our identity is defined by what we affect. Like with the energy that we call light, we can't see it, we can only see its effect on matter. Our self-consciousness is built by the reactions we see in other people. We cannot judge any action good or bad without the reactions of others. We see negative reactions and we may change the way we act. We see positive reactions and we may repeat whatever action brought it about. From the time we are little, we are constantly seeing ourselves mirrored in other people's eyes and building the thing we call personality. We are an accumulation of all the reactions we've gotten. We think we can choose who we are, but we are largely a series of forks in the road - good reaction, one way; bad reaction, another way. It's why no two personalities are the same. They diverge as soon as we take our first action and then follow their own unrepeatable route.
I'm picturing an infinite game of Pachinko, where God drops a chip and it plinks and plunks its way down the pins of our lives, sometimes bouncing left, sometimes right, ending up making a path that is uniquely ours, and no other can follow it in the same way. Where our chip is dropped is our genetic predisposition for certain things, but where we go from there is a zillion decisions of right or left, yes or no, and random bounces based on where we've been so far.
Who am I? It is impossible to say. But you are invited to watch which way I bounce.
Monday, February 13, 2012
Discovering Color
A funny thing happened to me on the way to the canvas ...
Actually, my painting style has gone through so many changes (as have I) through the years that one can hardly keep track. As far as galleries are concerned this is artistic suicide. Most galleries want artists who have a signature style that they do well and can keep producing in the same vein. But I am a complex organism, not a machine, and so my output changes as I change in the world.
For our new CD, "Dreamtown," my co-writer, Bob Elliott, asked me to look through some old paintings to see if we could find any images to use. He talked about some figures I had done in trippy colors. I looked at what I had been doing recently and realized that I was not painting in trippy colors anymore. I was painting in perfectly sane colors - true to life colors. Colors that were appropriate to the color and intensity of the light from the sky. This had not always been the case.
When I started unrolling some of those old paintings, I was a little startled. They were done in my manic phases where the paintings weren't so much about subject as they were about paint! They were explosions of color - very expressionistic. I was obviously feeling intense feelings while I painted and exploring my emotional attachment to all the various colors. There was hardly a color that I did not use.
Then, I went through my MFA program and really learned to paint all over again. First, I limited my palette. Gone were the intense cadmiums and cobalts and quinacridones. I started looking at Rembrandt, and noticed the almost complete lack of any bright color. He used basically lead white, charcoal black, yellow ochre, raw sienna, burnt umber and a few others. He always worked on a dark toned ground. I found this appealing at the time. I took my landscape palette down to chromium green, Van Dyke brown, yellow ochre, venetian red, titanium white and maybe a little cerulean for skies, though most of my skies were gray made from Vandyke brown and white. There was such a balanced consistency to the whole scene. Here in the Pacific Northwest, we do not have a lot of bright blue skies, and gray and dark green are pretty much the extent of our natural palette. I've been living here for about 11 years, and I'm sure the lack of color has influenced my painting. Look at painting from Cuba or Ghana, or Jamaica and you will see a different palette. Look at Van Gogh in Arles and compare to his paintings in Holland. The light we live in affects our painting.
I had learned to harness color to make it do what I wanted. I had learned to limit color by graying it out with its complement. I had learned to portray the light of the Pacific Northwest. But that was not what was in my secret heart. I used to intentionally place bright complements next to each other for their vivid effect. If I saw a little blue in a shadow, I would intensify it to a deep ultramarine. I might see straw-colored grasses on a bright day as stripes of cad yellow and dioxazine purple, strewn with dots of cad red light and cad orange flowers. Everything screamed colors. That is what I noticed when I unrolled those old paintings.
And so I looked at what I was currently working on - some small 8x10 landscapes which were all very proper and unremarkable. I suddenly realized that no one needed to see these places I was painting. Who would care? It was just another tree among billions, another road, another mountain. My painting had become pedestrian. I exerted so much control over the light that they had lost the intense emotion that made me love paint in the first place. So the first thing I did was get rid of the blue sky. We've all seen enough blue skies in our life - I wanted to paint the sky vivid yellow - not just a sunset glow, but a happy yellow that had nothing to do with a color the sky could actually ever be. The light of the sky changes everything. So if this was the light from the sky, how did that affect the trees? The path? The meadow? So, just that suddenly, my painting style changed. I looked at everything as containing the colors of my emotions instead of the color of my eyes.
I went back in to several of the small works I'd been making and completely painted over everything, keeping the good compositions, but cranking the color knob to 11. Shadows were once again deep ultramarine and grasses, cadmium yellow. There were no more gray rocks, but blue or lavender ones. The ground was not longer neutral - it jumped out at you with a pink soil stabbed with ultramarine shadows and flecked with color. I realized that I had been a reporter, when I longed to be F. Scott Fitzgerald.
But now, I had left my manic tendencies behind and was in control of my painting again. Painting is manipulation, in a good way. I can not only force your mind to think of a tree where no tree exists, but I can force you to feel the feelings I want you to feel about that tree. Think of it - You can't look at a good picture of a tree and see it for what it really is - molecules of pigment which reflect certain wavelengths of light, arranged by the artist in a more-or-less two dimensional pattern - you see a tree! And yet there is no tree. You could see it on the moon, in the Sahara Desert or in the Antarctic and you would still think of a tree. The artist forces your mind. He creates thought patterns based on our life's experience of a tree.
And now, in addition to this manipulation of thought patterns, I am playing on all your life's associations with color. The tree can be red and blue and still you accept it as a tree. Yellow and red and blue light can play in the leaves and you may still see them as green. I don't have to report that leaves are green - we all know that. And I have learned my own color-connected emotional language. I know how an alizarin crimson is going to affect you as opposed to a naphthol red. I know when to use chromium green and when to use cadmium green. I know what emotions I connect with colors. It's like knowing when to use a minor chord to convey a slight sadness and when to use a minor 7th for a more serious color of sadness. Or a major 7 for dreaminess. Or a diminished chord for uncertainty. So a cadmium green is happy and optimistic, where an olive green (which is different mixes by different color makers) is subdued and sleepy. A chromium green is a strong adult, no-nonsense color, and a phthalo green is bossy. You can't just use every green in every painting or your head will explode with emotion. This is what I used to do. And that's what my head did.
Now I hope that I've learned enough about light, paint and color to manipulate the viewer in exactly the way I intend. I hope when you see a painted tree now, you will not only think of a tree, but you will understand exactly how I feel about that tree. You will understand why I had to paint that particular tree in a world full of trees. It's never really about a tree, it's about connecting what is inside of the artist to what is inside of the viewer. You can use a tree to do it, or you can use a figure to do it or you can just arrange color on a canvas to do it.
