Four Seasons (Kim Mosley)

Being born is kind of simple. I've read about schoolgirls going out to the woods during recess and delivering their baby before the bell rings.

I was surprised to hear Buddhists believe that birth is one of the four causes of suffering, along with sickness, old age and death. Why?

The world where the fetus grows is very different from its next environment. Are we then done with birth? Not at all—our life and our birthing has just begun.  We contend (over and over again) with not getting what we want, and getting what we don't want. This goes on and on until we grow old and die.
In the meantime, we experience sickness and old age. As we recover from one mode of suffering we start a new one. So why is it so special to be human?

As I sat tonight I went from spring to summer to autumn to winter in each breath. I'd watch my breath arrive and it was spring. Soon what was so pleasurable became bothersome, so I would breathe out feeling pleasure. Yet the grasping for another breath soon followed that relief, and the cycle continued … on and on.

We welcome each new breath as it is born and grieve it when it leaves us a moment later. The cycle continues. And this cycle replicates itself in every mode of life.

Relationships start and stop. What was once glorious is replaced by excruciating pain. My grandfather, after losing his last dog, said he couldn't endure the pain of losing another one. He had lost his wife (the love of his life) when he was in his twenties. “No more loss for me,” he said.

So why is it so special to be human? Because we can watch as we bounce back with each exhale and enjoy the next fresh breath that bathes our lungs, our blood, and our psyche. It is our ability to watch that separates us from other life forms.

A Gift Called Goodbye (Erin Gaubatz)

This coming fall, I will be going into my senior year of high school and naturally, applying for colleges and scholarships. This is one of my essays that I’m planning to use this fall and I thought it would be a nice way to get back into writing on the blog.

In the four years leading up to our last goodbye, my mother was given a medley of gifts by the medical profession. The first gift was just the beginning. With a big tag labeled breast cancer, it showed up in the middle of our lives wrapped in a big pink ribbon, no card or instructions, and alas no gift receipt. Its arrival was marked with tears and puffy eyes. I used to hate the idea that there would ever be a reason that this disease was addressed to my mom, but it was she, that showed me how to take each gift with grace. Even the ones that make you cry. It wasn’t until the end of my sophomore year, when final gift arrived at our doorstep. Like before there was no card or instructions, and no gift receipt, except this time the once ambitious pink ribbon had faded, and the tag was not labeled with a diagnosis to start a fight, just a time: three to six months.

Shown (l to r): Mattie, Ronnie, Allie, Erin
Behind the camera: Doug

As my mother described, they were the days we had together and the days we did not. And it scared me so much. I had been given a time limit with the person I loved and through everything loved me. To think that three to six months would hold the last memories with my mom was not at first an idea I wanted to accept. Up until then, we had all taken on breast cancer as a fight. We wanted to win; however, it was my mom that showed us the beauty in accepting this time as a gift. And through her strength, I understood that acceptence did not mean surrendering. Accepting this gift of time was allowing myself to have a beautiful, long goodbye with my mom. I knew that she might not be there as I graduate high school, or walk down the aisle, but I would go through my life knowing that I was given the time that so many people never even get the chance to have. A gift of goodbye.

As one would presume, our goodbye brought along many tears, but it also brought memories, and joy, and most importanly, grace. I had listened to so many people tell me how strong my mom and my family was, and yet I don’t think it was strength that was holding us together. I believe that through the gift we had been given, we had all gained a feeling of grace. A grace that would accept even the heartaches as memory of a beautiful goodbye.

The first morning I went back to school after my mother’s death the air was still. As I stood in the grey light that hinted through the French doors on the back of our house, I could feel it aching to be revived by the sunlight. I was ready to go back to school, but I couldn’t help but linger for a few more minutes. My feet paced against the hardwood floor like ships waiting for their anchor to snag the bottom. Usually I raced out of the house in the morning, but that morning I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was forgetting something. By then the clock was pushing me along, so I went to tell my dad I was leaving. He stood in the kitchen, trimming another set of sunflowers from the pervious days’ services to put in a vase. As I saw the flowers lining the counter, I felt that knot tighten in my throat. This morning goodbye would have to take the place of two.

