Humility

This is not an age of humility. It is an age of celebrity and self-promotion. Youtube has enabled the ad man in everyone with a digital camera or mobile phone. "Look at me." is the underlying mantra of videos of cute cat tricks and gurgling babies. There are, of course, exceptions, but Google Ads belie a certain egocentric materialism generally.

As a humanist and atheist who admits ignorance of what I cannot see or understand in The Universe, I do experience a natural humility every day. My tenuous grip on life and consciousness allows me to appreciate the vastness of The Universe. I do not live comparatively in relation to other human beings. I understand that we are all smaller than bacteria in the great Universe around us. The famous will sicken and die no more elegantly than the man sleeping under a bridge.

Admission of the smallness of my life in the great sea of life and non-life around me is liberating. My greatest possession, perhaps my only possession, is this moment. Though it is precious to me, it is fleeting and so easy to miss. I choose to share my moments with you because I feel our greatest quality as human beings is our ability to share our internal experiences of The Universe with each other. Bringing our shared awareness to life's successive moments breeds compassion and mindfulness. Each tiny light of shared consciousness, like my own, joined with millions like itself, may eventually illuminate a world darkened by selfishness, poverty and violence. This is my idea of a great vision of a better world.

Choices

In every moment, the mindful and compassionate person must balance identity and humanity. This is practice.

Racism is a choice of identity over humanity. Sexism, including hatred of people for differing sexual orientations, is a choice of identity over humanity. Religious intolerance is a choice of identity over humanity. Ignoring the needs of the working poor, uninsured, mentally ill, addicted, homeless or any other peaceful human beings in need is a choice of identity over humanity.

Choosing peace is often a choice of humanity over identity. Choosing charity is often a choice of humanity over identity. Choosing humility is often a choice of humanity over identity.

Continuing to thoughtlessly choose identity over humanity in moment-by-moment living creates a bad personal environment, which will eventually alienate and marginalize. The evil of the world is built on countless individual choices of identity over humanity.

Walking the Middle Path by attending to a daily practice, committed to peace, mindfulness and compassion, entails balancing identity with humanity in every moment. Rather than seeking to change one's humanity, the seeker works relentlessly to change one's identity to harmonize with one's humanity.

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.