Transmutation

FuturePeak, Boulder Creek, CA July 2018

Dancing alone, wide, green eyes gazing up

starry, wondrous sky, expanding;

Twirling around, counter-clockwise motion, 

arms grounding, extended hands,

compassionate Universe,

transforming Ego,

longing for flight—

Heaven 

Heightening True Love to raise like seeds,

blown from trees, afloat, featherlight,

lifting above suffering

Earth’s dreamscape,

Where separations enmesh;

Fear evaporates like intense

summer storm, quickly dissipating into

atmospheric tranquility

You, guiding your feet to meet me,

dancing your own, unique rhythm, 

vibrational ascension,

holding each timeless moment

freedom for all beings;

Composing creations, interwoven like Tabriz and Kashan,

collaborative, masterful designs—

bliss and peace 

Fly weightless, infinitely deep,

high above temporal clouds, 

obscuring neither pure mind nor soul;

contented abandonment of aloneness,

intermingling independent movement;

spinning clear light, resonating,

strumming heart strings— 

One Song

  

Learning to Be Confirmation Unbiased

During the presidential election season, all over social media, people post "evidence" that comes from sources with one political leaning or specific intention. While none are truly unbiased, there are ways to sort through the muck. One great way to manage is to find information that challenges our views. To do that in a fair manner, one should give as much passion and time to seeking out unpleasant information that is opposed to our beliefs and stances as one gives to finding information that supports current beliefs.

If you already lean toward specific ideologies and beliefs, and then only seek circles of information that consistently confirm and never challenge that framework, there's a term for it, "confirmation bias", and chances are, your ideologies and beliefs are shaky, at best. At worst, those beliefs can kill people, when those with such bias are allowed to effect legislation and rules for the rest of us, or when average people decide to allow their biases to affect others' right to life and freedom.

Challenge your comfort zone and welcome others of and in the world to take you out of your personal status quo. Through allowing others to challenge our beliefs, our beliefs are either fortified, adjusted, or they are changed altogether.

It's how we learn and grow. Changing your mind or not being able to make up your mind is not weakness, it is strength. It fortifies and grows the mind to be flexible in thinking. And sometimes, issues are so complex, once we allow more information in, there can be no cut and dry solution or stance, because reductionism marginalizes and trivializes.

Anyone who truly understands an issue can argue for or against that issue with equal fervor and breadth, because they can explain all sides.

It gives us greater ability to be able to protect ourselves against tyranny and injustice when strategizing in a geopolitical sense, in business, or in our personal lives. And when need be, it also adds a sense of humility and compassion to our stances, so we are able to deeply understand the view of our supposed enemy.

So, challenge your mind's comfort and step outside the norm. Take a different path home and see what you find.

The Only One for Me Is You

The more I read about Syria and think of the past couple decades of middle eastern world affairs, the more it becomes clear that the objective is disruption of the entire Islamic world- religion? Oil? I don't know the "whys", though many people have their own ideas.

I do know that we all suffer in the consistent demoralization of humanity, sitting by, as those who blanket us in security are the monsters in the night who terrorize the hopes for peace. When I say "we", I mean all people of this planet.  Remiss of nationalism or any other "-isms", my choice is not to take sides, nor do I place blame with entities that I or mass culture deem responsible.  I understand that at the core of everything, each person is taught that Survival of the Fittest reigns over the land. I know that we are taught, from the moment the umbilical cord is cut and the oxygen from mother to child is ended, that we must breathe on our own, or perish.

It literally gives me pain to think of others' suffering- it doesn't matter how or in what fashion the pain occurs, just that it exists.  It's a real pain that I feel in my heart when I think of everything from the macro, planetary aspect, to the micro, of a dying child. It's a lot to shoulder that I, individually, am responsible for everything that exists whether positive or negative. What a heavy burden.

Fortunately, the burden is shared. Collectively, we are the same one at heart.  So, sing, dance, chant, pray, meditate, fund-raise, build, create, be that one consciousness that decides Peace. There is enough for all of us if we just change the way we think.

