Tag Archive: Buddhism


Political Leadership and Dialogue

Filed under: Life Lessons
October 28, 2015

GOP DebateAll over the world today there is debate about the relationship between politics and religion. As tonight’s GOP debate draws near in Boulder, Colorado, I’ve given some thought to the current candidates. Each has strengths and weaknesses. Thinking critically about the implications of any overarching objectives, is it possible in today’s world, which candidates remain aware of not only their own interests but the interests of all those they lead?

“Value-based” politics is not new. It’s been around for decades. What this increasingly meant was a politics based on a particular interpretation of the Christian religion and what it implied not just for theological understanding but also for political, social and economic practice. Thus, religion is no longer personal and private, it’s political and public.

I’ve come to this realization based upon several trends. First, religious texts are treated as statements of fact rather than a guide to meaning and life. Secondly, the reliance one particular religion as the ultimate truth is frightful. Thus, that belief system becomes the basis of government, law and practice. All other religions may be tolerated but not all will be respected.

We need leadership around sound principles and a political framework that can take us forward rather than back to what would be a contemporary version of the dark ages. The Dali Lama is such a leader. The Dali Lama meets with heads of state and beggars. In essence, he gets information from people at every level of society. By casting a wide net, he understands situations, can analyze them in many different ways, and creates solutions.

There are many, many leaders like the Dali Lama. However, in keeping the Lama’s leadership style in the forefront for a moment, the questions I would ask GOP candidates are:

  1. Once we understand people and their life, how will you lead the country in extending compassion to the people?
  2. How will you ensure your administration serve humanity by showing traits of peace, happiness, wisdom and enlightenment?
  3. In a diverse world, how will your administration and leadership foster inter-religious harmony and the welfare others while maintaining identity, culture and religion? Can we serve humanity without harming it?

If freedom and love is to be restricted, engagement limited, rights undermined, compassion thwarted and peace replaced with force there needs to be good and powerful reasons and a proper dialogue beforehand.

Unfortunately, for the moment, dialogue doesn’t seem to exist.

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Divergence Between Heaven and Hell

Filed under: About Love, Life Lessons, Social Justice
July 15, 2015

imageOn some level, maybe I’ve grown accustomed to ignorance. Not that I’m completely ignorant, but more so that I’ve got an ability to ignore that which surrounds. That whole statement sounds so New York. And maybe in that light, I’ve become more New Yorker each day.

For instance, I week ago I once threw change to an old man struggling on two canes. The weathered seventy something year-old glisten Fuji Apple red in the morning light. Eaten by blistered peeled skin, his hands shook unceasingly like a Home Depot paint mixer. There was no computer genius here, no lost mathematician or concert pianist. He was a societal cast away.

Yet dropping a few coins into his coffer became his morning ritual. That seemingly downtrodden man followed me, found where I worked and met me there each morning for several days. He became a pseudo toll agent and stood defiantly in my path until someone produced a few coins.On several occasions, I tossed a few outdated tokens obtained at a western Indian casino. After deducing who the culprit was, this gentle soul became belligerent. One morning, he was hauled away by NYPD authorities and I never saw him again.

But this reminded me that sometimes acts of kindness become entitlements. I am not not referring to entitlement programs offered by the government for the poor. Rather, it’s when an act of compassion is interpreted as comeuppance. And that’s what addicts do.

So many times in my life, I looked for hourly, daily, weekly and monthly comeuppance. It was a prerequisite to the day. At the end of the day, I became just like a New York castaway. And tired of my shit, people no longer moved to help. They sat. They watched. They commented upon my fall from grace and laughed.

Their lack of faith in my humanity did not dissipate overnight. Rather, I chiseled away my own humanity piece by piece, moment after moment, excuse after excuse. Like ‘Red’ in the ShawShank Redemption, I’ve lost my humanity, not because I’m an addict of this or that, because you think I deserve it.

