Spiritual Awakenings

 I wanted to write today about the concept of a spiritual awakening.  A good starting point is to Google something and shuffle through the responses, see if anything catches my eye.  One of the frequently searched terms if you simply type in "spiritual experience" apparently is along the lines of "am I having a spiritual awakening or spiraling into  psychosis?"  Did not see that coming.  (laughing, shaking my head emoji.)

Seriously, though, a spiritual awakening is characterized by a deep change in how a person feels, thinks, and sees reality.  Those of us so blessed will often display a clear mind, one that allows us to feel a deep sense of calm, joy, and love.   We feel grounded.  We know who we are and we stay connected to everyday life in a meaningful way.  We grasp the concept of humility in a deeply insightful way.  We feel more humble and this allows us to be kind to other people.  There is a profound shift in consciousness and a growing realization that you are not just your everyday thoughts, emotions, or ego, but part of a deeper, infinite awareness.

These spiritual awakenings may include a questioning of long-held beliefs and a strong need for occasional solitude.  We find an increasingly heightened intuition and begin to feel a deep, genuine empathy which leads to giant improvements in our relationships.  Peace in everyday life becomes not just a possibility but a reality.  We lose interest in material things.  OK, nobody loses all interest in material things - More money!  More sex!!  More power!!! - but we're able to keep those drives in a reasonable balance.

Here's a personal example of what I believe is a benefit of having some kind of spiritual awakening:

I always tip food service professionals.  In my humble opinion it's ridiculous that wealthy corporations try to shift their employee's compensation off of their balance sheet and into their customers' wallets but when I am elected Ruler of the World I'll get that squared away.  I bought a drink from a Starbucks that was inside a Kroger.  I paid with a credit card and was confused that there was no way to add a tip to the charge.  I opened my wallet which contained approximately zero dollars and then noticed that there wasn't a tip jar, either.  I asked the barista about this and she said that because the coffee shop was located in a Kroger that their policy of no tips took precedence.  I can understand this - you don't want cashiers and stock personnel hassling shoppers for money - but I wasn't thrilled with this policy.  I talked with the woman a bit about the difference between a no tipping culture and a tipping culture and agreeing that every employee should be fairly compensated for their work.  She was calm and reflective about the situation while agreeing that a little more money would be nice.

I left with my coffee.  (I should add that I was only at the Starbucks because the line at my regular spot was too long and I'm a busy, important guy.  That didn't stop me from using their bathroom before I walked home even though I didn't buy their product.)  I went to the bank and got some cash and walked back to the Starbucks.  I asked for some inspiration on timing and what an appropriate response would be.  The barista was alone so I stopped and said: "Excuse me, miss, but when you turned around this fell out of your pocket" and I dropped ten bucks onto one of the inventory boxes.  (Balance is my best friend!  I wanted to give her $5 but I could have given her $20 so the tenner was a good choice.)  She looked at me with a confused expression before she got it.  A smile and a mouthed "thank you" and I was down the road.

This was a few days ago and I'm still living on the fumes of the experience.  While the money was appreciated I bet that it was the kindness, the recognition that she enjoyed the most.  It's wonderful to feel seen, to be noticed.  I try to learn people's names and to remember a little, tiny speck of information about them so I can inquire after their pet or their family or their schooling.  I definitely do NOT talk on my phone when I'm in line.

I Intend to Make Sense

Intention:  A plan to do something.  It is what you mean to do and not what you actually do.  Or as it has been said with some beautiful snark: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."  The hidden purpose, heart motive, or inner will behind a person's thoughts or actions.  In psychology there's a keen interest in the fact that before we take any action - even something as pedestrian as getting up from a chair or taking a sip of coffee - we have to intend to do it.  I find this an arcane concept and not worthy of my attention until I'm reminded that the benefit to me of being aware of such an ordinary intention is that it helps me to pause and consider before I act or speak and this is a big, big help when I'm getting prepared to do something more weighty than drinking a cup of coffee.  That's a joke, of course - there is nothing on God's green earth more important that coffee.  If I can't smoke a joint or drink whiskey I'm telling you that coffee is all I got.

