Spying

A week or two ago one of my Facebook friends, my 20-something ex-stepnephew, wrote this post:

When you see a homeless person begging at say, a road intersection corner, with a scratty cardboard sign, do you give them a dollar, perhaps more; if not, how do you react to those who do hand it out?

The answers he received ranged from this one:

F--- 'em. I work for my money. Most panhandlers, according to MULTIPLE studies, make about eleven dollars an hour. I feel no pity. Also, half of those guys are on wellfare and NOT HOMELESS.

to this one:

I feel guilty if I don't and gullible if I do - can't win

and everything in between. It's a question I've wrestled with and have come to this conclusion, which is what I posted back to my Friend: I don't care how much they make an hour; it's a terrible way to live. I give out of gratitude for what I have.

I didn't bother to expound on some other reasons I give, without feeling gullible:

• Many people who ask for money on the street are homeless through no fault of their own, including military veterans, the mentally ill (we closed their facilities and kicked them out), and others;
• Even if they choose the life they live, they are much more likely to be sick or wounded than others;
• They are easy prey and are often attacked;
• There aren't enough shelters even if they wanted to go to them, and if they have a cart full of "stuff" they can't take it in with them;
• Sure they drink and drug. If you lived on the street you'd probably want something to help ease that pain too.
• No, they can't just "get a job" because they don't have an address or a place to get presentable enough to appear for an interview.

I could go on. Have you ever really seen the people who ask you for money? Some of them are obviously not as old as they look; they're just beat up by life on the street.

Here's what happened in Grants Pass, Oregon, on Monday. I was parked at Walmart * (Have you noticed, they've changed the way they spell their name? It used to be WAL-MART; now it's lower case with a little flower at the end: supposed to give us a friendlier, more hometown feeling instead of a giant blood-sucking corporate behemoth feeling. At least, that's what some guy on the radio said, but I digress.)

To digress a bit more, you need to know that Michelle has privacy windows. I can see out but you have to put your hands to the glass and peer in to see me. Thus I am accorded a view of people who are unaware of being watched, which can be very entertaining and enlightening.

This past Monday I was getting ready to leave Oregon around 11 a.m. when a small brown pickup truck pulled into the space next to me. It was already hot and their windows and mine were open, so when their engine stopped I heard a woman say "I don't lie to you, you know. I will answer any question you have." I didn't hear what her companion replied. As usual when someone parks that close to me, I lowered the window curtain so they couldn't see me even if they tried, which means I didn't see what happened next, but I heard the truck doors slam and figured they had both gone into Walmart.

About three minutes later I heard the truck door again, so I raised the curtain enough to see that the woman had returned with a piece of cardboard that read "Taco Bell Quick Prep Chunky Beans," which she had apparently retrieved from the restaurant dumpster a few yards away. I watched her use a dull pocket knife to cut about a 12 x 18-inch piece. Then she took a big black marker and made a sign that read, "OUT OF GAS," in very neat, precise lettering.

Of course, I immediately thought, How can you be out of gas when you just drove the truck into that parking space?

But then I thought, Okay, maybe they are really low on gas and need to panhandle for more before they really do run out.

About that time a man with long graying beard and hair road up to the truck on a bicycle. He could have been 40 years old or 60. He handed the woman a piece of paper. "Forty cents," he said, as she folded the paper and put it with some others in a little compartment under the dashboard.

The woman finished her sign, got out of the truck and walked to the nearest cart return corral, where she chose a cart and then looked into a nearby trash receptacle. She was wearing a full-length "granny dress" and her hair was pulled neatly back from her face and tied with an elastic. Her face was tanned and worn. I wondered if she intended to fill up the cart with trash in broad daylight, so I decided to follow her.

By the time I got my shoes on she was nowhere in sight, but before I returned home I glanced into the pickup (the windows were still down) and saw the sign on the seat. I also saw the piece of folded paper in the little compartment under the dash, so I boldly reached in, picked it up, and saw that it was a receipt for cash on bottles returned to Walmart. Aha! Apparently Oregon has a bottle return law, I thought. (5 cents each, as it turns out.)

