2009

Let's start again.

Let's keep going.

Let's practice, yes,

Let's practice daily.

Let's look out for others.

Let's look in for compassion.

Let's look forward to peace.

Solstice

in a time of uncertainty

what better way to be

than aware of beauty

in life's full simplicity

and all its daily bounty?

Hypocrisy

It occurred to me the other day while I was sitting in traffic. I was surrounded by SUVs and minivans, headed for a major artery which leads out to the suburbs. Most people live a lie.

I am a person who lives alone. I have no children. I recycle. I drive a fuel-efficient subcompact. I pay property taxes at the same rate as everyone else. I keep up my property. I did not overmortgage myself. And I am gay.

The people around me appeared to be affluent suburbanites. They were driving wasteful cars. They were disobeying the lane markers. They were driving one to each huge vehicle. I would be willing to wager than many were overleveraged.

I am perceived by a majority of the public as deviant, unworthy of basic legal rights, a threat to children.

I would ask: Who are irresponsible to children? Who are irresponsible to the planet? Who are deviating from that which is right and just?

Peace

World peace requires individual peace. To realize this is to realize the magnitude of the issue. The achievement of individual peace by millions of individuals who are still struggling for survival on a daily basis will not occur in one lifetime or many lifetimes. This is the challenge of the person who is committed to peace. Maintaining individual peace and hope for world peace under the real circumstances of today requires rigorous practice.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving about what and to whom?

Traditional societal holidays are clung to by those who benefit from a traditional, conservative society. They are ceremonies of validation. They are fortifications of conformity. Since these holidays have a core value of generosity and fraternity, they are far from offensive, even to social outsiders. However, the degree to which these holidays excite and amuse is proportional to the socioeconomic status of the celebrants.

Could we have an annual holiday of self-evaluation, honesty or meditation? Would those in power support a measure to give everyone the day off for these activities, which do not entail buying food or consumer goods?

Thanksgiving is like the celebration of a successful dice game. If the genetic and socioeconomic variables of your birth and subsequent life are lucky, you might be more prone to be thankful. However, if your variables have been most unlucky, Thanksgiving may well seem a hollow gesture. Many rush to religion in the latter situation. Imaginary friends, judgmental deities, these support a delusion that life has some humanly rational underpinnings. This is simply balm or opiate.

If society were truly human, in the fullest and finest sense, every member of it would indeed have great reason to be thankful every day of the year.

Accidents

We live our lives thinking permanence exists. Permanence does not exist. The Universe itself is temporary and imperfect.

Recently, my friend, Peter, was sitting in his ninth floor apartment on a Thursday afternoon. It was a sunny late Fall day. Suddenly, water was pouring through his ceiling onto his bed and all over his apartment. A pipe on the tenth floor had broken in a wall. Peter's whole life was changed. He was suddenly homeless. His routines were shattered. His belongings were destroyed or damaged. All this happened in minutes. The rest of the large metropolis around him was indifferently unaffected by the disruption of his whole world.

Exercising the mind and spirit to accommodate to change in daily practice is essential to develop the skills to deal with crisis. Crisis is inevitable, no matter how prepared we are. Life itself is change.

Proposition 8

The narrow success of Proposition 8 in California must be a great blow to those LGBT people who look to the heterosexual culture for approval. It is also a blow to those LGBT people who expect normal civil rights. It is a hostile denial of those human rights by heterosexuals who still need to think they are superior to someone....anyone. The large support for Proposition 8 in the African-American and Latino-American communities of Southern California has been seen by some analysts as the tipping point for the success of the proposition. The timing is so unfortunate, when many LGBT people enthusiastically helped elect Barack Obama president.

While individuals cannot change the disappointing outcome of such a test of humanity in the polls, individual LGBT people and those who support them can adopt a practice of unwavering out-ness and unwavering vocal support for LGBT civil rights. This is the best way to educate those insecure people who are ignorant of the common humanity they share with LGBT people. They may eventually be taught that denying the humanity of any human being lessens their own humanity.

Meanwhile, I encourage my LGBT brothers and sisters to live in strengthened solidarity and community. We need to stop allowing this wedge issue of heterosexual approval to wedge us apart. We need to be aware of each other in the public space. We need to acknowledge each other and be open to each other in the public space. By showing those frightened by us that we are among them and are social human beings, we can also educate. Wear a gay button on your jacket. Wear a rainbow. Put your arm on your friend's or partner's or spouse's shoulder. Smile at other LGBT people when you see them. Just smile. Let us make the world as friendly as we can for each other. It's the least we can do while we wait for the world to join us in our happiness with who we are.

Obama

This is a wonderful day in America. Those who stand for equality, social justice and economic justice have defeated those who stand for aristocracy, selfishness, and greed by a narrow margin. However, that narrow margin can make the difference between a descent into feudalism and a progression to a new enlightenment.

President-Elect Obama is perhaps the finest public example of practice I have seen in my lifetime. His moderation, deliberation and obviously sincere commitment to right action for the people are signs of a personal practice which must go deep.

I take his example to heart. I incorporate that inspiration into my own practice.

This is how we, as human beings, can evolve together. By sharing the strengths of our individual practices, we can do great things. But, we must support those in our lives who are committed to practice. And, we must educate those around us who have yet not committed to an evolutionary practice of their own by our example and sharing.

Beauty

Visual perceptions of human beauty are obviously learned behaviors. What is beautiful in one culture is not beautiful in another. What one person finds beautiful in a lover may horrify another.

Yet, there are social trends of beauty. These are taught to a receptive public by the drumming of visual commercial media. Long hair, short hair, tall, short, thin and plump. These all come and go with the whim of advertisers and the appetite of consumers for change.

There are also basic, generally accepted elements of human beauty which include youthfulness, muscularity, symmetry, smoothness of skin, large eyes, thick hair, white teeth, etc..

