Musings

The Amelie Challenge

2012-02-06T20:15:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been thinking about character development.

I really like how the movie Amelie handles it. You're told three things a character intensely dislikes, and three things a character likes that are neurotic. I was charmed. It quickly cut to the vulnerability of the characters. I started asking friends to take the Amelie challenge and describe themselves in this way.

Rachel Bird likes peeling glue off of her hands...speaking French with a southern accent...smelling her upper lip.

Rachel Bird does not like not getting the aisle seat...being on university campuses...receiving phone calls.

So what about you?

The destruction of peaceful culture

2012-02-06T19:10:00.001-08:00

His Holiness the 17th Karmapa, a 26 year-old man who is head of the Tibetan Buddhist Kagyu school, issued a statement about the three Tibetans who self-immolated today.

I was overwhelmed. I wept. So much suffering in the world. And the causes keep being created for it to continue in such huge doses.

My first thoughts concerned the Chinese. How could they continue this oppression? What did they think they were gaining by destroying this peaceful culture?

I initially appealed to nationalism--China vs. Tibet. The more I clung to that, the harder it was to grasp. That is not my real objection to what is going on.

Every morning I say a prayer Lama Zopa Rinpoche wrote called, Remembering the Kindness of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan People. At the end of the prayer there is an aspiration for Tibet to "achieve pure freedom and develop the Buddhadharma even more than before in Tibet."

After saying this prayer over thirty times the meaning has changed for me. I don't think of Tibet as an inherently existing nation. I think of it as a symbol of a land where people are supported to achieve enlightenment. That means that virtuous behavior is encouraged. That means that the land is respected and in turn provides for its inhabitants. That means that spiritual activity is seen as a positive thing to devote oneself to and thus monastic life is respected.

When I thought about the Karmapa's statement, it broke my heart to realize that this way of life is being destroyed all over the world. Of course there are more cultures than Tibet who have lived similarly, and as far as I understand through the media, they are almost all under attack in some way.

I know there are cultures in Africa who still are connected to the land. Who live slowly and peacefully, without the Internet, and who are fulfilled. I know that, due to greed and violence, their time is running out and thus their wisdom from Mother Earth may only be available for a short time.

I used to think that harm always came obviously in the form of an evil being, maybe with horns or with a weapon, but always with a clear way to denote the enemy. Now it doesn't seem so clear.

It's easy to point to the Chinese and say they are being bad. Make them the enemy. But not all Chinese people are persecuting the Tibetans. And actually, as we've seen in the iPad factory video that surfaced on the Internet, Chinese people don't even always treat other Chinese people with common decency. Some enslave others.

What breaks my heart today isn't specifically what the Chinese are doing. Or what greedy people are doing. Or what people who are celebrating non-virtuous activity are doing. It's not as simple as pointing a finger and assigning blame.

What breaks my heart is that there are peaceful ways of living that promote happiness--that could bring lasting happiness to everyone, and let us remember that happiness is not a limited resource but rather one that increases by being shared--and the value of these ways is not being celebrated. Instead it is being destroyed. This not only causes intense suffering now but also develops the causes for the future suffering of all sentient beings. IT HAS TO STOP.

And in that vein, I have to say that the proliferation of the Dharma in the West is quite heartening. The prayer also says:

Due to their limitless kindness,
The sun of Tibetan Buddhism has now risen in the West,
Which is a dark land.
But now that I have met with the Dharma,
I have received the perfect human body
Enabling me to lead a meaningful life.

Tibetan Buddhism injected meaning into my life and thus saved me. I owe everything to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Lama Zopa Rinpoche and all of my spiritual teachers as well as the Dharma and my spiritual friends. Thank you to them for delivering the teachings and giving me the support and courage to live accordingly, even in a time when this activity may be scorned. I no longer have doubts in the value of a virtuous life, no matter what is going on around me. I wish everyone this kind of peace as well as the further vast peace of enlightenment.

Buddhas everywhere

2012-02-04T10:51:00.001-08:00

Isn't it fun to be right and have other people be wrong? To me, it feels great. I'm so powerful. I'm brilliant. I know what's up and that other person is tragically stupid. I bring out my high horse and have a good gallop around. I'm completely satisfied.

This is especially useful in situations that involve sentimentality. That person hurt my friend. What a jerk. This bonds me more with my friend. We have a shared enemy. What an asshole.

Yesterday I thought about one of these assholes. He's new on the scene and actually, he's never done anything to me. I've never even met him. But he's a big part of a dear friend's life so I feel like I have room to talk. Also, a mutual friend of that dear friend has an intense aversion to him, even though she doesn't really know him either. That's hardly important for case-building and high horse riding.

I found that the more the two of us discussed what a jerk this guy he is and how he is such a negative influence on our friend, even though we don't know him, the more real it became. In fact, that evening the asshole contacted my friend and did something rude.

It was so bizarre. We don't even know him but it was like we brought it into existence with our talk and bad feelings. We had to stop and think. What the hell is going on?

Naturally, we scrambled to build a case. This guy just confirmed it! What a colossal jerk! Our friend should ditch him immediately. He's evil incarnate, etc. etc.

I gave it 24 hours and thought about it again. I had a totally different view.

Actually, this guy is amazingly kind. He's throwing up mirrors left and right so we can take a good look at what's really going on with us. Yet, we refuse to do the difficult thing and look. Instead, we throw up all kinds of junk to block the momentarily painful truth that in the end, could liberate us from a lot of nonsense and suffering (for example: my judgmental mind, my attachment to labeling things good and bad, etc.).

The more I thought about it, the more I realized, this guy is a buddha. And I'm grateful for him. I imagine humbling myself and prostrating to him.

Since then there has been more peace in me. I feel blessed.

Meditation Stand-Up

2012-02-04T10:16:00.000-08:00

I went to Yogananda's Lake Shrine yesterday and found myself feeling sharp and clear for today's morning practice and meditation.

I was looking forward to the joy and serenity of Kriya yoga. That might have been my first mistake.

My mind didn't clear itself. Instead, it started reveling in circular thoughts until I found myself performing spiritual stand-up comedy. And it was funny! I actually giggled once.

I was completely. gone. I didn't even have an interest in clearing it out. Instead, I wanted to see what would happen with this little world I created.

I opened solidly, even if I can't remember exactly what I said. I know the crowd was into it. Then I brought a friend on stage. An elephant. His name was Jeffrey.

Jeffrey was a line cook at a diner. He had a little white hat on as a nod to health standards. He didn't have much to say. And he was huge.

Since I was performing in Los Angeles I said that I expected to lose half the crowd right then, as the Hollywood people would be running out to call their agents upon realizing that Jeffrey must have the biggest dressing room of them all.

Then there was no joke about Jeffrey. I left him there to be the elephant in the room.

Later I thought about why I would have a meditation like this. Why an elephant?

I had done Tara practice where I read about the deity Tara eliminating the eight fears. The inner fear of ignorance is related to the outer danger of the elephant. Usually when I think about my mind being an untamed mess I think about monkey mind, not elephants, probably because it's disheartening to think it could be that unwieldy an issue.

I had a dog Sparky that attended puppy play school. His instructor was a retired elephant trainer. She said she had to quit that line of work when she had kids, as being an elephant trainer is the most dangerous job in the world. She said that they would train them to walk on command by someone standing a far distance in front of the animal and calling it, and another person standing behind it throwing rocks at his butt. I thought about which I'd like to be least--the person in front or in back? No. Probably the elephant.

I had a Buddhist teaching recently about what it's like to get stuck in wrong view. The teacher painted the picture of an elephant growing increasingly horrified of finding itself in a muddy bog, sinking deeper and deeper the more it thrashed about. The teacher asked if we considered ourselves as great as elephants to even be able to sink that deeply.

In the Sutra of Golden Light there is the story of Jalavahana's fish disciples. The kind doctor happens across a pond devoid of water where 10,000 fish are about to die. Jalavahana discovers that an evil man created a diversion for the water so that he could eat the fish. Jalavahana then convinces the king to let him use enough elephants to bring water to the fish and save them. Upon accomplishing that he realizes that the fish are hungry, so again the elephants are used as the agent of aid, this time to bring them food.

Obviously I have no idea why I was thinking about an elephant during my meditation today but I do think that all these teachings and musings involving elephants could be beneficial. Yes, elephants can signify ignorance but with a different view they can be intensely powerful and helpful. Also, considering the elephant's vulnerability breaks my heart wide open. What the elephant represents is really up to our minds, isn't it?

So like that. And Jeffrey is still here, by the way. Being that elephant in the room.

Merit and Purification

2012-02-01T12:51:00.000-08:00

When I first heard about the Buddhist concept of accumulating merit I have to admit, I was skeptical. I thought, "What on earth are they talking about? You do certain practices that don't make any sense and then you make a little stockpile of merit and cash it in at a later date? WTF? I'll pass. Buncha crazies."

Luckily for me I lived at a Buddhist retreat center so I couldn't actually pass. I ended up doing stuff in the course of my day that accumulated merit. Couldn't turn it down, it would come either way. So fine. I'll take it. Can't hurt anything.

I was also told about the importance of purification. Shortly upon my arrival at the Buddhist retreat center a nun taught me how to do the practice of the 35 Buddhas, which meant I had to repeatedly throw myself on the ground doing prostrations. I wasn't thrilled but she was a New Yorker and I didn't have the courage to tell this nun that I'd really rather not. I accepted that I'd wandered into her flock and was going to stay put for awhile.

I focused my purification practice on a particular relationship in my life and within the next year the relationship shifted significantly. In fact, this relationship was functional on a level I never, ever thought it could be.

Eventually I read that there is practice like pujas (religious ceremonies) and reciting mantras to clear up obscurations deep within, and then there is practice like teachings and debate to clear up obscurations on an intellectual level. I thought about that.

Then I thought, what the heck, I'll go for it and accumulate all this merit, do all this purification, and see what happens. What do I have to lose?

Turns out, a lot of junk.

What I've found is that I've piled stuff on top of stuff, all this garbage that prevents me from seeing things clearly and thus acting without confusion.

It's like when Michelangelo would find a hunk of Carrara marble and see his sculpture inside. The David just had to be freed. Like that, I'm chiseling away at the true me with merit and purification. When I make a crack I can wedge it bigger and bigger by throwing more tools on it. Sometimes a big hunk of rock falls off and I feel like I can breathe easier. No matter how long it takes I know eventually the whole thing will be there, perfectly polished. And it will be beautiful, radiant, just like when I saw The David for the first time and couldn't walk away.

The depression epidemic

2012-01-23T20:09:00.000-08:00

I had clinical depression for about ten years. It started when I hit puberty and ended after college. It was a bleak time and yes, there were external factors that were ugly but after much review, I can't say that they led to this pervasive sadness. It was something deeper than that.

Something shifted in my mind in my early twenties. I had to get off the meds because circumstances changed, so it forced me to sort things out in my own mind. I got better but I wasn't okay. I got to a functional level and that seemed like a real achievement.

Then life blew up and I slid back down. External factors got hugely ugly and my mind was a mess. But there was something different this time. It wasn't like when I was an adolescent. This time I had more hope. And a shred of hope is more. That's pretty much all I had.

I tried everything and lived the majority of my dreams. I had this feeling I'd always go live at a Buddhist retreat center and then life would be different. But I had to exhaust every possibility for happiness first, before I went.

When I finally went to a study group at a local Buddhist center I was terrified. I know now that it's because I was stepping into a new phase of my life and I'd never go back. I was afraid to move forward and leave so much familiarity behind, even though none of it made me truly happy.

The Buddhist center provided what I'd been looking for--answers. What should you do with your life? Be kind. It was a revelation. They didn't talk about the importance of competition and accumulating material objects and developing a certain reputation. They talked about openness and generosity. Loving-kindness and wisdom. They thought it was worthwhile to work with people so they could develop these qualities.

That was when I kicked depression for good. I discovered that it wasn't actually beneficial to treat the symptoms with a pill (a pill that didn't make me happy but instead made me feel nothing). It was the cause that needed to be addressed.

Once I had meaning and lived accordingly, there was no more depression.

This is why I believe the depression epidemic in our country makes total sense. The rat race is wholly unsatisfying. It would drive any reasonable person to melancholy. If you can drum up the intensity to buy into the system, then you stave off this feeling for some time but eventually, it's going to come for you. Because the fact is, the rat race way of life is utterly meaningless.

There is a way out! And it's not through a pill, and probably not through therapy. The way out isn't necessarily the Buddhist way. It's any way that leads you to the truth and gives your life meaning.

The Renaissance Man

2011-12-15T11:32:00.000-08:00

I was reading a piece by arguably the greatest philosopher of the 20th century and was struck by his unwillingness to ask a question that was solely philosophical because he wanted to leave things to their proper disciplines.

Honestly, it upset me. This interest in politely segregating the pursuit of knowledge seems like an agreement to shoot ourselves in the foot before we start.

What about:

Michelangelo,

Da Vinci,

Galileo,

Ben Franklin,

Leibniz, and

Newton?

Can you see Newton sitting there going, "Well, I'd love to look into alchemy further but really I just consider apples falling from trees and how the laws of physics operate within vacuums. I should stick to my specialty." Or Ben Franklin being like, "It would be great if we could see better and have light and stuff but I'm a politician, not an inventor. Hopefully someone will get around to glasses and electricity eventually. Wish I was qualified for that."

NO. They just went for it. They didn't get sold on their nonexistent limitations.

"Jack of all trades, master of none." Maybe it was true of the first person it was said about but it's not a universal. Not by a long shot.

So enough with small mind. Let's get back to our roots: BIG MIND.

On the benefits of academia

2011-12-15T11:12:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting in the bedroom I've had since I was born. There are two overwhelmed bookshelves behind me. There were books piled on the floor in front of them but I painfully whittled it down and am left with only a couple hundred of the most dear.

I'm amazed at the choices I made as a teenager--stole Plato's Republic from my dad, squirreled away Einstein, spent $50 on a beautiful signed Run Rabbit, Run. Then I spent years trying to hide my love of logic and brilliant ideas, in fact my compulsion to delightfully revel in them, to celebrate my Libra side which lives to see everyone get along.

In an attempt to be socially palatable (success questionable) I convinced myself that academia, for lack of a better word, wasn't that important. This summer I discovered that I'd been kidding myself for years.

There are huge benefits to the intellect, namely this:

It enables one to expose herself to mental annihilation over and over again to find what is indestructible within her.

(paraphrased from Pema Chodron)

Yes, I can jump out of a plane (check), fly a helicopter (check), etc. and see that the limits I'd projected for myself are mere illusions. But all my actions begin with my thoughts. So it's time to responsibly and thoroughly check out the contents of my mind. Then, once I prove something to be the case, I will have to let go of all concepts I had that negate it.

I want to know how things exist. How I exist. I want answers! I want to know what's at the bottom when we dispose of everything unnecessary. What is this planet, this universe, actually running on? What am I? Am I at all?

I want to rigorously look at what is going on, with no apologies. I want to take logic as far as it will go. I want to train so that eventually I can cut through things like a laser. This is not a hit at dinner parties (save for the exceptionally nerdy), so thank goodness for graduate programs!

How to write a Pulitzer Prize winning novel

2011-12-02T09:53:00.001-08:00

I've had a passing interest in writing a Pulitzer Prize winning novel so I've kept an eye out for what it takes to be competitive. Here's what I've found, loosely in order of importance.

Your subject matter should be largely inaccessible to the general public. That means you should go into deep discussion on philosophy, history, religion and/or literature. You could intertwine science, but be careful. At the very least include an extreme geographic location.
You need a morose main character.
Your writing style should include a feature that's new to people who read a lot of literary works.
You should have lots of description and make it somewhat meandering.
It should end with the reader going, "What the f#*$ was that!" They should feel like they need to reflect for awhile before they have a clue what they just read.
It's a bonus if you have a MFA in creative writing from a place like Columbia or the Iowa Writers College. You could do a fellowship at a place like Stanford too. That's okay.

This is the general idea for a Nobel Prize winning novel as well.

Go get em, tiger.

Prasangika-Madyamika philosophy, a love story

2011-11-22T10:39:00.000-08:00

I've had the good fortune of coming across a philosophical system that is logically consistent and offers actual content. This is hugely different than my undergrad experience. And yes, it is Buddhism but it's amazing. The mystical aspect has been falling off for me lately. It's just logical.

There are four Tibetan Buddhist traditions and somehow I ended up in a Gelugpa center. Gelugs are the most staunchly academic of the four. They took Buddha's "This is what I'm saying but find out for yourself" super seriously and developed a rich debate system. Anything that is presented in Gelugpa has to stand up in debate. They'll whittle it down to the barest of bones with no apologies. It gets kinda crazy in the monasteries cause the monks really go after each other. I mean, it's their world views at stake. They have to be ruthless.

But the BEST part of this whole deal is their dedication in determining how people and phenomena exist. I've been going over this since summer and I've never been happier. To finally have a proper explanation of how to rest in a space between nihilism and eternalism? Greatest gift ever.

When people say they've looked into Buddhism and they like it I tend to think they're referring to the positive values it promotes that are refreshingly free of dogma and maybe getting a topical understanding of the philosophy. But now I know this is something you can really sink your teeth into, as much as say, theoretical physics.

Some of the brightest people on the planet are students of this philosophy, like Jeffrey Hopkins and Thubten Jinpa. I think part of the reason they aren't well known is that they are not self-promoters.

I've finally been properly introduced to the Tibetan geshe program. These Tibetan kids start learning philosophy and memorizing huge texts so that when they graduate twenty years later they really get it. And they have to memorize definitions upon definitions so they can properly debate. Can you imagine a six-year old American doing that?

There are a smattering of people who are both Ph.Ds and geshes, like Thubten Jinpa and George Dreyfus. They're so brilliant it shocks and awes me.

I know all of this is new to America so I feel very, very lucky to have learned about all this. I mean, there's really no PR about it at all. Even if you want to learn about it in college, and I mean REALLY learn it, you have to search it out. It's not readily available. That's one of the cool things about being part of this tradition. When I'm at a teaching and I look around the room, I know that everyone wants to be there. How often can we say that?

Why I'm learning the Tibetan language and why it's so dang hard

2011-11-01T08:49:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year I saw the Dalai Lama's translator, Thubten Jinpa, give a talk. He blew me away. I did not expect that. I knew he was very smart and assumed he was uncommonly kind but something about the way he emanated rocked me. It wasn't unlike when I've seen His Holiness speak. After awhile I was so overwhelmed I had to leave the room. This container couldn't hold it.

A month or two later I decided I needed to make a change in my life. One thing led to another and I signed up for a Tibetan language course at a Buddhist college in Portland. This class would accomplish a year's worth of Tibetan in only eight weeks. I like a challenge at super high speed so I didn't have a doubt about attending the program.

When I thought about my motivation, a lot of it came down to one thing: I want to be like Thubten Jinpa. I want to have that kind of access to a holy being by being beneficial to him and others, and through constant exposure I want to become like him.

I've had the good fortune of being around a few Tibetan lamas and I've seen the effects of their over their 20+ years of intense training in wisdom and compassion. As a Westerner, I'll take any shortcut I can get to have even a speck of their realizations.

I went to Portland thinking that I was there to learn a language, in the same way I'd shown up for French class in college. At our class party right before the course started our teacher Craig, now my dear friend, told me, "Don't be scared. You can do this." I was startled. It hadn't occurred to me that I couldn't do it.

When class began it seemed doable. We learned the characters and pronunciation. The high tone/low tone and various aspirations were a drag but they didn't seem impossible. With practice they'd be spontaneous.

