Playing by the rules

I have been thinking of my daily practice this week since my house is again upside down with all of the dining room and kitchen into the parlor and I am the dog sitter for an ancient dog that appears to need to relieve himself every two hours.  I am not doing all the things that I think are important in my life.  I don’t get all the time to meditate…I am not playing by my own rules.   When you are a child, you have to learn that not all the time will the game go your way or will others play by your rules.   In my early 20’s I went to another camp for three sessions and they were singing a song that I was very familiar with but they were singing it with a different beat.  “that’s not the way it goes” I said and was told that is the way it goes here.  So sing or don’t sing…but this is the tune.  We do this with expectations about people.  This is the way they are to act, to always act, to always be.   This is the way it is comfortable for me if you think and act in this manner.  Well sometimes people do things differently than we expect and we get “disappointed”.  The disappointment is the variation in the expectation for perfection.

There will always be the potential of pain, but we don’t have to suffer.  Without the pain, we will not know the pleasure.  Without the dark we will not know the light.  The light does not take anything away from the dark or the dark the light but reminds us that all things have a ying/yang. 

People who put others on pedestals are bound to suffer as well as the pain of the crash felt by the one coming off the pedestal…. Rarely do they ask to be up there.  There is no giving each other a break.  It is only by truly accepting the humanness the ying and the yang… the dark and light that we can give up suffering and truly connect with another….good bad ugly. 

So if for today, I can write, feed four animals, and get a shower…. I am ahead of the game.  It’s all good.

My life class

I felt like I just stepped out of a shower after crawling around the basement all day.   For three or four years I have been trying to get myself to the Applied Philosophy course.  Last year, I sent in my money and then Georgette was in the process of dying and I had to drop before the first class.  To tend  to her and the animals.   Tonight I tended to me even with a strong ego undertow trying to drag me to stay home and tend to others.    In the last months of reading and trying to settle into a spiritual routine, I have been sitting with all the pieces but tonight just put the frame work on where I am going and what I must do. I know I am loved and even liked by some but for me respected is far more imported. When I feel that I am a non-person, my time is devalued, my name not remembered, I lose my grip on my higher self.   It is time to make some significant shifts and the shifts can’t just be when I am in the land of smiles. Being present for me is extremely important at this time of my life and in some ways it is a matter of life or death.  I need a nest both externally and internally that is safe and secure and free from things to trip over.

I know that I need to avoid negativity and the temptation to contribute to the pile of mayhem.  I am committed to NOW and yet yesterday I watched myself on a frantic runaway emotional train that I did not know how to stop and did not have the wisdom to get off at the last station for there was nothing I could do.  The train had been building up speed for months and yesterday was only the icing on the emotional cake.    Being present, the observer and balanced is so important.  One of the examples given last night was about having someone do something that is thoughtless or even wrong and our choice about our reaction really hit home.  The lesson was there was no going back and I thought of the energy that I expended feeling devalued only added to me devaluing myself.  I am far from perfect and make mistakes and if someone things even for a moment that I have the answers etc.. there is going to be a crash when it is apparent that I am just another bloke on the train.  

The question is what would a wise person do?  Well I was not wise.  So it is time for me to take some time to get myself steady and healed and when ready go forward to do the very best I can and remember the words of the rooms ….”and the wisdom to know the difference”.   

 We ended the class pairing with a stranger and saying…you are pure perfect and complete…. For our innocent core self surely is.   I felt like I had a shower of goodness and I am very grateful to be in the class and feel some stranger thought I was worth their positive words.   Ah…….

change of heart

“A change of heart requires a great deal of courage and a great deal of compassion. The courage is to not avert our gaze, but instead to turn to the various sufferings in our own life or in the world around us and see them.”  Jack Kornfield.