When I was once again ensconced in my window seat the woman returned with her cart, from which she unloaded into the back of the pickup two large white plastic bags stuffed with plastic bottles she had obviously scrounged from the trash cans at Walmart and the other stores in the complex. Then she left again on foot, without her sign.

As I was preparing to leave, the man came back on his bike, looked around for his partner and, not finding her, took off again. I left a five-dollar bill on the front seat of the truck, under the sign, hoping she would get to it before he did, and then wondering if she would tell him she had it.

On the way out of the parking lot I encountered a truly pitiful looking woman trying in vain to keep cool in the shade of a young tree. I don't know what her sign said, I just reached for some quarters and rolled down the passenger side window. When she came to take the money, I saw that she was in pretty bad shape. She could have been 20 or 50. She took the money and croaked something that I assume was a thank you. I rolled up the automatic window on my air conditioned home on wheels and left her there.

Praise the Universe from Whence All Blessings Flow...if you happen to be in the right place, at the right time, with enough dough.

PS: Yesterday I saw a woman on the street with a sign that said, no kidding, "Will Take Verbal Abuse for Spare Change."

PPS: Still working on that sonnet for you.

Finding God

If you don't find God in the next person you meet, it's a waste of time looking for him further.
- Mohandas K. Gandhi



If you don't know much about Gandhi I highly recommend any biography and also his autobiography The Story of My Experiments with Truth, in which he says, "I must reduce myself to zero. So long as a man does not of his own free will put himself last among his fellow creatures, there is no salvation for him. Ahimsa is the farthest limit of humility." Ahimsa is pure selfless love for every human being, and indeed for every living creature. It is non-injury in mind, word and deed.

Eckhard Tolle might say Gandhi was referring to the release of the egoic mind, which is that voice in the head, the thought process that continually reminds us that we are superior to others: smarter, better looking, more creative, more loving, more spiritual (you see where thinking can lead?). He says Descartes got it wrong: I Am despite the fact that I think; or, put another way, I Am only when I don't think.

Eckhart interprets Jesus' admonition to "Love your neighbor as yourself," literally. In other words, Jesus didn't mean love your neighbor as you love yourself; he meant love him because he is yourself. Your neighbor--and you--are merely the form that Consciousness/Essence/Being/Spirit/Presence/God has taken in this moment, in this blink of the cosmic eye. We are all merely the life force of the universe in human form.

By the way, if you identify as Christian--or ever did--Tolle draws comparisons with Jesus' teachings throughout his own teachings in a way that has re-opened my mind to true Christianity after many years of disappointment with the religion of my youth. I had painted Christianity with the same broad brush I used on all Christians; not that I wasn't aware of my prejudice, I just didn't know how to give it up. Reading Tolle has been worth my time if for no other reason than this.

Peace.

All Is Welcome Here

Broken hearts and broken wings,
Bring it all and everything.
Bring the song you fear to sing.
All is welcome here.
And even if you broke your vow a thousand times, come anyhow.
We're stepping into the power of now
And all is welcome here.
- Miten (song "All is welcome here")

The Peace Quote for today is actually the lyrics to a song by Miten. Here's the video too.

All is Welcome Here - Deva Premal and Miten - The best video clips are here

Day Nine?

Oh yes, Day 9 of 37. It went, never to be seen again. And I went to hear my sister and the Lindenwood Christian Church choir (one of the best in the city) sing Handel, always a favorite of mine. Then we had a lovely lunch with a friend and attended a play, Moonlight and Magnolias, a comedy. I fixed one of my favorite meals, from the old Weight Watchers Cookbook: Thai Marinated Steak (for my meat-eating brother-in-law), with a marinade made up of lime juice, cilantro, jalapeno, green onion, soy sauce and garlic--yum.