Over the course of the next few weeks I began to see why some people would give up on it before they even started. It's reasons like:

You'll have to find a course, program and/or teacher that will teach you Tibetan thoroughly, in a way that works for you. The world isn't exactly crawling with these. Plus, I've been told by a reliable source that it isn't until about your fourth year that things start clicking. Unfortunately most programs only teach up to second year Tibetan. At some point you'll probably have to be comfortable with being your own teacher.
It's an entirely different set of characters (a non-romantic language with 30 consonants). These characters are often stacked with a superscripted letter and/or subscripted letter. There are also four vowel markers. Words are composed of prefixes, superscriptions, root letters, subscriptions, suffixes, secondary suffixes and vowel markers. The only thing necessary to make a word is a root letter.
There are no spaces. Instead all syllables are separated by dots. Occasionally there are vertical lines but they don't necessarily denote the end of a sentence. You have to figure out where the words and sentences begin and end on your own. It becomes easier with practice. Be ready for very long sentences. Also, the titles for texts are sentences, usually of medium length. In regular parlance they will be referenced by their Tibetan nicknames, English nicknames and/or Sanskrit titles.
Tibetan sentences are written in a different order where the verb comes last and the verb type controls the syntax of the sentence. Basically the language structure is inside out.
Tibetan grammar is based on particles, rather than punctuation and, in large part, word order. There are no prepositions in Tibetan. A frustrating thing about particles is that the same one can be used for multiple reasons. In these cases the usage will have to be determined through context.
Tibetans like to be succinct and leave out things that are obvious to them, like the verb yin (phonetic/Wylie), meaning is or are, or grammatical particles. It's best if you think of yourself as a code breaker.
There are both classical Tibetan and colloquial Tibetan. Classical is based on eighth century spoken Tibetan and Sanskrit grammar. It's what all the texts are in and is akin to learning Latin. Colloquial is current spoken Tibetan and it's a different animal. Also, the pronunciation varies by region. When you're learning in a classroom, you're learning one or the other. That means it'll take you at least twice as long to get both the written and the verbal as it will any of the romantic languages. You'll need to be great at both to translate for a lama.
Practice sentences for classical Tibetan will be difficult philosophy, not things like, "The cat ran fast" (although you may luck out with "The yak bit the farmer."). Early on I would grow frustrated because we'd labor so much to translate a sentence and then I would have no idea of its meaning. Tibetan class resulted in a lot of philosophical explanations as well as historical because we'd often need context.
The differences between tone and aspiration are so slight, it's difficult for a Westerner to hear them. However, they will be hugely important in communication. Words can be spelled differently but sound almost the same.
Learning the Tibetan language means learning how it's written phonetically and being able to read that quickly.
Learning the Tibetan language means learning how it's written in Wylie, a language created to denote the Tibetan characters through our letters. This is imperative to know. You'll probably have to teach it to yourself because it's almost assumed people know it, especially when reading about Tibetan Buddhism in books written by Westerners. It's also vital for learning to type in Tibetan on an American keyboard.
Learning Tibetan means being able to read about Tibetan Buddhism in a pedantic fashion. There's a sub-language to learning Tibetan that is bred of Western high academia. Only very intelligent people get to the level of being able to translate Tibetan effectively, do field research and write useful texts. Not everyone will understand what they produce but that has no relation to its incredible value.
Learning Tibetan means being able to read about it linguistically. This is another pedantic sub-language that requires some effort.
Sometimes you'll find words written that break the Tibetan language rules. That's because Sanskrit is superimposed on them, usually for mantras. You'll have to learn how this works. Probably somewhere along the way of learning Tibetan someone will off-handedly comment, "You should learn Sanskrit." They're not joking.
If you do succeed in translating a philosophical document, you still won't know what it really means because these texts were designed to be read along with a teacher (lama) who can explain them. This is why all Tibetan texts that have been translated are only useful with commentaries.
Once you get good enough to translate you'll have to be sensitive to translation methodologies. For example, some words have five meanings to them, so should you translate the same meaning throughout the document or should you vary it according to the context? You'll enter the conversation of whether there should be standard translations to certain words or if there should be more latitude. This is only an example of one translation issue.
Tibetan philosophy is extremely difficult to understand, especially Madhyamika (Sanskrit word, you'll learn to tell the difference, i.e. Chenrezig vs. Avalokiteshvara). You'll want a strong background in Tibetan Buddhist philosophy and history, a profound love of logic, and to be filled with joyous effort, patience and perseverance.

Most of this really appeals to me so I'm happy to pursue it. The way I look at it, the treasure of Tibetan Buddhism was kept secret for so long because it was in a land surrounded by snow mountains. If you had the good fortune of finding out that it existed and then really wanted to learn, you'd have to make a serious effort. Now, learning Tibetan Buddhism directly is protected in a different way. Going through the above is like climbing a Himalayan mountain.

So before getting started the question to ask is: How badly do you want it? If the benefits are clearly understood I don't think anybody could hesitate to start the trek.

Incense Meditation

2011-11-01T08:33:00.000-07:00

I've been going to an amazing Buddhist retreat center on the next ridge for the past three weeks.

I can spend hours at this Liberation Stupa, completely happy.

My friend took me to the meditation hall for the first time and showed me the Padmasambhava statue.

He's housed in a building that looks almost big enough to be an airplane hangar. For perspective:

My friend Venerable Sarah gave me some incense to offer him. While she chanted I watched my stick burn. It reminded me of the advice from Zen Mind, Beginner Mind:

When you do something, you should burn yourself completely, like a good bonfire, leaving no trace of yourself.

I thought about how I was the fire. The ash was done, there was no more vitality in it. The unburnt stick was in the future. I watched the smoke curl off into a cloud, then disappear. I thought about how I thought my life was the smoke (the cumbersome past), and I clung to it, even when it had disappeared. I clung to the ash too. But it's done. I'm the fire.

So what is the purpose of my life? To leave a clean burn.

Ven. Steve's Peaceful Communication Technique

2011-10-18T20:53:00.000-07:00

Venerable Steve is the head teacher of my Buddhist retreat center. He's a lovely British fellow who happens to be a great listener. He can also offer sage advice while making you feel like you figured it out for yourself. It's a magnificent skill that I've been watching closely. I think I've figured out what's going on.

Here's a breakdown of how he offers advice.

First, he acknowledges what you're experiencing and sympathizes with you. "I could see why that would be difficult." He is sincerely saddened to hear about someone suffering.

Second, he takes a moment to mull it over. That way you know he's taking you seriously.

Third, he asks a series of questions. These questions lead to a conclusion he can forsee but they are also open, so that he could be wrong. He's open to being wrong. This gives you confidence his questions are not a manipulation tactic. If he's wrong he abandons his line of inquiry and goes back to mulling it over.

Say I was complaining that my manager did something that I think is out of line. He might say, "She has a difficult job and from what I've seen she handles it well. Do you think it's possible that you don't have all the information? Do you think there's a chance she could have done that for a good reason and maybe if you spoke to her directly you could find it out? I think she could have done that to benefit the center but I don't know. It might be worth looking into, though."

Also, every sentence he says is open-ended. A lot of his sentences take the form of, "That's not really X, is it?" "Not really" and "Is it?" are big players in showing that he is not being aggressive. But even more so is his sincerity.

I wish I could post him here to show you what I'm talking about. I've used his method in my life with great success. People seem to really appreciate it.

A rant about healthcare

2011-09-05T19:20:00.000-07:00

I've been sick. It got pretty bad. I had a headache for a week and a bizarre fever. The rational course of action would have been to see a doctor. But seriously, I laugh. That's the kind of thing available to Canadians and Brits, not a regular American like me.

However, I talked to a Brit and a Canadian about it this week and it got me thinking...this is a pretty messed up system. It's not just that financially it's gotten out of control. That's a big problem, of course, but I also don't want to get involved with the way healthcare is handled these days.

I don't want shitty drugs that are basically toxic and going to give me gross side effects, drugs that are available because someone wants to make money.

I don't want to fight this thing in my body like it's the enemy and simply hand over the problem to someone in a white coat. I want to be gentle. I want to know what's going on with me. I want to know how I can do long-term healing, physically, mentally and spiritually. I don't want to issue some quick, dirty battle with weapons I don't trust.

Also, I don't want to feel like me getting sick is a drain on the American economy. Since I've entered the working world I've felt like my getting sick was losing someone money and thus I've felt badly/guilty about it. I haven't given it the space to be something natural.

We need to revolutionize the way we heal.

My nominee for President

2011-08-30T08:34:00.000-07:00

When I woke up this morning I found myself pondering over the next President. This is silly because I have nothing against Obama. I think he's doing fine, actually. I know it's easy to jump all over me for that but I'm not a Democrat so you can't attack me based on party. Also, I think people fail to remember how hard being President of the United States of America is. We tend to expect perfection out of this position and get uppity when it's not delivered. It's ridiculous. The President can't please everyone and I'm not sure we even want that. Do we want someone who panders or someone who presides over our country in a respectable fashion? I think Obama has nailed the latter.

But I'm a daydreamer so I got to thinking about what it would be like to have a female President. Would she bring much needed compassion and insight to the position? Shortsighted as I am, I couldn't pick someone to be our strong yet benevolent matriarch (sorry, Ms. Clinton).

That's when Anderson Cooper popped into my head. I love it. I want him to be the nation's dad for awhile. I think it goes without saying that I'm picturing Soledad O'Brien as his running mate, but I'm open to other options (sorry, Ms. Palin, but no).

Obviously our country needs an endearing badass for representation. He's a Vanderbilt so that should mollify the Republicans. He's been busy keeping everyone honest so that should be a win for the Democrats. He's inherently bipartisan. He's ripe to represent a revolution! And did I fail to mention he's a well-spoken genius? He went to Yale, you know.

But now I've just read about his family and more about him and I'm not going to push it. He's so brilliant and a gift right where he is. And he already is revolutionary.

Back to the drawing board.

VMAs Point to a Revolution

2011-08-30T07:58:00.000-07:00

I've been chronically bored lately. It's that summer boredom of a kid who's been out of school for so long with nothing to do that she's now almost too heavy to do anything. That's why sitting in front of my computer staring at my Twitter feed is currently one of my top activities.

On Sunday night I was stunned to find that the Twitter world was watching the VMAs (MTV Video Music Awards). First, for the usual reason: "MTV has music videos?" Then because I couldn't believe how many people were so interested in these BS awards going to people they didn't know. It was just an excuse to spend hours gossiping.

I know this shouldn't surprise me. That's what the celebrity world is for, right? And they make the big bucks so that should offset our behavior. Plus, when they get into it they should be ready for this. That's just the way it is.

I don't buy it. Every time we act this way it's a choice. I do see how addictive TV is and how hard it is to change. I'm struggling with it myself.

Why is it that some addictions we won't tolerate and some we just shrug and accept them as reality? Why can't we stand there, clear-eyed, and strongly assert what is acceptable and thus loving behavior, and what is not?

I know we can do it. It's just a matter of getting there. And I know getting this BS TV out of our lives would be a great way to get on the right path.

I read that the average American spends five hours a day watching TV. That's a huge chunk of time to start devoting to something else, even if it's more constructive and better for humanity. I could see why some people wouldn't want to take on the challenge. It almost seems like we're sunk before we start. But we're NOT.

When you tell a kid to not do something he's lost. He needs to be instructed differently. Instead of being told what not to do, he needs to be told what to do. That's why I believe the key to ending TV addiction is to give people something else to do to replace it that is obviously better and is relatively simple.

I know one of the major reasons people watch TV is to zone out. They want to shut down after a day at work. They want a break from their own brains.

Is this what we want out of life? To be cogs in the machine and then go home and stare at a screen that causes us further damage? I can hear it already. "But that's just the way it is." No, it's not. That's a lie we keep buying in to.

I get the feeling the best way to start a revolution would be to do it across America through a major social networking channel like Facebook or Meetup.com. Maybe we could start with an hour a week we collectively devote to something else, like going to a park, and grow from there. There are a lot of possibilities.

We need to face a challenge together. We need a media revolution for our own sanity. We need to say that we no longer have patience for glorifying violence or demeaning women. We no longer want to watch advertisements manipulate us into buying garbage. We want quality television that celebrates kindness and that's it. We want television to inspire us.

We're ready for a change.

On Growing Up

2011-08-15T11:20:00.000-07:00

When I was a little girl I took adults seriously. If they said listen, I listened. And I remembered everything.

I think it was junior high school when I found out that other people's minds had been wandering in class. I was shocked. I did not remember a teacher saying that was allowed. These kids were breaking the rules! And in such a rogue, clandestine manner. What a scandal.

Obviously I had to try it.

Since then I've had trouble focusing in class. For a long time I struggled to focus on conversations. Now I'm getting to be a better listener but it's taking real effort.

There's all kinds of stuff I'm working out from when I was a kid. I'm grateful that I can have the awareness to work on it because all the stomachaches I've had from shoving it down have gotten pretty old. I want to be healthy!

Recently I've posited a definition for becoming an adult. At first I thought it was something like being patient with delayed gratification. That didn't stick. Then I thought it had to be about moving on from your parents and living on your own. That wasn't thorough enough. Now I think it has to do with no longer carrying the coping mechanisms of your childhood. Essentially this amounts to healing the inner child.

It's amazing how much my life has been disrupted and how much profound suffering I have endured by getting stuck in experiences from my childhood. In a way I've been reliving those moments almost every day and constantly reacting to them in my interactions with other people in an effort to protect myself. And actually, they aren't just things from my childhood. I get the same way about things that happened last year.

I think I'm protecting myself but I'm really hurting myself. By being so scared of experiencing future pain I shut myself off from what's happening at the moment. It's really, really sad and I know this isn't just my story. It's quite common.

I think about third world living situations and how this stacks up on the suffering scale. It's no contest--third world is way worse. The thing is, my mind can make this lovely life a living hell.

I want to stop doing this. Yet, really taking this on means changing a lot of my behavior, which requires courage that I often doubt I have. I'm in a space where I can't go back yet I'm hesitant I can step forward. I end up in an awkward phase that may simply be an adjustment period. I don't know because I'm too close.

One obstacle I make for myself that I am clear on is that I have constant non-linear, cloud thinking about what I should be doing. It's 100% not helpful. There's a Buddhist image that sums it up perfectly:

Samatha Meditation

Visual image of the "Tranquil Abiding Meditation", depicting the meditator's progress from the initial stages of mind control - by holding the mental power of memory (rope) and the mental power of alertness (taming hook) - to the highest stage, examining the correct view of voidness with single pointed concentration (fire).

I hope that one day I can wander to the end of that path and look back on the memory of child/adult, joy/pain. I look forward to the day when we will all transcend those dualities.

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
doesn't make any sense.

From Essential Rumi

LA Thoughts - part 2

2011-08-15T11:13:00.000-07:00

I was reflecting on my homesickness some more and I came to an embarrassing realization: I miss LA because my ego loves that place. It gets super big there. GROSS.

As soon as I realized that I stopped missing LA, but not my lovely friends there.

The other night I was telling an LA friend about my awareness that I wanted to do something stupid, but that even as I would tell myself, "You absolutely should not do that" I would go ahead and do it. He said he understood, that he'd been there. He told me I absolutely should not do it and issued some idle threats. Then he said, "But whatever you do, I'll still love you."

That's exactly the kind of love I've always wanted. And here it is! It feels like when I hold an infant, like somehow I'm being held too.

Swings and a pretty gray cat

2011-08-15T10:58:00.000-07:00

My Tibetan intensive ended on Friday. I have two weeks before Fall term starts and I don't have a job so I have a lot of open time. At first I was concerned about what I'd do. What if I got really bored? How would I make it?

I watched a lot of TV with my roommates this weekend but I've also been reading A New Earth, which helps me stop getting trapped in my mind (a great antidote for TV). On Sunday evening I went for a run. I love gazing up at the sky from the bridge or the field at Reed College, so after a couple miles my run turned into more of a stroll.

Sunday was the first day I saw the swing set. It's not part of a playground. It's behind the backstop for the baseball field (that is otherwise indistinguishable from the rest of the field that is a magnificent green and has a variety of arresting trees).

I ran up to the swing set and started pumping. It seemed fruitless at first. When I got on the seat my feet didn't touch the ground so I had to go on the faith that after awhile I'd start moving. After a few minutes I was in flight, feeling like I was about to soar into the clouds. And I was grinning, absolutely thrilled.

I walked home listening to a beautiful mantra to the Buddha of Compassion, rejoicing all the way. A cat that had avoided me in the past walked right up and wanted a pet. It was gray with a white undercarriage and blue eyes. Even when I got up she walked with me for a bit.

It's amazing how easily I forget what keeping an open heart and mind creates and attracts. There's no need for fear.

LA Thoughts

2011-08-13T22:27:00.000-07:00

Lately I've been having thoughts...glitzy LA thoughts. I've contracted a serious case of homesickness and it's for a place I've never properly lived in.

I've been in Portland since mid-May. This is the longest I've been away from my home state of California. I used to think it wouldn't be a problem and daydreamed about living in various places around the country. That was naive. I'm hanging on by a thin thread here and it hasn't even been twelve weeks.

Going on nomenclature alone, this homesickness doesn't make a lot of sense. I've been on this planet 28 years and lived in one town for 25 of those years. Even while I lived there I was clamoring to get out. I have no desire to return except for brief visits.

Somehow of all the places I've been, including Europe, I think LA is where I can rest my hat. After being in a town in the country for so long it's amazing to me how that city operates. Beach, palm trees, fast cars, beautiful people, entertainment capital of the world--I'm enchanted. It's life in a fantasy world. It's where I stopped clinging to reality and allowed things to be sourced from another place. It was difficult to make ends meet but there was so much magic to make up for that.

In Portland you are rarely, if ever, judged. You are more than welcome to be whatever it is you are, and encouraged to frolic in your own bizarre little world. That stuff that goes on in your mind that most people would consider rude and crazy to be honest about? Portland expects you to put it on display with proper apathy. This a post-judgment world so leave your emotions at the door. But no expectations, really. Do whatever you want (so long as you don't leave your dogs in the car unattended--there is a streak of necessary kindness running rampant in this city).

I was telling my roommate that I've never been accepted like this but at the same time I don't feel accepted because I'm without a niche. It's all wide open and I'm socially agoraphobic. I want to find a tree to stand under where I can have a safe look around.

But you know that as soon as I go back to LA things are not going to be exactly as I want them either. Until I'm clear in my mind, I will blame my environment for not bringing me enough pleasure. This is the desire realm, after all.

Waking up

2011-08-13T21:58:00.000-07:00

I've been reading A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle. I like to have it and When Things Fall Apart in regular reading rotation because they make the point to Being clear, and I want to keep it fresh in my mind.

My roommate asked me about A New Earth. I told her it was a book you'd find on the self-help shelf that covers the same sort of thing a lot of spiritual books do. "Like be a good person, that kind of thing?" she asked. I told her yes, but not really. It talks about the vastness of the present moment.

Before bed I was reading about the stories we run to keep our egos strong and healthy. I reviewed a few of my zillion. I thought about how exhausting it is to keep these stories up and wondered what it would be like to let them all go. I released a few into the void, but hung on to the rest to honor my fear.

I woke up the next morning in a way that was brand new. For a few moments there was a gap where I wasn't running a single story. I didn't wake up and think about who I was or where I was. I didn't wake up and think about who I was not or where I was not. Neither. Nothing. I was simply awake.

And to put it eloquently, "That was a total trip, man!"

"I'm so fat"

2011-08-10T10:49:00.000-07:00

I was thinking about obsession with weight and having the perfect body and I got to thinking, maybe this is a way to blame something for your life not being the way you want it.

If you're not the right weight/body shape you can say what's happening to you now is because of that and once you're the right weight/body shape it'll be different. It'll be better.

When I reached my goal weight/body shape I was dismayed to find that it changed nothing in my environment. And I was still the same person, I just looked different. I still had all the same problems. In fact, I was now more bored because I no longer had a goal to work on.

Funny, huh?

Re-entry

2011-07-04T19:33:00.000-07:00

I moved out of what is essentially a Tibetan Buddhist monastery three months ago. I lived there for a year but it was pretty close to regular society in Northern California. I wasn't isolated and I could certainly come and go as I pleased.

Living in the redwoods surrounded by holy objects did exactly what I hoped it would do--immersed me in Dharma. I hung out with nuns and monks all the time. We "partied" by doing Buddhist ceremonies and talking about his teachings. It was a blast.

Now I live in Portland. In a city.

This is pretty weird for me. Even though I moved here to earn a Master's degree in Buddhist studies it's a different world. Portland doesn't have holy objects everywhere. It has a lot of trees and greenery but it's still a city. It has a lot of distractions and runs on samsara. It's a lovely place but it freaks me out a lot. And by that I mean, it breaks my heart. There's so much suffering here and so many people don't know a way out.

I clamor to go back to a place where everyone at least acknowledged the value in pursuing a life free of delusion. Where people saw the importance of protecting their thoughts. Where people saw meditation as a necessity for no longer being a slave to their emotions.

Now there are fireworks outside. It sounds like war. I don't like it and neither do the dogs but what can I do? Accept it. Have compassion. Keep going.

That's it.

Shooting out of a cannon

2011-04-18T14:00:00.001-07:00

I was riding in the car with some of my Buddhist friends and we got to talking about fun things that Lama Zopa has said. My friend volunteered, "Even the guy shooting out of a cannon is looking for happiness."

After we stopped laughing his wife said, "Isn't it bizarre the things we do to find happiness?"

With that in my head I did an evening run at West Cliff. I found all sorts of bizarre things people were doing for happiness, like:

Hula hooping in a group over by the lighthouse
Sitting around listening to music through a crackling speaker while smoking and drinking
Incessantly beating on a drum

Not that I wasn't being weird. I figured out that I wore the wrong pair of shorts when I was about a mile in and pressed on anyway, adjusting liberally.

A bit ago I read something by Osho that said we are addicted to speed and that if we slow down we can find enlightenment. I think it's safe to say that speed is a measure of change so really what we like is change. And maybe by giving that up we'll find that everything is right here, in the present moment, no hula hooping required.

Date Talk

2011-04-16T19:35:00.002-07:00

I went on a date last night and found that we had a lot of views in common. I think we were on the same page on abortion. He started telling me about a conversation he had with his friend where he was trying to sort out the the logic between being against abortion and against Octo-Mom's rather large brood. It didn't jive for him. He said you have to be for one and against the other.

I said, "I don't see why it has to be one or the other. Isn't there another option?"

He didn't know what that would be.

I said, "Maybe we could just learn to be okay with whatever happens, like if Octo-Mom walks down the street with all those kids we just look at them and think, 'That's happening right now.'"

Then I clasped my hand over my mouth. I felt like I said too much. And that made me giggle a little.

Fear

2011-04-16T19:35:00.001-07:00

I was painting my toenails on the patio when I noticed this small, adorable lizard had scuttled up next to me. He was just hanging out! I was so happy to have him there but it was perplexing due to my fear of lizards.

My friend came and sat with us and I told her the situation.

She said, "Why would you be afraid of lizards?"

I said, "Because they're so fast! They can go wherever they want."

She said, "So?"

I said, "I can't trust them."

She said, "Trust them with what?"

I said, "They could crawl all over me!"

She said, "So?"

And then I hit a wall.

She said, "Fear is just another emotion."

Then I was liberated.

If you don't know where you're going...

2011-04-16T19:34:00.001-07:00

I was listening to country radio and a song came on that went, "If you don't know where you're going you might end up somewhere else." And I thought, "I guess." But then I thought that wherever you are there are you are so what's this about going someplace? How can you end up somewhere different than where you are? Then I felt like Winnie-the-Pooh. Oh bother.

