Fear calls out to be fulfilled

A few Saturday’s ago, I had a minor crash with the scooter.   I was in the turn lane and stopped with my directional on.  The traffic cleared and I started forward.   There had been no traffic and there was a clear lane to my left.   A woman with a child, came to my right and smacked the front tire and stopped my slow forward motion and pushed the bike to the left.  I continued to the right and ended up on the ground with my book in my bag smacking into my left rib and my right elbow breaking the fall to the ground.   I bruised my ribs which are still sore and skinned my elbow which has healed.  The accident was minor but it caused a greater issue…. Fear.

In the weeks that followed (two weeks tomorrow) I noticed that was becoming overly concerned about people approaching to pass and particularly fearful about the young riders who like to speed and weave in the traffic.  I could feel my body react and at times feel that when I stiffened I would compensate for my worse fear, being hit, and move the bike in the opposite direction in a jerking manner. I noted that on a few occasions, my over compensation was putting me in peril … I was stiff, over reacting to a non-real situation created in my mind by the fear of … what if.

I have taken some time to look at fear in my life as well as other examples that I can see in others lives.  Once something happens – and accident, a failure, someone cheating you or on you, it appears we put on a foreign body and start to live a life of fear.  I could see a tightening and jerking overreaction to the thought that something might happen. 

 I can see in others a tightening and loss of a usual forward-looking personality and the creation of a screwed always looking for the trouble signs… and overreaction that like the bike situation can make the situation actually come to pass… then I can say… see… I was right to fear.  The fear fosters the situation.

This morning, I am up preparing for an art class.  Last year’s sketching class resulted in my getting my money back and the teacher telling me to go home.   Today is watercolor for seven hours in the countryside with the landscape.   My first thought after I signed up and told the teacher of my experience and lack of skill… and she assured me she would be encouraging and gentle…was just not to go.  The day, 9:30-4:30 that includes a nice ride to the country, a visit to the teacher’s home with homemade lunch and materials and will cost 2500bht ($70).  Money is not the issue…

what if… I can’t put the mountains in my eye so they come out the brush, what if she laughs,

what if… but…

what if I allow myself to feel the mountains and feels like I do with the camera and let my eye and hand work together.  What if for only a day or an hour or a minute, I drop my what if and just let be me and what is?

I will drive out cautious but look forward and move ahead in my lane at a steady speed so the speeders will know where to go around me.  I will smell the chili cooking and the coffee brewing and watch the traffic, like the 490 coming into the city. 

 Like Pogo…I have met the drawing mat and the mat has met me

 or 

as Pooh said to Piglet who had just said…what if the branches in the storm break off and fall on our hear…..well… what if?

If fear makes me not want to do something or be me… .I am causing myself to suffer and I will drop that and not suffer. 

Simplicity - The Bodhisattva life

“Simplicity is experience pared down to raw essentials, with nothing added on or removed; therefore, it is without deception. When we have lost touch with ourselves and one another, the simplicity of death can bring us back quite powerfully to what really matters.”

My life has mostly been about putting out brush fires and speaking up for those that could not speak.  My career saw some real opportunity to make a difference and I was lucky enough to have a benefactor who was not afraid or threatened by my energy.  “Bon Bon…here is what I want you to do… now make it happen”.  I had an opportunity to see how things work in back rooms and how to talk to many people one on one to sway opinion.   My name was on nothing…none of the awards, grants, legislation etc. and only I knew what had gone on to get something done.  Much got done because we were a team.  A county leader with compassion, a boss with some ideas but no time, and a worker bee that was more eager to see things happen than to be the press release.

Community building is much the same but so fractured by self-interest that it is like trying to tame alligators.  It has always been about principles before personality but when a group has not taken the time to set forth principles it is another occasion of a fart in a windstorm and which way is the prevailing wind. 

At this moment I see national government blowing against about everything that is my principle – equality, fairness, inclusion and compassion.  My community is flowing in the direction of expediency rather than quality and high standards.  

