Archives for posts with tag: choices matter

Being

February 20, 2016 //
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I woke easily but wanting to sleep later. I lingered in bed for some time, but sleep wasn’t happening; the day had begun. I sat down with my coffee and opened my Facebook feed – generally a very positive place these days, because it actually does work to continue to refine my feed preferences over time. I block ‘news’ sites that aren’t legitimate news sites, choosing to refrain from injecting poison into my brain through my eye holes every day, if I can. I’ve even chosen to unfriend some long-time historical connections whose values, and means of expressing those, continued to cause me stress and rouse emotions like fear, panic, anxiety – hard to call them friends, if that is my reaction to their words, right?

The world is what it is, though, and incremental change over time on a global scale is crazy slow – because we don’t all share the same values, and frankly, it’s not even a given that we all make choices in favor of our own survival as a species. I mean… actually… it’s clear we don’t.

Isn't the beauty of a sunrise important, too?

Isn’t the beauty of a sunrise important, too?

Two articles got my attention in a fairly painful way this morning.  The first was an article about the artist Kesha losing a court case seeking to end her contractual relationship with a record company requiring her to continue to work alongside a producer who raped her. Wow. Seriously, Sony? Evil much? Is a record deal actually worth sacrificing a young woman’s mental and emotional health? My first thought is ‘how dare you?’, followed quickly by my own memories of attempting to report a sexual assault to my unit commander and being told I didn’t really want to ‘ruin that young man’s life that way’ and besides ‘it would be bad for unit cohesion’ and I should ‘grow a thicker skin – boys will be boys’. Yep. Apparently that’s still the world we live in. How about we fix that?

We could choose to change the path we're on.

We could choose to change the path we’re on.

The second article was entirely different, very peculiar, and tough to fit into my understanding of rational adult governance; the Southern Poverty Law Center produced their annual report of hate groups, and I guess I’m not really surprised, but… the Republican Party made the list this year. (Oh hey, guys – go you! It’s like an award for being… the worst people in the nation. WTF? Certainly validates my choice to register differently some years ago, just saying. Don’t hate.) Yeah. I actually don’t know what to say about it. I seriously doubt that my own Republican friends meet the definition of ‘a hate group’… then recall that I’ve unfriended a number of former associates, friends, and colleagues, for reasons very much relevant to the politics of hate: racism, sexism, xenophobia, religious fundamentalism, and political extremism of the sort that seeks to create a bigger and bigger divide between some arbitrary ‘us’ and some frightening ‘them’. So… huh. What now?

Taken in context, fully considering what you know of the world, yourself, are your individual choices building the world you want most to live in?

Taken in context, fully considering what you know of the world, yourself, are your individual choices building the world you want most to live in?

If Republicanism has indeed become a hate group… do we now see the wholesome, compassionate, educated, forward-thinking Republicans among us lead their party to a better way of viewing the world… or do they leave the Republican party? Those aren’t the only two options, of course. Another option is pissing and moaning about how misunderstood their hate is, and how they are only seeking to improve things for “everyone”, and perhaps something about how ‘that’s just a few extremists in the party’. Scary, though. If I were told, with supporting documentation and evidence, that ‘being an artist’ was a hate group… would I stop painting? Would I paint differently? Would living my own values require me to change my actions based on the new information – or would it require me to acknowledge the truth of it, and continue to live it?

What matters most? Taking care of me is not at the expense of others - it never had to be.

What matters most? Taking care of me is not at the expense of others – it never had to be.

When I realized I had gotten sucked into a very dark place quite early in the morning, even letting my coffee go cold, I set the world aside – it’ll still be here later – and take time for me. I calm myself with meditation, and take time to watch the morning unfold beyond the window. The sunrise was worth taking the time for it. A fresh cup of coffee is nice, too. I breathe, and let go of my own hurting resurrected by the unpleasant, uncomfortable, all-too-human hateful bullshit that snuck into my experience this morning. Hurts from the past don’t have to be indulged in the present; it’s something my traveling partner pointed out to me early in our relationship. Having the injury that I do, it’s often very difficult to ‘let things go’ once visceral real-time emotions are aroused, but it isn’t impossible. Verbs. Always with the verbs. 🙂

Be love.

