Gaia Community: Jake's Blog

so long, and thanks for all the fish!

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 09:38:34 -0000

Sometimes I can't sleep, and something within keeps my heart pounding, my mind awake, my body too tense to settle into my night, until I've exhausted myself by staying up late, or by discovering and doing what I'm supposed to do...

At the end of February of this year, I left Boston for Boulder to join many of my colleagues at the Gaiam offices in Colorado. But when I left Boston behind, I also left a relationship - the first time I ever left someone - and set out into a strange and scary new world of being single. I didn't leave because I'd stopped loving or caring for this person; I left because repeated experiences and lessons over the past year showed me that the way she and I related was in fact holding us both back. My actions of care, rather than encouraging independence and growth, had begun to encourage dependence and stagnation.

To move to a strange new place - as wonderful as Boulder is - frightened me, but not half so much as voluntarily saying goodbye to someone who loved me, of choosing to be on my own again, without knowing how my decisions would play out in the future. I remember telling my ex, "I'm sure you'll be the first to find someone new, I think it'll be a while before I meet someone who'd be interested."

When I boarded the train to Boulder, beginning a two and a half day trek across the country, I said goodbye to a city I knew well, to friends who lived down the street, to an apartment I called home, to a cat I'd grown to love, and to a person I also loved, but with whom I couldn't be together. Just as I set off for Maui four years ago, I consciously chose the more difficult path when I left Boston for Boulder.

It turns out, oddly enough, that life moves with amazing velocity and ferocity when you choose your destiny rather than wait for signs, rather than hem and haw. Only a few hours after leaving Boston, I received a beautiful and touching email from someone on this very site, out of the blue, expressing wonder and appreciation for my words here.

Over the course of the next month and a half, that email turned into a flurry of emails, and then phone calls, and eventually into a budding romance - two spirits separated by many miles, each appreciating and loving the other's mind. It ended on my birthday weekend when we met in Boulder, though it took a few more weeks of false starts and attempts for us to recognize these facts. But this too, difficult as it felt at the time, opened the space for me to become much more comfortable being on my own.

At the same time I was preparing to leave Boston, someone else from my past found me: my first semester of college, I met a girl whom I liked very quickly, and who liked me back with the same intensity. But circumstances surrounding our crush and the way we handled it led to us losing touch very quickly. By the end of freshman year, we saw very little of each other, and barely talked when we did. The next time I saw her after that was her graduation in 1998, a few months after I'd gotten married. And then we were gone from each other's lives.

10 years passed: I moved back to Boston from Atlanta, got divorced, moved to Maui, spent months homeless and penniless and 3 days in a psych ward and came out in a tiny little way enlightened (not the big E, but the little e, the kind where suddenly all the crap you accumulate that obstructs your vision and muddies your happiness falls away and you blink at the utter beauty that is realizing you are you, regardless of where you are, what you own, what you have, who you're with, and that you are here). I joined the Zaadz team, moved back to Boston, and she found me just as I prepared to make my next leap to Boulder.

When we started emailing again, I didn't think of romantic possibilities. I was still in a relationship, even though by that time my ex was quite aware I was leaving. And soon after arriving in Boulder, my romantic attention focused on the other person. In my mind, I'd messed up my opportunity fourteen years ago. So I did what comes naturally to me with my friends (and less naturally with love interests!): I acted like myself around her.

She and I met again for the first time in 10 years in June, in Chicago, before traveling to our college reunion. By the time we reached New York, our old classmates asked us how long we'd been together, shocked when we'd answer 'since Wednesday.'

One week after my wedding, in April of 1998, upon returning from my honeymoon, I walked in to my office of the job I held then to find an envelope with a pink slip. For ten years (just realizing it a few months ago), I avoided taking any significant vacation time from my jobs, for fear of being let go as a result, until meeting Kyrie in June. I finally relaxed about my fear of vacation time - still being judicious about how I used it - and allowed myself to take more time off. I was glad to discover that nobody cared that I took a couple days off a month.

On August 26, 2008, a day before I was due to begin a vacation to attend my best (from way back to high school!) friend's wedding in northern California's wine country, I sat down in my cubicle for only a moment before being asked by my manager to come talk with him for a minute. That was the last time I sat down in my cubicle, the last moment I led the team that has been building Zaadz and Gaia for you since 2006.

What are the chances of getting let go twice around the times of the only two wedding-related vacations I've ever taken?

As I left the building, I felt sad, a bit shocked. Remarkably absent from my reaction - different from every other time I've parted ways with a company - was anger and fear. I have Zaadz, I have Brian, and I have the incredible experience of working with this team, and I have you to thank for where I am now, for the opportunities that lie open to me, and for the equanimity to experience impermanence so clearly and without fear or anxiety.

I left with Kyrie for my California vacation happier and freer than I've ever felt before, with the future's wide open spaces stretched out before me. I drank in the rich wines, the rich sunsets, the rich landscapes of California, the rich joys of seeing my friend united in happiness with his love, and the rich love of sharing all this richness with my love.

An amazing coincidence, or synchronicity, or destiny, or just luck - to have traveled our separate paths fourteen years, through different places, different phases of life, and to reunite so comfortably, so easily, without a hint pretense or facade, to find in each other the amazing freedom to be each ourselves, without worry, without filter, without shame. How can I decry a life that bestows me such amazing gifts?