Without a base of principles, there is only self-interest.

It is time to sit silently in my canoe and wait out the storms… so the other day I went to a funeral…    my foot hit the simplicity ground.  Here and Now.  Pause.

The longest 20 minutes of my life

I kept thinking, if I were a prisoner of war, would I let the enemy break me.   I was ok, in pain, grabbing the wood next to my hand and letting out noise, but only once did I say stop and then took a breath and said ok.  This was my treatment today with a renown healer. I had been warned by my doctor friend that I might cry but I did not really have a full understanding of why I might cry.

I got to the place* that is difficult to find early enough to have a coffee.  (* it is by the road near University [20 roads in and around the university] turn at the wall of the Wat [there is a Wat every 7/10^th of a mile, from the school and down the road.  No more road [road takes several bends and splits several times], keep going.)

The dogs barked.  He said park there and come.  He took off his shoes and went into a small cottage with an alter and flat bed. I followed.   He asked my issues.   Right knee and left shoulder I said and pointed.  Ok.  

I took off my socks and laid on the flat bed.  He put his hand on my knee and started pressing on the muscles of my inner thigh, bent my toes and then started working all the muscles in my leg.  From the first push, I was in pain.

He then went to my shoulder and said something about a stuck ball… and pressed under my collarbone,  He then put his elbow or knuckle into the pubic bone, and that is when I almost lost consciousness.  Pressing the collarbone and then my pubic bone until there were stars and I could only hear my yelp as if it came from another room or the world.  

He did something with my arm, so I could feel electric never shocks moving my finger that I think were still attached to my arm.   It was almost out of body.  I hung strong and pretended to be giving birth since I saw 25-30 babies born, and most of the young mothers also screamed.

He stopped

Said get up…  

pick up your arm….

hop on your leg..  

 It is fixed as much as it can be.   

I looked at my watch 20 minutes.  Maybe 20 hrs or 20 yrs.     I put 500 bhat in the gold bowl by the Buddha and he opened he door and I got on the scooter and road off.

I took a middle road back to the city still trying to feel what didn’t hurt.   Stopped to get the bike serviced (got a new front tire), had breakfast, tried to meditate at the Wat by the gas station… and I am now going to shower.. and pass out. 

There is no self and other.

The Buddhist concept of non- separateness – there is no self and other,  is challenging when you see someone, collection, group that feels so apart from what you fanaticize as not related to your way.  This election has challenged my acceptance of non-separateness and brought to my forethoughts how can anything in me hold what the leader of the free world and his supporters are saying. Exaggeration trumps facts etc.   It is much like saying that person is not my president.  I am an American. DJT is the president of America.  Logic 101 says My president is DJT. 

I would like to think that I am not a racist. Make America Great again feels like Make America White again as the black/brown skin are statistically challenging the white skin population.  My DNA says I have some – 1-4% native American or African heritage so am I “them” or us or we.  Hard to bring into your arena of acceptance traits that don’t smooth into a nice package of who you think you are.

One of the most challenging things of last year was being told by someone I respect that I am a bully.  DJT feels like a bully with your ideas are not mine so wrong.   Am I like that?  Passionate, high energy, strong opinions, tenacity, outspoken all feel better.  I felt hurt by the remark and what I thought was a friendship faded quickly to non-contact.  “use superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force him or her to do what one wants.”  From a distance and after reflection, if I could change the words to say using strength, knowledge, and experience to alter someone’s behavior or thinking to make a change in their life or support a cause…    I can live with that.   I am not a mouse sitting on the sidelines and if speaking up and out is bullying, so be it.

There is some of me in DJT and some of the DJT in me.  I am from Ohio, and when I ride my scooter, I have a red neck.  I have been a hard taskmaster when working on projects but did not use a whip… does that mean I am not a “cracker”?   