The current materialism in society, combined with relentless saturation of daily life with commercial media which use human beauty to sell things, has led to a reduction of human beauty to its superficial material value. Beauty has been reduced to a manipulative tool to achieve materialistic gains. This is a generalized prostitution ethic, which is revealing itself on all levels of society.

One result of this ethic is the devaluation of hard work and merit as keys to success. The consequences of this are obvious. When those with marketable beauty become catapulted to positions of responsibility and celebrity over those with merit, genius or dedication, the fabric of society deteriorates.

Part of my practice is a conscious attempt to focus on merit, decency and intelligence in the people around me. This practice rapidly has made me aware that those with marketable beauty are seldom the focus of my attention in public settings or in general interactions. If conventional beauty has become power and power corrupts, then conventional beauty corrupts.

Pain

I had a recent surgery on my left foot's sole and middle toe. The sole's circular hole, about half an inch in diameter, goes down through many layers of skin to the deep red dermis underneath. It is painful when I put weight on it. The middle toe is missing one third of its tip. It isn't very happy when it is up against the inside of a shoe.

I resolved to maintain my life's routines through the inconvenience of the pain. Mornings are new beginnings. Striking the right balance. Avoiding the kind of movement which will cause knee and hip problems later. Navigating the stairs. Making my peace with the unavoidable pain.

This is a tremendous opportunity to learn about my practice and the realities of my daily life. What do I value? How committed am I to do certain activities? How flexible are my needs and desires. What is my true relationship between my consciousness and its source, my body?

So far, I am learning that I can work with pain consciously. I am also learning how much of my energy is eaten by the pain. I am using this awareness to feed my sense of compassion for those who live with chronic pain. I am also using it to temper my impatience with those who are unable to tolerate pain or discomfort.

Dealing with pain is a challenge. And, the brain has a mechanism which erases the experiential memory of pain once it is resolved. So, if I am not in pain, I do not "feel" your pain, as much as I may empathize from past experience.

My history of experiencing pain has been essential to my own personal evolution. Pain teaches humility, patience and temperance, if you are a willing student.

Racism

I am fascinated by the nebulous application of the word, 'racist'. For example, I have been accused of being racist by simply stating obvious, scientifically studied, sociological and anthropological elements of various racial and ethnic groups. Tribalism among Africans, for example. Matriarch worship among Latin Americans. Single female parenting in the African-American communities and its parallel in the poor white American communities.

However, given that I spent 20 years of my life physically washing, dressing and bandaging people of all origins with equal care and concern, I do not think I am more or less racist than the average decent human being with functional eyes, which are never color blind.

Now, when white people of all backgrounds across this country are obviously supporting an erratic, angry and bitter militarist because they will not vote for a biracial man with dark skin, few people anywhere seem willing to apply 'racist' as a descriptive adjective to these individuals. This means simply that America has become The Land of the Stupid and Superficial.

Living in fear of truth, science and the obvious will lead to disaster for any individual or society. Ask any well educated German or Russian about his nation's history. The Big Lie is always the common enemy. Unless you live in the light of truth and science, you are part of the Big Lie and cannot see beyond it.

Practice is a pursuit of truth. Self truth and world truth. Understanding the truth of things, as close as we can ever get to that truth, is a daily commitment and struggle, which requires time, energy and concentration on lots of information. Without this pursuit as a cornerstone of practice, life is filled with illusions and delusions. The deluded person cannot be a truly compassionate person.

Honesty

You cannot achieve peace and happiness in your life without developing the practice of honesty in relating with others.

Honesty with others requires honesty with oneself. Honesty with oneself requires self knowledge, self acceptance and the practice of self improvement, or evolution.

We are currently living in a popular culture in which alcoholism and distaste for self exploration are in vogue. Denial is rampant. Denial of real financial worth. Denial of responsibility for debts. Denial of responsibility for children's education. Denial of responsibility for the welfare of the society as a whole.

Self exploration, through meditation, intimate relationships, psychotherapy or other tools, is absolutely necessary to achieve self knowledge and honesty. It is necessary to take regular hard looks at your motives, emotions, reactions and hopes. Doing this throughout your day and your life will deepen your understanding of your life.

Self acceptance is the practice of looking at the results of your self exploration and accepting those results as who you really are. Warts and all!

Self improvement entails working from your real self image and daily working to make yourself more loving, more compassionate, healthier and more generous. It also can entail making yourself less selfish and less obsessed with your own needs at the same time.

"Spiritual" practices, based in sanctimonious and ethereal rites, are useless when seeking happiness and peace in one's life. Incense and fancy dress never made anyone a better or happier person. Hard work does. And it is best to start working right now.

Culture

Multiculturalism has become the refuge for scoundrels of all cultures.

Rudeness, public indecency, littering, obnoxious children, uncontrolled pets, vandalism, improper maintenance of private property. These blights on the general culture are routinely defended and excused by so-called multiculturalists, or The Politically Correct. Political correctness is used as a shield by the irresponsible and irresponsive. Looking the other way rather than practicing civic responsibility is a rampant behavior in urban society.

I ride public transport often. I see the deterioration in the American cultural ethic every time I am on the train. Garbage is thrown everywhere. People monopolize whole sections of a train to the exclusion of other passengers. Punks place their feet up and use three or four seats at their personal space with arrogant looks of challenge to anyone who might approach, regardless of that passenger's age or need of a seat.

These are symptoms of the dissolution of the fabric of civil society. By extolling the wonders of the cultures of our massive influx of immigrants, Americans have lowered the standard of their own country's etiquette to that of the Third World. Some immigrants have no needed role models, because nobody takes the time or risk of telling them their bahavior is simply inappropriate or disturbing to those around them. The poor who are native to America once looked to those who were better educated and mannered for standards of behavior. No more. They look to the deteriorated culture and simply behave as they would in their own educationally deprived homes. After all, nobody will take the time or energy to tell them otherwise. And, if some responsible, courageous citizen does speak up, that poor soul is often unsupported or even criticized by the lazy and undercultured around him/her in a public situation.