I believe if the universe has sentience, or direction, it challenges us and presents us only with jewels, opportunities that we many times do not understand or recognize as blessings, but that are not beyond our capabilities. No, they just ask us to stretch ourselves out, to reach, to test our limits.

And so this, my separation from Gaia, this is too a gift. With it comes some pain, some sadness, because I love what I did at Gaia, I love building the place where we all come to share our visions for a growing, evolving world. I love seeing that what I have always believed is true: that we all want to do good, that we all choose what is right and good and just in our hearts, even if we each believe differently about the details of good and bad, of right and wrong.

But I hadn't yet said goodbye. Siona and the team asked me to write my goodbye on the day I was leaving for California, and I intended to write it then. Sometimes ideas take time to reach maturity, and this was the case with my goodbye. I'm not leaving this community, but I am leaving a role I played in this community. I will no longer coordinate how things fit together under the hood, and sometimes on the surface. I can no longer steer Gaia's development in the directions I have championed since taking on a leadership role in Zaadz early in 2007. I'm saying goodbye to being one of your 'leaders' and saying hello to being one of you.

So.. goodbye.

And... hello.

I choose to embrace all the beauty and the wonder and the richness of my life, because suffering is a product of resistance.

And that is all, perhaps, that I have tried to say in so many words in my writings here.

Thank you, and goodnight.

And it was at that age...

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 22:41:03 -0000

... Poetry arrived

in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where

it came from, from winter or a river.

I don't know how or when,

no, they were not voices, they were not

words, nor silence,

but from a street I was summoned,

from the branches of night,

abruptly from the others,

among violent fires

or returning alone,

there I was without a face

and it touched me.

- Pablo Neruda, Poetry Arrived

I don't have my own answer to this one; but the title reminded me of one of my favorite poems, which I'm sharing with you here... click the link above to read the rest of it!

Celebrating Mom-mom

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 18:13:59 -0000

I woke up ravenous just before 6:30 this morning, grabbed a quick snack, and then fell back asleep until 7. I use my phone as my alarm, so when I picked it up to silence the racket, it informed me (as it so cheerfully does) that my father had called and left me a message.

The thing about the way my dad leaves messages - they're almost always matter-of-fact and efficient. The same was true of this one - following the formula so closely I remember every word of it right now:

"Jake, this is your dad. It's Thursday, about 9 am, and I thought you should know that your grandmother passed away this morning."

Mom-mom at home a few years ago with her great-granddaughter Haley (my niece)

Really, I knew before I listened. But hearing the news, delivered so calmly and so in-character for my dad, well - it hit me hard. She'd been sick before - in a coma for quite a few months while I lived in Maui, and my dad feared she'd never pull through that, and kept urging me to come visit her. Finally, after my situation in Maui improved and I could get away for a few days, I agreed - And just before my trip, my dad told me she had woken up.

When I arrived in New Jersey, I found my grandmother more gaunt, more frail and visibly smaller than I'd ever seen her before. But she was not only alive, she was lively. And as I watched her bicker with my dad, I knew two things: that she loved him tremendously and appreciated his care even if she protested (1), and that she'd be holding on for a while longer.

(1) she'd lost her husband when I was only 5 or 6, her daughter when I was in middle school, and her other son in March - though only found out in May

Though I inherited my last name (Stetser) and a lot of other qualities from the German side of my dad's family, the Irish Rileys were my dad's mother's side of the family.

From them, through her, I inherited part of my pale complexion, my hair's tendency to redden in the summer, a certain feistiness in the face of things I find unfair and in times of conflict, my tendency to form and hold strong opinions (which, over time, has mellowed out for all but those things I hold most dear), and my persistence.

Whenever we'd visit my grandmother in Woodstown (until she got sick and went into the coma and her house was sold), we'd have picnics on a picnic table that must have been 20 years old when I was born. It was circular, with two semi-circle benches and a hole in the middle that held an aluminum pole and umbrella for shading the sun. I remember it being a rather drab shade of gray, the same color some people paint concrete blocks to make them (unsuccesfully) look - I don't know, less concretey?

The year I moved back to the northeast from Atlanta, I drove a u-haul from the south to Boston and stopped to visit my father and grandmother along the way. Before long, Mom-mom took me aside and asked me to help her reseal the picnic table. So we grabbed a couple of brushes, a can of red sealant paint, and set about adding another coat to the old table, which she'd painted red at some point during the years I'd not had a chance to visit.

"Johnny" she said of my dad impertinently, "wanted to throw away this table. He said it was rotted through, and I told him it just needed some care."

She shook her head, as if shocked he'd suggest getting rid of it, though while I listened and brushed and stroked, I noticed that in places on the benches and the edges of the table, the wood had indeed rotted, soft and spongy underneath the skin of sealant.

"That boy wants to get rid of things too quickly sometimes," she told me, feisty as ever, "You just have to take better care of things and they'll last for a very long time."

Thanks, Mom-mom. For sticking around for so long. For being so strong in so many ways. For everything you've given me and taught me. I love you and I'll miss you.

And thanks, Dad, for taking such good care of Mom-mom.

Returning the favor!

Wed, 30 Jul 2008 23:48:58 -0000

So I've been writing on the topic of the heart and the law, about the practice of compassionate wisdom in every day life for a while. I know that I wouldn't be able to share these thoughts, my experiences, were it not for the wisdom of others who have shared their own knowledge and experience with me - through writing, voice and action.