Same Same but different.  It is all part of the large collective and at that point… not separate.

reading and writing

“I note however that this diary writing does not count as writing, since I have just re-read my year’s diary and am much struck by the rapid haphazard gallop at which it swings along, sometimes indeed jerking almost intolerably over the cobbles. Still if it were not written rather faster than the fastest type-writing, if I stopped and took thought, it would never be written at all; and the advantage of the method is that it sweeps up accidentally several stray matters which I should exclude if I hesitated, but which are the diamonds of the dustheap.”  Virginia Woolf

Reading has always been difficult for me.  Interestingly the two failings – my hearing loss and dyslexia keep me on the edge of understanding what others are saying or expressing what my inner voice is saying.  For the most part, I just bang out words and only backtrack to those words that pop up with red underlines when my fingers jump ahead to the next word before I finish the last.

Writing this blog over time and sending it to trusted friends has changed significantly since the first days.   When I first wrote, I wrote to tell others what I was doing or seeing, then I shifted to write what others wanted, and now I have found that I am trying to keep two sets of words and often not putting anything in on screen/paper.  I need to collect myself and be my self

I am glad that I don’t have to write on paper with a pen for I would never write just as I hardly read.  Reading is almost as difficult as writing ( I consistently write difficault ..) and often transpose my letters when reading.  

Neither the hearing nor the reading has stopped the thinking.  

 I learn by both, but confirm when I write.  If it sounds like a soap box, just don’t read what I write.

pictures two

I saw a same same in these two pictures...standing tall... sure of self ...protecting an inner fear 

(or maybe his stand up hair)

You must go here to get there

What am I willing to struggle for?

step by step

pictures part 1

I have been journaling and when I get it going in a direction that might be of interest or help to others, I will post.  In my effort to get something up on FB... I have put some pics that I want to have on my blog... so here goes..

FACES

I am dependant on many for existence... food, etc.. but in the daily moving about, what I do when I do it and even how I do it is primarily my choice.  

The other night, it an effort to share some time with my ChaingMai friend Daniel, I agreed to the movie.  It was not an easy task getting him to say which movie etc... other than meet at the box office at 5:45.   The movie he picked started at 8:50 and while we were going to have dinner (had to be there by 5:50 so he could get the early bird special....lives on $900 a month SS).  How long does it take to eat pasta and have a beer.. pouring rain so the usual rooftop garden was closed.   The rain was torrential and while I only live about 2 miles away... I was not comfortable thinking about going home when the movie was over... around 11.  I had my ticket  ($5) ... but I just said.. I want to get home.  He suggested taking a songtow.. which still would mean walking most of the way and then leaving my bike parked just off the sidewalk...    I wasn't in a panic.. but my guides said... you don't even enjoy movies about aliens coming to earth.. go home.   So I did.   In the long run.. There was no rain at 11.. but I was happy that I left.

Trying to get my life from moving down the same path is significant.  My feet have been moving in one direction so very long.. as in seeing something that needs to be done and just doing it.. and believing if I don't.. something bad will happen or nothing will get done.  I know others can do it. And even do it better...but I feel like I am the only one with the vision or passion.

This week I learned that The River Wall project which started in 2015 with the governor giving us $2mil to get the job done.. has been stalled. I have been warning about this and   I see government backroom moves to take the money and move it to other locations .. etc.  A few years ago a group got $2M for art and creative use of Genesee Park..and by the time the money got spent.. it went to the art around the new buildings (which I call legos) on the other side of the river..   Without a scream from the community other than one person who saw what was happening and tried to stop it .. things happen.  Elections happen.. and so it is.

So I sit here thinking... if I were home .. or I could write emails.. or or or.. and so I am  standing very still and holding onto my ego with all my might.. 

I am saying ...

thank you City for doing what you are doing... you are my friend.. you have given me the opportunity to make some significant changes in my life

I have been in survival mode all of my life... I survived when my parents got the shock that I was going to be arriving on earth and they were the lucky winners.. I survived being me.. and I thrived being me.   When the sun is out.. it is easier.. When it is raining... not so.    

When You have a wooden chair and a black and white tv..

                    you are a prisoner in the tv world.