The list of those celebrating my demise were many, Katherine K., Karen N., Joanne F., Mari T., Matt M., Tim B., H.H.H., and many many more. Yet no matter what anyone thought of my life’s experiences or worth, like all people, there was so much more underneath to learn. But no one did. Instead, personal redemptive efforts were suffocated, smashed and crushed like used cigarette butts.

There were many sleeplessness nights, where the desolate prodding of loneliness and loss accumulated like anvils. If I had life-affirming qualities, there were extended periods they where unacknowledged. But in that depth of darkness, I learned to tolerate life’s burs. Eventually, I became tough, calloused and could bear the verbal abuse of a thousand men. I became like and unlike those who walked New York’s concrete pavements. Like them, I wandered in-between corrugated steel girders almost without notice. Unlike them, I was full of compassion, love and beauty whose flowers simply waited for a few drops natures nectar.

It’s a weird place – a divergence between heaven and hell. But at the end of the day, we manufacture our own hell quite well. Find a way to live in heaven.

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New York Grime

Filed under: Life Lessons, Social Justice
July 6, 2015

imageAs I think about it, trial and error is vastly overrated. I keep hoping the next town, the next person met will open some unknown mantra and shed light unto Shangri-La. Yet addicts repeat steps others accomplished. Or mostly, what others haven’t accomplished. We continually yearn for the ‘something for nothing.’ Our often depressing day-in-day-out life relishes an idyllic world, where hope cures ills, where the guy gets the girl, bravery trounces cowardice and justice wins.

Addicts and common folk alike, simply cannot accept that we must do something for ourselves. You got here, wherever that ‘here’ is by yourself – and accordingly, we’ll have to find a way out of it – by ourselves.

New York City reminds me of all this and more.

My first impression of New York is vastly different from television. For the true witnesser, one quickly understands that dirt covers everything. Architecturally speaking, in the midst of all the grime, nothing seems eloquent. People become after thoughts. Streets are witnesses to personal unseen demons. Street grates and vents are clogged by strewn trash. The discard of humanity is archeologically petrified by wind, rain, snow and salt. Why toss stuff into a trash can when the street’s receptacle is logical, quick and readily available?

Whether we care to admit it or not, all us are like New York streets. Like personal shame, hidden fear and restlessness, crushed styrofoam, discarded remnants from Wendy’s, McDonald’s, and Burger King line New York roadways. Discarded gum liners, cigarette boxes, severed construction cones, old mattresses, foam, fragmented shipping boxes dot become pseudo roadway markers.

Every six blocks Apple iPhone 6 picture is silhouetted on some large building. One in particular caught my eye. It was a picture of a lone Saguaro cactus against the backdrop of a sun burnt Tucson, Arizona sky. It’s caption read, ‘Taken by an iPhone 6.’

Saguaros only grow near Tucson, Arizona. I’ve been there. Most New Yorkers haven’t. They’ll buy into Apple’s dream, that the iPhone 6 will produce some semblance of freedom and openness. It won’t. Probably never will. Few will ever embrace the open skies of New Mexico, Colorado or see the sun flowers of North Dakota.

Statistically speaking, New Yorkers live, breathe and die in New York. Few venture beyond the stagnant miles of steel and glass. Dressed in business attire and white sun dresses, the hordes simply bustle past their surroundings, willingly accept their surroundings and their fate.

The chronically drunk and addicted are pasted against shop walls. It’s not unusual to stroll past high priced outlet stores without seeing a forgotten soul splattered against the window pane. In their eye, there is no other life, there’s no hope. They’re soulless. Days filled by walking endless concrete carpets and alleyways, sleeping here, resting there, hoping for tossed parcels of used burgers and reclaimed sub sandwiches.

It’s difficult to sort fact from fiction. These are the same folks whom conservative pendents extoll as lazy, dirty and dangerous. Yeah, they are dirty. Sure, they can be dangerous. But society’s disdain and hatred put them there. With iPhone earbud drilled embedded into ear-canals, New Yorkers, walk past these wanderers with extraordinary contempt, nary a footnote in the biography of life. We’ve consumed ourselves in ignorance.