Be love.

I don’t have to live within my emotional pain. It isn’t a requirement to hold onto the worst moments as though they define the present ones. They are now only memories, scars, and lingering impressions caught in my implicit memory. I allow ‘now’ to become prominent, again. I step more firmly into this moment. I hear the music in the background… it’s apropos and I smile, and relax.  I think of my friends, their wit, their wisdom – even the Republican ones. The world is damned scary filtered by fear and hate, isn’t it? That isn’t the world I actually live in, myself… You? Maybe it’s a matter of speaking up when we hear it around us, just simply saying ‘Dude, not okay!’, and reminding each other of Wheaton’s Law.  Maybe it’s bigger than that – maybe we’re not the most amazing primates, after all? Certainly we’ve got room to grow as beings. We live in the world we choose to build. Could we do better? Choose more wisely? Well… yeah. 🙂 Let’s do that!

Today is a good day for sunshine, and for logging off Facebook. Today is a good day for being. Today is a good day to buy products from companies that don’t promote hate, or rape culture, or slavery, or exploitation, or… I didn’t say it was going to be easy. It’s going to take practice. 🙂

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, Words

Cut on the Bias

November 4, 2015 //
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It’s hard to dodge all the news about the ‘upcoming’ US presidential election – next year. I’m fairly bored with the bits that are about the election itself, and like many citizens I already have a good idea who I will vote for when the time comes. All the fuss and bother between now and then is just media foolishness, marketing to undecided voters, and a ludicrous waste of time and money for everyone else. Well – my opinion. I’m sure people who make their living marketing human beings for sale to voters probably feel quite differently about these sorts of things.

The barrage of human interest details, media-marketing of character qualities, and increase in spin (both positive and negative) spilling all over every pundit, issue, or moment that might brush past an ‘issue’ relevant to the upcoming election also tends to highlight some peculiarities of human beings that I do find worthy of study. I study the use of bias to drive cultural opinion. I study the use of social media to manipulate public opinion by charismatic grass-roots personalities, YouTube celebrities, and professional pundits. I study the deliberate use of inflammatory language to shift public opinion such that really horrible treatment of other human beings seems somehow… acceptable. I study the ferocity with which human beings strive to ‘be right’ – or to prove to someone else that they are, over the objections of other thinking and other experiences.

I most particularly study my own reaction when I read something, or interact with someone, and find one human being or another in some way ‘lacking’ humanity – a ‘bad person’. I’m very much aware that some people whose speech or actions I find entirely reprehensible quite likely seem fully justified and justifiable to the person using the words, or taking the action. Cops shooting people, for example – as a human being, I often find the circumstances (as presented by the media, that I’m able to be aware of) objectionable – and therefore, the law enforcement person who committed the act seems ‘in the wrong’ to me, and potentially ‘a bad person’ if they take their action to the ‘court of public opinion’ and try to excuse or justify it. From my outside perspective, I see the dead person as having every bit as much to live for, and every bit as much significance, as that law enforcement person. I don’t understand how people take a life without being affected by that action, myself; it is inconsistent with my experience of the value of human life. That’s an intense example, but there are equally troubling examples that don’t involve life or death in such an immediate way – politicians who push to cut government programs that benefit the working poor don’t focus on the impact those changes would have on people who rely on that help, they focus on the intended benefit to the bottom line. Employers who don’t pay a living wage don’t put their emphasis on any awareness that their employees are having to rely on government programs to make ends  meet, they focus on gross margin, and meeting financial goals. Most people, most of the time, think they are ‘the good guys’. So very very often we are not the good guys at all. It’s worth thinking about.