If .you get success and have a lounge chair and a great high def tv..

                    you are a prisoner in the tv world but you are more comfortable.

Same same but different.

Looking at the story of your life.. and saying.. I don't like where the plot is going takes courage and energy and there will be "adjustments".

I feel good about the new direction.  It will take time to get the new habits working in place.. But in the meantime.

So

Thank you friend – who knocked me off the scooter yesterday and caused a little skin off my elbow. You have helped me be more conscious of my actions, surroundings, and the here and now.

Thank you friend ...in the banking business either letting it be disbursed or disbursing...you have helped me see how close to the surface my feeling of scarcity is located

Thank you friend ...who picked a movie at an inconvenient time in the rain ... you have helped me see that I need to listen to my spirits guide and be compassionate to myself so I can learn more compassion for others.

The concert.  There has been little music occurring in ChaingMai related to the death of the beloved King.  Last night, Jean-Pierre Kirkland, a retired Brit who worked throughout the UK as an educator and counselor.  It is his extensive knowledge of music that makes the concerts so very interesting.  He has that Rob Goodling passion for the detail and presents it in a flowing interesting manner.  Last night he spoke of on Satie writing the Gymnopedie No 1 in a little bar called The Cat in the Montmartre area near the Follies.  He and his partner Pom, a Thai motorcycle group ride leader, are concerned about bring music to the remote villages and encouraging via financing, young talented musicians.  The Santi Music School has been an active partner in the effort and last night several of the young talents, Mr. Santi and a cellist from Bangkok were the entertainment along with Jean-Pierre.  A wonderful evening of intimate music performed well by all

The cellist from the Uk and now Bangkok could not bring his cello on the plane even though he offered to by a seat for the instrument.  He played a borrowed instrument.   The sock wearing violinist was twelve and chose two American numbers ... Somewhere over the rainbow and Amerika.  The room holds about 30 people and I was in the front row on a chair without padding which was the only distraction.

This gifted 12 yr old played Beethoven and Chopin with his teacher and then three solo.

Very enjoyable evening.

Blocks

I am writing in my head and seeing many things I want to ponder, but I feel like I have not found my groove of balance.  There is time, but I find I am spending my time in a pastime mode thinking about what I want to think about and let the minutes go doing idle computer game or search.  

Sometimes when I randomly look at the past writings, I find that there were moments of life clarity and moments of humorous observations and I can see and relive the snippets.   I see the value of the verbal and physical snapshot.  What is my trouble?

Live on a scooter makes seeing the big picture and getting from here to there easier, but you miss the small things and the details of the close-up.  This applies to my photos also.  Unless I stop, get the camera out and ready….no pictures for a day and yet I am seeing hundreds of mental movie pictures and recording hours of dialogue in my head.

The balance also comes from my effort to no remunerate and be more here and now.  One now slips into the next and to be creative and capture what is flowing in my life, I have to linger at that now to express what is seen by the soul.

I have several little books and note taking systems with me.  There is a voice in my head that says a slight alteration in the pause might be to linger and reflect.   A new day.

Money

When I was younger, I often lived on the edge with little extra funds.  There were times when I was not getting my expense check and was traveling that I was actually living from the gas pump to pump on credit.   I had poor credit since I was spending much more than earning.  I bought the house with no money down... and did most of the work, with little knowledge and helpers that often knew about what I did.  Logic and guts got me through as well as my love for my best friend that drove me to finish.
Today, after 47 yrs of working - a not so big but ok pension and SS, I pay my bills and have money in my account as well as some investments.   I don't have a great deal, but my house is almost paid for as well as the car - I have a $50K line of credit, a $2K overdraft, and a money market account tied to my Summit.
When I first arrived, it took me five days to get Summit et al to know that I was in Asia.. although I had told them and they had confirmed.
Today's trauma ....with about $12 in Thai money in my pocket (I have $300 in AM as an emergency)... I go to the bank, and it says... check your account....  I check cash - $3K... I check savings---$3K... I check Money Market....$7K...  I tried again... 3-4 times.    I go to another machine... card inserted incorrectly....   I check the card... wipe the strip.... and try twice more.... same way... same direction...and finally... $$$$$  My rent is due tomorrow....5500 for everything... so I have $ for gas and dinner.
I see kids at dinner counting their coins to pay for a coffee....    I have enough total to buy the condo I looked at ... all I want is $250....  
It is the small things in the process that brings you back to really...  as to the product...I am here... it is now... I can put gas in the scooter... and all is good.
I will learn how to transfer money from Summit to Bangkok NYC at no cost and get a Bangkok Bank Credit Card so I remove myself from the mercy of the credit union.  For 5 years they were great... the last two... It is a roll of the dice.