But then I thought maybe they were saying this is a bad situation, a problem. You should know where you're going so you can get there. Then my brain imploded, but just a little. A light implosion. If this is the thinking it doesn't make sense. Wherever you are that's it. There's nowhere else to be than right now so all this planning on being somewhere else and then assigning tags to it like "right" or "wrong" is a heap of future pain.

This makes me tired. I need a smackerel and a nap.

Identities

2011-04-14T12:07:00.000-07:00

I'm attached to my identity. It's the first thing I put on in the morning.

In Buddhism they say we die all the time. Each breath in gives us life and each breath out takes it away. Zen says: "What we call 'I' is just a swinging door that moves when we inhale and when we exhale."

I can acknowledge this and still cling to my identity. I want to be the perfect golden girl. But then I start thinking about reincarnation and how I've been male and female over eons. It dulls my ability to cling to this perception of myself. It gives me more sympathy for both genders. Neither is better or worse, more right or wrong.

Then I start thinking about how if we really clung to our identities we'd have all these selves from eons past to cling to. That would be pretty bulky and inconvenient. I'd have to sort through it all the time. "Am I being a pirate today or was that 500 years ago?"

So if that's inconvenient then isn't it inconvenient to cart around my identity from day to day in this life? It changes so much. I'm not the baby that I was when I was born. I'm not the sullen teenager anymore. Who knows what I am. Why try to straighten it out so I can explain it? It's just going to change.

I read a novel where a character refused to go by his birth name. He said he'd changed since then and it didn't work for him anymore. He preferred to have a different name every day to reflect how he was feeling. I really liked that.

I'm all for lightness. Clean-clear!

Children

2011-04-14T11:47:00.000-07:00

I've never had a burning desire to have children. In fact, pregnancy scared me for a long time. I wanted to avoid it. And I didn't really understand kids either. They made me nervous because I was a nervous kid who took offense at everything. I was afraid to make a kid feel bad.

Over time my nerves grew into fascination. I softened when I was a glitter tattoo artist and worked children's parties. There was no going back at the toddler party in Santa Monica. I wanted to pick them all up and gaze at them in wonder.

I love kids of all ages, even adults, but there's something that happens when I hold this baby Emma that I'm close with. My entire demeanor changes and I become gentle and joyful. It's like she's doing more for me than I'm doing for her.

She has a brother Sam who I've known in his third year on the planet. He talks a lot and I try to keep up. He has a lot going on both in his imagination and reality. Sometimes I get them mixed up and need him to get me back on track.

Sam's really smart and I can forget he's not an adult. We'll be doing something that makes us equals and then all of a sudden he's getting in a car seat. It takes me a minute to remember that that's his world.

Like Emma I think Sam is doing more for me than I'm doing for him. I'm grateful he lets me hang out with him. He has tons of fun and doesn't misrepresent himself.

I was watching a movie the other day where Helen Hunt looks into the eyes of a child and nothing is said. They just woke up from a nap so they are suspended in space. It moved me to tears. I think it's because I have tended to look at the adult-child relationship as one of dominance and submission. The adult is in power and control and tells the child what to do. In that moment it was clearly not true.

When they woke up from the nap they didn't have time to put on their identities so all that was left was vulnerability. And it was beautiful.

On Children

Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children.

They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you,

And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,

which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them,

but seek not to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children

as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,

and He bends you with His might

that His arrows may go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;

For even as He loves the arrow that flies,

so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Unexpected meditation side effect

2011-04-12T19:57:00.000-07:00

I went back to my parents' house and sat down at the piano I've had since childhood to play some pop music. I sight read but hadn't really done it for a year so I was sure I'd be rusty. Here's the weird thing--I was great. And I had a blast. For the first time I sang along and it didn't mess me up or make me nervous. It felt natural and joyous.

This is what I think happened: I meditated which meant my mind became more calm which meant I was less nervous which meant I stopped second-guessing myself which meant I just read the notes and happily played what was in front of me. I watched my whole body be into it. I felt like a performer!

To recap:

Meditation --> Calm mind --> Less nerves --> No second-guessing --> Just do it.

Dukkha

2011-04-10T19:28:00.000-07:00

I woke up this morning kind of melancholy. I still had a tinge of boredom from the day before and was concerned that today would be more of the same. Like that's such a terrible thing. But it did feel that way.

I sat with it and saw what was around me--a comfortable room, pleasant weather, all the food and drink I could want, health--and I saw that I was complaining. It didn't seem to go together. I had everything I needed and a lot, if not everything, I could want and I still wasn't happy. It was dukkha, or a term that is loosely translated as suffering from the first teachings of the Buddha.

I watched it some more and was able to be present in the moment. Then things changed shape. I saw that every moment is complete. And I saw what we build on top of these moments because of dukkha. My getting on the Internet to tweet--dukkha. My compulsion to go for a run--dukkha. Watching a quick little sitcom--dukkha.

This is all stuff I pile up so I can be distracted from being present in the moment. It's amazing how tangled I can allow this web of junk to get. None of it is important. It's happening, yes, but it's not worth getting riled up over. It's just stuff that was created for entertainment. They say it's like a dream.

My run didn't go that well because I'm having a problem with my shoes so I walked more than I had planned on. When it first happened I got a little frustrated but then I thought, "Who cares if I run the whole way? What's the big deal? I don't get in half marathon shape as fast as I want to? What's it matter if I'm in half marathon shape? Instead of having all this future pain why don't I just take in the day? Why not be right here and look around at what the sun is shining on and experience it?" That's when I felt the crispness of the air and noticed the ants at my feet. I saw the mountains in the distance and the field beside me. And it was complete.

Later in the day I had a bit of a setback. From what, I don't know but it felt like a setback. I could really get emotional over it, like I did in the past or I could see it for what it is--nothing more, nothing less. And it's not that big. It's not that small. It's just something that happened. I don't know the implications it has for the future and I'm not putting much attention on it. I'm just putting one foot in front of the other. Each step feels fine.

Surf it down

2011-04-08T19:42:00.000-07:00

When I lived at Land of Medicine Buddha (a Tibetan Buddhist retreat center in the Northern California redwoods) a small group of friends asked me to join them down the path for a smoke and a stare at the waterfall. I followed along but fear arrested me when we hit the steep slope at the final bend. I couldn't do it. But I had to. I did a sideways crab crawl down, petrified the whole way. Slowly but surely I got there. My friends passed me as I stuttered my way down, laughing at the entertainment I provided. When I got to the bottom our resident cook came sauntering down, carrying a glass of water from the dining room that wasn't disturbed in the slightest due to his confident strides in his platform shoes. It was a hilarious sight and inspiring to boot. I asked him how he did it. He was happy to tell me.

"Years ago I was working construction with a crew of guys on a roof. All of a sudden part of the roof caved in, taking a guy with it. The rest of us were terrified and didn't know what to do. We just kind of froze where we were. Then this big guy from across the way came over, taking big heavy footsteps. When he was in front of me he said, 'You just gotta surf it down.' Then he took the same big heavy footsteps and left me there. It became my motto for life."

It became mine too.

Relationships

2011-04-08T08:43:00.001-07:00

Since I was little I balked at the term relationship when it was intended to describe something romantic between and man and a woman (or man and man, or woman and woman). I thought we were all relating. Why should relationship be reserved for romance?

Even now I sometimes groan at the term. Ugh. It's become so heavily charged and full of expectations. I wrote before in a post about how the lamas laugh when people come to them about relationship problems. They say that we are complaining about not getting enough pleasure from our partner.

I've thought about this for some time and I believe that all my relationship complaints stem from not getting enough pleasure. Or, they did. Things changed in December.

Armed with this information I started dating a man I thought was adorable. He made me so happy. And obviously he wasn't perfect but even his imperfections were endearing. I really, really liked him.

Then he didn't call me back. Then I felt like I was chasing him. A small part of me wanted to go back to my old habits--complain about him, make myself seem like I deserved better than this, blah blah blah. But a bigger part of me wanted to stay with it and be honest about what I was feeling. What I found was that I really liked him and I wanted him to be happy and I wanted me to be happy.

A couple weeks later I found out he was dating other women and he was in a space where he wanted to sleep around. He wanted to continue dating me as well as the other women. It didn't work for me so I extracted myself from the situation and went my separate way. Even though I wanted to spend time with him I didn't want to deal with the pain of never knowing when he would call or when he would be honest. To be clear--I'm not saying he's a bad person. I'm not saying he's a good person either. I'm just saying that's what happened.

The bizarre thing about it, for me because this is new, is that I still think of him fondly and wish him the best. I don't have this desire to build up a case where he's a total jerk and look at how all men are so disappointing, etc. I'd like to use this experience as a reason for rejoicing that I may one day be able to express unconditional love to everyone.

Learning Tibetan

2011-04-08T08:08:00.000-07:00

I used to really think out my moves. In a way I was looking at my life like it was a game of chess. I thought I was in control and I thought I could win. Now that type of thinking feels so silly it makes me want to giggle. I was delusional to think that planning was logical. I even had some entitlement wrapped up in it. "I deserve to get a job that pays this much so I will get it." What? Why?

It is a bit scary to first realize that planning is a coat of comfort painted on a web of uncertainty. For quite some time if I caught of whiff of this I would cover it up and run for the hills. Unfortunately for my ignorance events kept unfolding that steadily chipped off the paint.

Two days ago I woke up and danced around my friend's apartment in San Francisco, then went outside into the sunshine to get into my car and drive to Sebastopol to take a drawing class from a master artist. One problem--my car wasn't there. I got towed. And there went the rest of my month's budget.

Rather than driving north to Sebastopol I ended up driving five hours south to my parents' house. My day got turned upside-down and inside-out. Or did it? I only think that way because I had a plan. I have to admit, I don't know what was supposed to happen that day. Or any day. Or if anything is supposed to happen ever. I just think that way because it makes me feel in control and if I'm in control then I'm not scared.

People ask me where I'm living now that I've left my job. It's quite difficult to deliver a polite response that says, "I don't know," especially when that response isn't full of fear.

The bulk of my possessions are in my car. My brother was kind enough to let me store some at his place. That's pretty much it. I'm a rolling stone. I think it seems scary because it is obvious my life has no guarantees. I thought I'd be in San Francisco right now but instead I'm back in my hometown. I don't know where I'll be next week so I can't commit to anything. But I have to even laugh at that. Commitments are so tenuous. One flat tire or case of the flu and they are broken.

I did leave my job with a plan in mind, though. I have to say that. I intend to move to Oregon to go to grad school starting in June. I am aware that anything could happen between now and then that could lead me in a different direction and I am open to it (really what other choice do I have? to throw a tantrum if things change? how exhausting).

There was a Tibetan monk who lived at Land of Medicine Buddha who knew some English. He found our sentence structure difficult if not impossible. Finally a nun explained to me that you have to turn your sentence inside-out if you want him to understand. "Are you going to the gompa?" would turn into "Gompa you going?"

I intend to do a summer intensive program in the Tibetan language. Initially I wanted to learn because I've been practicing Tibetan Buddhism for a year and it would be nice to know the native tongue. Then I thought maybe I could become a translator for a Tibetan lama. Now I think my motivation lies somewhere else.

I only know romance languages--English, Spanish and some French. These languages feel limited in their reliance on dualities, emphasis of the ego and method of explaining phenomena. I want another way.

Roger Federer, who is regularly interviewed in something like five languages, says that he has a different personality in each one. So, like that, I hope that my Tibetan personality will cultivate a way of thinking that is peaceful, happy and kind. But I don't know. Anything could happen.

Yogi chef

2011-04-04T08:47:00.000-07:00

There's a chef where I work who knows a whole lot about what it is going on. He's given me pearls like, "What's the sharpest weapon? Gentleness."

One morning I came in the kitchen thinking I looked normal but he immediately told me that I looked upset and a bit green. Without a filter on our interaction the honesty hit me hard and quick and I started bawling. It can still shock me when someone sees all my shit clearly. He took it in a stride, like usual.

I told him I was working some stuff out, going through my past and healing.

He got the big garbage can out from under the sink and picked up what was lying on top, "Yeah, you could sift through it all and say, 'That's a banana peel there. I remember when I ate that.' 'There's a wrapper from dinner yesterday.'" Then he picked up the can, "Or you could just say here's all my shit and I'm done with it. Let it go." He dropped it and it landed with a thud.

HELLO!

Survivor - Tibetan Buddhist Retreat Center Edition

2011-04-04T08:27:00.000-07:00

I'm moving out of Land of Medicine Buddha and getting some, if very little, perspective on the year I spent here. It hasn't exactly been easy living in a small room with no plumbing out in the woods but it has been undeniably magical. My approach to life has been transformed. I am consistently more happy and peaceful.

I'd love to share this experience with each sentient being out there and do so as much as possible, provided it's a welcome topic. I got to thinking, a great way to share this place would be to have the next season of Survivor shot at a Tibetan Buddhist Retreat Center. I think people would find it quite difficult, especially if the object was turned inside out. Here are some ideas:

You could start with one to three people and from their good actions add people to make the center run more smoothly. The goal would be to have a fully staffed center.
Everyone must meditate for an hour, three times a day.
If you have wrong speech (harsh, gossip, etc.) you get a warning. Three times, you're out.
Everyone would have less than glamorous jobs--cleaning toilets, etc.
Vegetarian cuisine.
Three to five hour pujas (religious ceremonies) going into the wee hours of the morning would be normal.

I previously posted about having a Tibetan Buddhist Retreat Center video game where I listed a variety of hilarious problems we've encountered here on the land. Those could be the episodes.

I think this could be a lot of fun!

Tree falling on my car

2011-03-06T08:18:00.000-08:00

Just wrote this to my mom:

I think you interpreted the tree falling on my car as something "unsafe." I took it as the opposite.

I'd been planning on going to the Stanford/UCLA basketball game that day which meant I'd have to drive over the 17 in the rain. I can always take Old San Jose Road and avoid the 17 so that would have been a good alternative. When my boss saw the tree on my car he said I could take the car we have on the land but I didn't want to. I said I'd just stay here. It wasn't a big deal. There are always more basketball games, right?

Our maintenance guy was at the dentist so we waited around for him for a couple hours to see what he'd have to say about the situation. At about five he still wasn't back so we assembled a group of people who would hold up the tree while I drove out from under it. When they got in position we realized the tree would just fall back on them so that plan was aborted. Eventually I suggested I try driving out from under the tree because while it had fallen on the car it kind of seemed like it was leaning on it. And it worked. I just drove out from under that sucker and it didn't even fall to the ground. It just stayed where it was--leaning like the car was still there. And it's not like anything was supporting it on the other end. It was bizarre. As far as my car, it had a minor dent. That's it. From a whole tree falling on it!

We all stood around in shock. It didn't make any sense. Eventually we wrote it off as one of those miracles that happens on the land and I moved my car to the regular lot.

The next day our maintenance guy was walking through the lot. He looked at my car then came and found me. "One of your tires is flat and you have a bubble on another tire which doesn't look good." He blew up my tire and then I went into town to find out what was going on. Turned out two of my tires had bubbles on them which meant they were ripe for blowouts (This was not due to the tree falling on the car; it was an existing problem. I even asked the guy at the tire store if the tree could have caused it and he said no). I needed new tires immediately and had to cancel my trip to San Francisco that weekend because the tire was too dangerous to drive on. (Holiday weekend--the tires came in on Monday.)

Me and a co-worker were cleaning a room when the maintenance guy (John, a dear heart) told me about the tires. It was right after a painting had started swinging on the wall and no one had touched it. I asked her what that was about and she said between the painting and the tree on my car she felt like a spirit was trying to get my attention. I thought about it and I realized that an angel pushed that tree on my car. There was really no damage and it was the only way I can think of that I would have found out that the car needed new tires and I shouldn't drive all the way to the game right then.

So here's an incident where we can think--"A tree fell on your car? That's so unsafe!" but where I think it's more apt to think--"Thank God a tree fell on your car so you could be safe!"

Twitter situation

2011-02-28T08:42:00.000-08:00

I tweet a lot about tennis on my account @TheSportBird, especially about Roger Federer. Last week he was playing a guy I'd never heard of and I said as much on Twitter. Someone I've never talked to responded, "You don't know who he is? You should remove Sport from your name."

At first I was offended. Of course, I heard the tone in which I was sure he'd said it and it was hurtful. Who knows if he said it lightly and was just kidding around. Didn't matter to me in that moment. This online persona I'd built as a sports guru was in question. I had to defend it!

I sat with that and ran through a list of possible witty retorts. I saw that I was upset. I saw that being upset was my prerogative. I wanted to be happy and I wanted to be kind so I responded:

"TheBird has a nice ring to it."

And he said: ":)"

Situation diffused. Friends made.

Mind transformation

2011-02-20T09:07:00.000-08:00

I woke up the other day to steady rain and, even knowing it wasn't rational, was immediately upset. It's cold out here in the redwoods and we had a big turnover day in housekeeping which meant I had no choice but to go out and turn into a popsicle to do my job.

I spent an hour trying to get my mind right before I went in but couldn't manage it. I was stuck in some real stinkin' thinkin'.

I greeted my co-worker by informing her that I was in a bad mood. She's new but since she's worked here before I thought she was going to be another person who let my stuff bounce off of her. My understanding is that we're all here to work on our minds and any of our garbage that comes out in the process isn't personal.

Wrong.

She went to the bathroom and I got started cleaning the other bathrooms. By the time I was done she hadn't shown up. I went up to the first room we could clean and there she was making the bed. I asked her if she knew that we always did bathrooms first. Then things got weird.

She insisted I came in with the wrong motivation and that I was telling her she was doing something wrong or I don't know exactly. I'm pretty sure she was insinuating that I had a problem with her and my bathroom talk was a passive-aggressive way of getting at it. Even though I had some stinkin' thinkin' going on it had nothing to do with her so I was lost. I didn't know what to say to her since she wouldn't believe I didn't have anything personal against her. I tried telling her I appreciated the job she was doing. Didn't work.

The other day another co-worker had mentioned that he's been feeling tremors in the earth and this is a good thing because it relieves pressure from the big one. So, like that, I went into my boss' office and had a meltdown. My tears relieved a lot of pressure.

I came back to my job with more clarity and was finally able to start working with my mind. That's when I realized that my co-worker was showing me that she needed me to have a different attitude at work. I immediately stopped my rabid self-cherishing and shaped up. I was pleasant and calm but also quiet to focus on what I could learn from what happened between us. Obviously I had been through things like that before and responded in ways that only increased suffering. This time I was ready to make a change.

Before lunch I found that my co-worker had given me a great gift--an opportunity to gain so much peace of mind by dealing with a problem that frequently comes up in life. I could have been pissed off all morning and built up a case to support why I was in the right and she was in the wrong, blah blah blah. But I didn't. She gave me a situation and then the space to work on my mind and I seized it and found that it snapped me out of my stinkin' thinkin' which was the very thing I'd been looking for!

After lunch she gave me a hug and told me that I couldn't have known this but she'd gone to make the bed to make me happy so she was frustrated when I opened the door and immediately started talking about a problem with the bathrooms. I told her that even though I appreciated it, it wasn't her cleaning the room that made me happy. She'd done something much bigger and I was overwhelmed by it because it gave me lasting happiness.

My co-worker and great teacher helped me transform my mind.

Cleaning with love

2011-02-12T22:26:00.000-08:00

I was amazed when a woman named Susan commented on my previous post about unconditional gifting and told her story of caring for her mother with dementia. It reminds me of my own situation.

I am the head housekeeper at a Buddhist retreat center--that means I clean a lot of toilets. I don't feel like I know anything about cleaning but my boss insists that I do a good job. I have to believe him somewhat because the guests seem happy with their rooms.

I grew up with a maid. In college I finally had to clean up after myself and I was pissed off. I didn't understand that messes were a part of life and took out my resentment on my roommates.

When I got married I accepted that messes happened but I didn't like it. Somehow there came a point of surrender. I found myself cleaning the toilets and doing my husband's disgusting laundry and I didn't mind it at all. In fact, I almost enjoyed it because caring for him was a way to show that I loved him.

Then I got divorced and found myself in an apartment with a roommate who was a guy in his twenties who cleaned at most bi-annually. I took it upon myself to clean our apartment and made it a practice to do so without resentment. I was cleaning because I wanted it clean. Period. I knew that his standard for cleanliness was different and that when I thought things were filthy he thought they were just fine. Why beat my head against a wall refusing to accept this?

There came a point when I was cleaning the apartment when I didn't mind it at all. In fact, I almost enjoyed it because it showed me that I was capable of loving someone who wasn't even a close friend this much.

Then I came to the retreat center and I was in charge of the toilets in all the guest rooms. And therein was the biggest surprise. I've never minded it. In fact, I almost love the toilets because they show me that by cleaning them I have the capacity to open up and love the whole world.

Later I learned something else about cleaning the rooms. How your mind and heart is when you clean a space matters to the person who will occupy it. If you clean it with love and peacefulness they will feel that energy radiate through the space. If you clean with hate and resentment then that ugliness will greet them when they open the door. When I clean I keep this in mind and it ends up being of benefit to me!

Unconditional gifting

2011-02-02T15:19:00.001-08:00

I used to think that the joy in giving came from what I got out of it. "I gave this to her because..." I had some idea of what was supposed to happen when I gave it to the person. Maybe it would make them happy. Maybe it would be useful to them. Whatever. The point is I attached an expectation to the gift. As I found out recently, expectations are premeditated resentment.