So, as I recently thumbed through a brochure for the Shambhala Mountain Center, I decided that, starting in the beginning of 2009, I wanted to personally offer something in return to the "wish-fulfilling gems" who live everyday lives with a Boddhisattvic spirit and share what they learn with us in the hopes that it helps us on our own journeys.

In January or February of 2009, I'd like to offer an award - the Heart of the Law - for the best new piece of writing about the practice of compassion and wisdom in everyday life, in the form of a scholarship covering tuition, room and board costs up to $750 toward attending a program at a recognized spiritual workshop, meditation retreat or other practice center... and I'm setting aside $750 of my own money so that I can make this happen.

I've never done this before, so I'm sure I'll learn more about the formalities of a scholarship along the way, but the rules are simple:

The entry/essay/writing should be spiritually-based and on the subject of practice in everyday life, especially as regards acting compassionately toward self and others, but does not need to be Buddhist or even necessarily religious in nature
The writing should be publicly available at no cost on the web - on a blog, a network like Gaia, etc.
Entries should be written, posted on the web and submitted between now and the end of 2008.
There is no set minimum or maximum length, but the medium for these works is the web, and writers should consider appropriate length for works meant for online consumption, as well as the 'everyday' nature of the topic.

I'm not sure whether I'll read and judge all the submissions on my own, or whether they will be reviewed by a group of judges - I would rather enjoy bringing together some brilliant minds to read and discuss what people write. When I've made that decision, I'll post that here as well.

I'm currently working on theheartandthelaw.org website, which will contain the details of the scholarship as well as links to submitted works - and hopefully other related content as it grows - and which is where I will announce the winner in early 2009.

If you're interested in entering a piece of writing, email me at jake@theheartandthelaw.org with your name, contact information and a link to the essay/entry/text you want to submit.

Also, if you're interested in helping judge; or supporting/sponsoring the scholarship, helping make it possible to award multiple winners and/or do this again on a regular basis, please contact me at the same email address (or leave a comment)

Final disclaimer - this scholarship is not affiliated with my employer or any other company or organization. Consider it a personal offer of gratitude!

Questions? Comments? Please let me know! And if you know people that would be interested in submitting or supporting, please send them here to learn more!

unfinished

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:15:57 -0000

I wrote the first faint line,

faint, without substance, pure

nonsense,/pure wisdom

of someone who knows nothing - pablo neruda, Poetry Arrived

never before have I written words for one woman,

preferring instead to say I'm 'inspired by'

those I love and have loved before.

but here is the muse who led me to poetry,

(for whom I wrote my first faint lines)

sharing again how easy it is to be happy.

so I choose to leave this work unfinished,

to live each inspired moment, a new verse,

ecstatic.

- July 29, 2008

i fear

Mon, 28 Jul 2008 21:00:34 -0000

i fear

the allure of the way

i once was, a master

of carving the sounds

of words,

the words themselves,

into captivating

performances, sliced

deeply from the flesh

of self-analysis,

fascinating and dark.

I called out!

to the painful, the

shadowy in you -

and you, transfixed

by the spectacle

of my despair,

which is what I fear:

how easy it was

to cut myself into concepts

into what we figure for

wisdom: merely weeping

wept with sweet, sweet sounds.

I fear the allure

of the lyricism of sadness,

because it stirs us,

draws us in, and sets

upon us, enrobes us

in a romance of tears

spoken in the tongue of

introspection.

nothing learned here

finds root or truth

in the shroud of darkness:

Wisdom grows in the light.

- July 28, 2008

sharp knives

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 22:35:41 -0000

I keep being reminded of a comment I posted on Pure Desire Feels Good To You, a great post on its own written by a good friend and former co-worker of mine. Though my comment in its original form remains there, I'm reposting it here, with some adjustments…

I think this is such an important thing to note… So many people spend their energy criticising the very nature of their being; that is… when we are hungry, we eat. When we are cold, we seek warmth. When we are tired, we seek sleep, or rest. When we feel lonely, we seek companionship. When we are horny, we seek physical pleasure.

Yet we’ve built up so much resistance about even these basic impulses. Instead of allowing ourselves to feel tired, to feel unfocused, to feel distracted, we cover those feelings up immediately with criticism and rejection. Note that we don't even allow those feelings a right to exist given current circumstances, when we could be exploring why we feel, how we can work with it or change our actions in order to avoid the same situations if they're getting in the way of who we want to be.

The thing is - emotions, feelings, desires - should never be repressed or denied. They should be unquestionably accepted - they are a representation of the form we take as human animals with minds, perhaps spirits, souls or connections to the divine. (That doesn't mean we don't learn from these things and our reaction to them; but if we are spending all our effort resisting and criticising our current circumstances, we fail to focus on working with our natural impulses, cycles, reactions)

To deny our form and the resulting limitations and effects of being in these forms brings us no closer to happiness or enlightenment, even if we sit 23 1/2 hours a day and refrain from looking at the opposite sex and live a life of total simplicity.

One of the truths I’ve accepted is that the sword of understanding - the sword of Dharma - can be used to cut through our bullshit quite effectively… but it’s equally effective as a weapon against ourselves if we decide to use it in such a way.

That space between a desire, an emotion, a feeling, and an action should be filled with acceptance of what is, followed by skillful choice. Using that time to refute that we even feel such a thing - that’s like playing with very sharp knives.