The daily reminder I remind myself of is that the world is going to judge me by my actions even though I would love to be judged by my intentions.

Acting with intention means making conscious, deliberate choices aligned with your core values and goals, rather than reacting on autopilot or impulse.  How many times in my drinking/using life did I hear someone ask me: "What were you thinking?" as we discussed what stupid thing I had just done or what stupid thing I had just said.

In spirituality, intention is the core energy, the why or inner state of being behind your thoughts, words, and actions.  It's a conscious choice to align your personal energy with a higher purpose, love, or truth and serves as a blueprint for how you move through the world.

I don't always understand what's going on when I consider these weighty questions.  I lived in a world of Impulse - Action where thinking or planning wasn't foremost in my mind.  Consequences?  Bleh.  Figure out how to correct the damage later.  I'd rather beg for forgiveness than ask for permission.

My muse, sponsor, and spiritual advisor Homer was defending against some criticism by arguing that his plans were well thought out as the animators opened up a thought bubble inside Homer's brain which showed someone passed out on a broken Merry go round that was slowly circling in the wind, rusty gears complaining.  I get it.  For someone who considers himself a deeply profound thinker I was living on a remarkably shallow plane.

To set a spiritual intention I find it helpful to find a quiet space, to clear my mind with deep breathing, and reflect on the inner qualities and energy that I want to embody.  Intention begins when a thought or desire meets a goal; a goal predicated on human needs or wants.  It's gotta be so deep inside us!  My meditation practice helps me get into the brief, flickering space where what I want clangs up against how to do I get it.  Are the getting actions going to be pure or evil-ish?

Intentions are responsible for initiating, sustaining, and terminating actions and are frequently use to explain why people engage in a certain behavior.  I feel like all of this is trying to explain how a thought begins.  What happens to set off that electrical spark and get things moving?

I think I should intend to watch an episode of The Simpson's to take my mind off all of these unanswerable questions.  I'm sure Homer explains it somewhere.

Negativity Bias

"For us, material well-being always followed spiritual progress; it never came first."

The Plain Language Big Book P 113  

Dammit!  That is SO unfair.  If I had a lot of material stuff then I'd be more inclined to do spiritual stuff.  If I'm not going to get a lot of nice stuff why the hell would I work on my spirituality?  A wise man once said: "The more expensive the chair . . . the more profound the meditation."

"Another principle we live by is this: We do not share the private or secret experiences of someone else unless we know they will feel okay about it.  Usually, we just stick to our own stories.  Any person may criticize or laugh at themselves, and other people may laugh along.  But criticisms coming from another person create the opposite reaction.  We alcoholics are sensitive people.  It takes some of us a long time to outgrow that troublesome trait."

The Plain Language Big Book PP 113-14.

I am famously sarcastic among my friends and neighbors.  I guess also among my enemies and competitors to be honest about it.  The point is that I get away with it - mostly because it's so over the top and transparently kind but also because I can take a punch, a shot.  I'm an idiot!  I know I'm an idiot!  So if you want to call me an idiot I'm with you, dude.

Repeating myself, saying the same over and over, saying the same thing using slightly different words, I adhere ferociously to the maxim that I don't say anything about anybody that I wouldn't say if the person was standing right next to me.  I don't want anyone to accuse me of talking shit behind their back.  If I can't say it to you I don't think it should be said. 

Negativity bias is a cognitive bias that results in adverse events having a more significant impact on our psychological state than positive events.  This bias occurs even when adverse events and positive events are of the same magnitude, meaning we feel negative events more intensely.  Most of our instinctual responses to the world were hard-wired in when the world was a much more threatening place than it is now.  We had to worry about starving or freezing to death or being eaten by something large that had lots of sharp teeth.  The fact that most of us are no longer in those kinds of circumstances hasn't eradicated that instinct.  I've always considered myself a negative, suspicious person.  Hurray for me and no shit!  I'm a survivor.  I can see now that my eyes are opened - or opening, at least - that most of us are like that although I tend to take things way, way too far.  One study suggests that we need to hear something positive six times for it to really take hold while we get the negative thing on the first attempt.  The fact that most of us have a negative bias suggests that all the positive people have been eaten up.