I've had the opportunity to rethink giving in the past year. I moved to a Buddhist retreat center where offerings are constantly made to the Buddhas. This perplexed me for a long time. What the hell was the point? Then I realized it wasn't about the Buddhas. The Buddhas don't need to be showered with granola bars and fruit (tsog) but the practice of doing it changes us.

When we make offerings we humble ourselves and surrender to the Buddhas. Now in life when I make an offering to someone I accept whatever outcome there may be. I know that my role ends in making the offering and then what will be will be. I'm at peace with that. If I give to a charity I don't think, "Then they can accomplish this." I think, "Maybe this will make a difference. I don't know but it seems like a kindness so I'm happy to do it."

This might just be semantics and only make a difference to me. I don't know. But the more I thought about it today the more I thought that unconditional gifting--offerings--mirror unconditional love. No matter what happens when I make the offering it stands that it was done out of love and that love is a fact as much as breathing is.

Offering to my past self

2011-02-01T16:59:00.000-08:00

I'm working on my memoir in a coffee shop right now. Even though I have this opportunity because I'm sick and therefore unable to work I can't help seeing it as a blessing. What luxury!

As I rehash the events of three years ago I begin to get confused on the timing. Did this happen before that...or after? It's almost stunning to realize that things that were so important at the time have little importance now.

I was forced to look up October 2008 on my Google Calendar just to get my head around it. As I look it over I gasp audibly. I put myself through the mill back then! Everything was charged and ready to explode--my work life, my home life, my dating life. I let myself get pummeled left and right and I lost the battle on all three fronts.

I'm wont to call it the hardest month of my life but the dramatization isn't important. It's done. Some of the residual damage may be here and I'm sifting through it as I write. The beautiful part of this process is the compassion I feel for my old self. It's not about forgiving the person I was then. She doesn't need to be forgiven. She was doing her best. What she needed was to be loved unconditionally. She was dying for it but didn't know and kept clawing out for it desperately.

I wouldn't find unconditional love for almost two years. And for that reason I feel so much compassion for this woman who had a huge heart and no idea what to do with it. She was beautiful and worthy of love. All I can do is love her now.

Tennis and Twitter

2011-01-27T21:01:00.000-08:00

A couple years ago my friend Ian said, "Rachel! People want to hear your sports stories." I didn't know what he was talking about. In fact, I was pretty happy he hadn't fallen asleep on me while I'd regaled him with yet another one. But he was serious. "You should start a blog. You should call it...The Sport Bird dot com! Put everything on it that you've told me. People will love it!" Hesitant I did what Ian suggested. I also built a Twitter account with the name. And boy, was Ian (@shobogenzo) on to something.

It ended up not being about the website but all about the Twitter account. I've been a serious Roger Federer fan since 2006. When you love a global sport you get up at all hours of the night to watch matches. Sometimes your Internet feed dies. Sometimes the network you trusted stops airing your beloved to show someone you have no interest in. Sometimes your beloved loses early in a tournament you thought he'd win and you are inconsolable.

For years I watched Roger Federer gracefully travel around the planet all by myself. It was lonely but worth it. There were times when I wondered if I was the only Fed Head in America.

When I started @TheSportBird I slowly met other Fed Fanatics. Tweeting while I watched tournaments meant I finally had company. It became fun on a whole new level. These beautiful people spanned the globe--USA (finally found them!), Australia, Italy, France, England, South Africa, Tunisia, Peru, Mexico, Canada, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines--and they were so kind. They also were devoted to Roger Federer for his being a hero on and off the court, a real class act. And because they could appreciate that in him it meant they appreciated it in everyone. This group of people around the world was full of love. IS full of love.

I used to feel this way for that day I'd go to Indian Wells Tennis Garden every year. The relaxed atmosphere can be attributed to more than good weather and beautiful surroundings. Tennis fans these days strike me as a global family. I can show up at any practice court and ask the person standing next to me who I'm watching. They'll happily tell me, probably tell me what brought them there, how their day is going and find something to giggle about. I remember walking past a group talking about how good looking Tommy Haas is. Without thinking I high-fived a guy as he said, "Even I wouldn't turn him down" and kept walking.

Now my Twitter tennis community is a wealth of high-fives. It's amazing, inspiring and keeps a smile pasted on my face all day long. Even if Roger loses we've still all won.

Where are you putting your energy?

2011-01-26T14:51:00.001-08:00

I was talking to a friend the other day about a dream he has. He wants to pursue a career in sportscasting as well as acting. He even has a job for a sports network in Connecticut and has been on air as a sportscaster. He's charming and engaging. I could watch him for hours.

So why's he not on ESPN? It's not because he doesn't want to be there. He really, really does. It's just that my friend has decided he has certain needs that must be met before he'll take another job. His needs involve money, a certain level of physical comfort and a retirement fund.

This means my friend isn't out pounding the pavement, taking advantage of random opportunities coming his way and building up his possibilities for serendipity. He's stagnating and the more he stagnates the more he pushes the bulk of his energy towards failing at achieving his dream.

I've done this a lot. I've focused on all the things that could go wrong and given very little thought to what could go right. I even started preparing for things to go wrong long before there's been any indication that they would. Why? I was scared.

Honestly, I've never accomplished anything inspiring through this method. Fortunately I have recently changed my habits so that I put the bulk of my energy towards positive outcomes and now I get all jammed up trying to explain how it's gone so overwhelmingly well.

I think even if we know all this intellectually it requires a certain leap of faith to leave your comfort zone. It's hard to accept that you may jump ship and belly flop while everyone stands around laughing at you. But really, how big a chance is there of that? And how big of a chance is there that you'll be in tattered rags rooting through a dumpster when you're eighty because you didn't put more effort into a retirement fund? Let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Instead let's keep pace with ourselves and give our best a shot in the world!

Miracles everywhere!

2011-01-26T12:47:00.000-08:00

I've had intestinal discomfort for a long time--probably fifteen years now. This past week was particularly annoying because I'd been cramping up and unable to get the nutrition out of food. Today I woke up after a rocky night of sleep and thought, "There has to be a pill I can take to make this right." I tried to dismiss the idea as ridiculous. I'd spent thousands of dollars with a doctor to alleviate this problem and he couldn't figure it out. How could a magic pill manifest now? But still, I wanted it and kind of believed that it was just a matter of finding it.

I went to the dining room and told a couple of my co-workers my problem. After mulling some ideas over one said, "My mom's friend had that problem. She took Chinese curing pills." Curing pills. The other co-worker chimed in. "Yeah, my ex-girlfriend had something wrong with her stomach and she took those and she was fine."

My close friend Annie walked in and said it was a great idea. She proceeded to tell me where they were located in the natural food store down the street. "Back of the store on the left, right in front of the door to the office."

I drove over and found them right there. A woman appeared and kindly explained the pills and a couple other items I might be interested in to fix my problem all for $25. I just went to lunch where I was able to offer some of them to a sweet Tibetan monk who has been having the same problem.

Miracle! And this is just one of the many I've experienced lately. They're everywhere! Even in a leaf or a bug.

Making Love

2011-01-26T12:18:00.001-08:00

For a long time I've thought that making love was a particular way of having sex. But actually, I think I made love at breakfast this morning.

Yes, there was an attractive male there but I never touched him. He was getting oatmeal while I was helping myself to yogurt. He said, "How long have you lived here?" I told him. It seems like small talk and maybe it is, depending on how you define it. In its greatest form small talk provides a bridge for connection and that's certainly what it was. By telling him I have lived at the center for almost a year he had a glimpse into my dedication to this beautiful path in which he plays a profound role.

He said he'd been holed up at our remote sister center for months and this was his first time out of the cave. I knew better. He'd made a trip to the founder of our tradition's house recently. I knew because I'd seen what he'd delivered there and been rocked.

When I asked he admitted his visit. Then he said, "Isn't his house amazing?" And that is where we began to make love.

By openly sharing our pure love for this path we have dedicated our lives to everything was said. Nothing was left out. All the beautiful parts of an entire relationship were experienced in these few sentences. We could release each other as easily as we came together. The love is there no matter where we are physically located and it continues to grow and grow.

Because it's not about us.

Shameless

2011-01-22T07:54:00.000-08:00

I was stopped at a red light in the heart of LA last week and found myself musing over a billboard for the show Shameless. I sighed and rolled my eyes. That's what America needs--another show celebrating immorality.

Then I found out my friend Mandy liked the show. And my friend Choying said I had to see it. This confused me greatly. When I found myself sick in bed all day I caved in and loaded it on Showtime's website.

I loved it.

Of course it looks slick because it's done on one of those channel's that's "not quite TV." It basks in the gritty side of life but with enough style that we're not left thinking it's disgusting. It's still mostly comfortable. And the lead girl has a hot bod which doesn't hurt.

It's about a family in the projects where the mom is absent, the dad is drunk and the kids are plentiful. Hot bod has taken it upon herself to take care of everyone but she's working herself to the bone trying to scrape together enough money for them to limp along. It could be a huge downer but it's not. The beautiful part of the show is that this family is shameless.

There's no time to sit around berating oneself and no reason. If the 14 year old wants to smoke the 14 year old smokes. No one's judging him. Why would they?

The viewers get to see what happens when a huge, allegedly dysfunctional family stops emotionally beating up on themselves. Vulnerability. Honesty. LOVE.

For that reason alone I'm confident in saying (and I've only seen the pilot) that Shameless is one of the greatest shows on TV.

WIN!!!!!!!!!!

On Writing

2011-01-21T10:56:00.002-08:00

I’ve been wanting to tell my story for quite some time but I keep hitting obstacles like, “How could my story be unique when there are countless sentient beings?” or “How will I know when it is time to tell my story since I am alive and it continues to unfold?”

The real problem is that I have an expectation about my story. It will be interesting! The profundity will make people furrow their brows appreciatively in far-flung reaches of the globe. I will gain fame and fortune. I already see the negatives to my infinite success from my one simple book. People will recognize me. I won’t have any privacy. I will be expected to produce another book of this caliber and find myself in despair over the possibility, and likelihood, of failure.

Is this much different than eating a good piece of cake? I eat the cake and I’m already upset that the piece is too small. This sweet experience will soon be over. Is there more cake? Can I have another piece? Oh yes! I forget to enjoy the piece I’m eating now because I’m busy getting attached to the next one. Still on the first piece I’m berating myself for being a glutton and telling myself that in the future I will be more mindful.

You’d think with all that energy I would have preemptively burned off the second piece of cake.

But the constipated memoir. I’ve only taken a few tentative bites before letting fear consume me. It doesn’t matter how many books I write, there’s no insurance policy to protect me from the next one being crap. So what if it’s crap? Then my identity falls to pieces and my vulnerability is exposed to anyone who wants to take a jab at it. I’m setting myself up to hang on the bottom rung of death.

The worst part of it is I may never know if it’s good. It’s nearly impossible for me to get perspective on my writing. I can’t get enough distance so I waffle between, “This is pretty good!” to “This is garbage. Why on earth did I think I could write? I’m a complete joke.”

Plus, writing is qualitative, not quantitative so there is no intrinsic way to judge it. I can’t offer a creative writing piece up to a teacher like a math problem and wait for the absolution in hearing, “Yes, that’s right. Good job.” It’s never right or wrong. It just is. And it’s maddening because I can’t ever truly believe my writing teachers anyway. Honestly I think they’re full of it so I can’t find even a moment’s respite in their flattery. There’s no one to believe about whether writing is good or bad. It’s experiential. If it meant something to you then it meant something to you. And if it didn’t, then it didn’t. That’s it. End of story.

It’s hell on my ego. This art form makes it thrash about in protest every day, rain or shine. And for that reason I can say the practice of writing is a great opportunity for my spiritual practice. Oh, how far I have to go.

And what brought you here?

2011-01-01T08:37:00.000-08:00

I sent this email to my friend and thought it was worth sharing (I live and work at a Tibetan Buddhist retreat center).

Yea! 2011 is here! I brought it in while chanting Om Mani Padme Hum in the gompa with a bunch of dear hearts. So fortunate.

Funny thing happened there. One of the people that came to the event tonight approached me during the break and asked, "How long have you worked here?" I told him. He asked, "And what brought you here?" like it was some corporate job interview question that required a linear response. It was hilarious! I just laughed and laughed. He was so confused which made me laugh more. Who on earth can explain what brought them to live and work at a Buddhist center in a perfunctory three word response? Eventually I told him we all arrived there out of desperation. I'm not sure he understood. He seemed befuddled. hehehehe

Charity

2010-12-30T08:27:00.000-08:00

I've had an idea of charity for a long time: give what you can spare and feel good about it. This was at great benefit to me. If I had old clothes I could give them away rather than feel guilty about throwing them out in the garbage. It was really at no cost except for the minimal gas and time it took to get to Goodwill. I thought I was really paying my dues putting up with the stink in the drop off area.

Then something changed. I realized that my mindset wasn't effective. I wasn't getting anything done by being "charitable." I was still out for myself.

I changed things up and took what I thought of as a risk. I laugh now that I think about it but it's true. It was such new territory for me I felt like the ground might give up from under.

What I did was give up something that I might miss, something that I still valued and wanted to use for myself. I gave it away without being asked and without expecting much of a result, just knowing that there was a possibility that it could benefit others was all that I needed to take action.

Now I feel like I understand what charity really is about. And it turns out it still was at a benefit to me because it expanded my mind and strengthened my courage and love muscles. There's something lighter about it. Before, when I gave away old clothes, I still felt the same. Now I feel almost new, reborn. What a joy!

Andy Murray

2010-11-28T15:25:00.000-08:00

I was watching Andy Murray play tennis the other day and it struck me that there was something different about his game. He wasn't blowing up when he missed points. Instead he was holding back and it was awkward to watch. I felt like the more he shoved his feelings down the more furniture he was going to break in the locker room after the match.

In his post-match press conference he revealed that he had changed his tactic and was trying to stay calm. Even while it seemed like the words were right it felt all wrong.

I contrasted him with the man whose face you find if you look up composure in the dictionary--Roger Federer. And there was the difference plain as day. Roger is calm. He doesn't have to really try. He's relaxed on and off the court because it's part of his personality.

I remember years ago Roger being asked how he stays so calm and him responding in a regular tone, "I've won a lot." Winning has become part of his personality.

Andy Murray has a much more difficult situation. He hasn't won a slam and he has Britain nipping at his heels impatiently, demanding one of him. Plus I'm not even convinced he likes tennis. It could be a job that he's come to loathe. Whatever the case, he's emotionally volatile on the court. It's part of his personality.

Currently he's training his personality and it looks ugly. But with time it could become one of his greatest assets. It could also benefit his quality of life off the court. For all these things, I wish him the best. And I thank him for reminding me of the ugliness of the period of trying to alter my own personality so that it is of more benefit to myself and others. I thank him for reminding me to be grateful that I don't have to grow up on a world stage and that my own development can come free of pressure.

High school reunion

2010-11-17T21:47:00.000-08:00

I had my ten year high school reunion this year. I went to a small Catholic high school in an agricultural town in California. At least 80% of the class was clamoring to leave the area and pursue bigger and better things. The four years we spent together could be summed up in one word--angst.

After college this thing called Facebook came out. The majority of the hundred students in my high school class made profiles and found each other in the next couple years. Then the oddest thing happened--our interactions became largely supportive, even to the people we barely knew. In fact, especially to them.

Some people came out of the closet. We thanked them for their courage and told them we loved them no matter what. Some people got married and we cheered them on and told them how beautiful they were. Some people said they were hurting and we said we wished them peace and that it hurt us to see them suffer.

Facebook turned into this beautiful place for us to celebrate our achievements. It stuns me but then it doesn't. Our small high school class always felt special, even in the angst-ridden years. I didn't get along with everyone but it's like this quotation I heard yesterday, "You fall in love with everyone you meet, even the people you hate." They're all in my heart because of the intensity of what we went through, like Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves getting together at the end of Speed.

I know this now but I didn't know this when our high school reunion invitation came out. "I'm not going to that!" I still had so much baggage from that trying time in my life.

Then a guest came to our center. We bonded like gorilla glue and I told him I was skipping out on my high school reunion. He wasn't having it. I asked him why it was so important and he said, "You go so you can see how far you've come."

So I compromised and went to the after-party. And yes, some people drank too much and some people seemed like they hadn't changed at all. There was an excess of drama and shit went down. In fact, that after-party might have mostly been a disaster. I only lasted about twenty minutes.

But I think that's the small part. The fact of the matter is, I have a lot of love for those people and a lot of love for my hometown. I got to see how far I've come. I couldn't ask for more.

Love you, St. Joseph High School Class of 2010!

Guess the dharma's working

2010-11-17T21:27:00.000-08:00

I went to Santa Clara University today to assist my friend who is a nun when she spoke at a Tibetan Buddhist seminar. I'm sick with a head cold and felt slightly awful. I also sat in the middle of the front row, which I usually hate because I like to be able to have the option of leaving without getting anyone's attention. So I thought I'd be kind of frustrated during the talk.

I was surprised to find that I spent most of my energy being charmed by the slideshow that the nun had put on the screen in front of the room as well as what she was saying. I've known her for seven months but I still got to know really interesting stuff about her personal life. Also, I was amazed to find that I could answer any question she addressed to the class. I felt like I could have given an hour and a half talk on Tibetan Buddhism with little preparation. Looks like my total immersion program is having an effect!

But the thing that surprised me the most was how easily I smiled and laughed. The class was told I lived at a Tibetan Buddhist retreat center which made me smile because of the expectations that come with that. I figured I met next to none of them. But then I laughed with joy at something the nun said and I realized I was acting like a Tibetan. In fact, the teacher, the nun and I all were. We giggled with joy a lot together during the class. What a beautiful thing!

Left real estate for philosophical reasons

2010-11-16T22:18:00.001-08:00

There was a time in my life where I didn't have a clue what to do with myself. I only knew what I didn't want to do. This was a problem. I ended up becoming a real estate agent.

I really tried to learn what the heck was going on in the world of selling land and houses but it was tough. I tried to ignore the fact that I couldn't grasp it and just concentrate on making money but I couldn't do it. I had a serious philosophical difference with my job.

I can't understand how anyone can own land. I've never understood it. The earth doesn't belong to anybody, not me, not you, not the bank. The earth just is. I can't understand how somebody first claimed a piece of it and I definitely can't follow how other human beings followed suit. Shouldn't everyone have scoffed when they saw the first person put a flag in the ground and claim an arbitrary plot of earth as his land? How did that crazy caveman get any respect? I'm guessing through aggression.

Doesn't this whole line of thinking really fall apart when you see those ads where you can name a star? Who the hell are you paying? Isn't this the same as buying a planet in a galaxy that I own but you can't see?

And boy, oh boy the companies that spin off of the idea of owning land--mortgage companies! title companies! You can get your pants in a bunch for the entire length of your arbitrary escrow. White collar conundrums--enjoy! Red tape, bureaucracy--have your fill! And it's all based on nothing real. Mind boggling.

I remember that last day in real estate when I went to my boss' office to tell him it was all over. "But the money, Rachel. Think of the money." This was a guy who had an impossibly huge house with an impossibly huge motor home in the driveway with an impossibly convoluted marriage looming over all the stuff the money had bought. So yes, I had given some thought to the money and it had motivated me to get my real estate license and land a position with a major brokerage. But that's as far as it could take me. Even this impossibly "successful" broker couldn't overcome the fact that nobody and everybody owns our planet.

You know what's crazy? A few years later I became a life insurance agent. How on earth did I manage that after what I'd been through in real estate? Money! I'm now at the point where I've chosen poverty just so I can get my ego straight. Of course, this is only poverty financially speaking. I'm not poor in spirit!

Echoes in my mind

2010-11-15T19:42:00.000-08:00

I have a lot of chatter in my head. I thought it was just the way life was until I was introduced to Buddhism. I learned about meditation and realized I too could calm my mind but didn't apply myself to it much.

That's where I am now. I'm doing some of the work but I could do more. I'm easing into it because when I've gone full throttle before I've grown frightened of the groundlessness and bailed out. Slow and steady.

Things are getting calmer and I've grown more awareness. I can watch my thoughts and see for myself where I could improve and also rejoice in where I already have gotten better.

This week I've noticed the echoes in my mind. I have quieted the disapproving voice of my mother. I have begun to quell the requests of society, mostly those having to do with the rat race. Today, as I was brushing my teeth, I noticed another echo--the should.

"You should be writing your next book, Rachel." It's such a know-it-all! And boy is it harsh. I end up feeling guilty and entertaining feelings of worthlessness the second it pipes up. I can go from, "This is a nice moment" to "I suck" in a split second.

I want to say the fact of the matter is that there is nothing I should be doing because I just am but I'm not sure that's quite right. If I take the Boddhisattva vows then I am committing to reaching enlightenment for the sake of all sentient beings. That's a lot to do. However, I am a sentient being and it's not being kind to myself to be a harsh know-it-all. Best to continue the mind-training and close up the cavern so the echoes stop bouncing around.

Friend, Stranger, Enemy

2010-11-15T19:15:00.001-08:00

Somewhere in my recent past I started to think of my life as mostly separate from society. I take trips out in to society and observe and then come back to the woods and mull over what I saw. This can't be right but it's where I am right now. I'm sure this too shall pass.

Yesterday I was driving to San Francisco and had a lot of time to listen to the radio. I kept hearing this recurring theme - "Tell the ones you love..." "Send a song to the ones you love." What the hell? What ones you love? I feel like an alien sometimes because I can't just roll with the most simple things. I hit the wall here.