“Goodbye. I love you.” He said as he kissed my forehead and held me, backpack and all, a little tighter than most mornings.

Walking through the halls to my first class, I couldn’t help but wonder if the people I passed had said goodbye to their mothers that morning or if they hugged their fathers before walking out the door. I hope they did; even the smallest goodbyes are gifts.

Spring and Dogen's Being-Time (Mark Frank)

[Being-time] is the actualization of being. Heavenly beings like gods and celestials are being-time. All the things in the water and on land are being-time. The world of life and death and everything in them is being-time; it continually exists, actualizing itself in your present experience. Everything exists in the present within yourself. 

Continuous existence is not like the rain blown by the wind east and west. Continuous existence is the entire world acting through itself. Consider this illustration: When it is spring in one area, it is spring everywhere in the surrounding area. Spring covers the entire area. Spring is only spring; it does not presuppose winter or summer. It is the actualization of the wind and sunshine of spring. Continuous existence is like this. But continuous existence is not spring; rather, the continuous existence of spring is spring (Nishiyama, 1975, p. 70).

Cherry blossom viewing in a Yokohama, Japan park

We are presently experiencing a cold snap here in my hometown, after being teased with a spate of warmer weather – an occurrence that certainly has many yearning for the arrival of spring. But that which we call ‘spring’ neither arrives nor departs. To think of the coming and going of spring, and time, is to think of time in the ordinary way—as something that passes. But if spring is something that passes, it must go somewhere. If time is something that passes, and we are time, then we must go somewhere—and yet we remain.

“Continuous existence is the entire world acting through itself.” What we call ‘spring’ is the entire world acting through itself. The entire world is neither arriving nor departing. The entire world is the sun and earth actualizing being-time, engaging in a spinning dance of nearness and farness. The entire world is the earth actualizing its being-time, now showing this face to the sun and now another. The entire world is life in all of its forms actualizing being-time in the present moment as all of life has actualized being-time in the present moment for eons and eons. The actualization of being-time includes warmth and rain and rising sap, buds and blossoms and birds building nests. The actualization of being-time includes the emotion and wonder of human beings gathering to enjoy that which we call ‘spring.’ But continuous existence cannot be contained or constrained by the word and concept of ‘spring’. Only “the continuous existence of spring is spring.”

Elsewhere in Uji, Dogen invokes a variation on the now well-known koan related to a monk asking his teacher, Joshu, the reason for Bodhidharma having come from the west. Bodhidharma, by the way, was the monk of Indian birth who is considered the first patriarch of Chinese Zen, or Ch’an. In the more well-known version, Joshu responds: “Cypress tree in the garden.” In Dogen’s telling of the story, however, we have a conversation between two Zen Masters, Yakusan and Daijaku, the latter with an apparently deeper realization than the former.

[Yakusan] asks, “I have more or less clarified the import of the three vehicles and the twelve divisions of the teaching. But just what is the ancestral master’s intention in coming from the west?” 

Thus questioned, Zen Master Daijaku says, “Sometimes I make him [Daijaku refers to himself] lift an eyebrow or wink an eye, and sometimes I do not make him lift an eyebrow or wink an eye; sometimes to make him lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is right, and sometimes to make him lift an eyebrow or wink an eye is not right.” 

Hearing this, Yakusan realizes a great realization and says to Daijaku, “In Sekito’s order I have been like a mosquito that climbed onto an iron ox.” (Nishijima, 2009, pp. 147-148).