I hate my cowardice in dealing with people.

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It’s Time To Forgive Dolezal

Filed under: About Love, Faith & Doubt, Life Lessons
June 19, 2015

imageThe U.S. experienced two extreme discussions regarding racism. The week began with Rachel Dolezal and her belief in being black and ending with nine (9) shot dead at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

The entire discussion of race seems so narrow. In reality, people with ancestors from Northern Europe or Japan tend to have lighter skin than people whose ancestors are from sub-Saharan Africa or Australia. The reason for these differences may have to do with the amount of sunlight in each place and how much melanin you have. The versions of the skin color genes tell your body how much melanin to make. All of this means that the difference between dark and light skin is only a few changes in DNA!

Yet with all these changes, the world uses skin color as the basis for discrimination, hatred and genocide.

Dolezal, who admittedly overstated and embellishing her childhood and ethnic identity, has been the dart board of the internet and television. From Buzzfeed reports to NBC’s Matt Lauer querying her upon whether she was a ‘con artist’ and or ‘Blackface.’ Others attacked her credentials, her family, her life and her accomplishments as if everything of one’s life could be claimed null and void.

Then came Dylann Roof, a bigoted man whose use of racial terrorism was violently displayed. Roof’s actions were designed to strike terror and fear. Yet, what ultimately occurred was a lesson of courage and grace. One relative claimed:

“Everyone’s plea for your (Dylann Roof) soul is proof that they lived in love and their legacies will live in love. So hate won’t win.“

So who’s crime was worse? Dolezal or Roof?

What Dolezal critics missed is that by comparison to Roof, Dolezal claimed to have felt a spiritual, visceral, this feeling of central connection with black, embracing its beauty and wanting to celebrate that experience.

Her critics also negated her love and work.

“They really don’t know what I’ve actually walked through and how hard it is. This has not been something that just is a casual, you know come-and-go sort of identity you know, or an identity crisis. It’s something that I’ve paid away.”

And through all the media and web mud slinging, has any journalist reported of her accomplishments?

“I don’t think anything that I have done with regard to the movement, my work, my life, my identity, I mean, it’s all been very thoughtful and careful, sometimes decisions have been made for survival reasons or to protect people that I love,” Dolezal said.

Many have struggled with questions of how to forgive those who carry out those horrendous acts. In a time of such deep grief, how do you forgive the unforgivable? Forgiveness is a spiritual practice. As such, forgiveness has been taught by Jesus, the Buddha, and many other spiritual teachers.

Practice forgiveness for our own sake, to be unlocked from anger, fear, and resentment. Doing otherwise gives those who wronged you an even greater victory than their original act. The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church family members and vistims embraced forgiveness in a beautiful act of selflessness, something that can attempt to stop the seemingly endless cycle of hatred.

Ethel Lance’s daughter said:

“You (Roof) took something very precious from me. I will never talk to her ever again. I will never be able to hold her again, but I forgive you. And [may God] have mercy on your soul.”

Myra Thompson’s relative, Anthony Thompson, told Roof:

“I forgive you and my family forgives you,” he said.

Forgiveness is poignantly illustrated in a well-known Tibetan Buddhist story about two monks who encounter each other some years after prison release where they were tortured.

“Have you forgiven them?” asked the first.

“I will never forgive them! Never!” replied the second.

“Well, I guess they still have you in prison, don’t they?“

In the spirit of forgiveness, it’s time to forgive Dolezal. Let her continue the mission of rights equality.