I did "not doing" in a lovely sanctuary surrounded by colorful stained glass and people who, like me, were there to find their own inner peace. It was Palm Sunday and the children's choir carried palm fronds and made me cry (as usual when I see children singing).

As I participated in the service I tried to focus on the Jesus I know, who is a different person than the one I knew as a child and as a young adult, a different one from the Jesus the minister talked about. I took the bread and wine that was offered, to be polite, but I didn't think of it as the body and blood. I thought of what Gandhi said: "I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

I also thought of what Eckhart says of Jesus: "Jesus on the cross said it all when He says, 'Forgive them for they know not what they do.' Which means they are unconscious. So when you realize that you naturally forgive." That is what I did yesterday morning, while music swelled and the prayers went up.

Day Three, Day Seven, Whatever

I don't know what number to assign to this day of the Do Nothing Challenge but it's not important. What I have learned is that taking the time to "become one with all that is" has helped me reconnect with the self that I was becoming before I found myself involved in a couple of situations that made that becoming more challenging. Those two situations are visiting an ex-lover and visiting my family.

Are there people in your life whom you have known so long, or so intimately, that they may have expectations about how you will behave based on past knowledge and experience? Does the "family dynamic" take over when you are together for holidays or other gatherings? I am the oldest of five children. Do you think my siblings see me in a particular way based on 50 years of experience, without regard for, or knowledge of, the work I have done to become the person I am today? It can be frustrating, but of course, it's not all their fault: I easily fall into those old patterns if I'm not constantly vigilant.

The same thing happened when I visited my friend Mary Helen in Houston a couple weeks ago. We dated for one year, around 1986-87. During the two weeks I spent at her house recently I felt the pull of our old relationship dynamic, which can be summed up as, "Just let me tell you how to run your life and we'll both be much happier." (Guess who had the control issues?)

So this challenge has come at an opportune time in my journey. I need a daily reminder that being Here and Now is the only place to be, and that the "I Am" that Eckhart talks about is not anyone's sister or mother or partner, but pure ego-less consciousness: One With All That Is. Peace.

Pretend You're a Dog

Okay, it's onward in the 37 Days Do Nothing Challenge and I'm finally off to a great start. Turns out I can't see the big magnolia from the sleeping side window of the motorhome, but the tree I can see is even better because it's a deciduous tree of some kind and it has that green on it. I had a grand time just looking at it, and watching the neighbor kiss her husband good-bye as he left in the car (so sweet), and enjoying the birds, and catching the fleeting shadow of a low-flying FedEx plane (imagining it was a chicken hawk and I was the chicken).

A couple of days ago I spent some quality Do Nothing time on the back deck with the dogs and cat. There is no better model for the Do Nothing life than a dog or cat. They don't hold a grudge because you stayed in the motorhome all day and didn't come in to play (poor Trixie cries and cries. Maybe I'll try bringing her out here), and they don't worry about whether or not you'll take them for a walk tomorrow. They live in the NOW, right where I want to be. Just another part of all that is.

Don't Just Do Something, Sit There

As you may know by now, I am a big fan of Patti Digh, her book, Life Is A Verb, and her blog, 37 Days. I admire her so much that when she suggests that we all do something, whatever it might be, I try to do it.

Her latest idea is that we should all pick one thing to do just for ourselves, and make a commitment to ourselves to do that thing every day for 37 days. I've been struggling to decide what that thing is, and it's already Day Four.

See, I already do just about everything for myself that I can possibly do. I wanted to live a simple, stress-free life, so I retired early and started living in a 19-foot motorhome. I wanted to see the country before I got too old to drive comfortably and that's what I'm doing. I wanted to work for peace in the world so that I could feel that I had contributed something important, which led to my discovery of Eckhart Tolle, who told me that the best way I can contribute to peace in the world is to stop thinking and align my consciousness with the collective consciousness of the universe. Aha! I have been trying to decide what to do when what I really wanted/needed to do was...are you ready?...absolutely nothing. That includes absolutely not thinking about what I want/need to do.