Given the context, I think we can safely conclude that Dogen considers Daijaku’s response to have conveyed his understanding of being-time – as does, for that matter, “cypress tree in the garden.” Just as the being-time of the cypress tree reflects the deepest truth of the entirety of the universe, and just as the being-time of the sun and earth and all that lives in or on it or rains down upon it encompasses that which we call ‘spring,’ so the being-time of Bodhidharma and all those who intently practiced the Dharma with him in China encompassed that which we might call a Zen ‘spring’ on the Asian continent. But if that is what Daijaku intended to convey, why didn’t he just say it? What’s with all of this raising of eyebrows and winking – or not? My understanding is that Daijaku is conveying his understanding of Bodhidharma’s being-time by relating the truth of his own being-time, and by doing so, relating the truth of being-time in general. If he’d replied by saying “cypress tree in the garden” (someone else’s answer), Yakusan would not have understood Daijaku’s response as the deepest expression of his own understanding which, itself, is always changing, always evolving, never absolute – being-time. And so it is that Daijaku sometimes “make[s] him lift an eyebrow or wink an eye.” Daijaku is conveying the reality that being-time is the moment-to-moment “actualization of being.” He is conveying the reality that “continuous existence is the entire world acting through itself.”

But that is not quite all there is to Daijaku’s understanding of being-time. By his own admission, that answer is sometimes correct and sometimes incorrect. Being-time encompasses enlightenment as well as delusion. Perhaps Bodhidharma himself, if we could ask him why it was that he came from the west, would respond very much as did Daijaku: “Sometimes I head east, and sometimes I head west;  sometimes to head east is right, and sometimes to head east is not right.” Such is being-time.

Sometimes spring arrives ‘right on time’ and sometimes spring is ‘late.’ Sometimes spring comes ‘early’ and with it the awakening of myriad beings which then freeze or whither or starve. This, too, is being-time. To say that spring has made a mistake or that all of those myriad beings have been mistaken is to not understand being-time. Arriving early is being-time. Arriving late is being-time. Heading east with the intention of heading east is being-time. Heading east with no intention whatsoever is being-time as well.

Cherry Blossoms and Temple Cat

Read the entire post on Mark's blog, http://crossingnebraska.blogspot.com/2013/01/dogens-being-time-part-2.html

Cherry blossoms in Mitsuzawa-park at Yokohama, Japan by Kounosu via:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cherry_blossoms_in_Mitsuzawa-park_at_Yokohama_Japan.jpg

Temple cat amongst cherry blossoms by Tanakawho via:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cat_(412403542).jpg

Iris (Betty Gross)

A Real Home We Have in the Body (Emma Skogstad)

In the center the most tender is.
Silent weeping, softness,
children sleeping, baby bird—
everything that is unwinged and woundable
is curled up deep under
the iron bars of ribcage.
This gentle place young is,
and timeless and without face it is.

We, believing ourselves homeless, forget.
We rush about and stiffen
to protect and hide
from others, from ourselves,
we in our turtle shells,
hunched back or chest puffed out:
it’s all the same.
It’s all protection of
this most vulnerable,
this most tender.

But the center is where
stars shine, where
we are guided
to each other, where
if we are most brave,
if we have been most harmed,
we know indestructible we are.

To meet each other tentatively
most in this tender place:
we save each other;
we save the world.

A Story of an Ordinary Day (Bill Metz)

Everyday life ... is ... the only teacher ....


Jack’s old Volvo turns the corner. Motor dies. Oil spills.
   
     Thin 80ish man. Such sweetness.

He’s sure it just needs one little thing. A wire reattached. A little coolant. He fiddles. I talk. I wonder. Do I need to take this problem from him? I ask if his wife knows where he is. I ask is anyone—a brother—he can call?.
   
     “No one I would want to disturb.”

He thinks the car, her car? only needs a jump start. I smile with him. A neighbor is arranging the jumper. He tells me his wife died 3 months ago. He tells me they had a revival of romantic love. He tells me about the minutes and seconds before she died. She asked for a kiss. He gave. She received. That gift. And in seconds he watched her blood pressure drop to zero.
   
     I thanked him.

I already had two grieving people to try to catch that day, that morning, almost that hour.
   
     I didn’t have to take on his car problem. A neighbor did.