I don't get why I would limit my love to just a few people. Inevitably life would turn into us vs. them. Anyone who threatened the ones I loved would have to be squashed. And then anyone who didn't love me or hate me I'd have no use for. Neutral people? Waste of time. I'd disregard strangers with a flick of the wrist, not able to be bothered with the fact that they too experience joy and suffering.

Where I live there is a lot of discussion about the commonality between friends, strangers and enemies. We amuse ourselves by thinking about people we know who have played all three roles already and are cycling back through. Everything is impermanent.

Our sister center had a retreat this year with a special deal, "Sign up and bring a friend, stranger or enemy for half off."

I think it's fine to dedicate a song to somebody. It can be quite sweet. But let's not let our love stop with there!

A human being is part of a whole, called by us the "Universe," a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest--a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. -Albert Einstein

Frustration

2010-11-13T23:04:00.000-08:00

There's a lot of self-help stuff out there about anger. My favorite quotation on it as of late is:

Anger is self-torture. -Yangsi Rinpoche

If you like the abridged version of things you're probably going to love that. Cuts through everything, doesn't it?

What I don't hear a lot about is frustration. I have spent so much of my life frustrated! Just thinking about being frustrated is upsetting.

Let's air out our dirty laundry. According to Merriam-Webster here's what's going on:

a deep chronic sense or state of insecurity and dissatisfaction arising from unresolved problems or unfulfilled needs

Ouch. Now you know you have problems. But at least you have some idea of why it hurts so much.

I heard that one spiritual master summed up everything he was trying to teach with one sentence: "Try not to mind things so much." That could really help with frustration. You know how when you smoke weed you don't really mind things so much? I think we're going for a consistent similar state. The problem with smoking weed is that you get attached to it and then you end up suffering when you don't have it. It's a shortcut and it doesn't work. But it does help give some idea of the mind state we're looking for.

I guess you could also sum it up by saying: "Try not to grasp things so tightly." I was frustrated over some toilet paper a few weeks ago. We really needed more toilet paper so people could wipe their butts! Don't you see the urgency? My boss, who orders it and hadn't quite yet, attempted to calm me down. "Rachel, there was a time in your life when you didn't even think about whether or not this place had toilet paper." He's right. There was a time in my life where the center didn't exist to me. Doesn't mean they didn't have toilet paper needs. So why do I think now I have to be all upset about it? There's probably a bunch of centers around the world that need toilet paper just as badly. I don't get all riled up about them. Huh.

Too much physical comfort

2010-11-13T21:55:00.001-08:00

Living at a Buddhist Dharma and retreat center is full of challenges. Just this morning the septic system let out a fickle miasma that took refuge in my room. Stinky times ensued but so what? It's not going to last forever. One of the guarantees we have in life is that it is impermanent.

I was talking to our spiritual director, this glorious nun from Singapore who has an upbeat energy and laughs frequently. I asked her why more people my age didn't come to the center. Rather than bring up the obvious culprit, the septic system, she said, "I think Santa Cruz is too nice." The response surprised me and I let it be.

A few days later we watched the movie Blessings on the Nangchen nuns. These women live at altitude in a remote part of Eastern Tibet devoid of virtually all the comforts we are familiar with. They do three year retreats in meditation boxes all crowded in a room together. When it gets freezing cold they strip down, wrap themselves in wet sheets and go out in the elements to practice tumo where they generate heat from their own bodies that often leaves the sheets steaming.

In this movie I heard the phrase "too much physical comfort." Please notice this is not physical comfort in general, rather it is too much physical comfort. This can hold people back from practicing spirituality and surrendering to a spiritual life. And why would you want to do that? Because you put yourself on a path to hitting the big-time jackpot of equanimity, lasting contentment, peace and joy and enlightenment even.

I said this phrase to my co-worker, a darling woman in her early sixties who works hard taking care of the lamas when they're on the land. She first said that as you get older some comforts are needed simply because of the body's wear and tear. I told her I meant it in reference to America. "Oh!" She nodded seriously. "Too much bling and foo foo."

She nailed it!

Magnetizing

2010-11-13T21:36:00.000-08:00

I was running at Westcliff today in the sunshine passing all these happy, beautiful dogs and thinking about my life. For the first time ever I had to admit, at least for the moment I have everything I want.

This is brand new territory. I'm not saying everything is perfect. I mean, Roger Federer did lose his match this morning and I did sit on a wet toilet seat. But the point with those two things is that they did not weigh me down. When Rog left the court he smiled and waved so I knew he wasn't devastated. The only thing I want is for him to be happy. As far as the toilet seat, when I realized I had a wet butt I just laughed which was awesome! It means my mind training is working.

I've been thinking back on my year and it's been incredible. Miraculous things have happened. In fact, they started to really happen in waves after I wrote my novels. I can't deny that there's power in writing. I wrote those books as fantasies and they started to come true in an eerie but amazing way (details could consume a book, which I may write, so none are going here).

I also made a list on 43things.com of things I wanted to do in my life. Amazing things have been checked off, like flying a helicopter and meeting Roger Federer.

But then I came to this Buddhist retreat center and even more stuff started to happen. I can't even explain it all but I noticed that recently I haven't even had to write it down. If I'm going to the meditation hall and keeping up my practice I have a lot of power in my thoughts. For example, a couple weeks ago I thought, "Oh no. The rainy season is coming and I won't be able to run. It would be nice to have a gym membership." The next day my friend from the center had an extra three month pass and offered it to me.

Another example: A few days ago I realized my favorite sweater, a trendy white and gold Baby Phat number, is getting undeniably stained. I thought, "Aw. I'd really like another white sweater." I haven't been shopping in months and didn't have any plans to go. I just put the idea out there and forgot about it.

This was around the same time I'd been thinking, "I really want a Roger Federer jacket, the official kind with his logo." That's just ludicrous but he's been wearing this slick black one at his matches recently and I have begun to covet it. I looked it up and it retails for $120. Way out of my price range.

Yesterday this guy who follows me on Twitter sent me a picture of the black RF jacket he found at a store. He said he'd buy it if he had the money. That made me think about looking it up on eBay. And boom. There was a white and gold Wimbledon RF jacket in my size on auction with the starting bid of $30. The auction ended in 7 hours and the seller is in the next town over. There were a lot of RF jackets for sale but all were Buy It Now for $120 except that one. I won it for $36 and I'm meeting him at the post office down the street tomorrow to pick it up.

Seriously! What is that!?

All I can think is that I'm doing some work with energy and I'm learning magnetization. It is AWESOME. Heartily recommended.

Tibetan Buddhist Retreat Center, the video game

2010-11-09T19:45:00.000-08:00

This morning I rolled out of bed intending to go to the bathroom in the other building and then come right back to bed to properly wake up. I took a detour after the bathroom to get a cup of tea in the dining room and suddenly my day had started. In minutes I was having breakfast with our visiting lama's translator and our spiritual director and being asked to help with the day's puja. Before I could brush my teeth I was in the backseat of a car in my pajamas holding a heavy tray of tormas so they wouldn't fall over on the way up to the meadow. Our spiritual director told me I'd have to hold them for at least half an hour. After I helped her set up for the ceremony I had fifteen minutes to get back to the main area of the center, brush my teeth, change and pick up the lama. I'm happy to report I was early.

During all this tomfoolery my boss and I got to talking about the challenges we faced living and working at a Tibetan Buddhist retreat center. It occurred to us it would make the perfect video game.

Object: Good karma strengthens your health while bad karma makes you grow weaker. Gain good karma by following the precepts on the land and developing loving-kindness and wisdom. To beat the game you must transcend karma all-together and reach enlightenment.

Level 1 - It's your first day and you just showed up at the center to move in. It's 6pm and you have all your stuff in your car but the founder of your tradition, who you've never heard of, is doing a tantric empowerment in the gompa. You have no idea what this means and are a little scared of it. The manager tells you that you can attend as a blessing. You go without realizing it's a four hour ceremony of which you understand little because you don't speak Tibetan. Just when you think it's about to be over the director and spiritual director of the center ask you to help hand out food to the monastics and laypeople in attendance. You're exhausted and have no idea of the rituals involved in handing out the food. Who goes first? Where can you walk? You're pretty sure you're about to offend a whole lot of people. What do you do?

Level 1.5 - You're the head housekeeper and you have a group coming in so you must clean ten rooms in the next two days. This is possible if you work hard and don't get distracted. However, you are asked to go to a meeting. Even though you've lost time you still believe you can meet your deadline if you stay focused. Then your vacuum dies. All the managers are in a meeting and there's no one else to ask for help. What do you do?

While solving this puzzle you should be jumping around to collect the stupas and tsog. Avoid divisive speech, killing and intoxicants.

Level 2 - You're in the dining room at 8pm grabbing a cup of tea before bed when a guest approaches you. "I'm sorry but my room actually isn't clean," the sweet older gentleman tells you. You're the head housekeeper, you know there was a problem in reception and the directions on his cleaning his room probably got mixed up. However, you also know all the lights are out on his wing and you're scared of the dark. You can't upset him and you definitely can't panic. What do you do?

Level 2.5 - There's a lady in room 18 who has two dogs with her. After two weeks she's checking out and it's on your housekeeping schedule to clean her room today. However, after cleaning room 17 you notice a Do Not Disturb sign on room 18 as well as a beautiful gray cat in the window. When you go tell the receptionist about the sign and the cat she responds, "Are you sure?" What do you do?

Level 3 - There's a group of women on a weekend retreat and they're doing something spiritual like Reiki. Their lunch is scheduled for 12:30pm but it's now 1:30pm and you haven't seen a trace of them. Your shift as head chef is over at 2pm. Your helper's shift is about to end and then the dinner crew is showing up shortly thereafter. You can't hang around much longer waiting and you certainly can't hand over lunch duties to the dinner crew but the food is getting cold. What do you do?

Level 3.5 - You and the spiritual director have a great idea: you'll show a beautiful movie about some inspiring Tibetan nuns in the gompa on Thursday night and you'll invite the staff as well as some volunteers. You clear it with the chef that he'll make pizza for the event. After you've invited everyone the chef informs you that he won't be providing the cheese or toppings for the pizza. He suggests that everyone bring their own. You know this is a recipe for disaster but the center can't budget for cheese and toppings. What do you do?

Level 4 - Some kids are tearing around on the land, making doughnuts in the meadow and in general being jerks. You're the manager and your quirky maintenance guy has decided to put a stop to their antics. He's firm with them and this does not please the teenage boy behind the wheel. The next thing you know your maintenance guy is a hood ornament on the kid's truck. What do you do?

Level 4.5 - You're in your tiny cute room which happens to be located next to the lids of the septic system. Unfortunately the septic system has been leaking for the past week and when it does a fickle miasma gathers in your room, sometimes making you wonder if you'll be asphyxiated. You have terrible ventilation and even if you leave the window open it takes forever to get the smell out. It's been happening two to three times a day for the past week and the manager and maintenance guy are stumped on how to fix it even though they can't ignore the urgency as the alarm on the system has been going off. You're concerned that you might have a geyser of poo outside your room any day now but more than that you're becoming less and less able to tolerate the smell. You can light incense but it's a huge no-no because you live in the forest. What do you do?

Level 4.5 - Your sweet resident cat who everybody loves has been acting weird. Your co-worker who takes care of her mentions that the cat could either be sick or a big earthquake could be coming. The building you live in wasn't built to earthquake code and you know a big shake would flatten you like a pancake. Which do you hope for?

Level 5 - There's a teaching in the gompa (meditation hall). About twenty people are in attendance. The resident monk is in the kitchen making tormas for the puja the next day. At about 9pm the power cuts out and your center is plunged into darkness. It's a moonless night and you can't see your hand in front of your face. All these people have to get to their cars and the monk has to finish making the tormas. What do you do?

Level 6: You and a team of devoted designers spend months creating a beautiful shirt to sell in the bookstore. Upon blushingly presenting the new shirts to the spiritual director, you receive an 80-minute impromptu teaching highlighting everything wrong about the shirt, including which hell realms directly correlate with owning the shirt. What do you do?

Level 7: It's late evening on the last night of a 50 person Jewish women's retreat, and the plumbing in one wing of rooms overflows. The quirky maintenance man is nowhere to be found, and the only way you know to stop the overflowing toilets is to break the main water line with your foot. What do you do?

Level 8 - You're in your room on your computer because for some reason you can't fall asleep at 2am. All of a sudden you hear the building rattling. It sounds like someone is dropping the AV equipment on the hardwood floor above your room when there is absolutely no reason for someone to be in that room. After this goes on sporadically for a few minutes you hear the sound of little feet scurrying up all your walls. All your walls. You're terrified and can't think of any explanation except that you're being haunted. You have no reason to believe that someone would hear you if you screamed and you have no phone. What do you do?

Level 9 - You're the housekeeper and have to clean room 6. This is the room you've had trouble with because there's a glitch in the water system and the toilet holds water that's near boiling hot. As you approach you smell the unmistakable stench of poo. This is alarming because you haven't even opened the door yet. As you walk in you're almost bowled over by the smell but you push through because who else is going to do it? When you get to the toilet you discover a wealth of diarrhea that's been brewing for two days since the guest left. You know that if you flush it you could flood the room. What do you do?

Level 10 - As we enter the slow winter season, the operations manager begins to panic about the lack of funds that were saved during the busy season. His solution: Tell staff that they cannot eat hard boiled eggs in the winter and to water down the milk. On a strenuous day with a huge turnover you, an exhausted employee in housekeeping, walk into the dining room for breakfast. The protein-filled eggs are in a bowl on the table with a small sign in front: For Guests Only. Not for Staff. The watered-down milk is in a pitcher next to the cereal. The dregs of the pot of oatmeal are stuck on the bottom. It's too far to drive to McDonald's and you're not sure you can spare your shoe leather to boil up for a morning stew. What do you eat?

Welcoming Autumn

2010-11-06T11:51:00.000-07:00

For as long as I can remember I've wanted an eternal summer. Lucky for me I live in California but still, over time I've grown spoiled. I've come to think an entire day in fifty degree temperatures qualifies as legitimately freezing. Turn on the heater!

I've always lived in a proper home complete with a thermostat. This made the transition into fall and winter almost imperceptible save for that pesky time change. The audacity of the sun to not show itself for at least ten hours! How rude.

This year I live in an "improper" home. My room is about eight by eight feet, has poor insulation (if any), rodents in the walls and no thermostat. I have a space heater. My bedroom door opens to the redwoods and if I want plumbing I have to go to another building, possibly arguing with some raccoons about territory on the way.

I'm surrounded by nature. There's a creek running next to my building. I don't run here at dawn and dusk because of the mountain lions. When we lose electricity at night it is pitch dark on our land and you can see millions of stars.

So no. I'm not complaining about the lack of heating or plumbing. I'm actually rejoicing in this opportunity to experience the seasons.

A few weeks ago I noticed the orange and yellow leaves falling on the driveway. Typical fall observation kind of stuff. But then last week I was cleaning a yurt and I noticed the slant of the sunlight on the floorboards. It was a different angle. The angle of fall.

I don't know if it's because I'm living in the redwoods or because I'm practicing the Dharma or both. Or neither. Maybe this is something that happens with age. But this year I don't just notice the change of the seasons from time to time. I feel it.

I feel the crispness in the air. I feel the weaker rays of the sun. I feel the coziness creeping into the center, like fall is closing in to bring us all together. I feel this like a hug, like a reassuring grandma. For the first time I don't want to fight that summer is over, I want to melt into the next season and let it carry me.

A few days ago I was walking on Westcliff in Santa Cruz. Westcliff is heaven. There's a beautiful neighborhood along the cliff that at this time of year gives way to fantastic surfing. There's a lighthouse that is a surfing museum at the spot where people gather to watch surfers drop into twenty foot waves. When it's not so crowded otters drift by and you can actually hear them cracking shells open as they lie on their backs, sometimes nearly bumping into surfers. You can see the famous Santa Cruz Pier and the roller coaster rides behind it. You can walk to to where the road runs out, alongside peaceful bikers, runners and walkers, past the dog beach, past the nude beach, past the guy giving free massage, past the kids smoking pot and reach Natural Bridges, a beach featuring rock formations turned into arches from the pummeling surf and a monarch butterfly preserve.

I was standing at the lighthouse watching the surfers when I felt something like light fingers reach out and grasp my shoulders. I turned around to an almost undetectable, "Whoosh!" And there it was.

The sun had reached the point behind the clouds where it was shooting a deep pink across the sky and it was demanding attention. I smiled and walked over to where I could clearly view this miracle.

This sunset was like none I had ever seen. It looked like it could be heaven or Armageddon. You couldn't tell if it was transcendence or destruction but either way you had to honor it.

A crowd gathered. We pressed up against the railing that stopped us from falling off the cliff and watched this spectacle, dotted with cypress trees, a dog joyfully running in and out of the water below us. There were no words, nothing to say. We just watched.

When the sun had sunk leaving a parallel line of pink above the horizon people began to disperse. There had been a man standing a little ways down from me and now he was walking by. I had a fleeting thought, "Wouldn't it be nice to fall in love here?" He walked behind me and I breathed in deeply as I felt his energy pass. It felt so comforting and beautiful. Then he was gone.

I don't miss him. I don't miss the sunset. Each thing in its own place. Love need not be possessive.

Best Friends

2010-11-06T09:54:00.003-07:00

Somehow life got away from me after high school. I lost all sense of who I was even though I had the obvious progression into college. Without my friends from back home and our usual haunts I felt groundless.

I spent years scrambling, trying to get my footing and sometimes felt like it was coming back but it didn't. It never did. I only got fleeting glimpses which ended up being unnerving as they slipped through my fingers. They resulted in more grieving for a time when I wasn't necessarily happy but at least I knew my place in the world.

Eventually I came to accept that I'd never have friendships like the ones from my country hometown. I stopped searching so much and focused more on developing happiness out of what I had.

When I moved to Orange County a couple years ago I didn't know anyone and I couldn't make any friends because my health was failing. I couldn't fall back on co-workers because I couldn't find a job nor could I hold one with my health so I had to get creative. I'm a social person so thank God for the Internet but that wasn't enough. I craved connection.

But when you're sick and can't commit to any plans because you don't know when you're going to have to stop and go home to lie on your couch and clutch your stomach it's tough to develop connections. I came to realize that I did have friends from my hometown, friends that had been with me almost my whole life, friends that I took for granted--my passions.

Growing up I played the piano. Yes, I resented it for awhile as a child but now I appreciate it. There's a point where I can play a song and become the song. The sheet music is spread out before me but I'm no longer reading it, I'm feeling it. I am it.

I grew up near the beach. I love feeling the sand between my toes and seeing the sunset over the water. In Orange County the dolphins would play with me, popping up in the whitewater of the nearest wave and let their sheer joy radiate out.

In Orange County I could read. I could go to the nearest bookstore and visit all my friends piled up on the shelves, these wondrous volumes who shaped who I am, all those memories stacked up for sale.

In Orange County I could go running. Yes, I was sick and I never knew when I'd be too sick to continue but somehow that enhanced the practice. Picking up distance running changed my life, taught me endurance, stripped me of my idea of being a princess. In distance running all those human traits that I tried to hide out of politeness were exposed. I stank. My nose ran. I had to go to the bathroom all the time. My feet fell asleep, my stomach was in constant pain and sometimes I'd end up on the side of the road in tears. But I kept going. What else was there to do?

These are just four of my closest friends. Letting them take care of me has led me to my greatest friend: the Dharma.

One day recently I was in the meditation hall showing my parents around. We came across a postcard of our tradition's current leader, Lama Zopa. A smile overtook me and I picked it up. "This is my best friend," I explained. Then I was stunned. Why would I say that?

I told my friend Alec about it later. She said, "That might be the best way to describe your guru." I've given it a lot of thought and I've realized something about superlatives like great and best.

I used to think that those words meant there had to be only one. Roger Federer is the greatest tennis player of all time. I don't think that anymore. I now think of it like a limit in calculus, like greatness is a function that results in this line on a graph where nothing can go past that line but there are many points on it.

Lama Zopa's greatness is a function of his infinite love. He is not the only conduit of this infinite love. Best friends are all the points on this line that are the manifestation of infinite love, whether or not they be sentient.

Problems

2010-11-06T09:54:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I was struck by the problems I had running through my head. It led me to put them in perspective.

High class problem: There's never enough time to go to the Caribbean!

Middle class problem: The septic system isn't working properly and now it stinks. =(

Low class problem: Damnit. I'm about to deliver a baby and I have to walk twenty miles to get to a midwife.

The top two problems I actually had. The last problem is a problem my friend's charity OneMama.org is working on alleviating.

I have to ask, did I really have a problem?

Earlier this week I was cleaning a toilet at work and getting frustrated. It was hot; I was sweaty and over it. It would have been nice to be doing something else. I started to resent my life and stomping around in my mind. This sucks. This is stupid. Maybe I should quit.

I remembered something the lamas say when they're approached by a person who is complaining about his romantic relationship. "You're complaining because you're not getting enough pleasure from your partner," they'd respond after sweetly giggling at the absurdity.

I can grasp that but for some reason I haven't applied it to other aspects of my life. I've had an at least weekly habit of complaining about not getting enough pleasure from my job. Why do I think I am entitled to constant pleasure from my job? Nobody ever promised me lasting pleasure from anything so why do I get surprised when it goes away?

I do it with other things too: This meal isn't giving me enough pleasure. This car isn't giving me enough pleasure. It's endless.

At least now I've found the root--entitlement to pleasure. I can finally go to work on this.