Practice involves constant self-appraisal, self-education, self-discipline. However, compassion cannot be practiced in isolation. Compassion sometimes entails correcting wrong behavior directly or by example. By correcting wrong, or uncivilized/dysfunctional social behaviors, the practitioner is being compassionate. The practitioner is trying to help the corrected person live a more functional and happy life in society.

CEO-Plutocracy

I have used the term 'corporatocracy' to describe the current world government. Yes, world government. The world is being governed (badly) by corporations.

The Business Roundtable, for example, represents 160 US corporations through their CEOs, who as a group lobby and push around the US government at all levels. There are similar organizations and institutes in every industrialized nation. This amounts to a plutocratic group who govern through veiled bribery and campaign contributions.

The US sees its most blatant putsch by the CEO-Plutocracy to date in the $700 billion demand placed before Congress. Amazingly, Congress has said a temporary 'No', but this is temporary. This minimal show of resistance is spurred now by genuine fear that there will be a popular uprising in the voting booths this November, when a general election takes place.

The reality is this: Those in corporate power know that the planet is polluted, overpopulated and under-resourced. They will do whatever it takes to see that they and their offspring survive in the opulence to which they are accustomed and feel entitled. End of story. It's that simple, ladies and gentlemen.

Practice will become more essential for those who are not part of the CEO-Plutocracy. That is, for 90+% of the human species. To survive in a world controlled from the top is difficult. Look to stories from Victorian England for a primer. To evolve will become more and more challenging. To refrain from self-defensive or forced military violence will become nearly impossible. War will be used to keep the poor occupied, distracted and limited in numbers, as much as possible without alerting them to the real reasons for their systematic enslavement and destruction.

Practice living without aspirations to be part of the CEO-Plutocracy. It is a closed system and it is a corrupt, evil system. Live to be compassionate. Live to be whole in mind, body and spirit. Live without material obsessions or addictions. This practice will put your truth and your essence out of the reach of those who would dominate you or destroy your essential being.

Thieves

Wake up America!

Bail Out = Corporate Welfare = Your Future Bankrupted.

Money

Currency, money, is a contract. In the US we are seeing what happens when unscrupulous thieves break that contract to satisfy their own aggression and greed. They are reaping the product of unbridled greed and desire. No government should give them quarter. No conscientious person need be troubled by their fate.

If you practice daily deception and theft, your life will be subject to deception and theft. Feeding greed and desire inevitably leads to disappointment and pain.

Choice

Pro-Life, Pro-Choice. These political footballs expose the immaturity and ignorance of much of the American electorate.

Life often requires choice. However, choice also implies full individual responsibility for the effects of that choice. I believe this is the sticking point to which Pro-Life supporters react most strongly. Pro-Life supporters tend to see pregnancy as a choiceless event. They oppose family planning, contraception and sex education for minors. This is plainly irresponsible and childish in an age of overpopulation and environmental degradation of the planet.

To insist that an irresponsible pregnancy and subsequent birth is an unquestionable human right is both irresponsible and, for the planet, unsustainable. Generally, a teen pregnancy is an irresponsible pregnancy. A pregnancy in any woman who does not have the means to fully feed and educate the product of that pregnancy until it is an independent adult is an irresponsible pregnancy.

There will come a time when these simple concepts will drastically limit personal freedoms for everyone on the planet because of the strident irresponsibility of segments of the population.

One-ness

The great fear of life, its greatest challenge, is its inherent, physically determined, mental isolation. We are born alone and we die alone. Each of us, encapsulated in one body, must make the internal journey of his/her life in solitude.

Individuals and cultures deal with this differently. Religion is a common vehicle for people to assuage their fears of one-ness as it pertains to life and death. In fact, the less educated the person and his/her culture in modern science and philosophy, the more he/she tends to rely on religion, concepts of immortality, concepts of an afterlife. In these inventions, people can imagine that they are never really alone. In fact, when they die, they can believe, they will be reunited body-less with their loved ones and never suffer the separation of death again.

No such magical thinking is available to the awakened mind. The awakened mind uses practice and learning to forge constructive ways to live with one-ness, while remaining compassionately engaged with other human beings. This is one of the core principles of practice.

Those who embrace awakened, mindful practice as a way of daily living are truly liberated from fear about living and dying alone. Frankly, these fortunate human beings are too busy for these insecurities. They are also too engaged in positive change to be drawn into culture wars or religious wars. They are painfully aware of these horrors of attachment and ignorance all around them. However, their road, their path, is forward, nonviolent, ultimately peaceful.

Labor

The use of the word "work" is varied. Most people associate it with the exchange of time for wage. I have always associated the word "labor" with demanding physical effort.

Labor is a part of my practice. I labor at staying physically fit. I labor at maintaining my small garden. I labor at maintaining my house. Turning labor into practice is a conscious decision to approach physical toil with acute attention and appreciation of the task as having value of its own.

This is a Zen concept as well. Zen practitioners rake gravel, sweep floors, bake bread, polish wood with meticulous attentiveness and daily repetition as part of their meditative practice. Focusing on simply being while laboring yields peace, balance, communing with the Universe.

I have found that choosing a new task, one with an inherent challenge to your skills, yields growth and a tremendous sense of liberation. This is a paradox. By becoming focused in the most material and mundane task routinely and entirely can lead to an openness to the wide Universe. This accounts for the utter bliss found in some craftsmen who master their medium (wood, paint, stone) and continue to strive routinely to achieve a great sense of perfection. The liberation they experience is found in the absolute dedication to the labor.

We are currently in a dark time. Physical labor is currently seen negatively by a vast segment of the population in wealthy societies. Even those with poor education or intellectual capacity look down on physical labor as an inferior occupation. Should we wonder why the infrastructure of these wealthy societies is threatened by increasing use and inadequate maintenance? Should we wonder why obesity is epidemic in these societies?