My lesson was—I don’t have to take on every problem that the day presents. His neighbor assisted with the car problem—competently, gently, lovingly.
   
They had to call a roll-cart truck to take her away, the old Volvo. The motor was dead.

Jack needed one person to hear his story. Another to fix his car.

Crying (Kim Mosley)

From Ruby's BBQ, men's rest room, Austin, TX

One of my eyes has been crying lately. Maybe it has been crying a long time and I just didn't notice. Sometimes I think this is a problem. Should I get it fixed? And then I wonder which eye should be repaired: the cryer or the tight-fisted “I'm not going to feel anything eye.” It is my right eye that cries. Normally, it is the left that is known to cry. Like most things, I have it mixed up.

It feels good to cry. I never was much good at it. My father told me to stop crying when my mother died. That wouldn't have been so bad except it was so hard to cry that I was glad I was crying—glad that I was feeling something.

But then, when he was dying, he got mad at me because I wasn't crying. He told me that this was a very somber moment and that I should be sad. But he was so beautiful in his acceptance of death that I laughed.

It is convenient to half cry because I can wipe my tears with one hand. Tears are kind of salty and cool. Maybe that's why they feel so good.

I suspect it is my body that cries. My mind looks at things very differently. It views the costs and benefits of the situation. A tree dies and I say to myself, “now the sunlight can hit the pond.” I don't feel much for the tree, until I feel this cool drip seeping down my cheek. Then I ponder, “Oh no, the grand tree is gone!”

P.S. As I read this out loud to my writing group, tears started coming from the left too. Someone handed me a box of tissues. That's a first for me.

P.P.S. Think I'll call the eye doctor, in hopes that it is my heart and not something less serious.

P.P.P.S. I have an eye appointment at 2pm. Stay tuned.

P.P.P.P.S. The eye doc said I have matted eye lashes and that I should wash them three times a day with Johnson Baby Shampoo, diluted 1:1, for a week. He was concerned that I didn't know what 1:1 meant. I told him that photographers know that. Of course, this disease has a cool name: blepharitis. He said I could read about it on the web.

Willing the Moon (Sarah Webb)

Hard to hear
this slippery sound,
change slipping down

in darkness the bean
uncurls his fat stalk

a cat steps over the mounded row

I sit at my window
writing this,
willing the seeds to grow
the moon  to rise past the trees

demanding a poem
stopping myself

Let it come
the slow push of bean
against mud

Now Come to This (Betty Gross)

Weeds, Milam County , TX

Now come to this empty field,
this burned and blackened expanse.
We burn to clear; we slash and burn,
ready for planting.

Seeds of thought are hidden, protected.
Spring is full; summer is near.
And what of this promise,
the empty made full and on and on?

This cycle is dependent on impermanence.
Where is the center,
ever-shifting but no less connected?

We wonder as we wander
and take the backward step
of no expectation.

Cry and mourn,
light and dark,
each with its gravity.

Signifying nothing,
a moment is flow.
We can’t force the waterfall to flow.

Wait for the next click of the clock.
Night follows day.
Spring is not jealous of Winter
or resentful of Summer.

A kernel of longing,
a piece of a picture.
A jigsaw there,
but not for owning.

Kuanski Falls, Cambodia

Cherry Blossom Tattoo (Joel Pang)

Cherry blossoms and koi fish design and tattoo by Joey Pang via Wikopedia Commons

Challenge #6: Vulnerability in Practice

The practice makes us vulnerable. We are led to let the carapace of protection drop, and then what of our old protective habits of fear and retreat, anger and blame? The writers in this issue's JustThis speak of opening to people and feeling worthy enough to come out of hiding, responding to aggression and danger in new compassionate ways, fully experiencing change and loss, becoming malleable and receptive to whatever comes.