There is a small path through my house and I think I see a path through my health and life.  In lining up some house projects, I can see the target dates are within reach.  What I have learned is that I don’t do well with open ended and  go on forever projects.  The stacks and clutter and move here to move there wears on me.
While I am about to start two community projects, the charge to myself is 1.  Get it organized and 2. Get rid of it.  That feels very good.   It feels even better when in reading between the lines, that I am not needed on tasks that I would enjoy doing.   “We need new blood”  which to my ear was blood let of the old.  I am old.  And while I believe nothing is permanent, I had hoped that I will say when “the time has come”. 
For so long I have thought that it was my “job” to pick up pieces and do many jobs. I have done some that I did not want to do….   I have seen hundreds of folks come thought saying they were going to do this and that…and not do anything… Most of the time, I have picked up the pieces and not said much about who didn’t do much and when it was over, it was myself that was the target for anything that went wrong.  I have had a change of heart and it is my intent not to stand by and hold my community coat.

Not my job, not my issue, not my responsibility.

I will not do a job that I don’t believe in or have passion for and if what I want to do is taken from me and given to another, so be it but the space will not be filled with someone dumping a task they need done and  I don’t want to do.

My waterfall is falling and while I will have to go a pick up the Buddha (rather than pay $800 to have it delivered) the end of that project is within view.  I have put May 18 as a target date for completing the house and most of the garden and will have an open house the following week.   Sometime, I will journey to Ikea to pick up the bed.  It is all good…..

 I even have more hope for my poor beaten up body.  A pocket of fluid in my knee is causing some of the issues and I will try a new regime to see if I can get it under control.  It is my intent to see my internal world with the concern and compassionate eyes of the Buddha

Aging vs Maturing

Getting old is easy, it just happens.  As I am finding out it happens in spurts and there is little you can do about moving back from a new level of “old”.  Getting mature is much harder and it takes a long time and lots of work.  When I am at the end of my energy string and someone puts weights on my feet, in my overwhelmed, tired, and “strung out” state, I go back into my old coping bag and grab the familiar.  Recently, in trying to finish a task that I has agreed to do, didn’t believe in, and didn’t want to be doing, only to find that I was working with incorrect information...so  I grabbed my angry bag and started swinging. There might be righteous indignation involved since I did not need to put the time into the project had I knows the accurate rule of the task and I took time away from my rest, doggedly doing the project, the mountain of tasks that were on my plate that I want to be doing was staring at me.   I got angry.  I felt like someone did not respect me or my time and just abused me.  Then I got angry and abused myself twice.  Once by doing the task and once by the anger.    It was useless and stupid to get angry.  It wasn’t going to change anything and if I did not learn the lesson to walk away, cut my losses, put miles between myself and what was taking my energy, I was going to remain stuck. It is just not worth it.   My other lesson learned is how people see me.  I have had input from a few people recently who have presented a picture of myself that I don’t recognize.  I need more time to meditate about what is my stuff and what is the observer’s projection.   I miss my lifelong friend for she was always a good neutral voice when I was thrashing ideas.   So I will listen to the sound of silence and take better care of my maturing self.

Values

“How is it that I so consistently do not choose what I value and instead choose what I do not value?

 I want this and yet consistently do that.”   – Cheri Huber

            I have long considered Cheri Huber my teacher.  I have not been in her presence for many years but I have her books and I use the monastery morning meditation reflection as my own as well as the daily reminders, etc.   What attracted me to her is that it feels like she is in my head.  This is particularly true when I do my out of body experience and watch myself doing something that is not what I want to be doing, saying, acting, etc.  I am try to remember that life is a practice.  I am not a Buddhist, meditater, cook, dreamer….I am just practicing at them all. 

            I am also reminded that when we lose our innocence as a young child and move away from simple and our true self, we put on a coat of believe that we are separate.  We start to believe that this is the way things are and anything not the same as my way is another way and my way is better or not as good a way etc.  Cheri refers to this as having lenses installed in our eye and thus the reason we are attracted to some and repelled by others. Our “tribe” wears the same lenses. 