Practice itself is difficult. Incorporating physical labor into practice adds a great deal to it. For some, physical labor may be the path to practice and human evolution.

Consciousness

I have been reminded this week of the importance of practice when I have listened to accounts from the Democrats' Convention In Denver, Colorado.

Angry women allow their rage over the loss of their idol, Hillary Clinton, to endanger the accomplishment of a great cause for all the American people: The displacement of the fascist regime of the Republican presidency of George Bush. Others decry Obama ostensibly for this or that reason, while their racism is obvious, though (perhaps) unconscious on their part.

Consciousness, mindful awareness in each moment, is the keystone of practice. Without consciousness, right action and right thought cannot be pursued in the moment because life will always place distractions in the way of the unconscious person. We all suffer for the lack of practice among most of our brothers and sisters on the planet. Human beings will continue this suffering until practice is the keystone of life on the planet. This may or may not happen before the human race becomes extinct.

Politics

We are on the verge of a political season of promises, dirty tricks, celebrity worship and unrealistic expectations. The party conventions will be held later this month in the US.

Politicians, like religious leaders, often present their own compulsion for fame and power as selfless compassion in order to win votes. I am sure that some of them believe their own myths. However, someone committed to practice understands that power corrupts. It distracts from the focus on personal responsibility and personal evolution toward compassion, humility, acceptance, and liberation from need and desire.

Administration of the basic infrastructure of society is necessary. Politicians are failures at this. One needs only look at the nearest bridge or highway. One needs only to walk along the shore of the nearest public beach of lake or ocean. One needs only to ride through the poorest neighborhood in any city.

Politicians ignore the one largest threat to planetary peace and well being. Totally. That is overpopulation, of course.

So, as part of my own practice, I stay informed about politics. However, I focus my energy upon my own responsibility and development. No matter who becomes president, senator, representative or selectman, I must live my life with open consciousness in order to evolve. To do otherwise is reactionary and delusional. If every adult simply lived in practice, based in responsible action and just cause, politics, as they now exist, would be unnecessary and obsolete.

Boredom

There is no boredom in practice. Boredom is a symptom of a failing or flagging practice.

As we know from psychological theories and science, boredom is frequently a symptom of sexual frustration, clinical depression, lack of understanding through basic education. Boredom is a symptom of an inability or unwillingness to channel energy through meditation or chanting or hard work or intellectual curiosity.

The beauty of Zen practice, as an example, is its relentless attention to refining the usual, the routines of daily living. Zen practice entails a lot of hard physical work as well as sitting meditation. Balance. This leaves little time for the ego to corrode energy with obsessions about sex, food, alcohol or other addictive behaviors.

Any practice, mine or yours, can adopt the best of Zen and other practice forms. Just reading and then applying these different techniques of practice leaves little time for boredom. The payback is huge and far outweighs the effort.

So embrace boredom as a symptom. Use it as an alarm to get off your ass and do something that will increase your knowledge, your ability to be a growing person and your daily practice. Reaching for the TV remote control is the way of the lazy and the unadventurous.

Loving

Loving is a process, as opposed to LOVE, a vague and often commercialized thing for which millions yearn but never find.

Loving is an act of mind and choice in every moment. Loving is the neutralization of hatred and anger towards others in the moment. Loving is giving patience as a gift to yourself and others. Loving is taking and extra breath, counting to ten, thinking before saying. Loving is paying attention to the needs of others before thinking of your own. Loving is being brutally honest when it is the right thing to do. Loving is refraining from using honesty as a weapon. Loving is accepting and exchanging loving freely. Loving is the middle path. Loving has nothing to do with orgasms.

Loving is a part of being and becoming an evolved person. Loving is an essence of practice.

Folly

Belief in permanence is the greatest folly of the human mind.

We are impermanent phenomena. We change from moment to moment without control or intention. Our bodies are similar to chemical reactions in a test tube. They begin, proceed and end. All this occurs according to physical and chemical laws of energy and matter. That's it!

Living a happy and compassionate life with the constant awareness of this reality takes practice. Folly is the absence of practice and is a waste of human intelligence.

Creativity

What can be considered creative? Paintings, writing stories, design, sculpture, these are traditional creative forms. Creativity in a capitalist society is driven by money, marketing and celebrity. In the post-Warhol age, people create to be noticed, to be lauded, to be acknowledged, to be paid.

Creativity is a part of Buddhist practice. It is not often labelled as such, but it is a necessity. This is the creativity of keeping the quest for positive human change alive, despite the inertia of the Universe.

Creativity is required to make one's immersion in the necessary routines of practice a worthwhile and renewing process for personal evolution. This is the creativity which stems from mindful observation of minute details of life. This creativity is aided by meditation. This creativity brings the mundane to another level, where it is cherished and honored as a great gift, the gift of being. With this gift, one can continue the creative process of becoming a compassionate human being.

Layers

You may find that your life experiences will add layers of understanding and feeling to your consciousness without your doing a thing. Aging and sickness are life's great teachers. Unfortunately, most human beings do not reap the wisdom of aging and sickness until they have very little time to apply their increased awareness, empathy and compassion.

The point of practice is to learn as much about the full arc of life and death while having the time and energy to apply this learning to life. When this happens, the level of learning goes deeper and deeper. Then, when additional layers of life experience come along, more and more can be learned from those new experiences.

Enlightenment and liberation start with learning. Book learning and experiential learning. When one looks to the history of Siddhartha, it is tempting to assume that meditation alone led to his enlightenment and liberation. However, Siddhartha had the best education of his time as a young royal prince. He traveled extensively. He communicated with the most revered thinkers of his place and time. He was a worldly man before his enlightenment and liberation.

The deepening layers of bodily and conscious experience will come inevitably. We all age, sicken and die. How we prepare to experience these deepening phenomena depends on the preparation we consciously put into our daily lives through practice.