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Hey Baltimore – God Answered Nothing

Filed under: Faith & Doubt, Life Lessons, Religion
May 2, 2015

PrayforBaltimore-copyChants of “no justice, no peace, no racist police” echoed through Baltimore streets Saturday in a march organizers dubbed as a “victory rally.” Pastor Michael Crawford homilized “Satan wants our city, and he can’t have it. We were born for this hour and we will fight this right away — on our knees.” Crawford further alluded to principalities and powers of darkness being everywhere, but God was greater.

The victory rally came amid a surreal week in “Charm City,” where Edgar Allen Poe eloquently wrote “There is no exquisite beauty…without some strangeness in the proportion.” Here’s a few of the bizarre I saw:

  • Rashid Wiggins sold $10 shirts with the slogan, with “I Matter.” Apparently $10 will ensure one matters;
  • Protesters charged police with “kidnapping” a prominent black community organizer. Never mind the fact the protester was arrested for violating curfew;
  • CNN’s Brooke Baldwin decided to blame the Baltimore riots on returning veterans;
  • Baltimore Orioles and Chicago White Sox played in an empty stadium; and
  • The Ad Council used an ill-advised Public Service Announcement (PSA) promoting a Caregiver Assistance program that included the background audio of a TV news anchor announcing:

“Riots nationwide have prompted local governments to declare martial law….the President is asking that citizens find safety and remain calm….authorities are working to contain the outbreak.”

I pondered this mess while watching a lone protester stand in front of the burned-out CVS with sign reading “God heard our prayers.”

Seriously? God heard our prayers?

Let’s highlight some of the insanity.

In Baltimore, police and civilian vehicles were destroyed, businesses looted, and as of this writing, fifteen officers injured.  In summary, Baltimore tallied:

  • 200 Arrests;
  • 15 Structural Fires;
  • 144 Vehicle Fires;
  • National Guard;
  • Curfew;
  • Citizens Attacked; and
  • Police Officers Indicted.

In the wake of Michael Brown, Ferguson recorded:

  • 80 arrests;
  • Over 100 gunshots;
  • 25 buildings burned and/or looted; and
  • Vandalized police cars in Ferguson, Missouri.

Oakland, California residents notched the following in marches for Michael Brown:

  • A looted Starbucks
  • Smart & Final had liquor cabinets pulled off
  • Chase Bank had two front doors smashed
  • Wells Fargo (targeted in previous Occupy and Trayvon Martin protests) experienced broken widows
  • 40 people arrested on charges ranging from assault on a police officer, to vandalism, burglary, public intoxication, and refusal to disperse
  • Officers pelted with rocks, bottles paint and fireworks.

But hey, God answered our prayers. It’s such a wonderful example of God’s intervention. Isn’t it?

I’m amazed how people attempt to find meaning in the absurdity. Truthfully, God answered nothing. The only principality was ignorance and intolerance. They were bred from our inhumanity – bred from deep within our soul.

If that CVS protester was right and God answered Baltimore’s prayer, then His message to those who lost a business was … what? To those who were attacked, did God ordain that?  Was God’s hand of justification empowered through a young prosecutor, the indicted officers or both? To those who lost jobs as a result of destruction, did God answer their prayers as well? I mean maybe they didn’t want to go to work that day. Did God get the prayer wrong, simply fuck up and make a mistake? “Oops, my bad,” God exclaimed.

A part of me wants to yell, “God answered Baltimore’s prayer, but Bosnia, Rwanda, ISIS, Boko Haram, Hiroshima and Nazi death camps were God’s plan? How many people go to bed hungry every night? And now you’re praying for the ‘God of justice?‘

Borrowing from Rabbi Brad Hirschfield, I openly ask anyone to tell me about God’s plan. But if you’re going to tell me about how His plan answered Baltimore, you better also be able to explain how the plan wiped out so many who had nothing to do with either Gray or the officers. The test has to do with going and saying it to the person whose business burnt down. Look in their eyes and tell them God’s plan was to wipe them out but justice was served. I don’t worship that God, but at least you have integrity.

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America! Stay Different.