Hmung

I have been thinking a great deal about vocation... having a passion for something.  I don't feel my eyes have led me to photo subjects.  My meditation is ok but I am getting more out of some books and recordings by great teachers about Dharma and the Sutras.  I don't even think I had a career.  I might have helped a few people along the way but I went down many streets while someone paid me.  I had a passion for basketball and skiing but that was my hobby.   I am reading a book, The Road to Character, that highlights the lives of people who developed character and also many a vocation.  I have tried to put principle before personality but it has left me questioning if I can stay attached to several organizations that are neighbor personality or principle driven.
Yesterday I stopped into an exhibit by a woman who was a violin soloist and teacher in Chicago and became interested in the music of the indigenous groups in Asia, the Hmung tribes.  I am going to buy her $65 book not so much for the book, which is very informative but for her life work and her inspiration to myself to start putting the pieces together for my vocation.   As an overall view of her work, while it focused on the music and instruments, she also spent time with their lives...the clothing, the healing, etc.    Here are a few pictures of parts of her display.

There are many rituals in the design of the stitches.  The shapes and configuration are purposeful for protection or to ward off illness

 The cloth over the baby's back has many signs circles, crosses, diamonds to confuse the evil spirits and protect the baby.  Some tribes have more stripes and some more circls

This is how they make the cloth.   the top right ball is crude hemp and the one on the left is ready for weaving.  the middle is a model of the loom ad the bottom is the shuttle used to take the string across the set up string and to add color.

Over the hump

I am going to share something very personal.  I went for a facial the other day to Nori who is a very skilled Chinese Dr who does deep muscle work with a stick.   She stuck me a bit and reminded me that my hump was getting more pronounced from sitting at the computer.   At the end of the facial, she said I should detox and gave me three brown tablets and said take them at bedtime and the next day you will be emptied of old toxins.  Fortunately, I thought I should do this on the weekend when I was not going to ChiKong.  Last night I took the pills. (pause)                  My experience with detox has been colonic, which is not easy and painful for me, but if done by a good practice person, it takes about 1.5 hrs, and you are not exhausted, and you actually get up and leave.      The brown pill method turned out to be marathon sprint to the commode or at least the commode room followed by cleaning up the half the room and a shower. I will shorten this by saying I take a shower a day and I am about seven days ahead and the very final note, why would anyone do that to themselves,  Like Tom Hanks to his son in Sleepless in Seatle... where doing ok by ourselves aren't we?  Was I that bad before....  Today I am freezing and am apprehensive about what virgin food I should put in my sparkling clean and empty body.

May all beings be at ease.
Whatever living beings there may be;
Whether they are weak or strong, omitting none,
The great or the mighty, medium, short or small,
The seen and the unseen,
Those living near and far away,
Those born and to-be-born,
May all beings be at ease!

It is hard to accept that when you feel that you are on the right path and that your step is easier that it is temporary and you just need to enjoy the moment.  Around the next bend is some piece of earth that will end up in your eye and you will have cloudy vision. 

I can feel my body being more relaxed as I go about the day.  I will be spending most of my time by myself and have more say about go here, go there, or don’t.  While my calendar looks full …today my chi gong class, breakfast with the expaits at Riverside, a

curator's tour of an art opening, it will be my pace and timing.  I will come and go when I feel I want to do so. 