What is truly the outcome of my words, my choices, my actions – even my opinions and values? Who is being hurt by what I say, and what I do? I’ve given up on making an effort to ‘be right’ – even at work, which has real moments of hilarity; people definitely tend to expect a person to stand firm on some opinion or policy moment-to-moment, and being more invested in a greater understanding, and questions over answers, is unexpected. (I make a distinction between being accurate and ‘being right’; the former is about data, the latter about opinion.) On those rare occasions when I get pulled into a discussion where I feel I may ‘be right’ and inclined to defend that position, I notice pretty quickly; I question why I think I am right, and why I feel moved to defend my opinion – would the stronger position be to ask questions (and listen to the answers), and find a shared answer, an inarguable mutually respected truth, or a new solution? Listening has more value than ‘knowing’. All that worthless certainty generally just adds up to waiting for a turn to talk and not listening (or learning) much at all.

Just for fun, when you are reading articles in your feed, or listening to politicians talk, ask yourself ‘who is this position hurting?’ Just that. Go with the assumption that the more certain someone is, or the more they fight to be recognized as ‘being right’, the more likely their position does have unacknowledged consequences – collateral damage at a minimum – and ask the hard question; who is this hurting? Make a point of acknowledging for yourself the fundamental legitimate humanity of each human being participating in our culture (yes, all of them, even ____ ). Isn’t it easier to talk about cutting social security benefits if we don’t also have to think about elders who count on social security to live on in their final years, and what the practical realities of that scenario really are? Isn’t it easier to talk about ‘constitutionally protected gun ownership’ if we don’t also focus on innocent lives lost to gun violence, to accidents, to misuse? The media knows this is difficult stuff and applies a generous helping of spin – depending on their preferred audience – to ensure our attention is ‘well-placed’ to keep us glued to their channel for their advertisers – it sure isn’t about ‘truth’, or informing us.

Compassion was much harder to develop or to experience when I was firmly focused on being right. Turned out ‘being right’ has a lot less value for me, personally, than compassion has.  I’m sometimes fairly dismayed at how willing human beings are to hurt each other in the name of being right. It’s not a pleasant quality. Being willing to listen more, and being committed to letting go of ‘being right’, it is also hard to allow myself to look at another human being (however ludicrous or evil their opinions seems to me to be) and judge them as ‘a bad person’…but it is appalling to me how many people build their fame (or notoriety) on treating others poorly… and how often we allow, or encourage, it. Maybe it is time to stop rewarding such people with our attention – or our votes? Well… it is for me.

Walking my own path.

Walking my own path.

Thoughts over coffee on a chilly autumn morning. It’s a good day for taking time to listen. It’s a good day to include my own in the voices I listen to myself. It’s a good day to recognize the value of my attention and to be quite selective about what media is allowed past my eye holes into my thoughts; the profit margin of any one business, pundit, or news outlet is no concern of mine (and I am aware that it is their sole concern as a business). It’s a good day to change what I hear about the world by setting boundaries, and asking questions: “just the facts, please”, “who profits from this position/proposal?”, and “who will this hurt – and how badly?”

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Categories autumn, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, The Art of Being, The Big 5, War and News of War, Words

Presence and Coffee

June 14, 2015 //
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I woke from a sound sleep with some difficulty. The alarm rather insistently simply continued to beep until I finally pulled myself free of my dreams and shut it off. I lay quietly for some time, trying to remember why the alarm was going off on a Sunday, but certain there must be a reason for it. I smiled thinking of yesterday, of Friday, of lovely days to come…Right. I’m working today. Still not awake, I rise and begin going through the motions of a work morning, peculiarly out of sequence and with little awareness.

A different coffee, on a different day.

A different coffee, on a different day.

It was my first sip of coffee that really got my attention – not because it is coffee, and a lovely taste of morning, oh no, not in the least – it’s dreadful. Well, to be fair, why would I expect differently? I was so careless and inattentive making it that it qualifies as having been made solely because hot water passed through ground coffee and found its way to a cup. LOL I pause for breath, and really give myself a chance for my brain to boot up. My consciousness is barely coming online – I usually don’t actually make the coffee until I am able to do so mindfully, and present in the experience; a good pour over results in extraordinary coffee, a sloppy, careless, inattentive, imprecise pour over results in a far less satisfying brew.