Existence

2010-11-02T23:08:00.000-07:00

I've been a big fan of things existing my whole life. I really like the idea of solidity. Liquid makes me a little nervous and vapor makes me downright skeptical. It's solids that have my heart. I've managed to apply solidity to abstract concepts and even though I could not physically hold them the fact that other people acknowledged them and would even grow intense about them was enough. They were real.

Then I met the Dharma where it is said again and again that things do not inherently exist. This was in one sense great to hear because it felt right on a gut level but in another sense quite troublesome. My abstract concepts were reduced to vapors right along with my chairs and clothes. I was riding around in an invisible car?

I have little moments of realizations of emptiness and they tend to leave me upset. My ego is disturbed and wants to go back to its regular antics. "Yes, this room is mine!" "I am a nice girl!" How terrible for my ego to have to cope with all this. It has to stay in great shape so it doesn't collapse.

But collapse it shall, right along with everything I built. This gorgeous house of cards...this beautiful house of glass. Poof.

Globalization

2010-10-29T08:19:00.000-07:00

I get the impression there's a widespread assumption about country music: it's people whining about their hearts getting broken in an assortment of lame, backwood ways. I've never understood how this theory got such sturdy legs. For me country music has been mostly uplifting and often transcended romantic relationships to celebrate other forms of love.

Take the song American Saturday Night by Brad Paisley:

There's a big toga party tonight down at Delta Chi
they've got Canadian bacon on their pizza pie
they've got a cooler for cold Coronas and Amstel lights
It's like were all livin' in a big ol' cup
just fire up the blender, mix it all up

It's a French kiss, Italian ice
margaritas in the moonlight
just another American Saturday night

That's an upbeat, catchy song about globalization, my friends. Lately I've been struck by how global my own little life is.

I live in a Tibetan Buddhist community in California. Tashi Delek! The four resident monastics are from Tibet, England, Singapore and California. The leader of our tradition is from Nepal. The reincarnation of the founder of our tradition is from Spain. The head of our lineage, HH the Dalai Lama is from Tibet but takes up residence in India because he is no longer allowed in his home country.

At my predominantly white Catholic high school I used to eat lunch with a girl from Iran, a guy from China, a girl whose family was Indian and a girl whose mom was from Taiwan. We were the little United Nations. Makes sense that I live at one now.

My mom is from Mexico. My dad grew up in LA but his mom came over here on a boat from Holland. I fell in love with France when I was nineteen and took classes in French so I could keep living there as an option.

I'm a sports fanatic but my favorite sport by far is tennis and my favorite athlete of all time is Roger Federer, the hero of Switzerland whose mother is from South Africa. I get up at 4 and 5am to watch tennis matches that are streamed online, most recently in Shanghai and Stockholm. I tweet about it and talk to people in Canada, South Africa, England and Australia on a regular basis. So far I haven't found anyone in America to tweet at about Roger.

The day I met Roger Federer I was taken to the tournament by a man who had worked extensively on a documentary in the Arctic. Last year when I went to the same tournament to see Roger's exhibition match, Hit for Haiti that would benefit the country after its disaster, I found myself standing next to Kim Clijster's husband, a former American basketball player who played in Europe, and was elated. Belgian Kim is my favorite female tennis player. When she won a warm up tournament for the Australian Open in Brisbane last year she gave all her winnings to a local children's hospital. It is largely due to acts of global charity (Roger is an ambassador to UNICEF) that I fall so hard for my tennis favorites.

My brother recently went on a trip to Brazil where he was actually in a parade in Rio de Janiero for Carnivale. He travels frequently and a few years ago took a trip to Angkor Wat in Cambodia. I have a little green elephant from that trip sitting next to me now.

I could go on and on about instances like these but the point is that I am excited about globalization because it dissolves the "Us vs. Them" attitude that divides humanity.

When I returned from my summer in Europe at age nineteen I moved into an apartment in Santa Barbara. It had been so long since I'd mindlessly turned on a TV, I found myself instead opting to lie by the pool in the twilight, looking up at the sky. That moment was incredible. I forgot to look at the passing clouds as part of Santa Barbara or part of California or part of America. They were just clouds above Planet Earth. I grasped at the political borders that I'd known so well to divide my world but they wouldn't appear. I realized the energy it took to make them exist and how little energy it took to let them dissolve.

Then it was gone. Within the next week I was a staunch resident of Santa Barbara in my home state of California in the great USA.

Now in my Tibetan Buddhist community I work at getting back to that state and holding it. But I'm scared. Of what? Of being a freak, I guess. An outcast. Scared of my own power too. Here they suggest you go about your spiritual growth slowly but steadily. For someone of my generation that's quite a difficult request but after seven months I've found that it's been the case whether or not I'm okay with the speed. At least I know that immersing myself in the Dharma is my ticket back to a world without borders and it's a commitment I can make for the rest of my life.

British English is actually quite different

2010-10-28T23:50:00.000-07:00

The memories of summer school in England are emblazoned on me like a crest on a blazer. Sometimes I can still feel the crisp air on my face as I remember perching in my windowsill overlooking Queens College, not quite believing that I'm on an entirely different continent than where I grew up. Here people put butter on their sandwiches and dip their French fries in mayonnaise. They even put the emphasis on mayonnaise in a different spot.

But still, these people speak English and mostly do the same things we did back home. They have Starbucks and...streets with cars on them and people who wear clothes.

Actually in retrospect life in Cambridge, England was really quite a bit different from life back home. I lived in a building from the 1600s that was referred to as New College. Old College was a stone building from the 1300s.

At Cambridge I'd take a history of philosophy class and then the professor would mention an object from the lecture so we could all go take a look at it. "Would you like to see Bertrand Russell's spectacles? Follow me. They're in the museum across the street."

At Cambridge we'd get together on Friday evenings for Formal Hall where we'd get dressed up, drink entirely too much ("The Americans can't hold their liquor"), and then be served at long tables laden with perfect settings and be served all at once by a staff who synchronized their movements. I could have sworn we were at Hogwarts in this heavy wooden room seeped in history.

Cambridge is made up of many colleges, each an entity to itself with classrooms, dorm rooms, a library, chapel, dining hall and yes, bar. I suppose you need the duality between the chapel and the bar for the requisite understated British humor.

The leisure activity of choice in the town of Cambridge is punting. This does not mean they enjoy heading out to the football field and kicking to another team for hours on end. They prefer to get in a little boat like a canoe, take a long stick and push off the bottom of the river. Once they pick up momentum the person in front uses the oar to steer.

Americans find this terribly boring. "Where's the sport in this?" they demand to know. When the British are helpless to locate a response the Americans figure it out for themselves. "Okay, guys. What we're gonna do is chug some wine and then race down the river." They are amazingly adept at organizing this event and it goes off with a million hitches, all of which could have been predicted. Yes, 99% of participants end up in the river.

I loved my time at Cambridge so much I was actually upset while I was there because I knew it would be over and that fact really pissed me off. Now I realize there's a part of it that can live inside me always. I can choose to speak British English.

Sometimes I think in British English and find myself quite happy. It's especially enjoyable when it comes through in John Cleese's voice. I think it sad when American men can't use phrases like, "That's really quite splendid!" without coming off as fruity. When Mr. Cleese invokes the phrase it's absolutely delightful.

Have to admit, writing that paragraph was a little exhausting. Maybe I'll find some middle ground and concentrate on talking like Donkey from Shrek. Shrek was British wasn't he? By the transitive property I gotta assume Donkey is too or else what is an American Donkey doing in the British land of Far, Far Away?

Oh! New idea. I could just go to grad school at Cambridge. I'm so smart. (American trait here. We love to say how great we are. Have I mentioned how great I am? I'm the best. Awesome, really.)

Murder

2010-10-28T23:16:00.001-07:00

I've had a pretty severe grasp on murder: it's wrong. I've also been under a serious belief about murder: I would never do it.

After a month of living at a Tibetan Buddhist center with the following precepts:

Abstain from killing (even bugs)
Abstain from lying
Abstain from stealing
Abstain from sexual misconduct
Abstain from usage of intoxicants: tobacco, alcohol and drugs

I got rocked. I thought the lying one would be the easiest. Of course I don't do that. I feel like I took a truth serum awhile back and now it's impossible. I told Melissa I don't lie.

"That's great," she said. "I lie to myself all the time."

Busted.

Not killing would have to be the easiest one then. According to the precepts if you accidentally kill a bug it's okay because you didn't have the intention. But still, it saddens me when I accidentally crush an ant and now I say a mantra for it as a reflex. The habit of no longer killing flies and mosquitoes wasn't so difficult to give up, even if I was being bitten like crazy. I discovered that I've been an ardent speciesist, that I've discounted the lives of zillions of creatures because I thought them worthless and crushed their life forces without so much as a backward glance. Now when I see someone with a fly swatter or Raid my heart breaks a little.

This is stuff we've all heard before from people like those crazy vegetarians so I can't be that surprised by my reaction. But here's something no one warned me about--I've loosened my grasp on murder in general. I don't see it as such a horrible thing anymore. I see it more as a thing, a phenomenon, a reaction, an illness.

I know that I've murdered in this life (bugs plus I've eaten lots of meat) and I can't say with certainty that I haven't murdered in past lives so who am I to judge?

I write to prisoners who are interested in Buddhism. Tonight I read the most heartfelt letter from a man who is longing to understand goodness so he can devote himself to it. I don't know what he's done to land himself in prison and I don't care. At a retreat this weekend I learned that we have a tendency to take a moment out of life, a snapshot per se, make it into the reality of a person and judge them accordingly. But it's not real. None of us is one thing that happened one time. And we're not one thing that happened a bunch of times either. We're fluid, dynamic, always changing. We make mistakes but we also have moments of true love for one another and our world. Why cling to one of these?

Actually, I do cling to one of these. I cling to the love because anything else is an aberration.

C'est la vie

2010-10-28T08:30:00.000-07:00

Melissa and I were wheeling the housekeeping cart back to the main building when she stopped abruptly to pick something up off the ground.

"Come on, little fella," she coaxed.

A ladybug crawled onto her finger. She walked across the gravel in front of our meditation hall to put him on a flower then came back over to the cart.

"The funny thing is I probably stepped on all kinds of other bugs trying to save that one just cause he's cute."

Yup. Aesthetics FTW.

Passing

2010-10-27T00:31:00.000-07:00

In college I wrote a paper on the theme of passing in the book Black Like Me. It was a true story about a white man who changed his skin and hair so he would appear African-American and be able to experience racism firsthand.

I thought the experience of passing might exist in other forms but certainly wouldn't affect my life much if at all. Today it came back to me full throttle.

I was sitting in the dining room of my Tibetan Buddhist community. A nun and I were talking to a woman who was on a private retreat. Somehow we got on the subject of the differences between the speech patterns of the nun and I. We're both from California yet she's more didactic while I'm the token valley girl of the center. We had a laugh about it but then she went on.

"Rachel can take on a lot of personae. She can be the valley girl but she's also an intellectual. She's a sports fanatic. She's from a Mexican family. She went to Cambridge."

I thought about this all day while I cleaned toilets because also, I'm a maid. I don't know how long I've spoken with a barrage of "likes," "totallys" and "oh my gods!" but it's gone on long enough for me to start to believe that I am a bit ridiculous. I find that I am not surprised when people don't take me seriously and treat me like a child. In typical childlike fashion I respond to this treatment by wanting to throw a tantrum.

I'm not always like this. When I'm in an intellectual climate I can ramp down and speak with precision, insight and wit. I'm glorious when it comes to talking about philosophy, history, current events, politics, science--you name the topic. Yet somehow I can forget this and believe that I'm not worthy of actual learned people's time. I'll apologize excessively in embarrassment for the gall of having approached them because I'm probably still all jacked up about the Giants winning the pennant or something sports-related and setting up preemptive defense for the imminent sigh and roll of the eyes that comes from people who think sports are categorically stupid.

But this is not reality!

Tonight I found this out. I was falling all over myself trying to figure out if I should even approach this adorable man I'm interested in who is a Rhodes Scholar and decathlete. He's always been friendly. He went to Oxford, I studied at Cambridge. He wrote mathematical theory, I wrote novels. What is the problem? Why do I feel like I need to lay out a platform, in essence formally apply for his acceptance before I ask him to hang out?

In the midst of this nonsense I saw that one of the most brilliant people I'd gone to high school with was online. He also went to Oxford so I thought there was a chance he'd heard of the guy I was flipping out over. So I asked him, thinking this man also wouldn't find me worth speaking to. But he responded! And he said he'd heard of the Rhodes Scholar. Of course.

We chitchatted a bit and then he volunteered that he was impressed that I'd written novels. He couldn't get past the point of wanting to write them. That floored me. This guy who could move academic mountains was impressed with my quasi-intellectual feat?

It got me wondering why I was so loathe to call myself worthy. I found that it's in the idea of passing. I pass as a cheerleader airhead and that's fine. It's how my happiness burbles out. But it might not bring the best results, both from those around me as well as from myself.

If I am seeking to facilitate respect then I have to change what I am projecting. As much as I love her, I'm not Kellie Pickler. I'm not even sure if Kellie Pickler is Kellie Pickler. Anyway, I'm a woman who is intelligent, witty and infinitely caring. I'm worth the attention of anyone who wishes to grant it so I must project the woman who would believe that.

(At least for the interim, until I become enlightened. There are so many band-aid procedures until enlightenment! I wonder if I could start this process by limiting my use of !s. Sigh. I'll miss them. (!!!)

Buddhist Housekeeper

2010-10-23T22:54:00.000-07:00

People ask me where I live or what I do because it's normal. It's how people get to know each other in America. It's imperative for social organization.

Unfortunately for me I don't want to offer up an answer. I want to shrink away and disappear. But that's not an option so I say the city I live in and that I'm a housekeeper.

Sometimes I can get away with that but usually it's not so easy. I can't lie so if I'm pressed I give up that I live in a Tibetan Buddhist community in the redwoods.

That raises eyebrows. "Why do you live there?"

I'm at a loss with that question. Why do we do anything? I wouldn't ask why you're a teacher or a fireman. I don't know what answer they're looking for so I don't have a clue how to make the question go away. In my tradition there are obvious responses. Karma. Dependent-arising. But that won't fly in a non-Buddhist world.

I settle on a shrug then it's, "How long do you plan on being there?"

What in the world? I don't ask you how long you plan on being a teacher or a fireman. This is my job, my life. Why would I put an expiration date on it?

I settle on, "I don't have a plan."

They usually rest their case there. I'm hopeless. And I am. You can't figure me into the rat race. I've screwed the system up.

The thing that gives me relief is perspective on my place in history. Buddhism is new to the West and Tibetan Buddhism has only been outside of its home country for about fifty years. Of course someone who devotes her life to it is going to raise some eyebrows. I have to get used to it.

The funny thing is that Tibetan Buddhism has been in the West for less time than health insurance and retirement have yet those two notions have been embraced with open arms. I'm not sure what to make of that.

Guru Melissa Says Do Nothing

2010-10-23T19:50:00.000-07:00

I popped in to the reception office the other day and found a couple of my favorite ladies working. I don't know how we got on the subject but we started discussing how to approach problems.

Annie said that she'd once heard the more you try to solve your problem the worse it gets.

We all were moved by that and mulled it over. Then Melissa volunteered, "One year I decided to not do anything when a problem came up. It worked really well. People told me I was giving them the stupidest advice when I told them to do nothing but it really worked."

Today I was on a run on a road through the redwoods and something bumped against my bare leg from behind. I heard sniffle, sniffle then clomp, clomp and realized it was a big white lab puppy who'd lost his way. He bounded around me and I saw he didn't have a collar. I didn't know where he lived but figured since he lived in the woods he could figure it out so we ran together for awhile.

This dog was so cute! We came upon a driveway that went steeply up a private drive to a gate. The dog trotted up there so I thought he was going home but next thing I knew he was crouched over for a dump which had me thinking he needed some privacy or didn't want to be rude and do it in front of me. Either way it was endearing.

We kept going and I started to get a little concerned. What if he followed me into the center? What would the hoity-toity yoga people think? They'd probably be annoyed that some off-leash dog was wandering around. And what was I going to do with him anyway?

Then I told myself to just run with him. He was such a great partner going down the road. Why not enjoy it?

Not a minute later a truck started coming down the road towards us. Since the dog was up ahead I waved my arms to make sure they saw him. They stopped abruptly and the driver got out. The dog ran up to him. The driver scooped him up and put him in the back of the truck and then went in for some wet slobbery kisses. His owners!

As I ran by the lady in the passenger seat called out to me that his crate hadn't been locked so he'd jumped out.

Turned out it was no problem. And I didn't have to do anything!

Jessica Jackley, Micro-Loans and World Economics

2010-10-23T19:25:00.001-07:00

I love TED, a community devoted to ideas worth spreading that prolifically posts inspiring and groundbreaking talks on its site. Today I was introduced to Jessica Jackley.

Unassuming, well-spoken and poised, there was nothing to not like about this woman who welcomed me to the world of microcredit (the extension of very small loans to those in poverty designed to spur entrepreneurship). Learning about the brainchild of Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus changed Jackley's life and led her to develop Kiva.org, a site that has serviced over $160 in micro-loans.

With America's economic situation in the toilet, the FDIC broke, homes foreclosing like crazy and the government as corrupt as the Mafia, microcredit looks like it could be the direction international finance is headed.

What is money anyway?

Mine's numbers on a website. I can cash it in for paper but then it's just paper. Value doesn't come from being backed by the gold standard anymore. Money is ultimately an illusion we all agree to abide by.

Here are what some great thinkers had to say.

Thoreau: The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.

Russkin: There is no wealth but life.

Adam Smith: Every man is rich or poor according to the degree in which he can afford to enjoy the necessaries, conveniencies, and amusements of human life. Labour, therefore, is the real measure of the exchangeable value of all commodities. The real price of every thing, what every thing really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it.

Makes your heart smile, doesn't it? Who needs dolla bills! It's not about that.

Well, it kinda is. We have some big events creeping up on us. It is imminent that our government, banks and the media aren't going to be able to dress up the fact that the country is broke. Then there will be panic. Couple this with the fact that the baby boomers are due to cash out on their retirement plans in the next few years and you have the next Great Depression probably with worse attitudes. Woohoo!

So what can we do?

Aside from the obvious pep talk we have to decide what to do with the money we have saved up now (savings accounts, IRAs, 401ks, etc.) because it could disappear as quickly as you can snap your fingers.

Should we spend it? Blow it all on a fantastic car or trip? Should we donate it to a good cause?

I don't know exactly but I know what I do should be out of compassion for others. Right now my best idea is to put it all in micro-loans. Seems like it could be the most effective way to make an investment these days. And it might not only be helping an African farmer, it might be paving the way for a stronger, better world economy.

Stanley Jordan

2010-09-10T20:42:00.000-07:00

My friend asked me to go to a concert with her. "It's Stanley Jordan. He's so great. You're going to love it." I wasn't so sure. The last time a friend had told me that I'd love a group they ended up being the kind of sound that begs for a mosh pit. Not really my scene.

Rochelle promised that Stanley's crowd would be laid back so I acquiesed. I needed to get a break from my obsession with the US Open anyway.

We showed up at the Kuumbwa Jazz Center after his first show and waited in line. I liked that everyone was older than me. People drinking wine outside in a courtyard? That's exactly my kind of scene.

We sat third row aisle behind the piano and waited for the show to start. There was a poster of Miles Davis and another of John Coltrane on the wall. "They played here?" I asked Rochelle, just to confirm it was purely decorative. "Yeah," she said. Whoa.

A tall and thin black man with small hoop earrings and close-cropped hair came out on stage. He had a smooth, youthful face so I wanted to guess he was in his 30s but the emcee had said he was on The Tonight Show in the 80s. It didn't seem to match but he couldn't have been older than 40. He had a drummer and bass player. The Stanley Jordan Trio. And it was so weird! He didn't strum the guitar. He used the top part and tapped on it. He played entire songs that way. Later I found out that one of the things he's famous for is inventing the technique of guitar tapping.

His drummer was so fun. He sat there the whole set in rapture, a blend of curiousity, gentleness and celebration playing across his face. He knew he was in the presence of a genius and wasn't taking a single second for granted.

Stanley announced he was going to play a song from his most recent album, State of Nature. He said something about Mozart so I figured he was going to adapt a piano concerto to the guitar. He started tapping it out and then sat down at the baby grand. He proceeded to simultaneously play the piano and the guitar to create a complicated and beautiful sound.

I found myself holding my breath while he played the piano, praying he wouldn't make a mistake. I realized that's how I played the piano: with fear. I started to wonder what other areas of my life I was conducting in the same way.

Before the second to last song Stanley talked to us. "As mucisians you hear a lot of things about your music. 'There's no hook.' 'There's no chorus.' 'It's too long.'" He went on this way for awhile then said, "Well, we stand before you, musicians with no fear!" He said they were going to play what they felt and not to worry if we got lost, he promised he'd bring us back.

In that song Stanley kicked a shoe off and played guitar with it. He got down on his knees and used his guitar's relationship with the speaker to create a sound to match the song. He pulled down a microphone and said what popped into his head, my favorite being "Santa Cruz values are destroying the propaganda machine." Rochelle's favorite was when he said, "Meow." It was awesome.

I can't believe that I just wandered into this show, a show that featured a guy I am wont to call the Greatest Musician of All Time. When I got home I Wikipediaed him. I found out he's been nominated for Grammys, that he used to perform with Dizzy Gillespie, that he's actually 51(!!), that he can simultaneously play two guitars and that he's purposefully gone underground in the music scene and is focusing on music therapy at the moment.