That is why abstract painting is hard for some people to do and hard for some people to look at. Amateurs think they can just splash paint around and call it an abstract painting, and they think this is what abstract painters do. But that is not unlike making a bunch of random utterances and calling it a language. Or making a bunch of unconnected noises and calling it music. Color is a language that has to be studied. The more you study, the more fluent you will be. You can write like a reporter, but you can also write like Marcel Proust. But you cannot write and you cannot read anything unless you know at least some of the language.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
On Disappointment
A friend asked for a few words about disappointment and my first thought was - what an odd word that is. "dis" is obviously a negative, but "appointment?" So, of course, I had to look up the etymology. And oddly enough, the original meaning of the word was to remove from appointed office. One was appointed, and then, presumably from doing a poor job, one was disappointed. My friend holds no public office, so I know he has no fear of disappointment in this way.
So, obviously, we are talking about the frustration of expectation. There are three kinds of disappointment: disappointment in one's self; disappointment in others; and disappointment in the way things are. If you never expect anything, you cannot experience any of these disappointments. But our brains are conditioned to expect things. That is how we plan.
Let's look at them one at a time. If we are disappointed in the way things are, irrespective of what anyone has done, then it is likely that we are experiencing a form of depression. If the universe just doesn't seem fair, if it has rained too many days, if you are not as tall as you'd like to be and somehow you are disappointed by this, then your brain chemicals may be imbalanced. The universe is not fair - it is a very neutral place where things are not set out just for you to be happy. You can find happiness in acceptance of this. Someone told me a Buddhist saying the other day: When things are good, they are good. And when things are bad, they are also good. We cannot expect anything from the universe or from God. We make life what it is. Accept the bad. Strive for the good. Another saying: To have more, desire less.
But somehow I don't think my friend was alluding to this kind of disappointment.
So, what about disappointment in others? We like to think that we are all on an equal playing field and that others will do what is best for everyone. But we all have unique brains built by our own experiences - so every one is different. Every brain has its own best interest at heart, or the best interest of its offspring. I experience disappointment when I see selfish actions which do harm to other people, but the brain always thinks it is taking care of itself. We have all gone through emotional injury in our lives, and our brains have all built defense mechanisms to prevent the injuries from occurring again. So, sometimes our brain works without our consent and does what it thinks is best for the individual without ever consulting us. So what can we expect from other people's brains? Unless we're talking about your mom's brain, we can't expect other people to try and make you happy. If you expect someone else to make you happy, you very well may be disappointed.
But I think what really matters is that which we can do something about: disappointment in ourselves. We want to be the best we can be. We want happiness. We want to achieve this and that. We want love. We want acceptance from others. We want recognition. Some want money. Some want fame. Some just want to please their parents. Let's look at that.
When you are an infant, you are a blank slate. You have never done anything to either please or displease anyone. But as you grow, you start making choices based on whatever feedback you get from your actions. Since no one but your parents chastises you, you at first only please or disappoint your parents. They want you to be a certain way and this is based on their own childhoods and the childhoods of their parents and so on back down the line. No parents come to Earth wholly made, unaffected by their own upbringing. We are all products of a long line of human evolution and things that may have happened generations ago are still affecting your relationship with your parents. They are deep and mostly unconscious things. We transfer what our parents expect of us to what we think we expect of ourselves.
And what can we expect of ourselves? We are in competition with everyone in our society. We mostly enter the world in a weak position. Most people do not come into the world with the proverbial silver spoon in their mouths. Those people probably are raised to expect a lot - and they get it. But the rest of us have to work our way upstream in life, against a torrent of limitations. We should first expect only that we will live, that we have the drive to continue eating and taking care not to get injured. In this, we are usually not disappointed. But then, we expect ourselves to do something called succeeding.
Another interesting etymology: to come after, or take the place of another. e.g. If Queen Elizabeth II should die, Prince Charles would succeed. Gosh, you'd think he was pretty successful already. But, again, back to our parents - to succeed in our parents eyes is to do better than they did. Our parents want this for us and so we think we want it for ourselves. In olden times, where your ancestors might have been peasant farmers, you might literally just follow after them, and that would be your success. But in modern times, our paths so often diverge from our parents' and how then do we measure success? How do I relate as a writer, musician, and artist to my fireman father? If I can take care of a family like he did, does that make me a success? I have no wife and no family - does that make me a failure? Not in my eyes. I have had to redefine success in my own terms, because the things I have come to value are different than the things my parents valued.
If we can divorce our own notion of success from our parents', we will more seldom be disappointed with ourselves. Of course, we can try things and fail, but if we tried our best, there's no reason for disappointment. If we did not try our best, we must look at the reasons why we were trying in the first place. Was it to please others? And disappointment is inextricably tied to the past. We cannot be disappointed with the present moment. In the present moment, everything just is. We can only be disappointed with the past, and the past is unchangeable. When we accept that fact, we learn a lesson about the past that can be applied to the future. There is always a lesson in disappointment. Take it with you or the disappointment will be without value. Be grateful for the failures as well as the successes. Be grateful that you are having the full range of human experience. It is a miracle that we think and feel at all.
Let us take a moment to step outside of our brains and look at them as observers. Our brain is an amazing machine, but much of what it does is automatic. Right now it is sending electric impulses to you heart to constrict and relax, pumping blood throughout your body. It is doing the same to your lungs to infuse that blood with oxygen which nourishes every cell. It is turning food into energy. It is making certain muscles and tendons constrict to hold your body in the position it's in. It is also storing nearly all of your life's experience. And it is making sense of some of the stimulus it collects through our senses. But somehow we think we are in control of it. For the most part, we do not use our brains - our brains use us. We can learn to control this amazing machine better by getting to know it.
When we experience a disappointment, we have to look at how our brain is processing that information. Disappointment makes us feel bad chemically based on experiences that we have had in the past which were negative. Our brains have pleasure centers which are stimulated chemically when things happen which are life affirming. These pleasure centers, when the brain is functioning properly, are constantly fed by neurotransmitters and our normal, waking state should be one of happiness and well-being. Of course, we do not always feel this. Some things threaten our sense of well-being. Our pleasure centers shut down and toxins from our environment and adrenaline are free to flood our bodies. We sometimes get rid of toxins by tears or vomit or sweat or urination or defecation. Sometimes we feel so threatened that our body goes into "fight, flight, or freeze" mode. Our automatic brain does the driving and we react "without thinking."
Awareness of the present moment and the miracle of consciousness can put all things in perspective. Before an event occurs is the time to think about disappointment. What will I feel like if I don't get that job? What will it feel like if I am rejected? What will it feel like to be laughed at? And why will I feel this way? How is this coming experience like that of my childhood? What do I expect of myself? If you act consciously instead of reacting unconsciously, you will seldom feel disappointment in yourself. That is the only disappointment that you have any control of. If you're disappointed with others or with the universe - get medicated and seek therapy. Focus on your expectations. Remember, to have more, desire less. Accept what is. Not just take, but embrace the bad with the good. You are insignificant to the universe, yet the whole universe dwells inside of you. Is the raindrop disappointed that it has to fall? That is its nature.
So, obviously, we are talking about the frustration of expectation. There are three kinds of disappointment: disappointment in one's self; disappointment in others; and disappointment in the way things are. If you never expect anything, you cannot experience any of these disappointments. But our brains are conditioned to expect things. That is how we plan.