So I laid back on my comfy cushions and looked out the window, something I do several times a day already. Then I looked out the opposite window, and out the roof window. And while I was looking at the redbud and my sister's house and the trees, I stopped thinking about what I want to do for myself for 37 days and became one with all that is.

And then I realized that what I want to do for myself is just that, more often, and that I don't have to "meditate" in the traditional sense in order to do it. I just need to stop thinking and sit here. I don't even have to close my eyes; in fact, keeping them open, looking at all that is, seems to work better for me than closing them. I can keep the thoughts at bay more easily if I have something to look at (as long as I don't think about it, don't name it). I don't need a special mat, or special clothes, or a special posture, or special words. Oh heavenly relief.

So now I will set aside two specific times for not doing. In the morning, before I roll out of my bunk, I'll raise the curtain and look out at the fresh new morning and the big magnolia over my head. At night I'll go outside and look up at the stars, or the moon, or the clouds, and listen to the night sounds.

Hey, you know, if you do "not doing," too, we'll have world peace that much sooner. Just slip into the stream of consciousness, get on the frequency, ride the wave (to mix a triple metaphor). Oh my, what peace.

Are You Aware? Yes, You Are!

Awareness is our true self; it's what we are. So we don't have to try to develop awareness; we simply need to notice how we block awareness with our thoughts, our fantasies, our opinions, and our judgments. We're either in awareness, which is our natural state, or we're doing something else.- Joko Beck

Do you subscribe to the Daily Peace Quote? Oh, you must. The address is http://www.livingcompassion.org/. Every day you will receive a wonderful quote, some more wonderful than others, like the one above. I have a special folder in my "saved" emails for the ones that really hit me between the eyes, and I go back and look at them now and then. Sometimes I use one for the signature line on my email. My current email signature is a quote from that old curmudgeon H. L. Mencken: We are here and it is now. Further than that, all human knowledge is moonshine.

But let's get back to Joko Beck, whose full name is Charlotte Joko Beck (born 1917 and still living, in Prescott, AZ), who is a Zen teacher and the author of the books Everyday Zen: Love and Work and Nothing Special: Living Zen. Once again we are told that we already have within us everything we need in order to be fully conscious, fully present as Eckhart says. All we have to do is stop thinking about everything else and there it is: inner peace.

I had an opportunity to practice today while doing my volunteer assignment. Second Harvest is getting ready to do a Hunger Survey to find out more about their clients, the people who are served by the 200 agencies who help Second Harvest distribute food. As an incentive for the clients to complete the multi-page survey, each one will be given a $15 VISA card. My job was to open the 500 envelopes containing the cards, detach the cards from the printed material, recycle the paper and reinsert the cards into the envelopes in number order. It took nearly four hours, and I did it by myself, with no one around to talk to, not even a radio playing to relieve the tedium. I thought, what a great opportunity: four hours with nothing to think about. It wasn't the same as painting furniture or drawing (two things that never fail to engage me so fully that I forget to eat) but, amazingly, I was able to focus on the task and not think about what I would do afterward, or what I did earlier, or where I would go to dump the holding tanks in the RV, buy gasoline, do laundry and get a shower (which are the things that have been on my mind lately).

Later I went to the warehouse to help with food packing and came upon a group of adults from The Arc, the organization formerly known as ARC (Association for Retarded Citizens). They were packing "backpacks," which are bags of food for kids to take home from school on the weekends.

The bags include non-perishable, ready-to-eat foods such as Spaghetti-Os, pudding, snack crackers, fruit cocktail, etc., and they go home with children who usually get their daily breakfast and lunch at school through the free/reduced-price meal program. I have been aware of the school program for years, having worked in a school district where 50% of the kids are served by it, but I never stopped to think what those children ate on the weekends.

Anyway, here were these developmentally disabled adults packing bags of food, and I thought to myself that if anyone is probably conscious most of the time, it might be these people. They certainly seem to be living in the moment.