            I hear the clock in my life ticking.  When I was younger, there would be lots of time to do this or make that or learn the other.  Tick tick… while we never know the time of departing, there is a logic that says at a person approaching 74 as less ticks on the clock that one 24. Now I have to be more discerning about how many steps I want to climb or actually, how many I can climb.

            I value attributes.   We all don’t have them all the time but some have more of them than other people.   Congruence, Integrity, non-judgment, and compassion are high on my list and I try to be more mindful of where I am in relationship to these values. And for today, I will remember that life is practice…one day at a time.

ah....my cave

 

 

 

Alter with ladder to copula

 
The  bed - hall - wardrobe and tomorrow a new bed!!!

 

 

Is it the light at the end of the turnel or a train coming toward you.

I have to be very patient with myself for the next two weeks but what will really help is at least having my bedroom in a place that is comfortable for me.  I will get the bed tomorrow and the rug will come up next week….but even now, it is so open and free in there when I go to rest.   When I am thrashing, feeling very unsettled and have more on my plate than even I can handle…it is a great way to see the people in your life.   Very few can really stick with a rocking boat.  Not a bad thing.  Many are happier on the shore or not comfortable with someone else’s discomfort or would prefer a steady Eddie type.  Well that is not me.   It just helps to know who you would want on your life raft.  Most of the time when a ship is going down, the waters around are not clam…there will be a thrashing. 

It has not quite been a month since I returned from a very simple life of one room, routine, good diet, and just a few selected friends etc…  I didn’t think of it as vacation but the way I want to live.  Coming home to multiple projects, the house all over the place in spite the heroic effort of helper Beth to get the place perfect,  dark rainy days, no time to cook or sit with a meal on a regular basis and then community projects that suck the life out of you…. I get spent.    A massage once every three weeks is not daily…I limp.  It is hard to get down to the floor and back up since I really can’t put much pressure on my bent knee… but it is OK and I am grateful to be walking. 

I hesitate to say I see the light at the end of the tunnel since my helper Russ reminds me that it might be a train coming the other way. There have been a few express trains lately.  But I believe I see the end in sight with the house (after the new bed, the carpet up, the furniture from the kitchen and dinning room moved to the parlor and den to allow the floors to be refinished, Jim goes away for a week and I tend a very ill dog…..) …and it will be just the way I wanted it to be.. and I am grateful for the help I have had and the funds to do it…….but the last miles are the hardest. 

I thought of Page and I trekking up to the home stay in Vietnam over rocks and hills hungry and tired and carrying more than we needed to in a pack.  When we were finally there and didn’t have to walk any farther, my body was so tired and sore I could hardly enjoy the wonderful meal our guide prepared. (I did enjoy the garlic French fries she made in an open pit fire and he beer from the generator driven cooler)   I went to bed dirty and got up to a squat toilet that was more than a challenge to my beaten up body.  Finally the mountain shower the next day and the knowledge that they were able to cancel our trek to a spot far down the road… helped ease the pain.  I knew I would make it…but I also recognized that the joy of skiing mountains for 18 hrs. a week for as  many years had taken a toll. I am now more than ever realizing that selection is the key to life. 

While I can afford to just buy things and put them someplace… I am now doing it with discernment and that is what I am committed to do with my time and energy as well as who is in my life raft.  

QUALITY VS QUANTITY

There is no doubt in my mind that quality trumps quantity.  I remember getting an invitation to a birthday party for 250 of my closest friends.  Who has 250 close friends.  I think I might have 250 acquaintances or casual associates, but there is not even 50 that I would call friends not alone close friends.  I have long believed that a friend is the first person to walk in when the rest of the world walks out.  I think I can add to that, a friend doesn’t make you feel badly about your feelings.  Today I felt validated rather than depleted. Ah that was all I needed.

 I did my taxes today and I while hardly paid any taxes but I will get a refund.  You forget that income taxes is not about the money you have but the money you earn. I have a clean plate day tomorrow…no meetings… no demands… ah…feels wonderful.  And tomorrow, I will have been home a month,….no…not so.   