Let's look at them one at a time. If we are disappointed in the way things are, irrespective of what anyone has done, then it is likely that we are experiencing a form of depression. If the universe just doesn't seem fair, if it has rained too many days, if you are not as tall as you'd like to be and somehow you are disappointed by this, then your brain chemicals may be imbalanced. The universe is not fair - it is a very neutral place where things are not set out just for you to be happy. You can find happiness in acceptance of this. Someone told me a Buddhist saying the other day: When things are good, they are good. And when things are bad, they are also good. We cannot expect anything from the universe or from God. We make life what it is. Accept the bad. Strive for the good. Another saying: To have more, desire less.
But somehow I don't think my friend was alluding to this kind of disappointment.
So, what about disappointment in others? We like to think that we are all on an equal playing field and that others will do what is best for everyone. But we all have unique brains built by our own experiences - so every one is different. Every brain has its own best interest at heart, or the best interest of its offspring. I experience disappointment when I see selfish actions which do harm to other people, but the brain always thinks it is taking care of itself. We have all gone through emotional injury in our lives, and our brains have all built defense mechanisms to prevent the injuries from occurring again. So, sometimes our brain works without our consent and does what it thinks is best for the individual without ever consulting us. So what can we expect from other people's brains? Unless we're talking about your mom's brain, we can't expect other people to try and make you happy. If you expect someone else to make you happy, you very well may be disappointed.
But I think what really matters is that which we can do something about: disappointment in ourselves. We want to be the best we can be. We want happiness. We want to achieve this and that. We want love. We want acceptance from others. We want recognition. Some want money. Some want fame. Some just want to please their parents. Let's look at that.
When you are an infant, you are a blank slate. You have never done anything to either please or displease anyone. But as you grow, you start making choices based on whatever feedback you get from your actions. Since no one but your parents chastises you, you at first only please or disappoint your parents. They want you to be a certain way and this is based on their own childhoods and the childhoods of their parents and so on back down the line. No parents come to Earth wholly made, unaffected by their own upbringing. We are all products of a long line of human evolution and things that may have happened generations ago are still affecting your relationship with your parents. They are deep and mostly unconscious things. We transfer what our parents expect of us to what we think we expect of ourselves.
And what can we expect of ourselves? We are in competition with everyone in our society. We mostly enter the world in a weak position. Most people do not come into the world with the proverbial silver spoon in their mouths. Those people probably are raised to expect a lot - and they get it. But the rest of us have to work our way upstream in life, against a torrent of limitations. We should first expect only that we will live, that we have the drive to continue eating and taking care not to get injured. In this, we are usually not disappointed. But then, we expect ourselves to do something called succeeding.
Another interesting etymology: to come after, or take the place of another. e.g. If Queen Elizabeth II should die, Prince Charles would succeed. Gosh, you'd think he was pretty successful already. But, again, back to our parents - to succeed in our parents eyes is to do better than they did. Our parents want this for us and so we think we want it for ourselves. In olden times, where your ancestors might have been peasant farmers, you might literally just follow after them, and that would be your success. But in modern times, our paths so often diverge from our parents' and how then do we measure success? How do I relate as a writer, musician, and artist to my fireman father? If I can take care of a family like he did, does that make me a success? I have no wife and no family - does that make me a failure? Not in my eyes. I have had to redefine success in my own terms, because the things I have come to value are different than the things my parents valued.
If we can divorce our own notion of success from our parents', we will more seldom be disappointed with ourselves. Of course, we can try things and fail, but if we tried our best, there's no reason for disappointment. If we did not try our best, we must look at the reasons why we were trying in the first place. Was it to please others? And disappointment is inextricably tied to the past. We cannot be disappointed with the present moment. In the present moment, everything just is. We can only be disappointed with the past, and the past is unchangeable. When we accept that fact, we learn a lesson about the past that can be applied to the future. There is always a lesson in disappointment. Take it with you or the disappointment will be without value. Be grateful for the failures as well as the successes. Be grateful that you are having the full range of human experience. It is a miracle that we think and feel at all.
Let us take a moment to step outside of our brains and look at them as observers. Our brain is an amazing machine, but much of what it does is automatic. Right now it is sending electric impulses to you heart to constrict and relax, pumping blood throughout your body. It is doing the same to your lungs to infuse that blood with oxygen which nourishes every cell. It is turning food into energy. It is making certain muscles and tendons constrict to hold your body in the position it's in. It is also storing nearly all of your life's experience. And it is making sense of some of the stimulus it collects through our senses. But somehow we think we are in control of it. For the most part, we do not use our brains - our brains use us. We can learn to control this amazing machine better by getting to know it.
When we experience a disappointment, we have to look at how our brain is processing that information. Disappointment makes us feel bad chemically based on experiences that we have had in the past which were negative. Our brains have pleasure centers which are stimulated chemically when things happen which are life affirming. These pleasure centers, when the brain is functioning properly, are constantly fed by neurotransmitters and our normal, waking state should be one of happiness and well-being. Of course, we do not always feel this. Some things threaten our sense of well-being. Our pleasure centers shut down and toxins from our environment and adrenaline are free to flood our bodies. We sometimes get rid of toxins by tears or vomit or sweat or urination or defecation. Sometimes we feel so threatened that our body goes into "fight, flight, or freeze" mode. Our automatic brain does the driving and we react "without thinking."
Awareness of the present moment and the miracle of consciousness can put all things in perspective. Before an event occurs is the time to think about disappointment. What will I feel like if I don't get that job? What will it feel like if I am rejected? What will it feel like to be laughed at? And why will I feel this way? How is this coming experience like that of my childhood? What do I expect of myself? If you act consciously instead of reacting unconsciously, you will seldom feel disappointment in yourself. That is the only disappointment that you have any control of. If you're disappointed with others or with the universe - get medicated and seek therapy. Focus on your expectations. Remember, to have more, desire less. Accept what is. Not just take, but embrace the bad with the good. You are insignificant to the universe, yet the whole universe dwells inside of you. Is the raindrop disappointed that it has to fall? That is its nature.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Monkey Mind
I first read the phrase Monkey Mind in a column by Herb Caen, the late celebrated columnist for the S.F. Chronicle. His first sentence was ... Monkey mind, leaping from limb to limbo. He then went on to fill a whole column with leaps of thought that were truly acrobatic. Stream of consciousness is a great thing for an artist to possess. Monkey mind is a Buddhist idea of a person who can't stop his mind from going on its merry way, a restless, preoccupied person. It is the exact opposite of the ideal of a quiet mind.
The phrase enters my consciousness now because I watched a documentary about Jane Goodall, the chimp behavior expert and activist. I must declare that chimps are not monkeys. They are in the family of great apes, which includes the gorilla, the orangutan, the bonobo and man. The great apes are just a stone's throw away from us genetically. And watching the chimps easily makes one feel related. Are humans really the smartest of the bunch? This is not such a facetious question. We are, without a doubt, the most accomplished and have the most complex brains. But what do we do with our complex brains?