This guy is a gem.

I'm a Fraud, You're a Fraud, We're all Frauds!

2010-09-10T18:43:00.000-07:00

I've been terrified to apply to grad school because the teacher I seek for creative writing is at the best (most highly ranked, esteemed) writing school in the country, the Iowa Writers College. If I apply and am rejected then I feel that they'll know I'm a fraud. But if I apply and am accepted then I feel like every day there I'll have to fight to not be exposed as a fraud. Yesterday I realized something.

I am a fraud.

It's so liberating! Eckhart Tolle helped me get here. I'm not saying I'm a bad writer. I'm saying that the idea that I'm trying to sell, that I'm a Writer, is a concept. It does not inherently exist. So no problem!

On the Notion of Progress

2010-09-10T18:18:00.000-07:00

I took a class in college called 17th Century European History. On the surface it seemed like superfluous content that would get me requirements for my major. In retrospect it was quite helpful.

The professor was like an intellectual Danny DeVito. When handing out class evaluations at the end of the term his instruction was, "Put whatever you want. I'm tenured." His favorite pasttime was making grandiose statements like, "You can't use a word like 'essentially' in your papers. It's meaningless!" Then in the next paragraph of his lecture he'd do exactly what he said he wouldn't tolerate.

Since college I've been through a lot of jobs, most intense. These companies wanted to make a mark on the world, make lots of money, grow in fame and prestige. I ran out of energy and am taking a break. I now do housekeeping at a retreat center in the redwoods.

Today while I was out cleaning our yurt village something Professor DeVito said came back. "The notion of progress came about in the 17th century." I remember when he said it. It struck me as ridiculous and pompous but I've thought about it infrequently over all these years.

Now I don't feel compelled to refute his statement. I don't feel like I need to protect progress. It can handle itself. I'm comfortable putting some space around it and checking it out. The thing is, human history tended to be pretty similar for quite some time. People accepted a way of life because it worked. They didn't have the media telling them to dream big so they kept doing what they were doing.

I don't remember what event my professor said changed this but it's immaterial to the argument that the notion of progress didn't always drive human behavior. At some point humans decided to make progress a goal and now that it's been going for so long we forget that it's simply a human construct and we can choose something else.

Ambition --> Human Construct

That feeling of weight on my shoulders and the knot in the pit of my stomach --> Developed from my devotion to human constructs

Sitting by the pool considering the redwood trees and the bird flying above me --> Joyful.

It seems as though we sometimes get caught up in things we first regarded as means to an end, like wealth, and mistakenly make them the end

Also, it seems as if we can identify things as human constructs they begin to lose their solidity and, given attention in this manner, have the possibility of dissolving.

Farewell Party

2010-09-02T20:27:00.000-07:00

Lama Zopa is giving a teaching in North Carolina in a few weeks which means all the monastics are going to head out there for the fun. Unfortunately for me this means three of our four resident monks and nuns are going to be gone for at least two weeks. When Venerable Drimay told me she would be gone for a whole month I actually shed a few tears. It hadn't occurred to me before that one day she wouldn't be there.

We've had the pleasure of Geshe Wangdu's company for the past two months. He's been giving teachings in our meditation hall five nights a week. It turned out he was taking the same flight to the East Coast as Venerable Drimay.

Our spiritual director, Venerable Tsomo, asked the staff to be say goodbye to Geshe Wangdu the morning he left but she couldn't pin down a time and it was driving me nuts. I like to make things concrete and put them on my calendar. Finally I appealed to Venerable Drimay on Tuesday evening in the dining room since they were leaving on Thursday. We settled on 9am-ish and made some jokes about how it was going to be a farewell party and how we'd all show up and make a big scene over it. I wrote "Farewell Party for Venerable Drimay and Geshe Wangdu, Thursday at 9am-ish" on the whiteboard where we usually list what food we're having for a meal. I decorated it a little bit to make it cute. Then I took the next day off.

On Wednesday morning I sat out the staff meeting even though I usually attend it on my day off and went for a run on the beach. When I came back for lunch the staff was all confused about the farewell party. "Where's it going to be? Who's throwing it?"

Tsomo asked me what I knew about it. "Do you know who wrote that on the board?" I told her I'd done it but I didn't mean for it to be anything other than us gathering around the departing car and cracking a champagne bottle on the bumper. Drimay was amused but Tsomo wasn't satisfied. They were all set on a party now.

Our head chef, Brian, came down to the dining room and announced he was making pancakes with a special fruit compote for the big event. So there was a caterer.

"Did you invite Geshe Wangdu?" Tsomo asked me.

"No."

"You should invite him! It's your party."

"But Tsomo, I don't speak his language."

Didn't matter. With her persistence I found myself going up to the lama apartment to invite him. Luckily Venerable Steve answered the door and translated the whole thing. He told me that the food would have to be ready by 8am so they could be sure to eat before they left for the airport. I had to go back down to the dining room and verify this with our chef. Then I went out of town.

When I got back that evening there was an email from the director of our center to the staff about the time for the party moving to 745am. So the director was coming.

There was also an email from Tsomo. "Hey - Genla is going to your party tomorrow morning - at 7.45am!" (We call him Genla as a nickname.)

I got up at 7:40 this morning and rolled into the dining room at the appointed time. Everyone was there gathered around three tables that had been pushed together. Geshe Wangdu had already been seated and served.

Everyone thanked me for putting the party together. "What a great idea!"

I'd done nothing except post something on the white board!

I kept trying to explain but then something would happen to thwart my efforts. Tsomo asked me to go get my camera and took group shots of us. She had me sit at the head table with the monks because it was "my party."

When they had to go Venerable Steve (our head teacher), Venerable Samten, Geshe Wangdu, Venerable Tsomo and our director Denice all piled into an SUV. As I waved goodbye I felt a heavy absence, like my children were heading off to college.

Venerable Drimay was off brushing her teeth so I waited around for her. Our esteemed teacher Jon had arrived in the nick of time. He'd been waiting up by the lama apartment because that's where we always say goodbye to the lamas but for some reason had popped into the dining room when he figured he'd been too late. We cracked a few jokes. I told him about how the party had come to be and he told me I'd done a good job hiding the booze.

After Drimay had gone I went back to the dining room and found that Geshe Wangdu's special plates left on the table. I took them upstairs and the chef laughed. "You have to do the dishes." And I did beacuse it had been my party.

Future Pain

2010-08-23T22:23:00.000-07:00

A few months ago my friend told me not to have future pain. I didn't realize that was what worrying was until she put it that way. I couldn't come up with a single rational reason for why I should continue my future pain. Since then I have made it a practice to ease off on it and life is SO MUCH BETTER! I have consistent happiness and level moods. Over time I've found there's really nothing to stress about. If something goes well then great. If it doesn't then there's an opportunity to learn and grow. And if the shit really hits the fan as in a major earthquake then oh well. What control did you have over that anyway?

The Binky Burial

2010-08-11T21:15:00.000-07:00

I have this friend Sam. He's smart, fun and is great at setting boundaries. He's also in really good shape. I don't think I've met one person who doesn't like him. He's pretty much the most popular person where I work.

I ran into him in the dining room yesterday morning and he announced that he was going to bury his binky.

HUGE NEWS.

By the way, a binky is a pacifier and Sam's three years old.

Sam said he wanted Venerable Steve (our head monk) and Gen La (the visiting lama) to be there and he was going to do it next to Kwan Yin (the beautiful statue we have of the goddess of compassion up in the meadow).

Unfortunately Ven. Steve and Gen La were out of town so we had to move the festivities to Sam's backyard. His friend Thea got him a little clear case and he put his binkies in it. He showed it to all who were present.

"Look at my binkies," he instructed.

We looked on forlornly. We gave our heartfelt goodbyes to the binkies. Sam put them in the hole and then covered them up with a picture of a hole (scribble marks on brown construction paper cut out in a circle). He and his mom buried that and then put a sign on top that said, "No more binkies. Bye-bye sugar babies" (sugar babies are cavities). Sam asked us to all help bury that sign.

We all stood up to examine our work.

"Do you have any last words?" Thea asked Sam.

"No," he said. Then he ran off to where I'd set up to glitter tattoo him.

One of the many cool things about Sam is that he does not hang on. Like the Dalai Lama he experiences the moment and moves on, maintaining a face absent of guile.

Alexander McCall Smith

2010-08-11T20:40:00.000-07:00

Years ago I fell in love with The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith. When I ran out of those I continued on to his other series and even some of his more random works. It seems as if whatever this clever man from Edinburgh puts to paper can't help but be charming and irresistible.

Alexander created a character named Bertie that is particularly memorable. This young native of Edinburgh has an insistent mother whose goals never seem to match his own. Thus, he has a pink room and a psychologist.

When The World According to Bertie came out I was compelled to send Alexander a note with my gratitude.

Months later when I'd moved to the northern part of California my former roommate informed me that he'd forwarded me mail from another country. He said it looked like something I would want.

When I received the unusually large envelope one side with Royal Mail stamped on it was scratched out and my new address was scrawled on the other side. Inside was a letter and a small pamphlet.

The letter was from...Alexander McCall Smith! He apologized for his late reply as his letter had to be forwarded from his publisher in New York and I must think he was quite rude. He included a signed copy of a short story in small circulation.

I did laps around my community in jubilation. What good fortune! I didn't even expect a response.

Today I found myself sitting on the steps of the imposing Gothic Catholic Church in downtown Santa Cruz with a stack of literature I'd been meaning to read. In the stack was the little story The Trees That Made the Sound of the Sea.

Sometimes Alexander likes to number the paragraphs in his stories so that they appear to be some sort of proof from a critical thinking class. This was one of them. I find them a bit hard to follow but soon relaxed into it and let the prose wash over me.

He expounded upon the lives of a few characters, using irrelevant information that at first glance made them seem like simpletons. After awhile I realized it had the odd affect of endearing them to me. Less was more.

By the end I was in tears. "He was crying for everything he had lost...for the world that slips away from us, no matter how hard we try to anchor it to us, with love and belief."

I wasn't crying out of sadness. Looking out into the sunshine pouring over the square in front of me with the fountain burbling away I was overwhelmed. My past, the good and the bad, what had led me to be sitting there in Santa Cruz sublimely happy, came flooding back. And I was glad I wasn't able to anchor it all to me. It would simply be too much and I would be left an unfashionable kind of heavy, not unlike obesity.

Yes, this communication with Alexander McCall Smith has been glorious but I must let it be. Experience it as it arises and then let it go. That is where the incredible lightness of being comes in. And that is what I want.

Intensity

2010-07-29T15:31:00.000-07:00

Today I learned that good writing is like good acting—it’s emotional. You can’t keep everyone at arm’s length and call it great. You have to expose yourself, let it all hang out. Without that kind of courage it’s ordinary. With that kind of courage it’s approachable, real and often transcendent.

It’s so hard to even get to a place where you can touch your emotions and see what’s stirring up in you. We don’t want to be honest with ourselves because it hurts. It’s uncomfortable. Fuck that. Skating through life is not an option. Who knows when we’ll breathe our last breath? Not everyone is meant to experience life through writing or acting but whatever medium we’re gifted at, we owe it and ourselves intensity. For the sake of all of us. As residents of Planet Earth we’re all in it together.

Too bad I suck at it.

Me and My Gut

2010-07-29T15:16:00.001-07:00

My gut has had a horrible time hanging out with me. I’ve been so mean, ignoring it, telling it it doesn’t know shit. And come on! If there’s anything it knows it’s shit.

My poor second brain has protested in almost innumerable ways and gotten quite a bit of attention. But it went so long without any respect.

It’s hard to listen to someone who only tells the truth. I had to slog through so much junk and pain before I gave it a chance. I’m still not perfect at it but life has improved drastically since I started being kind to my gut—not treating it like a second class citizen but actually welcoming it as a member of the same team.

When it hurts now I try to remember to give it a pep talk and ask it to smile. I take a minute to consider what’s going on and what feels wrong. Then I make an effort to do something about it. I’m not strong all the time but I figure with practice we could be great friends, me and my gut.

If I Can Dream

2010-07-26T22:10:00.001-07:00

I got hooked on this Hulu show called If I Can Dream. It's a reality show where six people live in a house and work on making their dreams come true. There are three actors, two musicians and an aspiring model.

It sounds pretty ordinary but what stands out to me is that these people are generally pretty nice to each other. The editing doesn't really celebrate drama like I'm used to in reality television. And surprise! It's still entertaining.

I got to thinking about how these people are so fortunate to live in an environment that is set up to see them reach their goals. I was offended when they slacked off. But then I realized...I live in a dream home.

Here in my Tibetan Buddhist Center all my needs are met so that I can concentrate on practicing the Dharma and there's so much support. It's all I've ever wanted but on top of that I have plenty of time to write my next book. It's unbelievable. The thing I hate most in fending for myself is going shopping and figuring out what to eat. Here it's taken care of. I NEVER have to go grocery shopping and I have access to plenty of healthy food. That frees up so much time. That in itself might be my dream come true.

On top of that phenomenal teachings are readily available, our grounds are beautiful, we have a temple with a 25-foot tall golden Buddha and our meditation hall is perfect. This opportunity is rare and beautiful and I have every reason to be as dedicated to achieving my goals as the people on If I Can Dream. Plus, I can be grateful for the absence of cameras!

Attachment

2010-07-22T09:15:00.001-07:00

I've been practicing Buddhism like my hair is on fire for almost four months now. Around the end of the first month I read a book by the Dalai Lama in which he said, "You must not get attached to anything, not even your practice."

This upset me. I couldn't understand what he was saying. I'd been through so much and fought so hard to be here. Buddhism was the one thing I wasn't going to let go of.

I had a conversation with the scientist I've been dating the other night in which I made a slightly sloppy statement. "We made up physics." Oh boy. Talk about finding the wrong thing to say. He was incensed. "We made up math, NOT physics!" He had Einstein hair over it.

I tried to backtrack but he wasn't having it. In a way, I didn't mean that we made up physics as the parts of it that are true and accurate are a priori knowledge. And math is that way too. You know what else is? Buddhism (insofar as the path to enlightenment).

So yes, in a way they all exist by themselves, independent of us and the human element comes in the expression of them. That is the part we made up and that is where we fall apart and start looking like we stuck our fingers in a socket.

Now when I think about not getting too attached to my practice I understand it better. Buddhism is one way to express a priori knowledge. It's not that big a deal, at least not a big enough deal to get all bent out of shape over and cause myself suffering if I can't practice in my usual ways.

Houston Smith said, "Institutions are not pretty. Show me a pretty government. Healing is wonderful, but the American Medical Association? Learning is wonderful, but universities? The same is true for religion... religion is institutionalized spirituality."

I have no doubt that there were good intentions in the founding of these institutions but attachment made a mess of them. So what can we do?

Start with where we know we can make a difference--ourselves--and let go. Learn to accept the immensity of the moment and realize that it is more than enough.

Jonathan

2010-07-21T22:11:00.000-07:00

I'm training for another half marathon while doing a manual labor job so obviously I get hungry. This is occasionally a problem since I live in a vegetarian community and don't want to take more than my share.

I've recently started working with someone new, a young man named Jonathan. He's really into nutrition and most recently worked at Whole Foods. I like to hear him disgustedly say something I previously thought was acceptable is absolutely not. He has no patience for anything that his cells wouldn't welcome with open arms.

I told him that I was concerned that I wasn't getting enough food. He poked his head out of a bathroom he'd been cleaning and said, "You should really eat raw." I obviously thought he was an idiot for such a suggestion but he explained himself. "That's the kind of stuff your body wants. If you ate like that you'd be so healthy. You'd glow."

Poof!

My mind opened up. I realized how boxed in I'd been about nutrition. I thought I was so educated but really I was only working within a set of assumptions. I've never tried eating raw for more than one meal. There's a chance Jonathan is right but how would I know if I didn't loosen up and give it a chance?

This morning I was reading about Chogyam Trungpa, the founder of Shambhala, a man who was known to be a great lama who practiced crazy wisdom. He would drink and partake in all sorts of debauchery and he died young.

Since I'd been opened up about nutrition I was ready to see Chogyam Trungpa's story in a new light. Before my first reaction would have been something like a judgmental, "You drink that much that's what you get" but now it's more, "Huh. He drank a lot. I wonder why he did that. I have no idea." And that's that.

Another thing I read this morning said that we only experience surprise because we have expectations.

Jigme

2010-07-21T20:31:00.000-07:00

I had the honor of working at an incredible vegan restaurant in Costa Mesa for about five weeks this year. It was the first place I'd ever worked where every aspect of the business was in line with my values. Plus, the restaurant was in a yurt!

I was going to a Japanese Buddhist center at the time and against my better judgment was vocal to my co-workers about how excited I was to be practicing. They were nice about it.

There was one guy who was really nice. When he first introduced himself I couldn't imagine that I'd heard his name correctly. I had to write it down. "Jigga? Jimmy?" JIGME. Our co-worker Eric, who we called Buddha because of the resemblance, told me to just call him Jiggles.

Jiggles had a different sort of vibe than the rest of us. He had an accent that I couldn't place and even though he didn't look like the kitchen staff I tossed him into the Latin category.

One night Jiggles and I had to close the front of the house and count out the tips. We sat across each other in a booth with dim light overhead and repeatedly screwed it all up. Somewhere in the midst of it we began to have a conversation.

I said something about Buddhism. He said he was Tibetan.

I was shocked and didn't believe him. He was calm and waited it out.

I ended up explaining my interest in Buddhism and discovered that I probably knew more about it than he did. He said he had a picture he wanted to give me and he'd bring it the next day.

The next day at the end of my shift I tentatively reminded him that he might have something for me. His face lit up and he went to the little closet we called an office. He pulled a roll of paper off a shelf and handed it to me. I unrolled it and found a red cloth with a golden Buddha woven on it.

"For me?"

He nodded. "Do you like it?"

I liked it and was in love with him.

Pretty soon the whole staff knew I was in love with him. He was just a year older than me and beautiful. I never tired of watching him serve people, wrapping it up by offering a pleasantry and a slight bow. I didn't even mind that he was married. It allowed me to keep him on a pedestal, always perfect.

One night the staff bailed and just me and him worked the front of the house on a busy Saturday night. I took all the orders and he served and bussed all the tables. It was madness. There was no way we should have been able to pull it off.

At one point someone ordered a wine that I had run out of. I was forbidden from leaving my station so I asked Jigme to get another bottle from the back. In an uncharacteristic fashion I didn't get it in the next five minutes. Even worse he saw the glass I had poured and almost rudely insisted that it was enough. I responded with almost rude urgency that it wasn't and was immediately horrified. He got me another bottle right away.

When the crowd had died down I told him that I was sorry if I'd spoken sharply to him. He looked at me without a clue of what I was talking about and said that everything was fine. I told him that I thought he was great at his job and I really enjoyed working with him. He said he thought I was great at my job and enjoyed working with me.

A few days later I was standing at the bar wiping glasses. He was running around, working hard like usual but with that grace that made it look effortless. He really had fun all the time.

We always had music playing and most of the time it was good stuff, light but peppy. At this particular moment we had a U2 song playing, something almost nondescript that most people wouldn't bother acknowledging in the background. Jigme said something in passing that made me burst into giggles. "Beautiful music."

He was thrown by my laughter and stopped for an explanation. I couldn't give him one. He really meant what he'd said. He was in the moment, appreciating it and letting me in on it. It was so pure and so amazing that all I could do was laugh.

When I announced to the staff that I was leaving in order to live and work at a Tibetan Buddhist community everyone was supportive. I was moving by myself but needed help with one thing--moving the sub-woofer in my trunk. I asked my manager if I could borrow "my favorite" for a few minutes.

Jigme, of course, said he was happy to help and handled it for me. It was the last time we'd see each other so he gave me a hug said, "I think you're a very sweet girl. Please don't change." Then he walked away.

Driving up to my new home I thought about him. What was it that made him different from everyone else at the restaurant? We were all nice with good intentions. Then again, most of us gossiped and talked about inane things all the time. I can't remember Jigme doing that.

It took meeting Lama Zopa, one of the two founders of our tradition (Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition), and our resident Tibetan monk Samten to really get it. These men are different because they don't have the junk most of us do. Most of us are coping with layers of horseshit - emotional baggage, preconceived notions, etc. Jigme didn't have that. He didn't have any junk separating himself. He just gave the best of Jigme to you straight.

He had another job at Chipotle and worked so hard but he lived in the moment and let everything else go. If you asked him if he was happy he'd give you a puzzled look because what else would he be? Tibetan culture isn't perfect, nothing is, but it sure does give a strong foundation for leading a good life, no matter what the circumstances.

Now I have the honor of living in a Tibetan Buddhist community and I've never been so happy. And the picture Jigme gave me? It's framed and hanging above my bed serving as a reminder to loosen my grasp on anything and everything and enjoy the moment because there's not one good reason not to.

Soha

2010-07-19T22:58:00.000-07:00

One of the main tenets of Buddhism is impermanence. As soon as we start thinking something is going to last forever we're heading into suffering. This applies to our identities and it also applies to romantic relationships.

I got involved with someone who is not interested in the spiritual part of my life. Spirituality pervades every part of my life so it was obvious this would become a problem for us. Somehow I ignored this blinking neon sign and convinced myself that there was a good possibility we could love each other forever. I overrode so much of what I had learned in my practice to give this relationship a chance. Something in me said I had to. My gut was really into it. And I don't have regrets.