Not me, man.  Nothin's going to catch me today.

Forgive? Never!

It's an interesting word, forgiveness.  It's an interesting concept.  Before I came into Alcoholics Anonymous I had very little grasp of what it meant.  I had absolutely no concept that the magic of forgiveness is what it does to me.  While it can be a real gift, a real blessing to the person I'm forgiving there's no guarantee that it will change that person's life - the guarantee is that it will change my life.  This is the basis of A.A.'s action Steps: admitting my faults - my faults - and then admitting to another person where and when I've behaved poorly with no expectation that this will be well-received or that I will be forgiven by the other person.  The whole idea is to set myself free and to leave the reaction of the other person entirely up to them.

Forgiveness is giving up all hope of a better past.

I guarantee very few things but here's a doozy and ironclad to boot - you are not going to be able to change the past.

It's the intention to forgive that's important.  It frees me from having to actually forgive someone in that moment.  That can be hard.  If I want to forgive someone who has harmed me - or who I think has harmed me - I can at least start with intending to forgive them and I have found that the forgiveness will come, the resentment will fade, the freedom will manifest itself.

A resentment is like eating poison and hoping the other person will die.

I have found this to be true - that there is no one alive today that I think owes me an apology.  I hold very few resentments and when I do I don't hold them for long.  This, naturally, has some nuance.  It doesn't always hold up under the withering light of inspection.  But mostly I'm at peace with other people.  And, critically, I don't have anyone that I need to apologize to today.  When I fuck up I take care of it, right then, right there, stat.  I cannot abide with that feeling of guilt.

Screw Guilt.

Forgive is a word that arose in the 5th century or so in England.  So not that ancient a word.  Maybe we knew how to do it and what it meant intuitively but the concrete concept is not that old.  The Biblical concept is to release, pardon, or forgive a debt.

Forgive:  To forgive means to stop feeling angry or resentful toward someone who has done something wrong, choosing to let go of the desire for punishment or revenge; it is a persona choice to release negative feelings, rather than a requirement to forget, excuse, or reconcile.

 A true apology is a repair process; it requires taking total responsibility for a mistake, acknowledging the pain caused to the other person, felling sincere regret, and committing to changed behavior so the action is not repeated.

The Past, The Present. and The Future

We don’t remember every single thing that has ever happened to us.  There’s a mistaken belief that it’s all in there somewhere and that if we could only properly and efficiently access the memory files then we could relive each instant of our lives.  Our brains are too smart for this.  Our brains fill in cracks.  The simplest analogy is our eyesight - there’s too much going on in the world and it’s happening too fast so our brains fill in the gaps.  There are plenty of studies done on people who have had retinal tears or an optical disease that deprives them of a chunk of their eyesight but they’re unaware of this - the brain combines the images of both eyes and glosses over the missing visuals so that the person manages well enough.

What’s even more interesting is that our brains seem to screw around with our memories to make them conform to our current perception of ourselves.  For instance, if you were cruel to an animal long ago and you’re no longer cruel to animals that sets up a dissonance in your head.  You’re uncomfortable with the fact that you were cruel.  It’s incompatible with the image you have of yourself so your brain begins to subtly alter this memory so that you think you didn’t behave the way you actually did.  Often this dis-remembering leads to some outrageous and easily disproved lies.  We look at people who have been caught making something up with our mouths agape and our eyes agog.  “How could he/she think she could get away with that bald-faced lie?” we think.  It may very well be that the person isn’t lying but rather listening to the crap his/her brain has made up.  Some people, of course, are actually lying.  There are lying liars out there.

Our brains have a lot going on.  The speculation is that some of this rewriting of history is a way to make sure that we don’t go absolutely batshit crazy.
Life gets lifey sometimes. If you keep doing what you've been doing you'll keep getting what you've been getting.
Time is seen differently backwards and forwards. Write your own obituary.  Being productive versus being on vacation.