Snappier™

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:29:47 -0000

I don't blog about technical things too often here, but I wanted to share that this morning we introduced a number of changes that should significantly improve your experience reading blogs on Gaia!

You should notice that people's blogs and individual entries load much more quickly than before, and if you use the link to 'friends' blogs' to catch up with what your friends are saying, we've given that a pretty good kick in the butt too.

We've always sought out ways to make sure the Gaia experience is a good one, but over the next few months we'll be working extra hard to improve the performance and usability of the site.

Thanks to each and every one of you!

Remembering to breathe

Thu, 15 May 2008 21:33:45 -0000

It's easy to forget to spend quiet time in the solace of my own self.

When I moved to Boulder from Boston, I left behind friends and loved ones in search of a space of my own, a space where I could return to the passions and interests that fuel me, rediscover myself as an individual person, and seek the wisdom that comes from the quietude of being by oneself.

But it didn't quite happen that way. I found very close friendship quickly with just a few people, the kind where hours slip by in easy, enjoyable, comfortable conversation. And I quickly learned to expect that level of interaction, that level of interpersonal stimulation. I fell in love with being around loved ones.

About the time of my birthday, that changed, and I lost that daily interaction - so I threw myself into work, into play, into interaction with other people nearby... by the following weekend, I'd worn myself out perhaps more completely than any other time in my life. I hadn't stopped in weeks. I hadn't breathed. I hadn't taken time alone with my thoughts, in that shadowed, scary place where self-doubts and gnawing anxieties arise.

Our relationships are best when they are like two flames warming and dancing with each other, but drawing from their own fuel. When I use my friendships to replace my own lack of energy, or inspiration, or spiritual fuel, I drain them.. I diminish their glow. And the same happens when they do it to me.

I've found it hard sometimes to see that point when things cross over, because it isn't always something that you see in relationship. Oftentimes, you see it when you're alone. Perhaps craving attention, wishing someone was around to whom you could talk - about anything - the weather even. When you don't let yourself take that time, you don't even see it.

But in the past few weeks, both by choice and by necessity, I've spent more time breathing, more time remembering being happy and comfortable by myself. It feels good. Spacious.. as if the world is opening up an array of opportunities to me and simply saying - take your time... choose well.

I don't mind hanging out by myself. It brings me back to my center.

How do I express love?

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:15:08 -0000

For me, it's harder to not express love.

But when I do express it... I do it through a million small things. My words (essays, entries, poems, letters.... (the ones you all get to read here, and the ones that are meant for the eyes of a few, or only myself and one other)... I write with more clarity, more understanding, more inspiration. The presence of others, especially the ones I love so dearly... is the core of my creativity. Through my relationships with these wonderful beings arises everything I have to share. Without them, without this love, without this care... I would have nothing to share with you.

They are my inspiration, and my muse.

I do it through my actions, a glance. A kiss. A look. My hand on someone's shoulder. Giving - time, lots of time, and lots of energy too. And occasionally gifts; I love giving them. It's a shame in our culture that so many use gifts as a system of barter - to earn favor from another, to set up a system of expectation or debt; I don't want those dynamics in my relationships.

And I express love through seeing and hearing you, and through understanding you, as much as I can.

But when my heart is full and I love, I'm not even sure i'd call it 'expressing love'... I feel like it just shines out without my effort or thought at all, and trying to shape it or force it only occludes that light. My challenge is just letting it come forth, without restricting it due to doubt, fear, impatience, unknowing. My challenge is just to be the channel through which this care flows freely.

I see through you.

Mon, 21 Apr 2008 19:19:52 -0000

You there. Yeah, you - the one who read the title of this entry and hoped it wasn't true. I've got something to tell you.

I can see through the front you put up. I know you've been worried someone would figure you out eventually. Sorry, but you were right. I know what you fear.

You tell yourself that you present well; that you're presenting a mask, or only a part of you, and wherever you go, there's that little worry -- maybe not so little - maybe it consumes you -- that somebody, somewhere, would find out your charade and call you out.

I'm calling you out. But not in the way you're expecting.

These things you share with people; this mask you wear; this presentation of yours; these things youv'e done or thoughts you've had; they're all true, aren't they? This isn't stuff you're making up. This is the stuff you choose to share with the rest of us. Your best side.

And when people offer you respect, when they want to be like you, when they compliment you, you feel like they're only seeing this surface part, a little piece, the front you put up. So instead of accepting the kindness and the accolades offered to you, you say 'I put on a good show.' and deep inside the fear grows a little that you'll disappoint when they find you out.

Here's the deal. That person who earns respect, who is a role model, who inspires people, who is complimented on her work... that's you. Not only that, but by your own admission, it's a fraction of who you are as a complete person. Just a tiny part of you achieves greatness and the people around you recognize it.

Real masks and real facades don't do anything other than hide the truth. They can't achieve greatness. But these things about you, your 'presentation', isn't a fake. It's you. Right down to the core. And you know it isn't even all of you. You know that you're even more than the person who does these things. You're not less. You're not someone else. You ARE the recipient of this applause.

That's the logic of it. Your fear is that you're lying and somebody's going to find out that you're not up to the task. But the truth is that you're just sharing a real part of yourself, the parts that 'present well' - that doesn't make them any less impressive, and it doesn't change the fact that you earned the praise you receive.

