Irritating People

 To develop the practice of compassion to its fullest extent, one must practice patience.  Irritating people provide us some of the best opportunities to practice patience, tolerance, and compassions.

The Buddha says: "Without an enemy you cannot practice tolerance, and without tolerance you cannot build a sound basis of compassion.  So in order to practice compassion, you should have an enemy."  THIS is why there are some many irritating people constantly clogging up my headlong pursuit of what I want.  I supposed to LEARN from them.

I don't learn anything when I'm getting what I want.

Be Nice, Redux

I was chuckling about that old advice some dude gave me in Chicago in response to my confusion about the concept of"practicing these principles in all my affairs."  He said and I quote: "Just don't be an asshole today."  I'm not even sure this ever happened.  This is one of those stories I've told for so long that it has fixed itself in my memory banks as an actual event. Honestly, if I think about it, it sounds like something I said to somebody else.  Most people have the courtesy and dignity to keep un-spiritual comments like that to themselves or to not even think about saying it.  Whatever.  The advice is trenchant and applicable if you ask me which you have not done.  "Be nice" is a polite way of rephrasing this.

I try to imagine walking into a Starbucks with Jesus or the Dalai Lama or the Buddha himself.  I'd add other historical religious figures who may or may not have existed but I'm most familiar with those three.  Would the barista be muttering "What an asshole" after taking their order?  Or would they have said something that made her smile?  Maybe remember the incident later in the day or share it with someone else?  That's what I shoot for.  That's not too esoteric a thought.  I didn't have to work on my spirituality for years to understand that this is good, nice behavior.  Sometimes I buy a drink for the person behind me in line and their reaction is always one of shocked surprise.  I wonder at the effect such a little outlay of not-going-to-be-missed-ever cash on my part creates.  It wasn't that nice but people are like: "Really?"  I was checking in for a flight once and I asked the harried gate agent how he was doing.  The dude actually stopped, looked me in the eye, and said: "Thanks for asking!"  Holy shit, he must deal with hundreds of people and no one ever asks that?  I'm getting off easy.  I've taken to politely inquiring of the person or persons in front of me at the grocery store checkout lane if they would mind paying for my groceries as well.  It always goes well.  It has never gone sideways on me.  I almost always have a lighthearted conversation with the individuals involved.  No one has ever taken me up on it . . . .

SuperK and I were in a Buddhist monastery in Kyoto, Japan, looking over some books at a table manned by a monk.  Orange robe, shaved head, big coke-bottle eyeglasses, a pleasant, relaxed look on his face, when he said: "I think you are the happiest couple in the world right now" or something to that effect.   My Bullshit Meter would have kicked in hyperdrive when I was drinking but both of us could see that he could see something in our demeanor that impressed him.  I'm not sure we felt it at the time but we had an aura that he picked up on.  See?  See how easy it is to make an impression?

I did buy a book.  So maybe he really was a grifter, the bastard.

F.I.N.E.

"Mindfulness comes from a highly developed awareness of your physical and verbal actions.  If you pay close attention to your conduct when eating, coming and going, sitting and standing, and so forth, then a strong condition of mindfulness will take hold.  True change is within - leave the outside as it is!

Usually my advice to newcomers is to be patient; have fewer expectations of yourself.  It's most important to be an honest citizen, a good member of the human community.  Whether or not you understand profound ideas, it's important to be a good person wherever you are right now."  Sayeth the Dali Lama.

To paraphrase in Seaweed Speak: Don't be an asshole today.

A new woman shared today about her daily conversations with her sponsor.  This is the sweetest woman I've met in a long time but I'm suspicious of people who are really doing well when they're first getting sober.  I'm glad she's positive and cheerful but . . . c'mon.  Nobody comes in because things are going well.  In fact, shit has to be really going sideways to even consider attending Alcoholics Anonymous.  Nobody wakes up one morning and says: "Wow, things are great.  I'm healthy, my job is going well, the family worships the ground I walk on, I've got plenty of money and no legal problems - What the hell, I think I'll go to Alcoholics Anonymous."  So if your life is a mess and you've overcome the sheer weight of fear and inertia to actually go to a meeting then you're not happy with yourself.  During their daily phone call this woman's sponsor eventually got tired of hearing "Fine.  I'm fine.  Everything's fine." and finally said that if she wasn't going to be honest then she couldn't be of any help as a sponsor . . . as an A.A. friend, even.  When we ask someone in A.A. how they're doing we really want to know.  It's hard to get past the prejudice we have of people when we find out that people who are inquiring after our well-being are only doing this as a social courtesy and not out of any real concern.  Try telling someone in the Real World that your ass is falling off.  Watch them back away with a horrified expression.

FINE: Fucked Up, Insecure, Neurotic, Evasive.

Are You Kidding Me?

Free will is not the liberty to do whatever I want.  It's my doing what needs to be done even when I'm facing headwinds.  It doesn't mean I can do anything that pleases me.  There are things I can't do whether they're restricted by laws or moral issues or safety concerns.  I didn't use to care about those restrictions.  Restrictions were for chumps, in my way of thinking, until I found out the consequences of not following rules.  I was a sloooooowwww learner.   Today free will means doing things like changing selfish behavior.

Today am I thinking about tomorrow or a week from now?  I have so many things left that I want to do in the increasingly short period of time I have left.  I'm better off looking at what I have accomplished in my life, my career, my family dynamics.  I'm usually surprised when, after telling someone who has inquired after my day. I receive a compliment, when I'm embarrassed at how little I think I've done.  

The Dali Lama again here talking about contentment, specifically addressing contentment with respect to food and clothing and housing . . . "By reducing expectations you will promote contentment which is called liking meditation and abandonment.  We should be contented in material areas, for those are bound by limitation, but not with regard to the spiritual, which can be extended limitlessly.  We should not be content with the degree we have when it comes to compassion and altruism."