One advice I will give myself, don’t tear up every room in your home at the same time.  My shelter, my nest, my sanctuary is very important to me.  It is my place to go when I feel no one gets me.  my life is about needing a space to lay down and put my foot on the floor, breath slowly and get myself together.  I pushed my crew and myself today…got a monkey off my back and put my pedal to the metal and got the floor board replaced in the kitchen…moved 10 pieces of furniture and created the beginnings of a sanctuary in my bed room… ah… the candle is in the window.. the aroma therapy is smoking away…the new sheets are on the bed.. there is no junk around…and I am so happy.   I am home.

With my new home is my new mantra.. it I don’t enjoy it…it is work… if it is work…it is not for me…I am retired.  I passed alone a project I don’t believe in and set up a system so that I don’t get seduce by junk mail. I’ll do the taxes tomorrow after breakfast with a friend… and say.. can’t wait to get home… mmmmm nice.

This has been one of those days when you just wonder what you are doing.  A couple of meetings for the community, a long afternoon of writing for the community, and an evening of sitting through another long meeting….and then… just some sit back and enjoy a blast from the past watching The Band and the movie The Last Waltz.  Tempting not to smoke a joint for I was back listening to the concerts in my head – so many I had heard or seen or been in the field when they played.  …. Muddy Waters… “I am a man”…. Joni Mitchell…. “hitchhiker” …..Eric Clampton… and what is new.  Someone said today that they hoped could learn to love myself… well honey… that is not my problem…   I am pretty happy with the core me, just hate when I get into the undertow of minutia.  

Housemate Jim tells me that the rule of the warehouse is … don’t f… with me.. and I will not f….with you…. Love it…   Today someone f…..with me.. I am out of their company.  Don’t want to get even…want to get going… I have too many placed to see and too much to do to get into some else’s stuff.  I feel I have about 10 years of good health.. sure don’t want to use the time to chaise rainbows.

As I listened to the music tonight I thought of all the great times I have had …..”the night they tore ol’ Dixie down….”.  I know I am really not getting my “me” across when I project that I don’t love my life or love myself..       It has been a wonderful life.  I love me so much that I am only going to do the things I want to do….   Last night I went out with folks from my first Thailand trip….  I was on stage again…I love making people laugh…I thought how much Dan would have enjoyed the evening…the old Thailand Gang together again and if felt like only yesterday.  It is 2:15AM…..so…out of her.

I am not going to take any time to explain me… you either get me or don’t and that is ok…because…I get me.. and that is who matters…

BETWEEN HERE AND THERE

I have been trying to live my life in the Now, but…. There were so many things to go back and tend to that happened over the time I was away, it is almost like I have to relive the 62 days in this environment.  Add to this that I am tearing up the house to fix the floors, get new carpets and finish organizing the basement… There are stacks of furniture, clothing, book and stuff in many corners.  It has moved from stuff to organized downsize, but it is that in between space.    In the meantime, I am trying to finish a few projects, get the yard ready for relaxing and trying to keep up with correspondence, my meditation, and my food program.   It took hours to get the pictures off the little Acer and into my computer for review. I haven’t looked at one or edited, but they are in this computer.  I bracketed many and did raw and jpg so there are an incredible number of duplicates and some are just junk… It took hours to download some CD’s that Jim wanted… and hours to sort a bookcase etc.. hours to research and book some airlines for Jim’s vacation  . but 7 months later, the windows are in and almost finished, I have a plan for each space, know what I am keeping and tossing, and still managing some social time.   The storms are in process as well as the pillar trim… so I have many projects that I am the contractor for  and many project to do.  I need a vacation.   The good thing, I see a light in the tunnel and there has been much progress toward really getting my shelter to be my castle…. I love what I see, but where is the wand that just makes it happen… I looked at my closet the other day and thought…my life is between sizes… not thin enough for the goal clothes but not fat enough to look ok in the larger sizes… I am in between…  

(I have heard from most of you...but some not, so if you haven't said you want to stay on, this will be the last blog in your email....love to you ...bonny)