Robotically, I put the warm mug to my lips again, and again I am dismayed at the coffee. Lesson learned? I pour it out and make myself a properly well done cup of coffee, mindfully and present in the moment – I deserve the very best from myself, for myself, and taking the time for a good cup of coffee is more than a ‘treat’ for me, it is one of the first things I do each day to treat myself well. It’s very much worth “doing right”.

There are verbs involved.

There are verbs involved.

The window was wide open yesterday, for some time, while the air conditioner was being installed. This morning I woke with a handful of mosquito bites, where my arms were exposed to the air while I slept. I am unsurprised. They are obviously just mosquito bites, and I don’t fuss with them, or worry about them; they itch a bit regardless. I smile thinking about ‘the birthday spider’ (my traveling partner spotted a spider at an inconvenient moment, and it was dealt with, no freak outs required). There have been far fewer unwelcome visitors since I began taking strong measures to manage them. It is summer in the Pacific Northwest, and I live alongside a wetlands park – mosquitoes and spiders share the area, and this is a known thing – I just want to keep them out of the apartment, generally. 🙂

Life’s curriculum is never completed, summer or not – no spring break, no time out for the holidays, no recess. I was talking over lessons learned about living a polyamorous lifestyle with an interested friend, and because I am no expert on matters of love, I referenced those whose knowledge, experience, and expertise I rely on, myself. I’ve learned a lot about love with my traveling partner, and I’ve read far and wide all manner of words about love and loving. It’s uncommon to find a proper ‘handbook’ on this sort of thing, but I have found three really good ones, myself, that tend to cover the basics of love, loving – and loving more:

  • The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz is a great starting point on a basic foundation in good emotional self-care. I am quite certain, from my own experience, that failing to treat myself truly well is a limiting factor when I turn my affection toward loving someone else. There are a number of other weightier tomes I could turn to, but this one covers most of what I ever needed – given committed practice. I regularly revisit this one. It was recommended by my traveling partner and has not yet let me down…but it’s not on point regarding ethical non-monogamy or polyamory, it’s more…how to be a basically decent human being to myself and others.
  • Then there’s How to Love by Thich Nhat Hanh, which is simply the utter essence of Love, in words. It is the most basic expression of what it takes to love well and skillfully, in any form a relationship may take. It’s not really a guide, or a rule book, it is simply ‘how to love’ – there are verbs involved, but given this book I’d expect any whole, sane, rational person could nurture love even beginning in its absence, perhaps. Certainly, when I read this book, I realized that this is indeed how I would like to be loved. I am learning to love more skillfully through the simple practices it outlines.
  • There is a book that is entirely on point and quite skillfully written. It not only covers what works – it covers what doesn’t work, and why it generally doesn’t work, and how to avoid the pitfalls. I regularly recommended the content when it existed only as a website, and I recommend it as a book now – More Than Two, by Franklin Veaux and Eve Rickert, and this is the book I suggested to my friend. It is rich with basics and I suspect any sort of relationship benefits from the knowledge within its pages, but it is very specifically written about the many sorts of relationships thrown into the rather large bucket of ‘all consensual adult relationships that are not monogamous’ – of which there are actually many sorts.
Conveniently for sale where words are sold.

Conveniently for sale where words are sold.