Set aside a time every day to meditate. Set aside a time every day to exercise. Set aside a time every day to learn through reading and communication with those you meet who have much to teach you. This is all part of daily practice.

Sunday

sunday...day of whites and colors...
fetch the straw basket out and sort.

regular load? high water setting, yes.
snap, twist, whoosh, clunk, swish.

blinking timer light says, 'go ahead'..
tic, tic, tic, in my mind's background.

spin thunders in the basement below.
final clunk. wash done. dryer gapes.

my steaming vapors vent outside.
do neighbors smell my cleanliness?

it is a liturgy of fabric resurrection.
it is a celebration of man's machines.

sunday...day of whiter whites.
sunday...day of brighter colors.

___________________________

Shill

Today Tony Snow died. Like his predecessor, Scott McClellan, Mr. Snow became the salesman for a corrupt fascist regime, which has waged illegal war, killed hundreds of thousands of helpless civilians for oil, spied on its own citizens to maintain control and lied daily about the nation's health and economy. I am sure these men see what they did as only a job. I am sure Nazi propagandists saw themselves the same way.

Every individual bears the responsibility for the jobs he/she performs, despite any rationalization he/she may make to the contrary to live with a troubled conscience. Life presents daily opportunities and demands to make right choices for the good of one's personal evolution and the evolution of the human species.

Do you throw that piece of paper or plastic out of your car window? Do you smoke that cigarette? Do you buy that sugar-infused coffee? Do you push your way through a line? Do you disturb your neighbors with loud and obnoxious behavior? Do you support a dictator? Do you hide your real beliefs to be liked?

The corruption of humanity occurs in small doses with minor daily decisions to do what is not the righteous thing to do. Sentimentality, peer pressure, religion, prejudice, all these factors are constant inhibitions to doing the right thing. Overcoming these habits is called practice. Practice also begins small and grows large with daily persistence.

Masculinity

Gender is not a matter of choice in nature. We live in a time of gender alteration by surgery. We live in a time of metrosexuality. We live in a time of sexual take-out menus on Web sites. You name it; you can get it.

Masculinity is still valued in a society where men are becoming undervalued. Education statistics indicate that men are performing badly academically in relation to women. The media culture indicates that brutish, rude, criminal men sell clothes and music.

So, what is masculinity? Is it a mix of hormonal responses and affect? Is it the swagger, the crotch scratch? Is it the accomplishment of athletic skill? Is it the ability to coldly kill an enemy in a uniform? How do you define masculinity?

I abandoned my masculinity about 10 yrs ago when I first fell critically ill and nearly died. I realized that disability had made me something other than masculine or feminine. It had made me human in consciousness. Recovery only solidified this feeling about my genderness. I began the process of accepting myself to an extent I had never imagined when I was engaged in the 'normal' world.

I happen to believe that moving past obsession with gender is another step in personal evolution.

I also think that gender obsession to the point of self mutilation is a disease. The cure for that disease is the actual mutilation (sex reassignment) in the eyes of some. I would disagree, despite the current political trend to accept that solution. Yet, I would support and defend those who feel so compelled that they undertake that surgery, if I felt they have explored all possible options to deal with their gender obsession without self mutilation.

The photograph above is allegedly of Oscar de la Hoya, the famous boxing champ. It has become a notorious image. It challenges the masculine stereotype of millions of men and women. It does not challenge mine. Does it challenge yours? My practice includes being aware of my gender and what effects it has on my attempts at personal evolution. While I am not obsessed with my genderness, I am also not ignorant about it. This is another example of seeking the Middle Path.

Summer

Eniko, poet/friend,
inspired this.....



Summer has come for an extended visit.
He's sweating on all the furniture and weeps,
in thunderous showers. The plants love him.
The bees and wasps are frantically building.
I sit in my new patio space and watch him.
He seems determined to topple the tall lilies.
Those weepy outbursts and windy tantrums.
When he leaves I won't miss him 'til January.


________________________________

Sports

The top photograph to the right was recently taken in front of the Science Museum in Boston. The museum is hosting a corporately funded exhibit on Olympic sports history. The photo below it replicates a Nazi propaganda poster which was used at the time of the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, which were presided over by Adolph Hitler and are considered the beginning of the current commercial Olympic movement. This represents the same genre of propaganda used to equate teamwork with family with social responsibility.

The sad truth which history conveys is that genetic-family-centered, sports-centered societies are less socially responsive to social needs. In fact, these societies, like ancient Rome and ancient Sparta, were war-centered and brutal to those in their societies who did not measure up to the warrior classes. These societies, like the current American society, were fractionalized by gangs, political factions and family feuds.

As a taller-than-average boy with a father who was compulsively driven to conform to conservative heterosexual values, I was cajoled and then bullied into participating in basketball games. I had no aptitude or interest. The result was a widened permanent rift between my father, my older sports-minded brother and myself. I was verbally demeaned and humiliated within my family and in public for the remaining years of my childhood and adolescence in my working-class environment. While ineptitude at sports was the overt reason for ridicule, the subtext was my suspected homosexual nature.

This was valuable training for my personal evolution. I saw through the mindless popular myths about sports and masculinity and aptitude. I was able to work out that the men who were most driven to conform and comply with these myths are the same men who support war, child abuse, the abuse of women and the suppression of their own homosexual feelings. I can only assume, from my experience, that the women who are similarly driven are similarly motivated by rage and fear.

I firmly believe that organized sports as they exist are part of the problem, not part of the solution. I believe they are impressed on youth to produce compliant citizens who will join armies and fight real or virtual wars for the corporate powers. The merging of nationalism or global capitalism with organized team sports is glaringly obvious everywhere. I am sure my simple assertion of this opinion could throw indoctrinated team sports fans in to blind rage. This would simply prove my point, in my opinion.