Last night on my way to sit with the sangha, the road was dark and busy and I just went home after a nice meal with H&H.  I listened to a dharma talk by Penna Chodron and felt it was where I was to be on a dark night.  

Today, no rain.

The lesson for me is to be at ease in the rain and in the some and wish all well.  I rode past a man drinking the last juice from a discarded beer bottle – it is easy for me to wish him well.  Much easier to send a kind thought to him than the self-inflated ex-marine in my class or the man that will be president.  Who knows, the man with the bottle may be richer in heart and more at ease than either.

Yesterday I went to DaDa for oatmeal mango and banana....  I could have the same picture for the past three-four years.  There is great comfort in stability

Same staff... same wall signs.....same fans... same help staff... only the two German men and the american women have changed.

My laundry person is on holiday to visit her family until the 7th so I was out of underwear.   I remembered the place at the mall with the flyless men's briefs... so I now have four new pairs.  As I went by the IT shop, I saw this salesman having a rest.  I am amazed as to where and when folks can sleep.  first, I would have to lay on the floor and second... I would be fired.  Just a quick shot with the phone but I the scene gave me a smile.

 

I have been in Thailand for three weeks and while some of my life is in pattern some is still an off step.   I love the spontaneity and non-fatal risk living, but I also like order.  You might not know this since my place of living is often not a home but a landing pad.  I am working on that. 

One thing I have learned about me is that if I don’t set the day with a time for “things” I want to do, as taking care of me and learning from my  life aka Blog, I do things that push the day forward until bed time.  I have played more spades online than blogged.  In my life process, will it matter that I outplayed a 75 yr old woman from Canada etc. 

On New Year’s Eve day, I started the day in a tangle of misconnections to my home.  I had been reflecting that morning about loving someone.  My online teacher Ajahn Brahm, had given a great talk on seeing the joy in the past year and accepting a choice to love or be in suffering.   In the talk, he asked what it is to be loved and loving.  I ran through the people in my life and reflected that in most cases, I know how to act so they can accept me easier in their life rather than just coming with my bumps and knowing no matter what, I am loved.  

When you have or appear to others to have a strong personality, it takes work on both parts not to be overwhelmed nor be overwhelming.  Someone once said of me that if there is a world earth crisis, I will get out and then figure out how to make a computer out of string.  But that also has its price.  Some folks see me as competition or someone to compete against or try to control.   I see me as someone who tries to let everyone one around me live their lives until they step on mine. 

When someone yammers on about something they are not willing to change or let go of…I am ok the first round but if they are stuck on not being able to change the other person… I must move on and encourage them to do so also.   T

here are some that think the rules don’t apply to them.  We have a person who thinks she has it together but who has not dealt with some enormous and scary issues.  She buys a big dog that needs a dog park or an acre of land.  Sweet dog but bounding through a community with folks with issues about dogs is not neighborly.  Short of calling the dog warden, it will not change until the dog can’t walk

I have been loved unconditionally and have loved back.  It was a deep friendship that ended too soon by disease and death but to this day, I hold Chuck in my inner heart and think of him often.    I see a kind and loving neighbor who unconditionally loves his wife.   I don’t believe he has had many thoughts of how he might change her.  That acceptance of the bump and holes as part of the package is love and so few really have it.   In most of the relationships, it is how the other person should be  or act so that my life is easier.   Buy a blow-up doll, the humans come with bumps.

That brings me to my housemate.   I have known him for 15 years and he is who he is.  He is not unkind or mean, but he is so into his now that he really does not have a clue as to how his behavior affects another.  The list of times this has happened are numerous and some were critical and more painful.  I must love his bumps and just because he says, let's chat at a particular time and then is not there does not mean anything is wrong but that something, almost anything, has come to his attention and the promised contact is gone.   It is my life task to maintain my sanity and just say… that is Jim.

Off to start my week with Chi Kong.