This idea occurred to me the other day when friends were engaging in idle chatter and I was noticing that it made me tense. It took a few hours of contemplation to figure out why. It turned out to be a justice issue. Here was someone saying nothing intelligent, cementing the idea in my head that she wasn't very intelligent overall, and yet I happened to know that she was thriving in her life - she had a good marriage, had plenty of money, supportive parents, a life she apparently enjoyed. And here I am making very little money, living a forced frugal life, renting instead of owning, not able to afford new shoes, but using my old shoes which were second-hand when I bought them, wearing second-hand clothes not because they're stylish, but because that's all I can afford. I consider myself a reasonably intelligent person. I value intelligence in others. Yet I am by no means thriving. I'm happy, but I don't have the kind of life that affords me a lot of choices.
So who is the intelligent one, really? We don't really value intelligence in our society any more. I feel as if I have become a master candle maker in an age of electric light.
And then there are the gorillas. Gorillas are monstrously strong, but they are vegetarians. I've been thinking lately that they might be a good model animal for the U.S. military. They don't have a very large territory and don't stray far on a typical day. They don't need to kill to survive. They hold their great strength in reserve in case they are attacked by a leopard, which is their only known possible enemy. And even then, the silverback male will put on a display of power before ever engaging, with the idea of scaring the possible predator away. They live a life of peace and ease. If that is not intelligence, what is?
Very few humans live such lives. Our lives are full of monkey mind.
Let me tell you another instance of monkeys in my consciousness. I am a songwriter and musician. I've been doing this for over 30 years. But my job is to buy art supplies, to check invoices to make sure we got what we ordered at the right price, to place new orders, to sell more art supplies. All day long I'm supposed to do this, and all day long there is Muzak playing in the supposed background. Sometimes there are good songs by classic artists. Sometimes there are terribly painfully bad songs which no one in their right mind would ever ask to hear.
But say I were not a music expert. Say I was a monkey expert. Say I'd been studying monkeys all my life. I knew everything there was to know about monkeys. I was an expert on monkey behavior. And the one day, someone unleashes a truckload of monkeys into the store. The monkeys are breaking things and biting people's ankles and scratching at their eyes. Some of them apparently have fleas. I know exactly how to handle these monkeys, how to make them behave - even how to rid them of fleas. But my job has nothing to do with monkeys. I'm supposed to ignore the monkeys and pretend they aren't even there. I'm supposed to go on checking my invoices while what I'd rather be doing is attending to the monkeys. It makes a job seem very mundane when there are monkeys about. Can you imagine Jane Goodall in the wild with the chimps trying to check an invoice? This is how out of place I feel at my job.
And yet the chimps live in large social groups, and have all they need. They are not perfect - they do kill, even their own kind and they do wage wars. But it seems the farther you go away from the human brain, the "happier" the animal becomes. Ignorance is bliss. Maybe monkey mind is the wrong phrase. Maybe monkeys don't do much thinking at all. Maybe they are like Zen masters who simply exist. Maybe it is the human's curse to have developed such a brain as ours, that worries and dreads and plots and schemes and is jealous and insecure and afraid and angry. Maybe Man Mind is the problem. I'll settle for Monkey Mind any day.
The phrase enters my consciousness now because I watched a documentary about Jane Goodall, the chimp behavior expert and activist. I must declare that chimps are not monkeys. They are in the family of great apes, which includes the gorilla, the orangutan, the bonobo and man. The great apes are just a stone's throw away from us genetically. And watching the chimps easily makes one feel related. Are humans really the smartest of the bunch? This is not such a facetious question. We are, without a doubt, the most accomplished and have the most complex brains. But what do we do with our complex brains?
This idea occurred to me the other day when friends were engaging in idle chatter and I was noticing that it made me tense. It took a few hours of contemplation to figure out why. It turned out to be a justice issue. Here was someone saying nothing intelligent, cementing the idea in my head that she wasn't very intelligent overall, and yet I happened to know that she was thriving in her life - she had a good marriage, had plenty of money, supportive parents, a life she apparently enjoyed. And here I am making very little money, living a forced frugal life, renting instead of owning, not able to afford new shoes, but using my old shoes which were second-hand when I bought them, wearing second-hand clothes not because they're stylish, but because that's all I can afford. I consider myself a reasonably intelligent person. I value intelligence in others. Yet I am by no means thriving. I'm happy, but I don't have the kind of life that affords me a lot of choices.
So who is the intelligent one, really? We don't really value intelligence in our society any more. I feel as if I have become a master candle maker in an age of electric light.
And then there are the gorillas. Gorillas are monstrously strong, but they are vegetarians. I've been thinking lately that they might be a good model animal for the U.S. military. They don't have a very large territory and don't stray far on a typical day. They don't need to kill to survive. They hold their great strength in reserve in case they are attacked by a leopard, which is their only known possible enemy. And even then, the silverback male will put on a display of power before ever engaging, with the idea of scaring the possible predator away. They live a life of peace and ease. If that is not intelligence, what is?
Very few humans live such lives. Our lives are full of monkey mind.
Let me tell you another instance of monkeys in my consciousness. I am a songwriter and musician. I've been doing this for over 30 years. But my job is to buy art supplies, to check invoices to make sure we got what we ordered at the right price, to place new orders, to sell more art supplies. All day long I'm supposed to do this, and all day long there is Muzak playing in the supposed background. Sometimes there are good songs by classic artists. Sometimes there are terribly painfully bad songs which no one in their right mind would ever ask to hear.
But say I were not a music expert. Say I was a monkey expert. Say I'd been studying monkeys all my life. I knew everything there was to know about monkeys. I was an expert on monkey behavior. And the one day, someone unleashes a truckload of monkeys into the store. The monkeys are breaking things and biting people's ankles and scratching at their eyes. Some of them apparently have fleas. I know exactly how to handle these monkeys, how to make them behave - even how to rid them of fleas. But my job has nothing to do with monkeys. I'm supposed to ignore the monkeys and pretend they aren't even there. I'm supposed to go on checking my invoices while what I'd rather be doing is attending to the monkeys. It makes a job seem very mundane when there are monkeys about. Can you imagine Jane Goodall in the wild with the chimps trying to check an invoice? This is how out of place I feel at my job.
And yet the chimps live in large social groups, and have all they need. They are not perfect - they do kill, even their own kind and they do wage wars. But it seems the farther you go away from the human brain, the "happier" the animal becomes. Ignorance is bliss. Maybe monkey mind is the wrong phrase. Maybe monkeys don't do much thinking at all. Maybe they are like Zen masters who simply exist. Maybe it is the human's curse to have developed such a brain as ours, that worries and dreads and plots and schemes and is jealous and insecure and afraid and angry. Maybe Man Mind is the problem. I'll settle for Monkey Mind any day.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Truth and the Mind
Just finished reading an article about a severely burned Iraq veteran who found pain relief from a virtual reality game called "Snow World" in which he shot penguins and snowmen and mammoths with snowballs. Brain scans of the area called the pain matrix showed much less activity while he was playing. He rated his own pain a 6 out of 10 while on other days it had been 9's an 10's constantly. The hell that the pain caused him was alleviated by giving the mind something else to focus on.