I was fortunate to attend primary school and university with people who were often wealthy.  I was surprised repeatedly at how ordinary their contentment was; no greater than my neighbors in my solidly middle class neighborhood.  I listen to billionaires bitching about taxes and wonder: "What the fuck?  Are you kidding me?"  

Work?!

"The Buddhist is not asking to be given happiness.  Rather, happiness comes from putting the doctrines into practice.  Buddha teaches the actual refuge - how to practice the doctrine - but the main responsibility lies in your own implementation.  And we find many similarities in the monasticre life of all religions - simplicity, devotion through prayer and meditation, and service to others."

This is the thing about the particular brand of spirituality we find in Alcoholics Anonymous - at its heart it's just a repackaging of spirituality in a form that doesn't make the alcoholic gag and choke.

I went to a men's meeting once that wasn't published in the A.A. meeting directory because we took some liberties not accepted in polite society and not condoned as proper for a normal meeting.  One of the things that happened that always amused me that when we read the part in How It Works that says (referencing our Promises): "They will always materialize if we work for them" guys would start shouting: "Work?  Work?  Work??!!" like we didn't really dig the fact that work was involved.  The other line that tickled my fancy was a call and response to the reminder that this stuff can come true "sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly."  The room would thunder with this: "Sometimes real fuckin' slowly."

Our ideas did not work.                                                                                                                                  It didn't work.                                                                                                                                                Many of us have wasted a lot of time doing that and it doesn't work.

Embers Bouncing Off The Asphalt

 As part of my current Quiet Time agenda I've been re-dipping my toes into a Buddhist meditation book where one of the main themes is that a lot of human misery can be attributed to Things: getting Things, keeping Things, lusting after new Things, more Things, spending huge amounts of time and money to Thing Upkeep.  It can be hard to separate a normal desire for human comfort with an overreliance on Stuff.

Here in Southern California we live under the threat of fires consuming Things.  I'm not used to the threat of a fire.  In the Midwest the threat was from tornadoes and I personally lived on a street that a tornado blew through and on another street that was tornado-adjacent.  I could hear the thing and it really does sound like a freight train.  I stood in my darkened bedroom trying to make sense of the noise I was hearing.  Afterwards I realized that the sound was Things being violently chewed into tiny pieces.  The thing about a tornado is that you don't know it's coming until it comes and it's over in a flash.  A hurricane takes its time but there's plenty of advanced warning.  Earthquakes I guess would fall into the over quickly category.  Fires are a different animal - you can see and hear the threat but where it goes nobody knows - so you just have to sit and wait which can be nerve-wracking.  We had a major fire here five years ago in gale-force winds and in those conditions the fire is firmly in control.  There's no dousing it.  

This morning there was a vegetation fire a half mile away from our house with the wind blowing in our direction.  The helicopters making water dumping runs woke me up.  Outside I could see the orange glow lighting up the clouds of smoke from below and I was startled to see the occasional ember drifting overhead, hitting the asphalt, blinking out.  It's never good when you see fire trucks cruising through your neighborhood, looking for hot spots.  I was mildly anxious for a bit but - I'll tell you - those fire guys are amazing.  I had some time to idly look over my Stuff, my Things, and  wonder: "What if it's all gone in a minute?  What would I grab?  What would my life look like if all of this was gone?"  It was sobering but it also felt weirdly refreshing, liberating, almost.  What if I had to start from scratch?  What would I replace?  What historical treasures and mementoes and geegaws and gimcracks and tchotchkes would I mourn?  What I feel an acute sense of loss or would it be more of a relief to have all that Stuff liberated from my control?  It makes me reflect on the stripped-down life I lead when I travel - all of my Stuff in one small suitcase.  I'm okay.  I don't die.

It's easy to pat myself on the back after the danger has passed and I'm sitting securely in the midst of my Stuff.  Nonetheless, I'm happy that all of the time I've spent meditating on the transitory nature of things has left me somewhat - mostly? - liberated.  It would be a gut-punch but I'd make it out alive.

Not In The Club

 Man, man, man, am I really responsible for my own problems?  That hardly seems fair.

The Great Fact is this: alcohol and drugs really, really, really fixed my problems . . . until they didn't.  When they got inside my brain I felt a switch snap and I felt okay, right with the world.  It wasn't relaxing or fun, it was need.

A famous comedian died recently who had fought addiction for most of his life.  These lines from his memoir really resonated with me:

"I want to tell you something about addiction: No matter who it is or what substance that person is hooked on, loneliness is at its root.  For whatever reason — and I have no theory as to why — there are those of us who feel isolated in this world, as if everyone else had some secret formula for getting along, for fitting in, and no one ever let us in on it.  That loneliness resides deep inside us, at our core, and no matter how many people try to help us, no matter how many friends reach out, support us, show up for us, it never entirely goes away.  It’s vast and shadowy and also part of who we are.  omething happens when we discover a drug or alcohol: Suddenly we have a companion holding our hand, propping us up, making us feel we fit in, we can be part of the club.  It’s there for us in the empty hours when it seems no one else is."

This is from Step Five in the 12 & 12: "Even before our drinking got bad and people began to cut us off, nearly all of us suffered from the feeling that we didn't quite belong."  I like the use of the word "quite," which means "to the utmost or most absolute extent or degree; absolutely; completely."  No slop in that definition, dude.

Step Five again: "When we reached A.A. and for the first time in our lives stood among people who seemed to understand, the sense of belonging was tremendously exciting."  Most of us know that feeling of finally having landed someplace where people got us.