And there's another bit to it, that I hit all the time; maybe you do too - work situations are especially potent at bringing up these fears. But here's a little secret: if you don't feel a little under-equipped for the work you do, you're not being challenged. You're not learning. You're not being asked to grow.

You're SUPPOSED to feel a little inadequate in a position that really pushes you to be more. The fear that you feel is partially because you take on roles that challenge you to grow.

So present your best self however you like. But don't forget to let the admiration and respect of the people around you all the way in to the root of your being. Because that's where credit is due.

Now get to it, I'm watching you!

Does Spiritual Practice Make You Happier?

Mon, 31 Mar 2008 04:03:50 -0000

Short answer? No.

But you didn't come here for the short answer, did you? (And if you did, well, I'm too wordy for that!). And the long answer is much more complex and intricate.

Long answer: Depends on what your definition of 'happiness' is.

Well, that didn't make things any clearer, did it?

For most people, happiness isn't something that's experienced as a primary emotion such as it is a commingled experience of feelings ranging from contentment, satisfaction, bliss and joy; and it is also the absence of negative emotions -- jealousy, anger, sadness, disappointment, confusion. But who can really define happiness in a clear, concise manner, without using these terms above? Who can encapsulate its meaning into something profoundly simple yet broad enough to describe the entire range of human happiness?

I've heard a lot of people confused by their practice when - after diligently attending to the practices of their chosen path - life doesn't get easier or happier. Parts of their experience they'd taken for granted start to fall away. Rules and concepts they believed stable and reliable no longer apply, and the right choice begins to waver, blurring from a clear line into a gradient of many options.

Most spiritual practices aren't designed for prolonging any particular state of mind such as 'happiness' or 'joy', or eradicating emotions like anger or jealousy. Meditation, for example, increases awareness of mental processes, allowing a person to see how feelings, thoughts, emotions appear, fill the mind, and fade back into the background. Physical practices such as yoga teach awareness of the way energy and feeling work in the physical body, offering a visceral understanding of the way each part connects to and works with the others. In fact, all the practices I've experienced - though certainly not even a significant fraction of the those by which enlightenment can be obtained - deal with awakening to a space of awareness, of opening to and seeing what's going on around you and inside you right now. They all deal with awareness.

But looking at anything really close up exposes imperfections, flaws, blemishes, differences. Nothing is perfect and uniform, no matter how close or far away you look... (though I like to say that makes everything perfect!). And that's how the life you're used to can fall apart, right in front of you, as your spiritual practice deepens.

If you were taught that the end of your practice is happiness, you'd probably feel cheated, disappointed, unproductive, disillusioned. Add that to confusion and you might think you just fell off the wagon. But you're actually just riding through the rough parts of the trail.

It comes down to that awareness. Your life hasn't gotten worse, but you're more aware of what's going on and more aware of your responses to it - the peaks and valleys you used to miss, or ignore, or smooth over by virtue of not paying attention, or resisting, or denying now spread out unavoidably in front of you. And you likely see yourself making these decisions that part of you understands aren't your best choices, but that another part of you feels are your only choice. And when you feel sad, you feel totally aware of your sadness. When you feel angry, you feel totally aware of your anger. But if you've learned that enlightenment is total, unending bliss, you might also feel as if you shouldn't be angry, or shouldn't be sad, or should just let things pass without attachment.

Detachment by itself does not awaken a person, and the common perception of detachment goes like this "Don't feel too strongly for or against anything. Let it be, let it flow. I shouldn't want things or resist things.", etc., etc. But we're human. We're expressed in a form that feels love, lust, desire, anger, sadness, joy, pain... and to detach fully requires that we resist the very form we're given; it requires pushing away a part of what we are. And while that's not impossible, I wonder if we place too much attachment on the idea of detachment itself; I hear so many people say 'I shouldn't be angry.' or 'I shouldn't be upset' when the fact is, expressing that only redoubles and continues the emotions that trouble them so.

Spiritual practice is going to make you tremendously angry, tremblingly sad, deliriously happy. In fact, for a while everything will feel vastly intensified, if you let it; if you don't resist it.

And then, sooner or later, will come a glorious experience. You'll drive home one day and hear yourself say 'I'm mean because I broke up with so-and-so", and you'll hear another part of yourself say "I don't need to feel that way." and your ego will slink back. Maybe it will come out a little later and taunt you for something else, and you'll strike back with "That's not important to me."

And you're liberated from being intimately identified with that voice that strikes you down - the "I'm a really bad person. Haha!" smug voice that gets some satisfaction out of self-hatred. Soon you realize that you're also a step behind the waves of emotion that used to completely shake the foundations of your being. You still feel as strongly, but the emotions no longer define you, and so you hold onto them with much less anxiety and energy.

And in that space, all the emotions of being human - love, anger, sadness, and others - still rise and fall, but behind it all is a peace, an open space where you are you, the atman, the holy part, the unbreakable you. And this, truly, is a form of happiness that can coexist with all other emotions you're capable of feeling.

(It shouldn't be a surprise that this is a point of awakening or enlightenment in some traditions - in some forms of Buddhism it represents a part of the first level of enlightenment...)

Yesterday, I ran through a parking lot with my arms outstretched, gleefully giddy, and felt so totally free. That moment, that feeling, such intimate and ephemeral perfection, and I was free to let the joy go naturally instead of fight to keep it alive.