Filed under: Life Lessons, Social Justice
April 6, 2015

Turing“Do you know, this morning I was on a train that went through a city that wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for you. I bought a ticket from a man who would likely be dead if it wasn’t for you. I read up, on my work, a whole field of scientific inquiry that only exists because of you. Now, if you wish you could have been normal … I can promise you I do not. The world is an infinitely better place precisely because you weren’t.”

~ Character Joan Clarke, The Imitation Game ~

I am haunted by the character’s words.

Why?

Well, there’s a ballot initiative that rivals ISIS atrocities, calling for the execution of gays and lesbians. It’s called the Sodomite Suppression Act.

According to the attorney pushing the ballot initiative, the only way to save righteous Californians lives is enacting a “kill the gays measure” found in the Old Testament. The author’s fanatical reasoning is to prevent “all of us from being killed by god’s just wrath against us for the folly of tolerating wickedness in our midst, any person who willingly touches another person of the same gender for purposes of sexual gratification shall be put to death by bullets to the head or any other convenient method; this by wise command of the good people of California.”

This is not the first time for such stupidity.

In 1982, Congress held its first hearing AIDS. Only one reporter showed. Some Republicans and Reagan administration members cast AIDS as a “gay disease.” One Republican, Rep. Bill Dannemeyer of California, delivered a speech on the House floor titled “What Homosexuals Do” and read graphic descriptions of sexual acts into the Congressional Record. He also pushed to create a government register of AIDS patients, corralling those who were HIV positive into internment and deportation.

Still, our current war against LGBT rights progresses onward. Governor Bobby Jindal supports a Constitutional Marriage Amendment, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and former Arkansas Govenor Mike Huckabee purport anti-LGBT theology and retired neurosurgeon and possible GOP presidential candidate Ben Carson believes jail turns people gay.

Why must there be war on the LGBT? Why do we need a “Religious Freedom Act?” Does California really need a Sodomite Suppression Act?

Diversity is America’s strength. We aren’t better by being one and the same. If we were the same, all clouds would be the same. Every tree would be the same. Every child would be the same and individuality would disappear and indifference would rise.

If we shot members of the LGBT community, Elton John would be dead and the world doesn’t get Queens, “We Are The Champions.” The Sistine Chapel ceiling, painted by a gay Michelangelo, would have to be destroyed. Great works of art by Leonardo da Vinci shouldn’t exist; that includes the Mona Lisa and Last Supper. Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker or Swan Lake ceases to exist. There would be no theatrical plays from Tennessee Williams or Stephen Sondheim. Andy Warhol’s groundbreaking Campbell’s Soup Cans painting would be a dream and Independence Day would not have been filmed.

Would we shoot Leonard Matlovich, an openly gay technical sergeant and Vietnam War veteran who received the Purple Heart, before or after he served? Are we willing to forgo Alan Turing’s team cracking Germany’s Enigma code during World War II, shortening the war by two to four years and saving an estimated 14 million to 21 million lives? Last but not least, can any of us condemn the hundreds of thousands gay men and women walking and working in everyday life, performing random miracles love, often unnoticed?

Shooting, killing, intimidating, expropriating the LGBT community’s ability to perform or exchange business services and property is no better than Hitler. All we’d have done is change the decade of occurrence.

Graham Moore stunned and inspired the audience at the 87th Academy Awards with his deeply honest acceptance speech for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Imitation Game.

“When I was 16-years-old I tried to kill myself,” revealed Graham. “Because I felt weird and I felt different and I felt like I did not belong. And now I’m standing here and so I would like for this moment to be for that kid out there who feels like she’s weird or she’s different or she doesn’t fit in anywhere. Yes you do. I promise you do. You do. Stay weird, stay different.”

America! Stay different.

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The Fallacy of Religious Freedom Laws

Filed under: Social Justice
March 30, 2015

101103_mike_pence_wave_ap_328Indiana Gov. Mike Pence (R) defended the religious freedom bill he signed last week, saying the growing outrage over the legislation stems from “… a tremendous amount of misinformation and misunderstanding.”