So I've had many reminders today that I have within me the ability to be at peace any time I choose to be. Incredible, isn't it? And if I can do it, you can do it. And everyone else can do it, too, all over the world. Stop thinking. Do it now.

Practice, Practice, Practice

My new spiritual practice is being put to the test.

I was getting pretty smug about how easy it's been to "stay in the present " or "be in the moment" or "live in the Now" as Eckhart Tolle says, but I was deluding myself. These days I come into contact with very few people on a daily basis, sometimes not even my hostess (in whose back yard I am parked), so of course life is easier, more enjoyable for me. In the past it's been the people in my life who made life hard, whom I perceived as the greatest obstacles to getting what I wanted. Perhaps it's been the same for you. Now, I'm on permanent vacation, enjoying beautiful fall days and communing with birds and chipmunks. No one demands that I come to a job (an obstacle to doing things I like), criticizes my work (an obstacle to my having high self-esteem), makes me wait for them beyond our appointed time (wasting my precious time that I could use doing something I like)...you get the idea.

The one person, however, who has been a constant in my life for the past 31 years and will be until the day I die, one of my greatest "obstacles," is my daughter, my only child. You remember, of course, that she is getting married in five days.

Well, something happened (it's not important what it was), and I have admitted to myself that she has a right to be upset with me. However, since I'm trying hard to stay in the present and not let my ego put me into defensive mode or even apologizing mode (so that I can feel superior for apologizing: you see how the ego as Eckhart decribes it can trap you?), I'm choosing to remain silent and just Be the Space for her issue--nothing else.

Fortunately, it is relatively easy to remain silent this time because the whole issue was presented to me by email from her two days ago. She chose that mode of communication rather than a face-to-face meeting or a phone conversation because, she said in the email, she was afraid she would cry through the whole thing. As a result of that choice, I have not had the opportunity to test my ability to remain present with her, and she has not had an opportunity to feel what that is like. Doesn't it take, if not eye contact, as least voice contact to Be Present? I thought of sending a reply email: "Okay." Or "Roger, wilco." But she didn't ask for a reply, either directly or by implication, so I didn't send one. Does my silence "speak volumes" and if so, what message has she received?

As you can tell, I have not "let go" of this yet. The night I got the email I struggled to focus on the present moment at least long enough to get to sleep. The past two days have been difficult, partly because I have not allowed myself to complain about it to anyone, which would have been one way I would have dealt with "problems with my daughter" in the past. Eckhart teaches that complaining is denying what is, thereby creating suffering for myself. It's also setting myself up as the one who is right as usual, by implication even if I don't give voice to it, and therefore superior to my daughter. I am right; therefore, she is wrong. He says my choices are to change the situation or thing about which I am complaining or, if that is not possible, accept it and move on. Of course, we all know we can't change another person, ergo...

Needing to be right has been my predominant modus operandi all my life, the thing I was led to discover in myself at a workshop in 1995. Since that time I have continually tried to be aware of my need to be right, and have attended other workshops on the subject. Eckhart Tolle's teachings have been the most helpful of all, perhaps because he offers a way to "do something" rather than just try to "be aware of" my behavior. Or maybe I'm just ready to receive the message, having simplified my life to the point where I can let it in.

Well, here I am talking about "problems with my daughter" again. Am I trying to justify the behavior by making it "instructive" for you, Dear Reader? I don't think so (at least, I hope not). Eckhart says, awareness of the behavior is enlightenment, a little pinch of it, anyway. That is the "doing" that he offers, the thing I cling to, the thing I am trying to share with you. I am focusing on becoming aware of my thoughts more of the time, on becoming the objective observer. My thoughts control my emotions; my emotions control my behavior.

How many times today have I said or done something in order to protect my oh-so-fragile ego? I'm letting it all go. Feeling my breath, moving in, moving out...in...out...that's the Present. The only place I can be. No worries. No fears. Just alignment with the energy frequency of the Universe. Aah...