My friend and I walked to Powell’s, nearby – itself a wonder of human knowledge – and found that they had More Than Two in stock. I bought a copy for my own library, with the explicit commitment to share it with my friend; I can’t answer all his questions so easily. I have recently observed that I have read all the books I own – it’s a very nearly accurate statement. (I started Fourier, and Pascal, but struggled with their work at the time I made the attempt, and haven’t returned to them.) It’s also a personal commitment; books are not merely objects of beauty in my decor. I use my porcelain demi-tasse cups, however antique, and I read my books. When yesterday began to wind down, and all the chores were completed, I took up the new book in my hand, relaxed in a comfortable chair, put my feet up, and went to the contents in search of content I hadn’t already read online.  Some time later I paused –  I was learning! There is more to learn. I learn best through my mistakes, and More Than Two opened to pages and pages of details of recent mistakes that suddenly seemed much clearer, and more readily understood in the provided context of the book. I will be a better lover, and a better partner, when the knowledge gained becomes actions resulting from better choices. 🙂

Yesterday ended well. Today begins similarly well, if a bit clumsily at first. Each passing day in my new home reinforces how important the choices I make are for my longer term well-being. Relationships matter, and there too I have choices – rather a lot of choices. I am learning that the choices I make in my relationships with others are affected by the choices I make regarding my relationship with myself; putting myself last, or failing to put myself on my own agenda at all, has lasting consequences in my relationships with others. Even the relationships themselves are choices; choosing to maintain a relationship with someone who treats me poorly may be an investment in long-term growth, and a promise of a better future, but it is as likely to be a compromise with serious consequences for my quality of life, and the ‘may be’ may not pay off, ever. My traveling partner taught me the value of being treated well in my relationships – and for me there is no turning back now (he’s set the bar pretty high for my idea of ‘being treated well’, too). My relationships need to be built on my Big 5: respect, consideration, reciprocity, compassion, and openness. Compromising my Big 5 doesn’t work for me.

Another coffee, another day, made with love.

Another coffee, another day, made with love.

 

I sip my coffee contentedly, considering my traveling partner with a smile, considering my friend, my life, and the future of love. Today is a good day for The Big 5, and The Art of Being. Today is a good day to enjoy my experience. It’s enough.

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Categories Free Will, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Relationships, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

Even the Longest Journey…

August 30, 2014 //
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…Is taken one step at a time. That’s not one I can argue with, refute, or change.

wXG

“Each time for the first time, each moment, the only moment.” Jon Kabat-Zinn

We are each having our own experience. Also completely true, also out of reach of argument or persuasion. We make choices. Choices to participate, choices to pull away, choices to nurture, choices to disengage – we even attempt to make choices about whether we make choices, which is nonsense and foolishness; we have no choice but to choose. 

Sometimes choices are obvious.

Sometimes choices are obvious.

I enjoyed an exceptional day yesterday, end to end quite a nice day. The evening was spent in the company of one of my partners, providing a listening ear, and a supportive heart. People suffer, even people who love well and deeply will suffer in the course of a human life. Suffering isn’t avoidable; we have choices to make regarding how we handle our suffering, and how we treat others while we suffer. 

Before we go farther, I’ll say I’m still practicing, myself, and one of my own challenges is indeed learning to treat others – and myself – truly well in the face of my own suffering. I am acutely aware of the suffering of others, and I observe their choices and behaviors attentively, asking myself all manner of questions about how what I see applies to my own experience, what I could choose to do differently, were it my choice, to find my way out of that darkness, and to treat my loves well in the face of pain or rage. I definitely don’t want to set expectations that I find it ‘easy’ or that it is a simple matter to change lifelong poor behavior, or rewrite bad programming. I will spend my life becoming the woman I most want to be; the challenges are real, the rewards can’t be overstated. 

Resuming my narrative, I return to last evening. We’d had plans as a family. Those didn’t work out. It happens. I managed to enjoy an amazing connected intimate evening with my partner, simply by listening, being supportive, and allowing the time spent to have real value and intimacy, in spite of the OPD at the heart of all that pain. I ended the evening feeling warm and whole, and knowing that my partner was supported and cared for to the best of my ability. We all want to feel heard. 

We each have our own struggles, our own challenges and doubts, our own fears – and our own nastiness to address in the silence of solitude, staring into the face of who we are in the moment with honest desire to do more, better…or finding a way to be at peace with the person we see. It took me many years to come to terms with some pretty shitty behavior I’d learned, and to recognize how significant my own role is in my contentment and happiness. It took even longer to acknowledge that I alone have the power to change me. Having gotten there it seemed almost cruel that I also had to decide what to keep, and what to change, for myself…and have to be accountable for the outcome when I choose poorly. 