George Stephanopoulos, host of “This Week,” ended an interview with the governor by asking for a yes-or-no answer on whether it should be legal to discriminate against gays and lesbians.

“You’re following the mantra of the last week online, and you’re trying to make this issue about something else,” Pence said. “What I am for is protecting … the religious liberty of Hoosiers.” Pence described the media coverage and opposition to the law as “shameless rhetoric,” saying it strengthens the foundation of First Amendment rights rather than discriminates.

Believe it or not, a federal version of the religious freedom law was enacted in 1993. However, dozens of states have passed their own versions, including one passed unanimously in Illinois when President Barack Obama was a state senator.

Supporters claim that for the florist who refuses to sell flowers for a gay wedding or a baker who won’t make a lesbian couple’s wedding cake, this law fends off lawsuits each business might face. Whereas civil liberties groups assert the law could be used by businesses to deny service to people based upon sexual orientation and religious belief.

The problem lay in the suggestion that both sides have valid arguments. They don’t. One side fights for equality and civil rights while the other creates pseudo bigotry to prevent the other from becoming reality. There really aren’t two acceptable stances on these issues for millions recognize what mainstream conservatism doesn’t – that God loves all.

The argument over what Pence signed is destined to become visceral, vitriolic, and ugly. Both sides dig in, because each thinks the other is flatly wrong — both in heart and fact. As the debate rages on, this will spiral to a place so far away from the law itself.

As a Buddhist, in general, Buddhism does not make a distinction between same-sex and opposite-sex relationships. Instead, the expectation is not to harm, exploit or manipulate others, which would directly violate the third precept, sexual misconduct. For instance, Zen Buddhists often refer to hedonism, ascetic masochism and prostitution as practices violating the “Middle Way.”

On another note, I didn’t know we needed to strengthen America’s First Amendment rights, for they seem pretty strong. But strange how some believe one amendment requires strengthening, while others, per se, such as gun control, gains nary a review.

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Wanting More

Filed under: Life Lessons
February 20, 2015

A_Christmas_Carol_-_Ignorance_and_WantBy nature, we always want more. Laying in bed druing a recent afternoon, a friend quierred stated that she did not know me. She wanted more – wanted to utmost personal thoughts.

For the most part, I been a fairly secretive person. I never told loved ones more than they needed. Seemed cruel to do otherwise. For instance, my parents, girlfriends and lovers were never told of trips to Cali, Columbia, Lima, Peru, Venezuela or any other weird or dangerous place. Of course there was always the chance my family could see their son/lover on a terrorist propaganda film. I accepted that potential but took stock in my ability to know the difference between good and bad social situations.

Having been in the military and astute business traveler, one grows accustomed to danger. You continually assess risk against reward, pain versus gain. But I always scoped an out, always looked for an extraction point. For instance, to this day, none know I can recall phone numbers and addresses of 56 US Embassies across the world, key US flights into and out of high risk countries, potential exit information ports and docks, trains and key border crossings.

For many years, wanting more meant getting back to US soil in one piece, with limbs and sanity attached. There’s no way to simply explain the destruction seen. Disaster pictures posted on CBS, NBC, CNN and ABC bear little resemblance to it’s real world counterpart. Standing among miles of desecration of a typhoon is like having a sadistic artist chisel an image unto your psyche. It’s impossible for a NBC Nightly News photograph to replicate the scene. Seeing a deceased man after the Haiti earthquake was sensory overload. Media photographs come unaccompanied by groans of death, pleadings with God for mercy or pleadings for death, a child’s tears and caskets lining miles of road. To those who bear witness, images float like unprocessed photographic stills left on a USB memory stick. You know they’re there but they’re undeletable.