Does spiritual practice make you happier? No, it brings you awareness, intimacy with now and here, freedom from the bondage of your past decisions and arbitrary rules. It brings you tremendous turmoil and then unstoppable peace. It brings you to your center, to the place of your calm, where you find a happiness that exists in the presence of all things, even sadness, anger, disappointment.

Does spiritual practice make you happier? Yes. It just takes you all over the map on the way.

Credit goes to Buddhadharma for the inspiration for this entry with their recent forum "Does Buddhism make you happier?" -- and to Sara for helping me talk through these ideas and providing a few real-world examples.

ache

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 07:59:01 -0000

the distance between us

cannot be measured

in miles

or hours.

we can't explain this

with words like near or

far away.

No measures.

this ache just fills the space

between you whom I hold

right here -

and you.

And we adore, resist,

embrace, abhor,

this ache

but it means we live.

the first few words (orsa)

Fri, 08 Feb 2008 03:58:31 -0000

i want, like the wind -

to see myself running

through these words of yours;

playful in your phrases,

or a storm, or twist of

light warming freckled skin.

So i invent myself

in the shadows, listen

with ears that rebuild

your art in my image.

i press myself in

between your lines

artlessly, with love

i want to be the hum

of a note or two;

i want to be a vowel,

even a word on a single line.

So I invent myself

a world where we are at play,

our words draw a map.

my imagination places me

in places your heart created

but maybe not all is shadow

that's me running through

your words, here and there,

a boy playing in your soul.

a few good books!

Sun, 27 Jan 2008 03:47:17 -0000

What are yours?

reconsidering change

Thu, 27 Dec 2007 18:57:40 -0000

(I started to write this months ago, but didn't feel ready to finish what I started. Here goes:)

Too often, people think that solving the world's problems is based on conquering the earth, rather than touching the earth. C. Trungpa (via Siona)

For as long as I can remember, I've wanted to change the world - I've never quite known how, or in what way, but as I think we all do ... I wanted to leave the world a better place than when I got here.

And as a result we spend our lives in pursuit of that one thing - whether it means securing a livelihood and future for our loved ones by working hard, making a profit and saving money, or speaking out against global warming, fighting terrorism at home and abroad, or becoming a deeply spiritual being and meditating for the liberation of all beings.

What happens the world fails our hopes and dreams? What happens when terrible things happen to our loved ones despite everything we've done? What happens when injustice continues despite our faith that our world can be saved? How do we reconcile the terrible things that happen in this world with a faith that we will overcome?

I wonder if that very desire - to change the world - to turn it from what it is into what it is not - might not be what gets us into so much trouble. What motivates Christian fanaticism is the same thing that motivates Muslim fundamentalism, the same thing that pits environmentalists and the oil industry in intractable debate, the same thing that fuels both anger and adulation of George Bush: a belief that the world is wrong the way it is, that in some deep-rooted way the existence of mankind is scarred by the sin of existing with anger and sadness and joy and love and desire and envy.

When I posted about waterboarding; when I talked with my friends about politicians claiming it isn't torture, I felt something rising up within my being, something powerful and tempting, as duality often is: anger over the use of torture that threatened to turn those using and supporting its use into my enemies, into dark, inhuman, unfeeling shadow beings who deserved to suffer for their actions.

Why? Because I don't understand how people can be so harmful to each other, how someone can stand in front of us and tell us that certain crimes against each other are justified because it is the only way our enemies will talk, will change, will come to our side or die. But in those moments that I felt the darkness rising, I understood. That very desire to save the world, to change the world, can divide us all and feed the very qualities we wish to leave behind.

As if we are pitted in a battle, all against all, to be the one to bring the world to peace and prosperity and enlightenment, to overcome those who don't believe the world will improve our way, to fight against ideas and actions counter to our own.

With change there is always opposing force; and forces which oppose generate heat and friction; hate and rancor; ill-will and violence. Here we are, each of us, believing that we know which way to steer the universe to save us all. And yet most of us still don't even understand ourselves.

Is it my work to change you into my image of perfection? Or is it my work to understand myself, my being, my place in this existence and to align myself with the vision of good I want to see in the world?

True change through skillful action requires tremendous understanding, a sort of nearly-omniscient wisdom and knowing that very few of us - if any - possess. Yet so many of us believes - whether by the morality we've learned or the concepts we've formed of right living - that we are imperfect, that who we are now must change, must conform to some ideal version of ourselves that we've envisioned. But is it truly possible for us to know what shape our perfect being will take while we are still occluded by ignorance? Or should we remain open and learn in every moment?

What use is it to tell ourselves with anger that we are not who we should be? Or that we have failed to live up to our own ideals in the past? What will that energy - angry, inward, sharp - create in ourselves except a dual existence: I, the struggling Good, and me, the sinner, the spiritual terrorist knocking myself down every chance?

And isn't that energy reflected outward in our immediate world and so on? If we do not choose to forgive ourselves for our own perceived failures, to spend our time learning who we are and how to live that life with the least resistance and most understanding possible - then we play out the same charade on every level of life: your loved one must stop nagging you; your family needs to be more supportive; the other driver is a crazy bitch; your boss should pay you more; your government should be impeached and tried for treason and war crimes; all evildoers in the world should pay dearly for their crimes.

And the best of intentions turns our hearts dark and bloody.