The long-standing beliefs of aloneness and separateness are at the core of humanity's progress and its demise. One mustn't toss out progress in place of collective oneness.  A recent study published in Nature Communications, coupled with common sense, determines that teamwork and cooperation are what propel society into survival.

This very moment of the Now is a chance to transform the energy of perpetual fear and suffering into one of perpetual motion of compassion and peace.

You are enough.

This is enough.

Enough.

I Am, or Am I?

On Sunday mornings, the Tibetan Buddhist Center of Philadelphia invites people to join in meditative practices, as well as holds group (sangha) discussions regarding various aspects of Buddhist thought and philosophy. Last week, after the traditional first-hour, the sangha, led by a senior teacher (when Ven. Losang Samten is away) in the Introduction to Buddhism series, learned of and discussed Vipaśyanā. This form of meditation practice is considered "insight" meditation where one thinks critically of the nature of reality, asking, "Who am I?" and "What is Reality?" While the question must not plague and weigh down the mind, it surfaces in daily life, bobbing up, like little fish in water.

In the last several minutes of the discussion, Jeffrey Carr's summary statement was inspiring when he said, "You only exist in relation to your experiences." What a profound statement- not so much profound in the words as it becomes when one analyzes the breadth of such a notion.

You only exist in relation to your experiences.

Not only will the meaning confound the truth seeker, it opens the clichéd Pandora's Box of self-inquiry. Certainly, people have delved, introspectively, into this realm as it pertains to self identity and the self in relation to the surrounding universe, for millennia. In building upon Jeff's comment, one may see that the individual's own experiences only exist, then, in relation to another person's experiences. If there is only one person, with no other existing beings, does the person exist? No. How can he?

This is reminisce of the ceremonial native North American sweat lodge experience where cool air ceases to be. One enters the lodge, fully knowing the idea of "fresh air"-- air that moves and flows around us and through us. Gradually, within the lodge, steam grows. There is no crisp flow that shocks one back into the safety and comfort of control of self and Ego, there is just steam. Thicker and thicker, it grows over many hours, and soon all one knows is steam and heat. It becomes what "is". There is no dichotomy, nothing to compare "this" to "that". Cool does not exist. Did it ever? One crawls from the claustrophobic womb of the lodge, the breath is taken and again, one remembers the meaning of "cool, crisp air".

From a sociological perspective, one observation is to extend this to greater society, recognizing that a universal interdependence exists. I cannot exist without I (you, me, they, we, he, she, they, us). Therefore, from a psychological perspective, one may also observe that because of this truth, it becomes a matter of life and death of the self that one have the ability to express his or her own life experiences.

It's no wonder that people act-out, demanding recognition of the self-- it brings material, physical validation to the very existence of the self.

This is me. This is you.

From the perspective of human maturation and growth, one finds it nearly impossibile to move beyond freeing that self that requires attention and validation and into a place of peace unless one finds satisfaction in believing he or she exists. If not reconciled, the self will continue to seek satisfaction and contentment in the world-at-large.

How one, then, identifies this lack of satisfaction determines that person's interaction with the rest of the "selves" that simultaneously exist alongside the individual. We are afraid. We are hungry. We are angry. We are love. We are compassion. We are peace.

So, what are you?

In 1999, I wrote a poem in response to my friend, Kelly, to whom I was attempting to convey that because of this interdependence we all all have with each other, one can then free one's self in saying that the "self" can then be defined to encompass all that exists. It has been published on the Zen Buddhist Order of Hsu Yun's website for ten years, after Abbot Chuan Zhi Shakya gave me precepts into the Order and named me, Fa Ming, which translates to “Brilliant Light”:

The Mask

The mask is placed upon the face,

yet envelopes all of me.

For with no disguise, how would your eyes

handle what they see?

I am yesterday, tomorrow, today,

I am all that will ever exist...

the tears you fear, the noise you hear,

a long awaited kiss.

For you I bend; to you, I extend

my million tentacle hands--

they grab you, feel you, show how to heal you

so you may understand...

Why.

I wear the mask, so you Can ask

Truth to seep into your mind--

"I am" is all you need to call

and Eternity you will find.