For those tucked in peaceful towns, criticism comes easy. But for people like myself, reporters, men and women of the Armed Forces, Doctors Without Borders and many many others, living completely only occurs from a 17 inch carry-on.

We live such lives because few can do what we do.

Coming home presents other problems. There are no Biblical verses that adequately mitigates stress. Verses expounding one giving their burdens to unto the Lord are drastically inadequate for those with a .38 caliber pistol pointed at their forehead. I’ve accepted just how difficult comphrension is for someone born, bred and living in a faithful community to understand the complexities village life 7,000 miles away. Thus, we accept gaps occur, people who spoke one way finds other voices, believers become unbelievers and unbelievers become believers. It’s the circle of life.

Wanting more is a theme humans seemingly perpetuate. Watching season 3 of Downton Abbey I found Lady Mary’s character pretty much a spoiled brat, rude and oversly self-absorbed about being a countess and staying at Downtown. I compare such images against that of a woman met eighteen years prior in South Africa. Her home consisted of four sheet metal walls, a tin roof, dirt floor, a blanket and some pots. I asked if there be heaven on earth, what would that look like?

“Heaven on earth would be running water.“

Ah, one man’s faucet is another man’s heaven.

A lifetime of wanting and craving creates a powerful energies that draw us toward fulfillment in the wrong ways. If we control the negative form of grasping and subdue it through insight, we’d be in a position to organize our life free of even the smallest trace of unnecessary clinging. To do so means you’d be capable of working and living peacefully in the world, of being undefiled, enlightened and tranquil.

We must lessen ‘want’s‘ burden.

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A Solitary Life

Filed under: Life Lessons — 1 Comment
February 12, 2015

imageThere are powerful words in Lynsey Addario’s memoir It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life of Love and War.

“I have missed the births of my sisters’ children, the weddings of friends, the funerals of loved ones. I have disappeared on countless boyfriends and had just as may disappear on me.”

As a vagabond road warrior and former serial asshole, I’ve never been a photo journalist. I rarely use my cellphone camera and never been to Syria, Afghanistan, the heart of Yemen or other strange places. Yet former girlfriends and wives, including Joanne, Julie, Karen, Aida and Virginia could attest that I’ve disappeared from their lives shockingly fast. I could barely commit to next week, let alone years.

I’ve spent funerals, births, birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, reunions and first communions sipping beer in an airport lounge or some distant hotel. I missed my brother’s wedding walking the jungles of Guam, deaths of Uncle Bill, Aunt Pat, Larry, Mike, Harry, Barbara, Jane, numerous cousins and countless distant friends. Literally, I don’t know my niece and nephew. I know their names, I know what they look like, but I know nothing of them. I’ve celebrated sunrises and sunsets, tornados and hurricanes, drought and famine with nothing more than a glass of Southern Comfort, an iPad or cellphone.

Contrary to a former administrative assistant’s repeated requests, there aren’t many pictures of me globetrotting through the 28 countries visited. Simply stated, when you live via carry-on, cameras are extra weight and knowingly giving a camera to an unknown local means it might just disappear. Romantically, I believe many would love to see these the places upon my visitation. Then again, there aren’t many who’d visit my funeral anyway and doubt few, if any, would intuitively grieve.

Borrowing from Sara Eckel, the intimate side of my soul did not acquire important skills such as how to be vulnerable, how to set boundaries, how to listen and how to speak up. I learned the art of compromise and forgiveness, but found many who couldn’t love when they didn’t always like one another. Thus, I cultivated significant wisdom from failure but bore little success. Maybe failure is a success?

In my parents generation, most married young and part upon death. Should death come early, they remarried quickly; if late, the survivor moved in with family or assisted living. In today’s world, surviving spouses avoid moving in with others—even, perhaps especially, their children. We cycle in and out of different living arrangements: alone, together, then alone again.

Still, as a Buddhist, I enjoy the solitary movement of my life.

I am a solitary person. Where others seek company, I seek secluded places of thoughtfulness and self-discovery. Like Thoreau, I go to the woods because I wish to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I haven’t lived.