The men responsible for creating democracy in modern times, men like Adams and Jefferson, did not play team sports. They did not learn the politics and philosophy of liberation on a football field or basketball court. Far from it. They read books, studied history and promoted cooperation of the many against the gangsterism of the few.

A world at peace would indeed have plenty of teamwork to do to correct the negligence and environmental corruption caused by corporate power. The time, money and energy spent on corporately sponsored team sports may eventually be put to better use. This would indeed be an evolutionary step for mankind.

Summer

In the 'developed' world, millions and millions of dollars are spent every Spring and Summer in attempt to prey on the insecurity of people, whom corporations view simplistically and cynically as customers. Advertising is focused on bodies and sex. Bathing suits and underwear adorn the buffed and flawless bodies of twenty-somethings everywhere you look.

This corporate self-hate industry, including diets, bogus exercise gadgets and unattainable goals for most people, makes many millions every year by inducing insecurity and offering magical solutions. Perhaps the best evidence to show the failure of capitalism as a model for human evolution is the massive number of obese and depressed people who sit and watch these advertisements over and over. Yet, obesity is rampant. Depression is rampant.

It is essential for individual human evolution to accept one's own being, including one's own body with its flaws and also its benefits. This acceptance is a first step to treating yourself with the respect and nourishment you deserve and need to advance in your life.

By embracing and accepting who you really are, you can then look to who you wish to be. This is just the beginning of a lifetime journey.

BuddhaToon: Compassion

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Righteousness

Right action is seldom easy and hardly ever popular. This is ancient wisdom. Last evening I was reading a memoir by Nichiren Daishonin (1222-1282AD), a revered Japanese Buddhist itinerant monk. The passage detailed his persecution by the local Japanese authorities of his time. He was being harassed and abused by the authorities for advising peace instead of war. Things have not changed much, have they?

Nichiren's advice is simple and clear: Do not set aside righteous action and thought for any excuse. Excuses are many and quite easy to adopt.

I agree with Nichiren's belief that all human beings, with the possible exception of the mentally ill and drug addicted, are instinctively motivated to right action. I have tested this at risk to my own health and well being as a nurse. More often than not, people respond to the message of righteousness. But, I have been kicked, punched and bitten enough times to know that the practice of right action has its risk at all times.

We may be leaving a period of darkness, in which our mentally ill and power addicted leaders have turned the whole American nation's back against right action in the world. I hope so. However, each individual must take daily right action as a practice for the human species to advance toward peace and survival. This is the ongoing challenge of mankind.

Beauty

The nature of beauty is subjective and random. One day, something may attract, and, on another day, the same thing may repulse. Novelty enhances superficial beauty. Experience enhances appreciation of deeper beauty. I spent a part of today working in my garden. There I learned some things about beauty, time and labor. Try it.

Hospitality

I was raised in European style. My family, for the most part, were new Americans. Our home, where my maternal grandmother lived, was the social nucleus for an extended family. This entailed weekly Sunday luncheons, gastronomic affairs with an abundance of peasant foods, recreated from Old World recipes.

I attended Euro-centric schools, taught by nuns and then Jesuits. The Jesuits who taught me were Francophiles for the most part. They summered in Europe, bicycled along the Loire, studied in Rome's libraries.

The Jesuits, being a rather hedonistic bunch despite their vow of poverty, taught us table manners, general etiquette and the ancient manners of hospitality, based in Greco-Roman civilization. It was a different time, before rappers and the omnipresent usage of obscenities in common speech.

I am glad I had the opportunity to glimpse the life of a more gracious time. Today, I value the exchange of hospitality greatly, but I find few people trained in or appreciative of the niceties of truly hospitable behavior. The general attitude today is rather basic and anarchic. "Here's the remote. There's the refrigerator and the microwave." Manners are often considered snobbery. This is a loss for the species. Perhaps it is an inevitability in an overpopulated and alienating world.

Part of my practice of compassion and caring is my developed sense of hospitality, despite my means. Hospitality is not made up of grand gestures. It is a sincere and affectionate sharing of one's happiness, home and resources.

Responsibility

One of the symptoms of overpopulation is the absence of responsibility and accountability between one individual and another in simple day-to-day interactions.

Capitalism thrives on overpopulation. This is basic to its structure. More customers, more widgets sold, more money for the capitalist. In fact, a scarcity of widgets, which inconveniences the widget-buyer, is a good thing for the capitalist, who can charge more per widget. Hence, the gouging of survivors of any disaster by those capitalists who have food and services to sell. This is not human nature. This is capitalist nature.

When capitalism is applied to health care, the result is plain to see in any hospital today. Too many patients, intentionally rationed resources, high prices, overworked providers of care and no accountability. Lack of accountability is almost a necessity in a hospital where the volume of patients exceeds the capacity of the facility. The administrators, capitalists from capitalist university educations, are delighted by this situation. More fees, more money for more buildings and higher administrative salaries. But, the patients receive inadequate care. The providers become irresponsible, because their mandate is dominated now by economic gain, not quality of care.

I recently encountered this process again. A resident physician wrote an incorrect prescription for a necessary pain medication for someone who just had a significant surgical procedure. The physician had not taken the time to research the pain medication in order to prescribe the correct dosage. I took the prescription to the pharmacy, where an overworked and exasperated pharmacy worker refused to fill the prescription. The medication was needed immediately for the surgical patient, whose pain was understandably acute and worsening.

The overworked pharmacist made a minimal attempt to correct the problem: A phone call to a voice machine. I had to pursue the issue for the next three hours by telephone. I was told the erring physician, when contacted, refused to correct the prescription on the grounds that he was "busy". I was told another physician would take care of it. Nothing happened. I called the surgeon's ofice and then managed to speak with one highly motivated and responsive person who took pains to accommodate the patient's comfort needs. Even then, the pharmacist made a frantic protest, upon my return to the pharmacy across town. Though she had the prescription guaranteed from the responsible provider I had contacted, she balked at providing the medication, now two hours overdue for the patient. Her reason: She had not received a fax.