Evolution

Our community is reserved for people who are over 55.  People over 55 are a famously crotchety bunch.  Many of us are way over 55 and most of us are retired.  So if you're still young let me say this: do not fuck with old, retired people.  We don't have anything to do except keep an eye on our neighbors.  A critical eye.  We look out the front window and if we see someone we don't know we say: "Who's this?  What's he doing?" We don't like noise or messes or big dogs and we loathe children with all of their yelling and running around and making a racket.  Ironically, as people age they express a great deal more happiness and satisfaction in their lives but you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who'd admit to that.  If you move into a community for older adults you'll find that there are more rules to follow than you can imagine. There are rules for infractions I don't know what the infractions are.  I assume they're made up infractions.  I assume that most of the rules - many of them seem petty and obvious - came into being because someone violated a common sense practice.  For instance, you are not allowed to wash your car in you own driveway, having instead to take it to kind of a washing bay.  I, personally, do not do this.  Call management and complain if you will but I'm not going to drive my car with all my car-washing gear and wet chamois and soaps somewhere else to do the washing.  There are car-washing establishments if I want to drive somewhere else.  I'm a pretty good neighbor and I get along with my neighbors so no one has ratted me out yet but I see some fluttering curtains.  They're keeping an eye on me.  They know what's going on.

Anyway, one rule is that you can't work on boats in your driveway.  Boat Guy did this.  And you can't store bags of crap in your backyard and - guess what? - there's the birth of Garbage Bag Guy who is the same Guy as Boat Guy which is doubly irritating while also being convenient when you finally get fed up enough to rat someone out.  You're supposed to have plants in your little front yard but the weirdos across the street don't do this but I don't care.  I like them.  The man next door is pretty deaf so from time to time he'll blast Mexican music while he's grilling skirt steaks or whatever tough, inedible meat he likes to grill.  Fair enough and no harm, no foul.  My car is loud when I head off to the Keep It Complicated meeting early in the morning.

So Boat Guy/Garbage Bag Guy has been storing a lot of wood and other random garbage-ey crap in his backyard which is definitely not allowed.   We shrugged and let it pass . . . until we had our second rat infestation in the crawl space under our house.  I have no proof that his crap is the genesis of the rats but if I was a rat a big pile of musty, dark wood might make a nice home to raise my rat family.  SuperK has now christened him Rat Boy which is an excellent nickname.  An excellent third nickname which is one nickname too many.   No plants in your front yard?  Eh.  Loud salsa music sometimes?  Meh.  Rats under my house which are expensive to eradicate?  Fuck that.

Assume:  To accept something as true without proof (commonly held definition); to pretend to have a different name or to be someone you are not, or to express a feeling falsely (how interesting!).

I assume most people are idiots while assuming the identity of someone who doesn't think most people are idiots.  A Win-Win for Seaweed!  The evolution of words can be so interesting.  Assume was a Latin word that roughly meant to take on oneself but evolved into this more sinister meaning over the years.  An assumed identity.  I assumed that I knew what the fuck I was doing.  No one else assumed this but I assumed I was fooling them.

There is a very human tendency to write a story based on assumptions.  I see someone in a Porsche I assume they're rich.  I see someone digging a ditch I assume they're not smart.  I see . . . I see . . . I see . . . There was a man in Cincinnati who had more sobriety than I did but no front teeth.  He dressed in clothes that suggested a life of manual labor.  Arrogant prick that I am I created a persona for this guy and I was way, WAY off.  I took the time to get to know him and this dude read more that me and I read a LOT.

The Toltecs warn against this tendency of our flawed minds to filter everything through our past experiences, to supplement new information with these existing beliefs and experiences.  And voila! we know the future!  Assumptions based on past experiences can wreak havoc on our lives.

If I draw two thirds of a triangle on a piece of paper or an incomplete circle or half of a bicycle most people will finish the picture in their minds based on what they have already experienced.  I assume this satisfies some ancient instinctual impulse but it also can lead to mistakes in our awareness.

Because I love thinking about the human mind, trying to understand why we do what we do, I'll toss in something called the Action Bias which is the tendency to choose some action over doing nothing.  The best example is a soccer goalie defending against a penalty shot.  The goalie will almost always try to anticipate an attempt to the left or to the right and dive in that direction while - statistically - standing in the middle of the goal is going to give him or her the best chance to block the shot.