A friend constantly eschews how hard her life is. Yet, quiet moments offers me the ability to understand that whatever life is, we must meet it; live it; not shun it nor call it names. Life is about living, about the essence of freedom available to all. Just as Lynsey Addario learned, it’s about living deliberately, with purpose. Similarly, George Bernard Shaw wrote of a purposeful life, a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one.

Living in solitude these past years, I recognize my own growth. I am deeply human, moral and spiritual. And I know that for most pressing moral questions, the spiritual and political can, and often must, go hand in hand.

Life is about waking in every moment. Whether you’re alone, married or bonded by group, live in the moment. Revel in it. Bathe in it. Breathe in it. And most importantly, live it.

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Brian Williams Will Resign

Filed under: Life Lessons
February 9, 2015

chinews-nbc-nightly-news-anchor-br-20150208I predict Brian Williams will eventually resign to pursue other opportunities. How can I predict such an event? While the military events surrounding Brian Williams and I are vastly dissimilar, the events and brouhaha surrounding Williams mirrors, almost exactly, what occurred to me five years prior.

As I wrote three years ago in my post Cruciatus in crucem. Eas in crucem, “…when I had a personal failure in the eyes of the community and I requested not so much redemption but forgiveness, I was given none.” On April 1st 2010, I was informed to take personal leave and then summarily executed the following day on Good Friday. And to this day, I remain forgiven by God, but unforgiven by the community.

For Williams, step one occurred Saturday, as he announced:

“In the midst of a career spent covering and consuming news, it has become painfully apparent to me that I am presently too much a part of the news, due to my actions. As managing editor of NBC Nightly News, I have decided to take myself off of my daily broadcast for the next several days.

What makes Williams believe he won’t be the story upon his return? Nothing.

As reported by the Washington Post, covering combat in person is a significant — and potentially life-changing — event. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, at least 61 journalists were killed in 2014. Twenty-three died while covering combat in 2014 and that’s nothing of situations such as the executions of James Foley, Steven Sotloff and other journalists by militant groups such as the Islamic State.

But what of accountability? As seasoned reporter, does he not have an ethical viewpoint that must be maintained? He does. But ethical principals are not equally adjudicated. Fox News Channel’s Geraldo Rivera was kicked out of Iraq in 2003 for revealing future troop movements while Dan Rather resigned as a CBS News anchor after acknowledging he used unverified documents in a story questioning President George W. Bush’s military service. However, even after a posting a seminude photo online, Rivera still corresponds for Fox while Rather’s career as a newscaster died a long painful death.

The lessons are twofold.

First, in todays’ world, almost everything you do is recorded. Everything you do via the Internet or social media is watched, tracked, monitored and recorded. Do not ever put anything on the Internet that you would not want someone to hold you accountable for.

Secondly, when you fall, learn to live through and past the experience. I violated the trust of those surrounding me way too many times. Those very events cost me dearly: lost my job, lost the love of my life, burned through a hell of a lot of savings. In truth, I found the following statement most profound, “Arrogant people cannot walk in unison with God or others.” It simply cannot occur.

For Williams the first year will be hell. Even the best personal energy is eroded by the constant emotional toll. I constantly found myself in torrent seas, lying too wounded from the battle. While the life I so wanted was reminiscent of a ship’s hull being ripped from the rocks, I found myself slowly sinking, swallowed by the darkened sea.

As a Buddhist, be forgiving. All of us have made mistakes. But we can strive to be of service, be mindful in understanding, showing kindness, honesty and humility. These are the worthy human values all of us should be proud to acquire. And while we may have gone to jail, lost a job, lost a loved one or family, we can become contributors to the greater good.

Nealry, five years later, I’m a survivor. I survived both my own inhumanity and that of the world around me. And while I lost my career, the death of our hopes in one led me to live out those hopes via another.

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