Our brains are equipped with chemicals which regulate our physical feelings as well as emotional states. I'm no brain expert, but am moderately aware of things called endorphins, serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine. Certain drugs, like opioids, affect the production of these chemicals and alleviate pain and promote feelings of well-being. I've heard that endorphins are three times as powerful as morphine. So our brains are equipped to manage pain, but unfortunately, most of us do not know how to manage our brains. If we did, pain would be a trivial message that something was wrong with our body that needs attention, and that's all.
Last year I had a weird, severe back injury while tying a shoe! Fear was my first emotion, because I had gone through years of back pain when I was younger that I now feel was tied in to my depressive/manic states. This time around, my bipolar disorder had been under control for about ten years with meds and therapy. The pain reached down through my nerves to the entire right side of my leg, feeling like a knitting needle were being jabbed into my joints. The trigger for the injury may have been a bulged disc pressing on the nerve that ran down that leg, but the pain, though severe, now did not affect my sense of well-being.
Like in the virtual reality game, I found a way to minimalize the pain using the power of distraction. Instead of focusing on the leg that hurt, I tried intensely concentrating on how good my other leg felt. Amazingly, the more I focused on the good leg, the less pain I felt. This told me that I was controlling the way my brain was processing its chemicals. I was able to produce endorphins enough to fill my body with a sense of well-being.
Lately, I think I've gotten better at producing these sensations at will. I have a sense of being high and my body feels wonderful. I feel lighter and a little less connected to what Eckhardt Tolle calls "the pain body." I also feel anchored to the present, and any baggage of all that I have been through in my life disappears. It is an amazing feeling. It doesn't last forever - life somehow always intrudes eventually, but it's a great skill to learn.
Meditation quiets the mind. When the mind is quiet, everything is perfect. In the present moment, everything is perfect. It is only the fear and anxiety of our expectations which are based on our past experience that take us out of the present moment. Some people say, you can't just meditate all your life, but they don't realize that you can quiet your mind during any activity. You don't have to be in a lotus posture, you don't have to close your eyes, you don't have to focus on your breathing. These are all things that might help you get there - they let you take control of your brain chemicals - but they are not the only way. If you are fully in the present, no matter what you are doing, you become the experience. You are no longer a person doing something, you are the entire world as your mind understands it. You exist in harmony with all of creation. Sounds nice, right?
You can be there right now. When we look for it, like the Tao, we will never find it. As soon as you stop trying to attain, you attain. You are the Buddha right now - you just have to stop trying to be the Buddha. But this is like the old story of the master saying that to attain enlightenment, you must not think of an elephant. The student then, of course, can only think of what he is trying not to think of. Stop seeking, and be the Buddha.
So the truth of reality is not what the mind tells us. Like in Plato's allegory of the caves, we only see shadows of reality and make our best guesses as to what it is. We are limited by our five senses. Reality is what we see, touch, hear, smell and taste. Could it be that there are other qualities of reality that we don't have the sense organs to perceive? Bats understand spatial reality by echolocation. Insects, birds and tropical fish see ultraviolet patterns that we can't see. Suppose we could sense magnetism, or density, or see gamma rays or electrical fields. There must be so many other aspects of reality that we cannot even measure.
So what is the truth? When your mind stops perceiving with its senses, it feels like truth. Truth is acceptance of all that is. Not judging, not comparing, not reacting, just accepting. Our brains are amazing machines that are built for judging, comparing and reacting, so that the organism of the body can successfully continue and help life on Earth continue. But we can control our brains, instead of our brains controlling us. We have the power to quiet our brains any time we want. And in doing so, we can experience the truth.
Our brains are equipped with chemicals which regulate our physical feelings as well as emotional states. I'm no brain expert, but am moderately aware of things called endorphins, serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine. Certain drugs, like opioids, affect the production of these chemicals and alleviate pain and promote feelings of well-being. I've heard that endorphins are three times as powerful as morphine. So our brains are equipped to manage pain, but unfortunately, most of us do not know how to manage our brains. If we did, pain would be a trivial message that something was wrong with our body that needs attention, and that's all.
Last year I had a weird, severe back injury while tying a shoe! Fear was my first emotion, because I had gone through years of back pain when I was younger that I now feel was tied in to my depressive/manic states. This time around, my bipolar disorder had been under control for about ten years with meds and therapy. The pain reached down through my nerves to the entire right side of my leg, feeling like a knitting needle were being jabbed into my joints. The trigger for the injury may have been a bulged disc pressing on the nerve that ran down that leg, but the pain, though severe, now did not affect my sense of well-being.
Like in the virtual reality game, I found a way to minimalize the pain using the power of distraction. Instead of focusing on the leg that hurt, I tried intensely concentrating on how good my other leg felt. Amazingly, the more I focused on the good leg, the less pain I felt. This told me that I was controlling the way my brain was processing its chemicals. I was able to produce endorphins enough to fill my body with a sense of well-being.
Lately, I think I've gotten better at producing these sensations at will. I have a sense of being high and my body feels wonderful. I feel lighter and a little less connected to what Eckhardt Tolle calls "the pain body." I also feel anchored to the present, and any baggage of all that I have been through in my life disappears. It is an amazing feeling. It doesn't last forever - life somehow always intrudes eventually, but it's a great skill to learn.
Meditation quiets the mind. When the mind is quiet, everything is perfect. In the present moment, everything is perfect. It is only the fear and anxiety of our expectations which are based on our past experience that take us out of the present moment. Some people say, you can't just meditate all your life, but they don't realize that you can quiet your mind during any activity. You don't have to be in a lotus posture, you don't have to close your eyes, you don't have to focus on your breathing. These are all things that might help you get there - they let you take control of your brain chemicals - but they are not the only way. If you are fully in the present, no matter what you are doing, you become the experience. You are no longer a person doing something, you are the entire world as your mind understands it. You exist in harmony with all of creation. Sounds nice, right?
You can be there right now. When we look for it, like the Tao, we will never find it. As soon as you stop trying to attain, you attain. You are the Buddha right now - you just have to stop trying to be the Buddha. But this is like the old story of the master saying that to attain enlightenment, you must not think of an elephant. The student then, of course, can only think of what he is trying not to think of. Stop seeking, and be the Buddha.
So the truth of reality is not what the mind tells us. Like in Plato's allegory of the caves, we only see shadows of reality and make our best guesses as to what it is. We are limited by our five senses. Reality is what we see, touch, hear, smell and taste. Could it be that there are other qualities of reality that we don't have the sense organs to perceive? Bats understand spatial reality by echolocation. Insects, birds and tropical fish see ultraviolet patterns that we can't see. Suppose we could sense magnetism, or density, or see gamma rays or electrical fields. There must be so many other aspects of reality that we cannot even measure.