I used to think I wanted to change the world; I used to think I wanted to change myself. But when I use 'change' in that context, I imply a value by the very fact that nobody - not one person ever living - wanted to change the world for the worse; we all want to make it better; to make it less sick; to make it only beautiful and joyful.

I used to hate decrepit, crumbling buildings; graffiti; trash blowing like tumbleweed across the road; the noise of cities. With new eyes I come to see these things as a part of nature, just as we are a part of nature; I have stood on the top of a landfill, the odor and sandy brown dust of discarded remnants of human life stinging my eyes, looked out over sugar and pineapple fields, past a green and grey dormant volcano, toward the sea and sky stretched out in blue and white until they faded at the horizon, and lost the line between pretty and ugly.

Our purpose is not change, not improvement. It is accepting. It is healing. It is understanding. Our purpose is becoming. Who we are. What we are.

Without accepting ourselves, we can't see who we really are and who we will become. Resistance necessitates something to resist; a force to push against; resistance creates ignorance, anger, violence, hatred inside us, even against ourselves. Acceptance reunites and creates peace and compassion, a place of healing. As we allow ourselves to heal, we learn the wisdom and understanding of the things we pushed away. We learn the secrets in ourselves that we locked away so that we could fight the good fight.

And where does all that energy go - the force of emotion we can collect in support of resistance? All that energy that used to drain out of you and yet seemed to do so little to help the world, leaving you cynical, disillusioned, and too tired for continuing the work of actualization?

It becomes ours for growth. We've stopped using it like a napkin against a torrential downpour. We begin to act - not out of desire to change and reform the world, but simply to provide aid and compassion - where we are most powerfully able. Change itself does not stop because we stop trying to force it; change is the only constant we know. The lie of 'changing the world' is that it isn't about creating change but rather resisting it.

Step out of your way, step out of the way of evolution and actualization and becoming - enter the slow and agonizing process of self-acceptance, of forgiveness, that will inspire self-understanding. See the lines shimmer and fade and open your eyes to a world that is evolving on its own, not in spite of us, not on account of us, but with us.

Even our desire for change, our ability to feel indignant and recognize injustice, are a part of who we are. So, too, are war and cruelty. Bloodshed, violence, cruelty, suffering - these will never be things we love, but responding with hate only fuels these fires. We can learn from the wisdom of the Buddha, of Jesus and of countless other teachers who have always recognized that hate only begets hate, and that only love, understanding, forgiveness, acceptance can overcome hate.

So let us not turn our eyes away from injustice, from violence, from the terrible things we do to each other and to our world, but let us also remember to see justice, joy, kindness, and the beautiful and limitless love of which we are not only capable but actually practice every day to those closest to us.

Let us stop judging ourselves first, slowly, as we can, stop telling ourselves what we shouldn't be and start to listen to what this form is telling us about who we are. Your evolution doesn't stop even if you stop trying to force it; you were built to grow, to evolve, to become. When you stop forcing, you allow the natural process of your own growth to continue. And as we begin to understand the parts of our nature that make hatred and violence possible, we see ourselves respond in those ways a little less powerfully; we begin to understand the why and the how, and what things must lead to such acts.

And suddenly we reflect peace, healing, understanding, becoming out into the world, and the natural process of the world's growth feeds off that energy, first in your immediate community and quickly outward in ways none of us can imagine.

But as far as I'm concerned, I don't want to change the world any more. I want to be part of the world becoming.

the definition of insanity

Sun, 23 Dec 2007 03:04:13 -0000

I have never been more panicked in my whole life. Once your lungs are empty and collapsed and they start to draw fluid it is simply all over. You know you are dead and it’s too late. Involuntary and total panic.

— “I waterboard!”, the story of a self-inflicted experiment to determine whether waterboarding really is torture (Bush & Cheney need to prove it’s not by publicly demonstrating the techniques on themselves with no pain or suffering before I’d believe it’s not.)

Torture, according to international law, is “any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity.

— Torture - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole" … includes torture, in Article 7, “Crimes against humanity”, and Article 8, “War Crimes”.

Uncle Zaady loves you!

Thu, 13 Dec 2007 04:48:06 -0000

building an expressive community

Wed, 12 Dec 2007 02:03:40 -0000

So I've been thinking about how existing networks fare at empowering those goals; it seems that the networks best at fostering connection (Facebook, LinkedIn, and I suppose Myspace) aren't as good at creating a space for expression (and vice-versa).

Argue with me if you will, but I tend to think that the sheer customizability of Myspace's profiles and the application-overburdened nature Facebook profiles (a seeming paradise of self-expression) instead creates over-stimulated jumbles of things that are not-quite-me. LinkedIn's profiles have a singularity of purpose that actually expresses the employable-me a lot more effectively, but what about creativity?And even though most of these networks allow members to post a variety of different types of content, their focus is clearly on people and user's creations have to sit a few pages deeper.

On the other hand, social networks for expression tend to be focused around certain types of creative content (Flickr, photos; Youtube, videos; Twitter, text notes) and make sharing your creations extremely easy. On those sites, your expression, your creativity, - your creations - become the focus, and the connecting power of the network fades into the background.

How, then, would the former kind of network nurture greater levels and depth of expression?