Being committed and feeling highly responsible for the vulnerable and traumatized patient/friend, I had exhausted myself to provide a simple pill two hours later than necessary to control his severe pain. Meanwhile, the capitalist-based providers had made tens of thousands of dollars for delivering irresponsible, unresponsive services. To hold these people to account under the current system is even more exhausting and far from effective in the larger picture. They can simply get away with it by shuffling responsibility around and moving on to make more money.

This is the future, unless enough people say 'no' and work to change the world. This is the whole basis and purpose of practice in a society.

Equality

Equality as a human right begins in the mind of the individual.

Getting married does not make a gay man equal. Adopting a child does not make a lesbian equal. Going to Harvard does not make a black man equal. Running for President does not make a woman equal.

These are simply the outward signs of equality according to human law and convention.

I made myself equal in my own mind and heart when I revolted against a violent and domineering family. I was twenty at the time. It was the beginning of my adulthood and the beginning of my individual practice of personal evolution. I said "No!" to violence, insults and constant attempts to control my life by my parents. Until then, I was depressed, confused and impotent, just the way my family liked me to be.

No amount of mimicking or sincerely imitating an oppressor will give you your own equality and subsequent freedom. This has been the mistake of many conservative political movements for change in the status of minorities. The wealthy heterosexual elite in American society derive great pleasure from these attempts at being like them. But they will not surrender their power and oppression without fear of the consequences of not surrendering those evils. They fear one thing: Loss of money, whether it be in the form of personal property, corporate assets, political power or social power.

The only protection of human rights is constant protest of their abuse in the face of the abusers, those in power. The human rights of all will not be assured until the weakest among us are protected from violence, oppression and poverty. The core of that protest is each individual person's actualization of his/her personal equality. That begins with saying "No!" to those in one's life who hurt, oppress and impoverish.

Knowing

Knowing oneself is difficult.

It is the cornerstone of practice.

Always playing roles is poison.

It erodes the center of the soul.

Knowing oneself requires strength.

Looking at the unpleasant is hard.

Working to change it is harder.

Not changing at all is death.

Knowing oneself brings true joy.

Accepting the beauty is the gift.

Nurturing it is true evolution.

Ignoring it enforces the unpleasant.

Knowing to change and grow is practice.

Truth

Jeremiah Wright, the much maligned friend of Mr. Obama, is a speaker of the truth. And I do not mean HIS truth only. Part of the popular furor he has raised is akin to the whining resistance of a sleepy child who resents being roused from its blissful sleep. A greater part of the cynical negative propaganda against Wright comes from the fascist Right Wing of the Republican Party.

The poor are poorer than ever in the US. The Iraq War is an abomination. The Bush administration is corrupt and evil. The Congress is impotent. Racism is alive and prospering in the US in many different forms. The people are suffering at the hands of the greedy, wealthy and powerful, whether those privileged classes are aware of it or not. The rich are richer than ever and paying less of their share of the public funds.

The truth hurts those who choose to deny it or ignore it. Wright is simply saying what should be said regularly on the public airwaves and in the press. Those forums have been kidnapped by the Right Wing.

It is easy to dismiss Wright as a crackpot. His style is histrionic. But Martin Luther King would be saying the same things if he were alive today. King's style was also histrionic. Jeremiah Wright is a brave man to follow in King's footsteps. Fascist assassins have good aim. Cowardly Liberals too readily defer to the Right Wing's brutality.

Practice is difficult and dangerous. It does not make you popular.

Economics

The human economy reflects the folly of the human denial of the human condition. In general, human beings live their lives irresponsibly. This is grossly obvious in the state of the planet, which human beings continue to consciously pollute and abuse every day.

The vast ignorance and denial of the inevitable consequences of overpopulation among human beings of all social and educational levels is obvious in the lack of discussion of overpopulation by world leaders, scientists and educators. This too is irresponsible.

The economics of the human species are less science than manipulation of markets and money to perpetuate the power of the few at the expense of the many. The current turmoil in the global human economy is evidence of this reality.

Humans spend their lives trying to balance their conditioned denial and religious illusions with the reality of mortality and their own irresponsible attitudes toward their own species and the rest of the planet. These contradictions will not be balanced. By letting this farcical play fall apart, the human mind awakens. By embracing mortality and taking a determined path to make the world a better place with daily right action and right thought (practice), human Being can be happy Being, liberated from the pain of constant uncertainty and illusion.

Potentates

Today, Herr Ratzinger is in America to manipulate the media and the masses. Can intelligent people be so naive to believe this man represents goodness and light? He is simply a walking anachronism, the representative of a dead and decaying mafia of tyrannical domination and brain-washing. He is the Osama bin Laden of his organization. Our own corrupt and fascist leaders are flocking around him. This is appropriate. It shows us clearly what and whom they represent.

Olympics

The Olympic games have historically been bound to politics. The bright light of the current international upset over the Beijing version of this politicized event is simply this: Some intelligent people are waking up to the new corporate fascism that is becoming a worldwide threat.

The current Olympic games are still patterned on the 1936 Olympics in fascist Berlin. The torch ritual was resurrected for that event by Hitler's Reich, which patterned itself on lunatic concepts of the Greco-Roman origins of the Third Reich.

Yes, Olympics and Fascism have walked hand-in-hand before.

One truly Greco-Roman concept was this: Give the masses bread and circus, and they will be distracted from the corruption which enslaves them.

Time

Reading this sentence is time lapsed.
Lapsing time evades. We waste it.
It pours through our minds, our hands.
Mirrors suck it dry with nonsense.
Banks hold the folly of lapsed time.
Lapsed people lie in timeless crypts.

(for Eniko)

Role

I recently spoke with a group of medical students. At the end of our time together I was asked to state my core message to the students about their relationships with their patients. I encouraged them to not become their role.