So what is the truth? When your mind stops perceiving with its senses, it feels like truth. Truth is acceptance of all that is. Not judging, not comparing, not reacting, just accepting. Our brains are amazing machines that are built for judging, comparing and reacting, so that the organism of the body can successfully continue and help life on Earth continue. But we can control our brains, instead of our brains controlling us. We have the power to quiet our brains any time we want. And in doing so, we can experience the truth.
Sunday, January 15, 2012
The Big Idea
I've always been a dreamer. Does that mean I'm not a doer? Not necessarily. Sometimes my dreams are grand, the kind that will change everything. Sometimes my dreams are modest, the kind that will change me. I suppose I've fulfilled many of my dreams. I'm an artist, a writer, a composer, a musician. But it's always the things I am not yet that drive me.
I've never been motivated by money, but lately I've found myself dreaming of having some. So several schemes are popping into my head to that end. I don't see my paintings as ever achieving star status - they'll probably just sell sparsely throughout my life, and that's a nice thing.
Just that there are some of my paintings out in the world makes me feel as if I am more engaged with other people's lives. There are those that are living with my paintings every day. They might never give them a thought, but they color the atmosphere a certain way. I'm in bedrooms where people make love. I'm in living rooms where people meet friends. I'm in offices where business deals are made.
But that is not about money. Lately, I've had the idea of helping other artists sell their paintings online. I know so many young artists who make small work, show it at coffee house galleries and occasionally sell a small work for a few dollars. This is the modest kind of purchase that anyone can make. It's not about the elite coming into a gallery with a checkbook and buying a painting by reputation. It's about the connection between makers of art and lovers of art. It's a small, humble kind of thing - not intellectual. It's outside of the ART WORLD, which has all gone kind of crazy. I want the outsiders who still do quality work to get their work into people's homes. There is no current system for this. I want to create one. An online gallery (I've registered he domain name galleryschmallery.com) that would sell work for no more than a few hundred dollars and even offer work for $25 and $50. I want to reach the kind of people who would never set foot in a gallery and when they want art for their home or for a gift, they end up buying cheap reproductions or posters. I want them to know that they can afford original artwork made by people who care about their art, and are not trying to be superstars.
I probably won't make much money at this, at least not at first. Who knows if this will catch on. But it will be a service that I am glad to offer my fellow up and coming artists. It feels important to me. It's a dream. But it's one I'm going to realize.
Some artists dream of being in galleries, having people actively selling their work which increases with value as it sells and their reputation grows. But what a gallery wants is a product they can rely on, someone who has a "mature" style, which is their way of saying someone who does pretty much the same thing over and over. That might sell paintings, but it doesn't help an artist's soul grow. Art is about introspection. It's about finding out who you are in the world and how you relate to life and then making that realization manifest. That is what a mature artist does. It's a skill that some people can practice with just a few strokes, while others do it with obsessive realism. But the mature artist is fully present in his work. It is imbued with his spirit. Making a picture can be easy and can be learned. But making it art takes a degree of self-actualization. The more an artist understands himself, the more powerful his art.
Most of my own output would not be on galleryschmallery.com. I would be very discerning about what I sold. Beauty doesn't seem to matter in the art world anymore, and there are many, many very ugly works that have great success. We shouldn't have to live with ugliness. Beauty is different for everyone, but there are universal truths that can't be denied. When someone is passionate about beauty, it shows in their art. Young artists are taught to avoid beauty, the idea being that if it pleases the eye, it cannot convey the greater idea. The idea is king in the art world today. One day, people will go to a gallery just to hear artists talk about the work they would make if they had any skill. There are artists who almost do this now. Artists who I won't name because I don't want to dignify their work by talking about it, but who just come up with ideas and then have other people make the work. This drives me bananas. Make the damn work yourself or don't call yourself an artist.
I'm getting off track. The kind of artist I want to feature is intimately involved with the making of the work. They are in the work. And they want to get back the energy they put into their work in the form of money. Sure, they have put a lifetime's energy into each piece, but it's better to get paid a little at a time than to wait for that big payday that comes with being an art superstar. I want to be a successful online winebar, coffeehouse, or bar, those places which show art, but are not in the business of selling art. Not a lot of art sells at these places, and you only get to see a small show each month. My site would enable you to visit hundreds of these places at the click of a mouse and to find just that little piece of art that moves you just so.
Maybe someday this would be a successful business and I could actually make a living from the small commission I would take (10% as opposed to a gallery's 50%). Then I could pursue other dreams of teaching college art, being a successful recording artist and songwriter, having a successful career as a published novelist. I find that if I put my dreams into words instead of just letting them play in my head, they tend more often to become realities. There's always room for more dreams.
I've never been motivated by money, but lately I've found myself dreaming of having some. So several schemes are popping into my head to that end. I don't see my paintings as ever achieving star status - they'll probably just sell sparsely throughout my life, and that's a nice thing.
Just that there are some of my paintings out in the world makes me feel as if I am more engaged with other people's lives. There are those that are living with my paintings every day. They might never give them a thought, but they color the atmosphere a certain way. I'm in bedrooms where people make love. I'm in living rooms where people meet friends. I'm in offices where business deals are made.
But that is not about money. Lately, I've had the idea of helping other artists sell their paintings online. I know so many young artists who make small work, show it at coffee house galleries and occasionally sell a small work for a few dollars. This is the modest kind of purchase that anyone can make. It's not about the elite coming into a gallery with a checkbook and buying a painting by reputation. It's about the connection between makers of art and lovers of art. It's a small, humble kind of thing - not intellectual. It's outside of the ART WORLD, which has all gone kind of crazy. I want the outsiders who still do quality work to get their work into people's homes. There is no current system for this. I want to create one. An online gallery (I've registered he domain name galleryschmallery.com) that would sell work for no more than a few hundred dollars and even offer work for $25 and $50. I want to reach the kind of people who would never set foot in a gallery and when they want art for their home or for a gift, they end up buying cheap reproductions or posters. I want them to know that they can afford original artwork made by people who care about their art, and are not trying to be superstars.
I probably won't make much money at this, at least not at first. Who knows if this will catch on. But it will be a service that I am glad to offer my fellow up and coming artists. It feels important to me. It's a dream. But it's one I'm going to realize.
Some artists dream of being in galleries, having people actively selling their work which increases with value as it sells and their reputation grows. But what a gallery wants is a product they can rely on, someone who has a "mature" style, which is their way of saying someone who does pretty much the same thing over and over. That might sell paintings, but it doesn't help an artist's soul grow. Art is about introspection. It's about finding out who you are in the world and how you relate to life and then making that realization manifest. That is what a mature artist does. It's a skill that some people can practice with just a few strokes, while others do it with obsessive realism. But the mature artist is fully present in his work. It is imbued with his spirit. Making a picture can be easy and can be learned. But making it art takes a degree of self-actualization. The more an artist understands himself, the more powerful his art.