Vulnerability and Worthiness (Emma, Kim, Quandra)

Kim: When Quandra wrote “vulnerability” I felt something hit me in my chest. It is the elephant in the room. “Worthiness” didn't seem so serious . . . maybe even another topic. Tonight I went to a party. Everyone was talking to someone, and I didn't want to intrude and didn't know how to intrude. I thought I might be at the party and leave without talking to anyone, and no one would know the difference. Then I saw a man seated alone, and I sat at his table and we started talking. He knew all about the migratory patterns of Monarch Butterflies and told me about them. I felt vulnerable at the party as I do anticipating my 50th high school reunion in June. What if someone discovers I have nothing to say?

Quandra:  I think worthiness and vulnerability are correlated. When my Uncle Des walks into a party, he proceeds to interject himself into every ongoing conversation throughout the night. He enters the room with the assumption that he belongs. I love it.  He couldn't care less who knows more about a topic of discussion; he'll just throw in his 2-cent opinion with no hesitation or deliberation. In his mind, nothing he says can detract from his non-negotiable sense of belonging. That's an awesome sense of worthiness that I think empowers his willingness to put himself in vulnerable positions (e.g. mingling at a party).

I haven't been as open to vulnerability because my sense of belonging—worthiness—isn't as strong. I wanted to invite a friend somewhere today, but I talked myself out of it, saying "she probably won't want to do it," and decided not to open myself to rejection. I decided not to make myself vulnerable.  Then, I asked myself what a person who assumed their own worthiness would have done. That person, I think, would have just offered the invitation without the deliberation and wouldn't have taken a decline as a personal rejection because their sense of worthiness doesn't depend on any specific event . . . it's just assumed to be true so being vulnerable isn't so threatening. If I believe I'm worthy of love and belonging no matter what then I can be vulnerable and okay no matter how things work out. I can be awkward at a party and know that I was just awkward at that party, that's all. My core sense of worthiness wouldn't be shaken to the point that I fear whether others see me as worthy. I haven't grown to this point yet.

Emma: Me neither. I love the phrase “non-negotiable sense of belonging,” Quandra. Yes, that is what I long for. I hold back, too, swinging between a longing for connection and a fear that being vulnerable will lead to my annihilation.

I used to often feel as though I had no feet. My vulnerability didn't feel like a choice to be made, just something that I had to cope with. Without my feet, I'd get knocked flat on the floor with just about every interaction I had. A lot of therapy and my Zen practice have slowly returned my feet to me. I still get knocked about some, but I can at least stay upright now. I suspect that this basic sense of worthiness is to be found in the body, in having a fully embodied experience of our own right to be here. Our bodies don't question that. I mean, our lungs don't say, “Has Emma been good enough to deserve breath today?” They are utterly impersonal. Our hearts continue to pump blood through us day in and day out, whether we're being kind and loving or a total asshole.

There is grace in talking about topics like worth and vulnerability. It would never have crossed my mind that either of you would have concerns about your worth. You're both fascinating and brilliant. Knowing these fears are universal somehow takes the sting out of them. It's just more evidence that they're not personal.

Kim: The Monarchs’ life span varies greatly (from 3 months to more than a year) depending on when they are born, and what jobs they need to do. The man I was talking to said they are the only animal that has such a varied life span. Of course, we are all vulnerable to have a premature death. But that is not determined by the date of our birthday. Is this vulnerability about fearing death? Certainly that's the vulnerability of a soldier (something I admittedly know little about). Or maybe the ultimate vulnerability is facing the wall in the zendo? We can't turn on the radio or TV. The only opium is running away with out thoughts, and that gets old pretty fast.  We are nothing but who we really is (Suzuki Roshi used "is" instead of "are" to denote the oneness of things).

I keep shying away from the worthiness part of this theme. At first I thought “I don't have an issue with that.” Now I've flipped 180° on that. It is my insecurity of being worthy that makes me so vulnerable. Thanks, Quandra, for suggesting this topic, which is quite the Pandora's box.

Quandra: Emma mentioned annihilation.  That's a heavy word.  When I read that I thought "maybe that's what has to happen though." Maybe, annihilation is what leaves our true selves exposed.  I heard someone say there's a part of us that was never born and a part of us that never dies.  So, not even annihilation can touch that part.  That word made me think about that section of A Path With Heart by Jack Kornfield that says “Only to the extent that a person exposes himself over and over again to annihilation, can that which is indestructible be found within.”