We all must assume a role in an industrial society to make a living or to contribute to our community in some capacity: Doctor, mayor, nurse, teacher, etc.. The role is a tag to promote confidence and covey a message of legitimacy.

Some people, as they age in their roles, allow their personalities to fuse with their roles. They begin to behave in archetypal ways, imprinted upon them by media and example. Some become rigid and patriarchal. Some become duplicitous and corrupt. Some become haughty and condescending.

To remain genuine, vulnerable and human within your role is an extremely conscious and demanding process, as the repetitive functions of the role become more and more automatic and routine. The functions of the role often improve in speed and efficiency with this repetition. However, boredom and increasingly mindless efficiency have a corrosive effect on human enthusiasm and opennesss.

Treating each case or each human contact within a role as fresh, interesting and worthy of full concentration is terribly demanding. Practice is difficult. But, the reward to the person who remains alive within a role is life itself.

Military

The problem with the military mind is its lack of ability to see its narcissism. It can only see war as necessity to justify its oppression and brutality. Peace keeping, another term for oppression of demands for human and economic rights by the poor and undereducated, in the 21st century can be achieved without hundreds of thousands of exploited underclass citizens being amed with lethal weapons.

The military-industrial (corporate) complex needs to process these underclass men and women to control them, disable them or route them into underclass jobs after their service. If they were not controlled in this fashion, they might well form an army of revolution against the status quo.

This is the old reality behind armies and wars.

If wealth were not hoarded and passed on by the rich, there would be ample financial resources to spread peace, rather than just keep it. Schools, clean water, healthy housing and more could be afforded to the poorest of our brothers and sisters worldwide. Armies guard the rich at the expense of the poor. Armies, like the violence they perpetrate, are evil without exception.

Pseudo-science

I recently heard an award-winning writer, a pseudo scientist, on the radio. This man, whose educational and practical background is based in literature and lecturing, has based a wealthy career on sensationalizing natural science findings. The old geek-freak method of selling entertainment, couched in the pretense of sophisticated science presentation. Apparently Yale University is quite adept at turning out this brand of expert. Look at President Bush, for example.

Real science is difficult, like real practice. It takes time and dedication. The kind of time and dedication that precludes most serious scientists from becoming media celebrities.

Real practice is like real science. Dressing up in robes, burning lots of incense, collecting icons and altars, quoting from religious sources with sanctimony, these are all the trappings of pseudo practice. Real practice requires education, thought, quiet, planning, and discipline. Real practice takes place in every moment. Real practice cannot be sold, taught or promoted. It can simply be formulated and lived by each practitioner.

Prejudice

There is a lot of talk, just talk, about racism in the US media this week after Barach Obama defended his religious friend and advisor, Jeremiah Wright.

Prejudice and bigotry based on race, ethnicity and religion imply ignorance on the part of the prejudiced. Prejudice and bigotry lead to mindless and routine discriminatory behavior based solely on visual criteria. Actually, bigotry based on economic class is rampant in the US and nobody wants to discuss that at all.

Discrimination is another matter. Discrimination as thought is human and intelligent. Without discrimination in each moment of our lives, we become stupid victims of naivete and stupidity. This is the tragedy of rote political correctness.

Careful observation and investigation of the realities of racial subgroups and ethnic cultural groups is called science. Sociology, behavioral psychology and anthropology are examples. To walk into certain neighborhoods or group-specific settings, whether they are black, brown or white, would be simply idiotic for anyone who did not take time to research and understand the dynamics of those areas. Therefore, there is a need for looking at people in specific group contexts as a matter of self preservation.

Barach Obama shows the consciousness of someone who has struggled with these issues his whole life. As a gay man, I have also struggled with these issues my whole adult life. I have had no choice as an intelligent human being. I have tried to behave in a way open to individuals, despite their color or ethnic markers. Rarely, I find individuals who are capable of stepping out of their assumed markers of identity to meet me half way to mutual understanding.

Practice is hard. It is not for the stupid, the enraged or the cowardly.

Clintons

I am amused by the current Presidential race here in the US. I applaud and support Mr. Obama's vision of change.

After all is said and done, Ms. Clinton is the wife of the man who is basically responsible for the last 7+ years of bumbling fascist government in the US. Yes, while some diehard Democrats still cling to Mr. Clinton's aura of charm and worldly intelligence, those of us with memories who follow politics understand that his sexual indiscretion and lack of cogent support for Al Gore gave us the coup d'etat in 2000, without which there would be no Iraq War or bankrupt treasury leading to the oncoming depression of the US economy.

Perhaps the Clintons think that we are all too stupid to figure out that they cynically took some pleasure in these events. Perhaps Ms. Clinton thinks us too stupid to realize that she needed the last 7+ yrs to get up to speed with a legitimate political resume with which to seek the Presidency. Perhaps the Clintons think us too stupid to realize they ae not 'Centrist Democrats' but self-serving 'Slightly Leftist Republicans'.

It is my practice to be wary of politicians...all politicians.

Dialogue

I recently experienced an informal educational meeting with several peers. The meeting was moderated helpfully by one of us. We each gave a time-limited presentation, which was then critiqued by the group. After my presentation was critiqued, the moderator added a final observation and suggestion. He said, "After each critique, you responded to the person's observations about your presentation. I would like to to not respond and just be silent after feedback."

Naturally (for me), I responded and was basically told to shut up. Had the moderator asked me not to respond to him, I would have gladly granted his wish. I realize now that being told to do something against my hunger for dialogue angered me.

I have to say that the enforced silence and the subsequent anger were helpful experiences. My practice entails making difficult experiences opportunities for learning. "Make poison (anger in this case) into medicine, like the lotus in the mire," to paraphrase the Buddha. There is always a new venue where I can be a novice. This is the excitement of the mind which is open to learning in every moment.