Most of my own output would not be on galleryschmallery.com. I would be very discerning about what I sold. Beauty doesn't seem to matter in the art world anymore, and there are many, many very ugly works that have great success. We shouldn't have to live with ugliness. Beauty is different for everyone, but there are universal truths that can't be denied. When someone is passionate about beauty, it shows in their art. Young artists are taught to avoid beauty, the idea being that if it pleases the eye, it cannot convey the greater idea. The idea is king in the art world today. One day, people will go to a gallery just to hear artists talk about the work they would make if they had any skill. There are artists who almost do this now. Artists who I won't name because I don't want to dignify their work by talking about it, but who just come up with ideas and then have other people make the work. This drives me bananas. Make the damn work yourself or don't call yourself an artist.
I'm getting off track. The kind of artist I want to feature is intimately involved with the making of the work. They are in the work. And they want to get back the energy they put into their work in the form of money. Sure, they have put a lifetime's energy into each piece, but it's better to get paid a little at a time than to wait for that big payday that comes with being an art superstar. I want to be a successful online winebar, coffeehouse, or bar, those places which show art, but are not in the business of selling art. Not a lot of art sells at these places, and you only get to see a small show each month. My site would enable you to visit hundreds of these places at the click of a mouse and to find just that little piece of art that moves you just so.
Maybe someday this would be a successful business and I could actually make a living from the small commission I would take (10% as opposed to a gallery's 50%). Then I could pursue other dreams of teaching college art, being a successful recording artist and songwriter, having a successful career as a published novelist. I find that if I put my dreams into words instead of just letting them play in my head, they tend more often to become realities. There's always room for more dreams.
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Thoughts on Dying
Bill is dead. It was a sudden onset of brain cancer which was only detected a week ago. I barely knew him - he was the husband of a woman I worked with, and he would stop by the office occasionally to say hi, or bring her something. He had a long life and a mercifully short illness.
I don't feel sadness at his death - I've thought a lot about death in the last few years. My dad is going to be 87 in March and my mom will be 82. I don't know how I'll react when the time actually comes, but I know it could happen at any time. I like to think I'm at peace with the idea. Accepting death is key to living peacefully. Even accepting my own mortality, and knowing that I could also die at any moment, for any number of reasons. I am ready. We tend not to think about death in our culture and so when it happens, we are usually not ready. If we are told we have a terminal illness, the rug is often pulled out from under us and it is then that we fully know that we are alive. And then, for some people, it is often too late to do all the things we wanted to do.
I don't want to do anything but have a deep connection with life, which I feel I have. I want to live as a loving person, which I feel I do. Every day is happier and more profound than the last for me. If I were told I was going to die soon, I would not be altered internally.
Dying is a state in which I will never be as long as I am conscious. I feel you are either 100% alive or 100% dead. I choose to remain 100% alive until I'm 100% dead. There is no dying.
I had a great aunt, whose name escapes me, who I was told was dying once when I was young. She turned out to hang around for quite a while. My joke got to be, "Is Great Aunt so-and-so still dying?" I would ask my mother this occasionally, and she would respond, a little miffed, "Yes, she is." I don't intend to die like that. I intend only to live. If I am irretrievably unconscious, then you can say I'm dying, because that's not really living. But other than that, I will never "die."
Death is also on my mind because of two stories - one of which I'm reading and one of which I'm writing. The one I'm reading is called "Life Work" by poet Don Hall, and is not so much a story, but a meditation on life as a writer, one who finds out he has cancer right in the middle of writing this very book. He thinks there is a good possibility that he will die, which adds a literary suspense, but having read the forward, I know that he did not die, but has lived for ten years after the publication of this book. It turns out that after publishing the book it is his young wife who gets cancer and dies at 47.
Any of us can go at any time. Our lives are the equivalent of a raindrop which falls quickly only to join the great water cycle again. I'm not saying I believe in reincarnation - I don't - but it's a nice belief. That we are part of something greater. That God is the storm.
The book I'm working on currently is called "The Cure," and deals with a group of terminal cancer patients who are cured by an experimental process just as humanity is wiped out by a plague that affects a supplemental element called lunarium, which people have been taking for centuries after its discovery on the moon because it promotes emotional well-being. They are spared because they are lunarium-free. They go from thinking they are going to die eminently to wondering about how to go about the rest of their lives, as others, who thought they would live forever, die all around them.
I think that we all need to meditate on our own mortality. Once you truly accept it, your life will begin.
I don't feel sadness at his death - I've thought a lot about death in the last few years. My dad is going to be 87 in March and my mom will be 82. I don't know how I'll react when the time actually comes, but I know it could happen at any time. I like to think I'm at peace with the idea. Accepting death is key to living peacefully. Even accepting my own mortality, and knowing that I could also die at any moment, for any number of reasons. I am ready. We tend not to think about death in our culture and so when it happens, we are usually not ready. If we are told we have a terminal illness, the rug is often pulled out from under us and it is then that we fully know that we are alive. And then, for some people, it is often too late to do all the things we wanted to do.
I don't want to do anything but have a deep connection with life, which I feel I have. I want to live as a loving person, which I feel I do. Every day is happier and more profound than the last for me. If I were told I was going to die soon, I would not be altered internally.
Dying is a state in which I will never be as long as I am conscious. I feel you are either 100% alive or 100% dead. I choose to remain 100% alive until I'm 100% dead. There is no dying.
I had a great aunt, whose name escapes me, who I was told was dying once when I was young. She turned out to hang around for quite a while. My joke got to be, "Is Great Aunt so-and-so still dying?" I would ask my mother this occasionally, and she would respond, a little miffed, "Yes, she is." I don't intend to die like that. I intend only to live. If I am irretrievably unconscious, then you can say I'm dying, because that's not really living. But other than that, I will never "die."
Death is also on my mind because of two stories - one of which I'm reading and one of which I'm writing. The one I'm reading is called "Life Work" by poet Don Hall, and is not so much a story, but a meditation on life as a writer, one who finds out he has cancer right in the middle of writing this very book. He thinks there is a good possibility that he will die, which adds a literary suspense, but having read the forward, I know that he did not die, but has lived for ten years after the publication of this book. It turns out that after publishing the book it is his young wife who gets cancer and dies at 47.
Any of us can go at any time. Our lives are the equivalent of a raindrop which falls quickly only to join the great water cycle again. I'm not saying I believe in reincarnation - I don't - but it's a nice belief. That we are part of something greater. That God is the storm.
The book I'm working on currently is called "The Cure," and deals with a group of terminal cancer patients who are cured by an experimental process just as humanity is wiped out by a plague that affects a supplemental element called lunarium, which people have been taking for centuries after its discovery on the moon because it promotes emotional well-being. They are spared because they are lunarium-free. They go from thinking they are going to die eminently to wondering about how to go about the rest of their lives, as others, who thought they would live forever, die all around them.
I think that we all need to meditate on our own mortality. Once you truly accept it, your life will begin.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Some Thoughts on Money
Money is a funny subject to me. It's rarely on my mind, and I rarely have any to speak of. But lately, it has been on my mind because I've been trying to raise it for a musical project of mine which is the pinnacle of my life's creative output. If I had money, any at all, I would just pay for the reproduction of this CD and that would be that. And many of my moneyed friends may be wondering why I don't just do that. But I live paycheck to paycheck - no savings, no investments. I live quite happily, mind you. Money, it is true, does not buy happiness - but the rest of that axiom should say it doesn't preclude it either. In fact, money and happiness are independent of one another. There are happy rich and happy poor. There are unhappy rich and poor as well. I feel the most pity for the unhappy rich. The unhappy poor may still have hope.