I can't remember if Lama Zopa or Lama Yeshe said it but I know they have a similar reaction to romantic relationships. First, they'd laugh heartily at the thought that you had them at your disposal and you'd ask them questions about romance. Then they'd shake their heads because first, loving someone romantically is so limiting. Why focus your love on one person when you are here to love everyone? Then they'd giggle at your inane problem because you'd be complaining that you're not getting enough pleasure from your mate and that's just silly.

I know that I can love someone in a romantic relationship as they should be loved. I know that I can offer this to someone and have it be rejected. I know that I have to accept this as his choice, as I was offering a gift and that is as far as my reach goes. People are free to do what they want with what they are given and that is that.

I learned that you can turn your life upside down to let your soul finally breathe and that some people will be inspired by your actions, some people will be horrified and some won't want to hear about it.

I know that when you do let your soul breathe that your life becomes a conduit for magic. I also know that this is your path and that nobody walks exactly the same one. You're in this universe with everyone, we are one organism, but you are 100% responsible for your part in it.

I know that it takes all kinds and that without certain experiences we wouldn't be able to practice our virtues. The person who seems like our greatest obstacle is our greatest teacher.

Garden Angel

2010-07-14T13:49:00.001-07:00

I moved out of OC in a hurry. I had two weeks to pack up my life and was driven by the compulsion to give away the majority of my stuff with the caveat that each item had to go to exactly the right person.

I gave the Buddha that had greeted me at the door to my friend at the Buddhist Center and my horrifically expensive makeup to the sweetest teenage girls who were bookworms just like me. Things kept finding the perfect homes.

But then the last couple days I hit a wall. I had to turn to Craigslist for help. I posted a garden angel for $8.

I got an email from a woman who wanted to pick it up. She arrived in a whirlwind and was already running late for something.

She was luminous. Her presence made sense of the fact that I'd set aside two of my favorite books for her before she arrived. I'd just had a feeling about them.

She thanked me for those, saying she had been wanting to get some good books but hadn't had the time. She explained that she was picking up the angel for her upcoming fundraiser and then gave me some details on it. It was magical.

Somehow she noticed my own novels that were on display and discovered that I was a writer. She said she was a writer too but ignored my requests for more information, insisting on being further charmed by my story.

I followed her down to her car so she could give me some literature on her charity. We espoused compliments as members of mutual admiration societies do.

Then I got it out of her. She had compiled the kids and teen Chicken Soup for the Soul Series. She was a Writer. And she was in my corner!

We had trouble separating but eventually let go. I will cherish that short encounter.

Later I got an email from her letting me know the fundraiser was about to happen. They would hold a ceremony where they would release monarch butterflies. You could pay to commemorate somebody by having one released in their name.

I had moved into a Tibetan Buddhist community and for some reason was compelled to buy a monarch in the name of our dear receptionist Annie. I thought the little certificate would arrive shortly after the event. It didn't.

I thought it would arrive the next week. It didn't.

I forgot about it.

Yesterday I went to get the mail and there it was! But oh no. I must have interpreted the instructions incorrectly because the little certificate was worded to honor Annie like she had already passed away. What could I do? I knew I still had to give it to her. I'd hope it was the thought that counted.

She wasn't in yesterday so I had to wait til today to give it to her. I went over to the bookstore before it opened and caught her by herself. I handed it to her and apologized that it was worded like I already had her pushing up daisies. She forgave me.

I messed around on the computer next to her desk for awhile and realized she was giving off a heavy feeling. I asked her if she was okay. She said her dog, her companion in life, had just died.

Whoa. How random that the butterfly thing would arrive in the mail when it did. And look at the chain of events that had to go off for us to get to that moment. Garden angel --> Chicken Soup for the Soul --> monarch butterfly release --> honoring a Tibetan Buddhist center's receptionist's sweet dog

I'm impressed. And I didn't even tell you about the crazy way that garden angel got on my porch.

Lunchtime Epiphany

2010-02-14T00:30:00.000-08:00

I was at lunch with a friend. He chose a restaurant that was more upscale than I'm used to. We're talking about a place that didn't feature a hamburger wrapped in paper. Instead, this place had linen napkins. I was completely out of my element.

We sat on the patio that looked out onto a slope of lawn next to a large area of flowers. We discussed what was going on in our lives, mostly stuff concerning work. It was all quite normal considering it was the middle of a work day but then there was a break in conversation and my gaze slipped over to the vegetation to my right. Suddenly I wasn't thinking about anything. And then it hit me.

We are so silly to think that we are islands unto ourselves. We are deluding ourselves into going along with this whole rat race. We're all connected and just part of the universe. Nothing more, nothing less.

This knowledge should evaporate all fear but it doesn't. Instead this information has to be absorbed through the skin and into the soul. It takes commitment and practice and it's really best executed with support from others. But at least I had a moment.

My best Craigslist post of all time

2010-02-14T00:23:00.000-08:00

Need help with exciting stuff (Newport Beach)

I am looking for an unpaid intern to help me out with some exciting upcoming work.

1. My unicorn is coming back from sabbatical next week. She needs a good deal of attention. Every morning she has her hair done and she likes 1-2 flights daily, one at sunrise and one at sunset.

2. I need to go on Millionaire Matchmaker ASAP so I am looking for a dynamic individual with a can-do attitude who can pull some strings in Hollywood and also straighten hair (cause that's what the lady on the show says is necessary to get it done).

3. I am planning a birthday party for a B-level actor who I have an intense crush on. It will be on a yacht and feature Fatboy Slim. I do not own a yacht and I do not know Fatboy Slim. You will have to make that happen.

4. It is my life's goal to set up a Slip N Slide on a Mormon Temple lawn in the rain. I am looking for someone to assist in this. Major history in shenanigans required.

5. Experience setting up zip lines is preferred. Zombie hunting experience a plus but willing to train.

In return for these efforts I will let you use my yacht occasionally and ride my unicorn. This is a pretty sweet deal and I anticipate a flood of applicants. I will do my best to get back to everyone but please do not be crushed if I am unable to respond.

Thanks and have a great day!

In N "Hang" Out

2009-10-03T15:50:00.001-07:00

I was at In N Out somewhere in southwest LA this afternoon with my co-worker trying to quell my voracious appetite. We went in to eat and she renamed the place the title of this post because the drive-thru line was so long. Genius, right?

There was no line inside but the two people ordering were taking forever. We tried not to lose faith that the line that was forming laterally would complicate things so that we'd lose our turn. We had no such luck. A woman about 45 years old with two teenage boys took the next available register.

"Excuse me," my co-worker, a 21 year-old girl, said. "We've been waiting for awhile and we were next."

"No you weren't. I was."

Okayyy.

A register opened and my co-worker went to it. "Are there two lines?"

"Nope. Just one."

"Then you might want to tell this lady about it."

That's when things got weird.

The lady whipped around at my co-worker and said, "Don't talk shit, bitch."

That really bowled me over. What was this lady trying to accomplish? If she really didn't want my co-worker to talk shit then why would she give her the only ammo she could use and call her a bitch? She'd foiled herself if she really didn't want her to talk shit which she hadn't even done. It was so weird I had to take it like she wanted to fight my co-worker.

What are you to do as the boss? I dunno. I knew the lady was going to look at me to see if I'd back my girl up. I didn't know if I would but I knew I was going to make this lady out to be a super freak. I arranged my face so that she could see exactly how I felt about her. It said, "Fight you? I don't even believe you actually exist yet. Is this for real?" Then I looked at her boys to see if they were gonna back her up. They clearly felt the same way I did.

And that was pretty much the end of that near In N "Hang" Out Throwdown Somewhere In LA.

Newport Beach Being Newport Beach

2009-10-03T08:27:00.000-07:00

I run a lot down on the beach in Newport Beach. It never gets old jogging down the boardwalk with Catalina in the distance, million dollar homes on my left and hot sand on my right. I get to go past a the cute little touristy area with the bars and shops, the pier and even a school that has its huge playground sitting out in the sand with no fences surrounding it.

I've dealt with some heckling from drunk people enjoying the scene on their patios but I've never been through what I went through on Thursday morning.

On the boardwalk I passed two men in their early forties who were dressed like they were trying to be casual but their oily hair wasn't really letting them pull it off. All I heard from their conversation was, "Money is power."

Then I passed up a couple ladies who may or may not have been cougars. I heard one of them say, "That 21 year old was hot."

I was shocked at how stereotypical these conversations were but tried to shrug it off as a coincidence. I'd never heard anything like it before.

Later I passed a couple of ladies and I heard, "He's just got six grand in a sock somewhere." Forget coincidence.

On my way back to the car I walked past a Hummer parked on the side of the road. It's license plate read www.BillionaireByThirty.com and it had a bumper sticker on the back window that said the same thing.

I guess that's just Newport being Newport.

Sunset at sunset

2009-08-05T22:49:00.000-07:00

I started thinking about how today was an interesting day and then I realized it's been a pretty interesting week and it's only Wednesday and then I remembered that I'm writing a memoir so hopefully my life is pretty damn compelling.

Today I was at home trying to locate my friend who lives in Hawaii who went MIA while I was selling high performance race parts online and following up with a woman on the glitter tattoo party I had just been assigned to do in Beverly Hills tonight. That's all pretty ordinary stuff (my friend was located and just fine) but it got better.

At K-Mart I almost got side-swiped by a kiddie pool. I dodged out of the way and then a woman appeared behind it and said, "Oh my gosh! I almost mauled you with a kiddie pool!"

Fed Ex delivered my new cell phone and I programmed it and uploaded my contacts right from my house! Isn't that a miracle?

Crawling along the 405 in West LA I was ecstatic. I get to sit in LA traffic! Finally! And I get to do it while I listen to some of my favorite radio stations in the world. YES!

I exited at Beverly Hills and got held up at a red light on Wilshire. A white, gorgeous convertible Ferrari with the top down pulled up on my left. I was trying to keep my cool when an Aston Martin got in the middle of the intersection to make a left and looked like it was having a face off with me while it waited for traffic to clear. This is such a huge departure from my previous life and I'm so grateful. I wanted to be part of the world where possibility was everywhere. It's not "That's good enough" anymore. It's, "That's good but we're looking for amazing."

I stopped at UCLA because I had to go to the bathroom and I wanted some bin candy. Walking down from the tennis court past Pauley Pavilion I realized that I am not built for college. I thought, "This is a place to contrive problems" when I approached Ackerman Union--not a good sign for someone who thought she wanted to teach creative writing to college students.

Then I drove up a steep hill (9.5 grade) to the glitter party overlooking LA and whoa. I LOVE LA. How come NYC got "Greatest city in the world?" I feel that way about LA even with its lack of parking spots.

It was a fun party for a group of girls whose biggest concern was whether the marshmallows they were dipping in chocolate were kosher. The house was lavish but also comfortable and the owners were genuinely kind. Realization--people who talk shit about rich people claiming they're totally out of touch and assholes are saying that out of jealousy. All the people I have done parties for have been super nice. I feel blessed to be so warmly accepted at these intimate celebrations.

Walking out to my car a hot guy in a Land Rover drove past me to the neighbor's house. I thought he might be the dude from The Girl Next Door. The house he was headed to was huge, imposing and had an incredible view. I had to think, judging by the cars in the driveway, this was a movie star party. Were they going to get drunk and then stand on the balcony and say, "We own this town!"? I really wanted to know.

I drove back to the 405 on Sunset at sunset. Felt great. Felt right.

Confirm your registeration

2009-07-23T14:19:00.000-07:00

My friend feels badly about this now, even while I'm sitting here applauding her!

From: My friend
Subject: Re: Confirm your Registeration
To: Department of Education
Date: Thursday, July 23, 2009, 11:12 AM

Department of Education,

Should I be concerned with the misspelling in your email subject line?

Fun from a common email address

2009-07-22T13:54:00.001-07:00

Got this email this morning:

FROM: Mark Maguire
SUBJECT: Wats the story??

BODY: Hows it goin rachel?

I have really bad hangover this morning, me head is thumpin and i need to sleep. Good job its quiet in here today, i will have to kick them out of the office for a while so i can get a bit of kip or else find a hiding spot to sleep for a few hours lol.Its nearly time to get me breakfast i need a cure badly and some headache tablets ha ha.

Im never drinkin before work again........actually i know i will.

Cheers
Mark.

The only thing to do was forward it to my friend Jeff who came up with this response:

Mark,

I don't know who you are but you sound like my kind of limey! I'm the Rachel in California who doesn't have a hangover this morning. And you're the Mark with a name that seems familiar but only because I was an Oakland Athletic's fan in the late 80s, early 90s. Do you have a coworker or a rival named Sammy, by any chance? Regardless, I'm loving the use of words like "kip," and "thumpin" and do believe I'll start calling Advil "headache tablets," as it's a far more accurate name, I do believe.

Since this was sent many hours ago I can only assume you can now provide the follow-up story about how you managed today. I'd be interested to read it.

All the best,
The other Rachel B

Got this gem of a response:

Ha ha i was expecting a reply about ten minutes after i sent that e-mail this morning and realised that i left out a bit of the email address that i was meant to send it to,im a bit of a thick like that.That shit is fucked up i email some what i now know to be a random email address and it turns out your from california and you dont have a hangover :(.Well im from Dublin , so the "kip" and "thumpin" is a little bit of irish slang words.

The rest of the story is that i struggled through a breakfast took an age to eat it nearly me whole break, felt rough as bag of bricks after it for about two hours,got me headache tablets which cured the head but i was knackered for the rest of the day so i did no work didnt manage to get a bit of kip though, ah well you cant win them all :).

When i read oakland athletic, i was thinkin it was a football(soccer for you) team so i had to google them,i see my namesake played for them good stuff and seems he is quite the legend.I prefer the NFL meself not a big baseball fan although a lady i work with from Philidelphia, big phillies fan by the way is trying to force me to like it lol.

So thats the story of the rest of the day anyway,Hope this finds you well.

Cheers
Mark

That's a bitch

2009-07-14T23:43:00.000-07:00

Today I decided to really entertain the idea of giving up. A few months ago I had this moment where I threw my hands up and cried, "I've been beaten!" and then fully intended to give up but got confused and ended up going to the gas station to fill up my tank cause how was I going to get home if I didn't take care of that? I really got off track there.

Today I tried to get back on. I really did. I decided that giving up meant grabbing a blanket and taking up residence under a freeway overpass. That way I'd be the pathetic homeless person and not confused with a troll like I would have been if I took up residence under a bridge.

But then I realized I probably would still have goals if I lived under the overpass, even if they were as minimal as sleeping through the night. I'd probably struggle not to entertain my basic instincts for survival like getting food. It started to sound like a lot of work to give up.

Pain, disappointment--they're facts of life. I can see that I can't avoid them by going deeper into the darkness.

Maybe my ambitions should go on the backburner for awhile so I can go back to fundamentals to see what is really important and get that down. Then I can rebuild on top of it.

It's not my nature to do things that way. I'm like a stew. I like to throw everything in the pot at once, stir vigorously and then hope for the best. But maybe it's time to take it step by step.

Sidebar - I thought I did a small version of giving up today when I didn't shower and then wore a wife beater and a cap to work with no makeup. Nobody seemed to care and I was still taken seriously. I guess that's how people roll when you sell high performance race parts online. Turns out I wasn't giving up at all, just reveling in my awesome employment perks.

Also, maybe we need to come together as a society and change what these shirts are called? It's kinda offensive plus I bet my mom read that and thought I wore a really mean dude to work.

A Word on Physics

2009-07-06T23:47:00.000-07:00

I find physicists to be a funny people. On the one hand, they're so damned smart. On the other hand, I think they're on a highway to nowhere.

Take quantum physics. It makes me think of Hinduism. They're trying to find Brahma--that thing that makes up everything else. The smallest particle in existence. The origin of creation, I suppose.

It's just so silly. Sorry. I might start giggling. From what I gather it just keeps eluding them no matter how many particles they shoot across a room at lightning speeds. Even Einstein couldn't pin it down. Now it's, "Maybe it's string theory." Or have we moved past that? I haven't been paying attention since The Elegant Universe.

I'm sure I'm not the first person to think this and I certainly won't be the last but it's been indicated to me that what these people are searching for will remain slightly out of their grasp, like the carrot in front of the donkey's nose. I just can't see the secrets of the universe being penetrated with pedantic rational thought. I don't see enlightenment being achieved through the writing of a mathematical equation based on inductive logic. I'm almost laughing like a fat, happy Buddha right now. Chortling!

I struggled with this problem as a philosophy major. I'm speaking from experience here. All the reasoning and proofs that a Bachelor's degree afforded got me nowhere except maybe more confused than where I started. And now when I think about nothing I make a lot more progress. It's pure comedy!

On Letting Go

2009-07-06T23:32:00.001-07:00

Sometimes when I meditate I clench my fist and then open my hand up slowly, imagining that whatever I am grasping at slowly falls out of my hand. Sometimes I need to repeat the process over and over to really feel myself let go. It can be hard. Letting go of my anger toward my ex-husband was impossible until I realized that I was hanging on to it so tightly to have an excuse for not moving forward. I didn't want to face my fears.

On Saturday I let go of something major. It was fitting because it was Independence Day. As I left a crowded street fair I let go of my need to be around people all the time. I thought it would be terribly difficult because I'm such a social person but what I found was something else entirely.

Yesterday I heard How Was I To Know by Reba come on the radio. It was spot on:

What I was so afraid of
Turned out to be my freedom in disguise
Now I know what I'm made of
Guess it just took some time to realize
I was blind I couldn't tell
Put too much faith in someone else
Gave up on myself

How was I to know
That I'd be O.K.
Thought I'd lose it all when you walked away
How was I to know
I would be this strong
I had what it takes all along
How was I to know

I've been greatly disappointed because I've expected so much. What I let go of was the expectation. I stopped clutching and started accepting reality.

I went to see the fireworks in Newport Beach's Back Bay by myself and it was amazing. It reminded me of my solo trek across Europe at 19. That was magical. Why have I been so afraid to travel in America the same way?

I'm excited to see what the future brings.

Radical thoughts (not about free radicals)

2009-07-04T22:22:00.000-07:00

I was on a meditative run/walk yesterday, which is kind of weird to say because it sounds pretentious, first off, when it really was not. Well, it was kind of because I was in this really expensive neighborhood in Newport Beach with a great view of the Marina and happened upon an awesome spot to launch my boat, which is more of an inevitable slow-sinking blow-up raft but around here it's money to say you have a boat.

That tangent is actually useful. Two major things happened on this run/walk:

1. I realized that women really do think about a zillion useless things a second that tend to drive us nuts AND that we can shut this off but we are pretty damn addicted to these thoughts and don't pay much attention the fact that we can rid ourselves of them.

2. Since I have some practice in turning off my thoughts in meditation, I went there while walking and nothing went through my head. I did it again while driving today. I felt like I had penetrated the inner workings of men! When they say they aren't thinking about anything it might be because they really aren't thinking about anything.

2a. When you aren't thinking about anything you have a a good shot at seeing things in more accurate perspective. The thing I was mulling over before I turned off my thoughts was how to love properly. I haven't seemed to be getting it right. I came down a hill and turned onto PCH. I passed pedestrians and people driving. I was pretty aware of what everyone was doing. That's when the perspective hit:

I'm trying to connect and love but I'm not seeing the whole picture. I'm only seeing PEOPLE. There's so much more to connect with and love!

Lightbulb! It was like when I read Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything and then been aggravated that people didn't seem to give a shit about anything other than mammals because, damnit, there are so many other forms of life it's ridiculous. We can't even seem to name them all for chrissakes! I cared quite a bit about porifera then but my thinking wore out when society didn't seem to have any patience for it. "Who gives a shit about sponges, Rachel?" I DO! They're a lifeform! There's something special and holy in that. Life is something to marvel at and respect. Am I crazy here?

Furthermore, there is energy all around us. All matter is energy. E = mc^2. Nuclear fusion, nuclear fission. Breaking down matter into energy, binding together energy to make matter. So are we really all that different, from say, our coffee tables? You think about it. I don't want to say what I think here because it may be used to put me in a mental institution. That tends to be the thing with radical thinkers, bless their hearts.

Stranded in the Middle of Civilization

2009-07-02T22:22:00.000-07:00

Years ago I stood at the counter at the bakery, armed with my wit and sarcasm, waiting to help the next customer. The hapless victim ended up being an eighteen year old kid who had come in from the highway with his, "Stranded" sign

I was flabbergasted. I couldn't help him. This was an impossible situation.

"How can you be stranded in the middle of civilization?" I demanded of my co-worker.

He tried to reason with me but I wouldn't have it.

"You cannot be stranded! You can walk. Everything you need is right here."

Unfortunately I'd been overheard.

"You can need a ride," the kid offered.

"Well, that's different than stranded. Stranded is being stuck in the middle of the desert with no options. Sitting around passing time in Montecito is a different thing altogether."

And actually, I'm vindicated to see that Merriam Webster agrees with me. Unless he was left on base (LOB) the kid doesn't have an argument.

But the point isn't that I won. The point is that in a greater sense, I might have been wrong.

Today I sat around in my apartment in Orange County with everything material that I could ever need at my fingertips and felt completely lost. GPS couldn't get me out of there.

In the middle of civilization I felt detached from everything around me. Disconnected. I told my mom, "I feel like I'm skimming along the top of the sand instead of making footprints."

Now I feel like I know what that kid was talking about.

Of course, melancholy isn't a permanent state unless you're Eeyore so I snapped out of it soon enough. I realize now that what I was so upset about only concerned the future. Everything that was going on in the moment was perfectly fine. More than fine. A blessing.

Maybe that's the key to never getting stranded--not getting too far ahead of yourself or too far behind because wherever you go, there you are.