I wrote at the end of my previous thoughts that I haven't grown to that point of a non-negotiable sense of worth yet.  After I sent the email, I thought of it differently.  It's more like I haven't grown to the point of reconnecting with it.  I remember being a teenager who didn't care so much about what others thought.  It's been over the years, for various reasons, that I learned to guard my heart and shy away from being too vulnerable.  That's what I mean when I'm talking about vulnerability: exposing my heart.  I don't really mean physical vulnerability or fear of death.  I feel I have so little control over that.  I don't even bother worrying about it.  I like what Emma mentioned about an embodied experience.  I want to settle so comfortably into my body that I reconnect with that part of me that knows exactly how to reach out in vulnerability.  That part of me knows exactly how to take care of me in that vulnerable state.  I need to reconnect with that.  In my mind, I feel like that would be like coming home to myself.

Kim: Yesterday at a Shuso ceremony at the Zen Temple we had the opportunity to ask questions of the Head Student. I asked him, “Is the Big Mind vulnerable.” First he said, “I haven't heard that question.” I replied, “Well, I made it up.” Then he said no, the Big Mind is not vulnerable, but when we come out of it, we are. I switch back and forth between feeling vulnerable and feeling invincible (actually most of the time somewhere in a la la land in between). It seems my choices when I'm feeling vulnerable are to be depressed, to protect myself from harm, or to simply take notice of that feeling and gently bid it goodbye. Bertrand Russell wrote in his autobiography that he used to feel tremendous anxiety. Then one day he realized that in the grand scheme of things, he was so unimportant in terms of the cosmos that his existence or non-existence really didn't matter (Big Mind?). From that point on he claimed his anxiety had left. Did he bid it goodbye or rationalize it away?

Quandra: I can relate to that. I'm less likely to fret over myself and how others see me when my perspective is broader. I adopted a new kitten this weekend (Zoya). I've been so consumed by taking care of her I barely remembered how agitated I was last week over a very uncomfortable meeting I had at work last week. Normally, I would have replayed that meeting in my head and wondered how each thing I said and did might have been perceived, but I brought Zoya home and was only focused on making her comfortable (and making sure she doesn't scare my geckos and bird). I've had a broader perspective, so protecting my image is smaller. Maybe, it's not that vulnerability goes away exactly. Maybe, it can just be held in such a large perspective that it doesn't dominate our emotional state. I think this is why some people recommend doing volunteer work when you're feeling down . . . getting connected to something bigger than ourselves can make us feel less anxious about our own image.

Emma: Yes, being of service helps me put my fears into perspective. I think it's because love, tenderness, and compassion arise in me, and their enormousness cradles the fear, vulnerability, and shame, which are, in that moment, both right-sized and deeply cared for. The love, tenderness, and compassion might be arising in response to someone else's needs, but they are my feelings, and they help me, too. I've found myself in so much fear about what someone is thinking about me, absolutely lost in despair over it, and then had that same person tell me about some struggle or joy in his or her life, and the fear just seems to dissolve—perhaps like Steven Levine says, into the enormous heart of mercy. And other times, the fear and vulnerability and lack of self-worth are just up and all that I can feel. It's so hard to just greet them, to recognize them as old friends, but doing that feels needed sometimes, too. Kosho talks about how all of our many selves are always trying to help us. The parts of me that feel fear and vulnerability, that say, “No! Do not connect! Danger! Danger!” are loving me in the only way they know how; they're using every bit of knowledge they have to keep me safe. It's just that those parts of me don't have access to the vast store of knowledge and experience from my whole life that I can find when I'm present to my whole self. Congratulations on your new kitten, Quandra.