Someone once told me to think of money as energy - you produce a product or do a service in which you expend energy - you get energy back in the form of money. The energy expended by a CEO probably does not equal the money she or he gets back. And the energy expended by a teacher certainly does far exceed the money he or she gets back. The universe is not interested in fairness. Apparently, neither is society. I make about $27,000 a year. I know there is some kind of taboo about saying this publicly, but I've never been afraid of the truth, and that's the truth. I have no idea how much my friends or family make, but one friend to whom I disclosed my salary acted embarrassed for me. Somehow, I get by - somehow we all do. I feel like there are those who make $80,000 a year who probably still think there just getting by.
I know that if I were making that kind of money, I would be a much more philanthropic person. That seems like a fortune to me. I couldn't spend all that money, and I don't believe in saving for a rainy day. I believe in helping others. Of course, if I had kids I would think differently. Everything might go towards their care, education and well-being. But as it is, I don't have to think about where my money goes. I don't have much say in the matter. I owe $70,000 in student loans, but thanks to income-based repayment I pay a low monthly payment and should have it paid off when I'm about 140 years old. Then there's the usual rent, utilities, groceries, gas, and the like. That eats up the rest. So every paycheck I start out at about zero.
I do occasionally sell a painting, but for the 35 years of energy I put into them, I should be asking an awful lot more for them. Sometimes I sell a piece which I'm not that attached to, though, and the energy exchange feels more equal. But it sometimes seems absurd that big name artists can ask hundreds of thousands of dollars for a wall decoration. Ultimately, that's what a painting is. But it's also a storehouse of the artist's energy and if the buyer can appreciate that energy, then that is indeed worth a lot of money. When I sell a piece and I feel the buyer appreciates my life's energy invested in it, it's almost beyond price. It's as if they're adopting a part of me. I get to live at their house and be with them through all their life's events. How can you put a value on that?
I've been paid for music many times where I've had such a good time that I feel I should be the one paying. And then there are those times where I've played to a bar full of chatty, inebriated people who couldn't care less that I'm pouring my heart into each and every song. My full energy and the energy of all my experience is then wasted and I feel like you could not pay me enough. I want an even exchange. I want to sing my life to people and I want them to take it in as if I were giving a dissertation or a testimonial. I don't need money if people really get what I'm doing.Some of my favorite performances have been sitting around campfires. But if I'm entertaining them on a more superficial level, then yeah, give me some energy back in the form of money.
I'm playing a gig next Saturday for no money. But it's going to be all my own music. Every note and word will be me talking personally to the audience, which will be peppered with friends and co-workers. I'm looking forward to it more than any gig I've ever played for just that reason. Sometimes playing for money you can feel like a prostitute. Same with selling paintings. But this will be music for the love of music. I'm hoping to do more gigs like this in the coming year. I'm ready to profess my music, not just mimic other people's songs. It goes beyond the sound, and into an area that is very personal. I know there will be people there who will not pay attention - it is a cafe, after all, and there will be people who barely notice what I'm doing. But if there's one person who gets it - one person who meets me in the field of my mind, then they will be rewarded with a lifetime's worth of energy, because that is what I put into my songs. I'll have CD's for sale for the price of a tip, but that won't be the real payment.
My energy is not stored in my money. I give money very little power. My energy is stored in my creativity and I intend to be generous with the energy I have. If only people would recognize that energy I would give it so freely. I am a rich man.
Someone once told me to think of money as energy - you produce a product or do a service in which you expend energy - you get energy back in the form of money. The energy expended by a CEO probably does not equal the money she or he gets back. And the energy expended by a teacher certainly does far exceed the money he or she gets back. The universe is not interested in fairness. Apparently, neither is society. I make about $27,000 a year. I know there is some kind of taboo about saying this publicly, but I've never been afraid of the truth, and that's the truth. I have no idea how much my friends or family make, but one friend to whom I disclosed my salary acted embarrassed for me. Somehow, I get by - somehow we all do. I feel like there are those who make $80,000 a year who probably still think there just getting by.
I know that if I were making that kind of money, I would be a much more philanthropic person. That seems like a fortune to me. I couldn't spend all that money, and I don't believe in saving for a rainy day. I believe in helping others. Of course, if I had kids I would think differently. Everything might go towards their care, education and well-being. But as it is, I don't have to think about where my money goes. I don't have much say in the matter. I owe $70,000 in student loans, but thanks to income-based repayment I pay a low monthly payment and should have it paid off when I'm about 140 years old. Then there's the usual rent, utilities, groceries, gas, and the like. That eats up the rest. So every paycheck I start out at about zero.
I do occasionally sell a painting, but for the 35 years of energy I put into them, I should be asking an awful lot more for them. Sometimes I sell a piece which I'm not that attached to, though, and the energy exchange feels more equal. But it sometimes seems absurd that big name artists can ask hundreds of thousands of dollars for a wall decoration. Ultimately, that's what a painting is. But it's also a storehouse of the artist's energy and if the buyer can appreciate that energy, then that is indeed worth a lot of money. When I sell a piece and I feel the buyer appreciates my life's energy invested in it, it's almost beyond price. It's as if they're adopting a part of me. I get to live at their house and be with them through all their life's events. How can you put a value on that?
I've been paid for music many times where I've had such a good time that I feel I should be the one paying. And then there are those times where I've played to a bar full of chatty, inebriated people who couldn't care less that I'm pouring my heart into each and every song. My full energy and the energy of all my experience is then wasted and I feel like you could not pay me enough. I want an even exchange. I want to sing my life to people and I want them to take it in as if I were giving a dissertation or a testimonial. I don't need money if people really get what I'm doing.Some of my favorite performances have been sitting around campfires. But if I'm entertaining them on a more superficial level, then yeah, give me some energy back in the form of money.
I'm playing a gig next Saturday for no money. But it's going to be all my own music. Every note and word will be me talking personally to the audience, which will be peppered with friends and co-workers. I'm looking forward to it more than any gig I've ever played for just that reason. Sometimes playing for money you can feel like a prostitute. Same with selling paintings. But this will be music for the love of music. I'm hoping to do more gigs like this in the coming year. I'm ready to profess my music, not just mimic other people's songs. It goes beyond the sound, and into an area that is very personal. I know there will be people there who will not pay attention - it is a cafe, after all, and there will be people who barely notice what I'm doing. But if there's one person who gets it - one person who meets me in the field of my mind, then they will be rewarded with a lifetime's worth of energy, because that is what I put into my songs. I'll have CD's for sale for the price of a tip, but that won't be the real payment.
My energy is not stored in my money. I give money very little power. My energy is stored in my creativity and I intend to be generous with the energy I have. If only people would recognize that energy I would give it so freely. I am a rich man.
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