I see a few possibilities:

Improve and streamline how content gets added. Tumblr does a great job at this - providing a dashboard with clear, quick links to post each type of content. Make it easy to share and to express!
Highlight user content directly on profiles. Instead of forcing people to go further into separate sections to see pictures, images, bookmarks, etc; a selection of that content should appear prominently on user profiles. Give their creativity the same importance as their network of friends.
Favor content creation over lots of widgets or lots of design customization. Instead of letting your users change the color and background of every piece of the page, or making them express themselves with other people's widgets, help them share what they create, either through those very same technologies or through good profile design.

What do you think? Are there other ways social networks - online communities -can foster greater expression - but more important, to bring expression and connection together?

revisiting 'disenchanted'

Sun, 18 Nov 2007 20:20:34 -0000

So disenchanted rocketed past Slicing Through Spiritual Elitism, About spiritual teachers and Did you know? to the top of my blog's hot results - and I first want to share a very, very heartfelt thank you to everyone who commented - for or against the system. I'm still catching up with the comments and the email, but everyone who spoke up - either on my blog or directly via Zaadz mail, or both - has been incredibly respectful and clear in their compliments and criticisms of the system itself and of the way I and Zaadz have handled things.

I specifically want to mention TextMage, who made one of the comments to which I took offense in one of the original threads. He went out of his way to accept responsibility for what he said and to explain his intent and to apologize for any hurt. It takes great humility to step forward and do those things, especially when you remain committed to the core of your cause.

Why has this all been so explosive? Because people love this community; I think a place of such high ideals and lofty goals quickly gains a passionate place in the hearts of people who care. And let's face it: we all really do care about this world, in myriad ways, and while the details of our beliefs and the methods of our expression certainly may not agree, the depth of our concern and care for the welfare of our community and for the world is unmeasurable.

In any controversy, too, it can be disturbingly easy to forget the humanity of the opposition group - to see them as 'oppressors', 'controllers' and 'fascists' for example - but that is the language of dehumanization. I wrote what I did to lay bare the fact that these words and allegations weren't striking into some monolithic giant with no heart, but were slicing into real people like me, to expose one of the faces involved in this whirlwind and display its imperfect humanity. And I think all of you who responded saw that and understood that our debate needed to return to civility and respect.

To those of you who felt I spoke directly to you in my damnation of disrespect: I hear you - we hear you - and we are listening and pondering what you are saying. A few people have already left and I think some more are preparing. I really felt pain noticing that one commenter, Dave, has already left. If I could satisfy each of you somehow, I would. Instead - even when I feel upset by how some of you choose to express yourselves, I listen to what you are saying and let it inform my decisions now and in the future. I have dismissed none of you, and I won't. That is my promise of respect to you.

I also do understand the dynamics at play - I discussed them in one of my first blog entries when I started working for Zaadz, How to change the world, in which I wrote:

...there exist two types of people who want to change the world: those who seek to create change through direct and confrontational methods and those who seek change by creating environments that embody those changes.

Zaadz is unique because we wish to provide a space for both groups, to create connections between them and strengthen the channels that create change in this world. Some believe change is only possible within - and as a result, seek out teachers and education to better themselves in the hopes of improving one small corner of the world. Others believe that external change is possible and necessary and act in a larger amphitheatre of activism. Quite often these two groups mistrust each other's motives or commitment, but both want the same end result: to make the world a better place.

It's the weekend, and we haven't made any firm decisions about the seed/trust system; a few have noted that yes, negative feedback on users has been removed, and any feedback on admins has been disabled (No, not because we don't want you to call us on our shit if we're abusing our power, but because admins were getting a LOT of positive feedback and that skewed overall reputation of community members to seem lower than they actually were. (For those of you who gave away all your seeds and saw your lights 'go out', that's what happened.)

A few clarifications before I enjoy the rest of my weekend:

1. If you run out of seeds, nothing bad happens.

Seeds accumulate as a result of being active on Zaadz (every member gets a bonus once a week for visiting at least once a week), for participating by posting comments, blog entries, photos, and most other pieces of content, and - finally - positive feedback will sometimes grant you some seeds if you're not already at your maximum. But seeds are, in effect, a currency of feedback. They help balance feedback and moderate the system - you earn your seeds through your own activity and plant them wisely in the hopes that the community benefits from your feedback.

2. You cannot be censored or deleted because of this Trust System

First, the pieces discussed in the original document that talk about content folding and user limits are not yet active. Even if you reach the thresholds that were discussed, you won't suffer any automatic consequences. Furthermore, in the current system, you would need to have several dozen items of your content independently reach the negative thresholds for restriction before you as a user triggered any automatic restrictions.

Your content is never automatically removed from the site, nor are users automatically deactivated. Those things will always require human intervention and will remain so.

3. We're listening

Whether you agree or disagree with what Zaadz the company does with Zaadz the community (and I'm sure there'll always be something to discuss!), we know that we're building a community here - a unique one at that - and all of us remain keenly aware that our task requires equal doses of boldness and humility. We're here to learn just as much as you are. Sometimes we'll do what you ask, and sometimes we'll plow ahead on our own vision, and most of the time we'll build this together. All of the time, we're listening.

Thank you all again for hearing me and for rising to the challenge.

P.S. Several of my dearest friends and many of my co-workers weighed in to support me and share their views in extremely well argued, well-reasoned comments. And a few in particular (Gwen, Stella Luna, and Matthew) touched me with what they said about my character... to all of you, and especially to those two.. thanks again for being part of my life. I hope to stand alongside you too, if the time should come for that.