Quandra: Emma talked about her love, tenderness, and compassion being extended to others but helping her too. I want to remember that . . . my goodwill towards others helps me too. That's really helpful. There was a guy who shared at a meditation group I attended who really made himself vulnerable.  It reminded me of how valuable it is when someone demonstrates vulnerability; it's like an invitation. I'm so grateful that he didn't hold back. His vulnerability invited me to share my own. That type of revelation can allow for real healing. A wound can't heal if it's not exposed.

Kim: I'm reminded when I am at funerals and one person after another speaks so authentically and with so much insight. If only we could take that truthfulness and retain it for our non-funeral activities. It is like we take our clothes off and reveal our deepest most innermost heart of hearts. Wow. How can that level of vulnerability be retained? That incredible warrior strength? That courage?

Emma: Life is so generous to us. It keeps presenting with opportunities for us to open up to our deepest experience of ourselves and one another. Not just with big, momentous life-changing opportunities; all the time. We get to choose again and again how we will respond, who we will let in, how deeply and thoroughly we will let ourselves be moved by it.

Kim: And we can open up now. That's the incredible gift of life—that we can “start over” at any moment.

Ai-ki-do(g) the Way of unifying with life energy or any other growling entity (Mike McCarthy)

“There are indeed (who might say Nay) gloomy & hypochondriac minds,
inhabitants of diseased bodies, disgusted with the present, & despairing of
the future; always counting that the worst will happen, because it may
happen. To these I say, How much pain have cost us the evils which have
never happened!”—Thomas Jefferson, Letter to John Adams, Apr. 8, 1816

After years of participating in martial arts, vulnerability as a practical
physical function has become second nature. It's easy to surrender to an
aggressive force by flowing with the action until your opponent's aggressive
move has carried them beyond their ability to maintain stability and
balance, allowing you to leverage their own momentum against them. But inner
vulnerability as part and process of an enlightened path is much harder to
achieve because the opponent is self. Our ignorant myopic view of reality,
our misplaced fear of hurt or rejection or failure, our selective
pessimistic memory that tends to focus only on the negativity of past
experience, our insatiable desire to control, and our denial of our own
inner potential, all separate us from freedom, freedom from our own self
centered illusion.

As a young boy I walked to elementary school every day, and there was this
large dog that took certain undue and unwanted interest in my wanderings by.
First there were only growls and barking as I hurried by, but somehow the
creature sensed my fear, and the situation escalated over several days. I
tried running and I tried kicking back at the beast, who was set upon
chasing me, but both actions led to tugs at my pant leg and shattered ego as
I desperately tried to remain on my feet and struggled to move beyond his
territorial bounds where he would eventually cease his aggressive pursuit.
My fear only increased as the days went by. I imagined all sorts of
miserable and tragic fates; and, I asked the wrong questions. Why me? What
did I do wrong to deserve this? When will this be over? Can I face another
day? How can I avoid the situation? Should I lie about not feeling well and
stay home?

Then the day came when I was finally liberated from my fears by fear itself.
I had carried the burden for so long that it turned into paralysis. As the
dog raced to once again harass me I was frozen in my footsteps. I couldn't
move; this was the end. I closed my eyes and surrendered to being knocked
down and having my throat ripped out. But seconds went by and nothing
happened. I slowly opened my eyes and there he was, just sitting with head
cocked to the side and ears perked erect. I stuck out my hand and he sniffed
my palm. I remember him relaxing his ears and returning to his haunt on the
front porch of the house. I hadn't fled and I didn't try to harm him; I had
unknowingly communicated a new signal. I wasn't prey on the run, and I
wasn't a threat; I was just another creature passing by.

Fight or flight is part of an ingrained mental state. We have rehearsed
fight or flight so many times in our lives, beginning in our childhood, that
they have become deep ruts in our inner consciousness. But what if we use
the momentum of every situation, good or ill, that comes our way to leverage
our fear of the unknown? What if we simply surrender to vulnerability and in
doing so maintain our inner spiritual balance? Might we find that it is our
self centered and deluded illusion of reality that is the true root of the
distress and suffering in our life?