I don’t think this is the sort of journey that has a proper destination. I am doubtful that there’s a nice ‘rest area’ at the end point, a place to sit and relax, and celebrate the finish line. No trophy. No report card. No certification. Life is not the sort of journey that ends with ‘mastery’ or an obvious ‘win’… Except… There are moments when I feel something different about that; when the journey itself is the trophy, the goal, the big win at the finish line. No matter how long the journey, it is still taken in steps, and in moments, and each one contains that tremendous power to choose. Each of those moments, itself, is precious – incredibly precious; there are no ‘do-overs’.

Some thoughts over my coffee...

Some thoughts over my coffee…

What will I choose today? It’s a lovely morning… Today is a good day to change myself, and the changes I make within my own heart, and my own experience, have the power to change the world. Today, I am a more experienced, more skilled human being than I was yesterday. Today I am a handful of  moments closer to being the woman I most want to be. Today is a fresh start and a new opportunity to choose well. Today is a good day to choose change. 

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Summer, The Big 5

Stillness and Beauty

August 18, 2014 //
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It is a lovely morning, following a great weekend. I could comfortably stop right there, this morning, and contentedly continue to meditate, or flip through images, or simply relax and watch fish swim. This, however, is time with myself I value, and taking this quiet time over my coffee and a few words nurtures something precious. I wonder for a moment about that idea, itself; do we each find some different little something to be the thing that fills our heart with a comfortable sense of who we are, or is it the same thing for each of us, only packaged differently? Perhaps both those things are true.

Details matter.

Details matter.

I spent a large portion of my thinking time yesterday considering how to arrange the space in the loft; we’ve made some different choices with regard to how we’re using some of our space. I’m going to have room to paint! Everyday painting. Any day painting. Room to work more slowly, and explore more details. Room to be more technical. Room to work large. Room to work, stop for a day, or a work week, and pick up the thread of a new painting and continue with it more fluidly, and with greater emotional integrity. Room to live actively in the headspace I’m creating in, surrounded by the work I’m doing. I’m so excited it is sometimes difficult to remain fully present and engaged in the moment, when some small detail occurs to me (‘Where will the aquarium go?’).

There are a lot of details, each a potential choice. What experience will I choose to build?

There are a lot of details, each a potential choice. What experience will I choose to build?

This change won’t  happen over night; there are other relevant changes in progress, and some work involved. I love having this to anticipate – even in looking ahead to it, there is delight. I’m also not prone to rushing stuff like this; taking my time with it reduces the stress of the change itself, which is a big deal for me. So, for now I am contentedly planning the details of changes to come, measuring space, measuring things, and doing the math. I’m sitting there, in the space-that-will-be, meditating in the openness and light, and contemplating the aesthetic of it, and what will be functional and beautiful, without being costly or impractical. I am making the space my own, even now, without moving one item from its current location to another. My heart is moving in. Suddenly our house feels far more homelike to me, and to a degree that exceeds most home-like experiences I’ve had.

I realize I’m sitting here, rather puzzled; how did I not get how important this so clearly is to me? Why have I turned a blind eye, or actively undercut my needs here, time and again over-compromising on an important value? What a crappy way to treat myself! I shake it off with a deep breath and a smile; I’ve only just begun ‘the second half’, certainly there’s time enough to learn to treat myself better than that. There’s time to make other choices. There’s time to appreciate partners who recognize how much this meets my needs – and potentially their own, as well.

There is simple beauty if finding my way, however slowly.

There is simple beauty in finding my way, however slowly.

Today is a good day to make new choices. Today is a good day to embrace change mindfully and with a serene heart. Today is a good day to enjoy the moment. Today is a good day to do my best, simply because it is my best, and that is what I do. Today is a good day to change.

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Categories Art, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Big 5