That is the curse of the age we occupy - everything is supposed to be a big deal · However the big deals get lost in the translation, each time a bloom opens, a web is spun, an infant chuckles for the first time; those are important, the death toll here, or there i hate to say is unimportant, or of relative importance. Our attention has been hijacked by professional manipulators of attention, so much so we are no longer even aware when someone or something has usurped our agency. Leonard Cohen said it well, “The blizzard of the world has crossed the threshold and overturned the order of the soul.” Just now i am listening to Bob Dylan’s “Thunder on the Mountain,” it has an oddly calming effect on my soul, which while not in torment is certainly in the throes of growth and lonely - and not · My existential luck seems to be holding, but it is more likely the result of good hydration after two abbreviated laps around the community i am lucky to be locked in.
Yet, to be true most of the communities i’ve lived in in the past 5 years on 4 continents would yield in some similar way a like feeling, for the world is truly full with love and loving people is that is what you are fronting. I use that vernacular loosely because i found long ago i have no switches - there is no back channel · What you see is what you get. At least that is the public persona i strive for, but the longer i explore the “con” Pema Chodron zeroed in on, the more i find the frightened hurt child to whom Master Thich Nhat Hanh says simply, “be kind.” It is a very useful admonition for one cannot really avert misery nor evade pain. I remember the Harris Ceramic Shop when i was still wet behind the ears, and looking up into the face of John the father of 5 wooly sons one of which is my “Indian Guide blood brother”, saying simply and with conviction while explaining his reading of the history of Buddha and the 4 noble truths - “Life is Suffering” ·
What dumb luck to be exposed to such a timeless truth at such a tender age, a truth which still evades my full understanding some 50 years later. The acceleration that the motor wrought is fairly useless in trying to comprehend something as profound as that, so why do we bother with motors¿ that is a question? I can tell you for certain i do not have the answer for you - it is difficult enough to answer most of the questions i ask myself · why is it that i find comfort in those questions i ask myself, for example? I know that terror is not a natural state of being for our kind or for most any other form of life on our planet - who benefits when i am afraid¿ who is responsible for my fear · the terrorist, or myself? who has greater control over what i feel, myself or others¿?
I struggle with the abstruse aspects of learning, most especially when experts parse the simple into finer and finer points - until what you are hearing is just nonsense. I can sympathize with those who mistrust science for that reason. I’ve spent more time in computer rooms than i’d like to admit; most of that time was hiding my ignorance while seeking out those who enjoyed sharing the mysteries of a language that was useful only as far is it gained you greater access to the core, or raised your income for your ability to parley. I studied the science and even had an opportunity to become a computer scientist, but my heart was occupied with the recommendation of a professional who fathomed my raison d’etre as an instructor of English in the middle schools of Los Angeles.
He was myopic in only the way that professionals can be - knowing my father was a High School English teacher was all it took for him to say in his professional opinion that that is what i ought to do. And i gave it a go, but found the cloistered environment of a cadre of indoctrinators bent on bending the will of open minds to the yoke or socialization more than that to which i could or would apply myself. Lucky me - trained by a High School English teacher to be a “non-teacher,” now 4 1/2 paragraphs into this essay, i am lost. But that is okay; in something as vast as this network of interconnected unknowns, it is more than natural to be disoriented - it was the notion of compassion which grounded me to the finish · i need no affirmation or confirmation or permission for any of what i do as long as i can find space in my heart to want the best for you and what you are struggling with, i am okay - PEACE ·
jts 08/08/2020
http://stoanartst.blogspot.com
reprinted with permission - all rights reserved
∞
No comments:
Post a Comment