Feeding Wolves

¡Hola! Everybody…
I’ve been under the weather these past few days, with my throat giving me problems. And, of course, my lungs have never been the same since 9/11. But right now I cannot afford to get sick because I have no insurance. Hence, I’m being extra cautious.

Speaking of 9/11, I will not be watching any celebrations or anything having to do with that tragic event. I am working on a piece that I will hopefully publish on Subversify this Friday. For my latest at Subversify, an alternative online magazine, click here. The following teaching story is the framework I’m using for the upcoming 9/11 piece…

* * *

-=[ Feeding the Wolves ]=-

One of the tragedies of 9/11, the one that never gets mentioned, was our collective response to the senseless violence. As someone who was there that, who felt the earth shake as the Towers came down, as someone who witnessed human beings throwing themselves from the inferno, and who breathed the dust… Suffice it to say that as a nation we have not honored those who died that day.

As human beings we have the wonderful gift -- the potential for transformative and change and a way to disentangle ourselves from our karma. At the same time we also have this knack for falling asleep. Change is not an easy task. It’s as if we’re continuously facing a crossroads, continuously having to choose which way to go, what road to take.

If we’re honest, we would admit that much of our journey is like a sleep walk: the same roads taken, the circular, repetitive dysfunctional patterns of our lives. In order to make skillful choices, we need a way, a compass, a set of practices that work to challenge us and keep us out of comfort of automatic pilot. I think we first need to learn how to be gentle with ourselves. We need to develop compassion for our imperfections, and to embrace the not-so-pretty aspects that we work so hard to keep from others. This is not to say we work to cosign our own bullshit, rather, it’s a way to recognize and honor our imperfections as well as our positive sides.

Anyway, I first heard the following shortly after 9/11. Perhaps you’ve heard it. For me, this story really brings it home. Perhaps this has some application in your life, right now, this very moment…If you ever get a chance pick up anything by the teacher, Pema Chodron (click here). Believe me, you will thank for a long time.

There was a story going around a few days after the attacks of September 11, 2001. An American Indian grandfather was speaking to his grandson about violence and cruelty in the world and how it comes about. He said it was as if two wolves were fighting in his heart. One wolf was vengeful and angry, the other understanding and kind. The young boy asked his grandfather which wolf would win the fight in his heart. The grandfather answered, “The one that wins will be the one I choose to feed.”

And this is our challenge in a nutshell. It is the challenge we face as individuals and as part of this world gone slightly mad. How can we draw upon our inner potential to see what helps and what harms, what escalates war and aggression, and suffering. With the precarious nature of the current times -- a planet in financial chaos and the environment the precipice, the time for sitting back has long gone. And though you might feel there’s nothing you can do, know that even the slightest gesture toward feeding the right wolf will help. Now, more than ever, you need to understand and act on this human potential for transformation.

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…

Is there one day from your childhood that you will simply NEVER forget? You and this young man have something in common.

Sunday Sermon [The Three Questions]

¡Hola! Everybody,
Story time!

* * *

-=[ The Three Questions ]=-

It’s amazing how sometimes I’m reminded of something I’ve read or heard and might have forgotten. The following is adapted from a collection of short stories written by Leo (War and Peace) Tolstoy.

Back in the day, there lived an emperor who searched for a philosophy of life. He realized he needed wisdom to guide him and how he ruled. None of the religions and philosophies of the time satisfied him, so he searched for a philosophy that was rooted in the experience of life.

After much thought, he came to the realization that he required answers to only three basic questions. With the answers to those three questions, he concluded, he would have all the guidance he needed. The three questions were as follows:

When is the most important time?

Who is the most important person?

What is the most important thing to do?

His quest led to a long search which takes up most of the original story, but eventually he finds the three answers when he encounters a hermit. What do you think the answers are? Look at the questions again, and pause before you read on…

We all know the answer to the first question, but it’s so obvious that oftentimes we forget it all the time. The most important time is now, of course. It’s the only time we have. Even in love, the only time we have is now. Love in the past is a memory and love in the future is a mere fantasy. We can only love in the now. If you want to tell a loved one how much you really love them, you should do it now. Not tomorrow. Not in five minutes. Now. Five minutes may be too late. If you need to make amends, don’t start thinking about all the reasons why you shouldn’t, or dwell on self-righteousness, or concoct reasons why you shouldn’t. Just do it now. The opportunity may not come again and you’ll be whining about how you didn’t seize the moment when you had the chance.

The answer to the second question is a little harder and profound. Very few people get this one right. When I first read the answer, it blew me away. The answer rips through the question in a way I never understood or imagined. The answer is that the most important person is the one you’re with.

My work involves listening to people deeply. It entails me being present in a way that’s sometimes exhausting because I’m listening on levels hardly ever utilized. In order for me to be able to listen in this manner, I have to have complete unconditional regard for the person. Listening, believe it or not, is a powerful healing mechanism. Have you ever been with someone who gave you their total attention? Do you remember how that feels?

Communication and love can only be shared with the person you are with, no matter who they are. The person you are with is the most important person in the world. People can feel that kind of attention. They respond.

The most common complaint among married couples is that they feel their partner doesn’t really listen to them. In a way, what that means is that they feel that their partner doesn’t make them feel valued anymore. If people actually were present with their loved ones, divorce lawyers would become a dying breed.

Most of the time in your life, you are by yourself. Then, the most important person, the one you are with, is you!

The answer to the emperor’s last question, “What is the most important thing to do?” is care. To care means bringing together being careful and caring. What does it mean to care?

Well, for me to care means compassion. If compassion can be represented by a dove (as it often is), then the wings of the dove are wisdom. Without wisdom compassion cannot ever soar. I always find it funny that in the Buddhist tradition, they differentiate between compassion and stupid compassion. To illustrate, I’ll share another story I heard at a retreat once. A woman had spent three months a loving-kindness retreat. Metta, a form of loving-kindness mediation intended to opening the heart, is very intense and liberating. Well shortly after leaving the retreat, this woman was attacked by a man in a dark alleyway. Luckily, her screams were heard by passerby who came to her rescue.

The incident really shook her and she wondered about all that loving-kindness practice. She went to her teacher and related the incident to her, hoping to get some guidance. Her teacher asked her, “weren’t you carrying an umbrella?” (the incident occurred during the monsoon season). The woman responded that yes she was carrying an umbrella. Her teacher smiled and told her, “Then you should’ve taken your umbrella, and with all the compassion in your heart, hit your assailant over the head repeatedly.”

That’s wise compassion and maybe that’s what’s meant by saying that the most import thing to do, right now, this very moment, is to care.

When is the most important moment? Now

Who is the most important person? The person you are with.

What is the most important thing to do? To care.

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…

My Mother and El Lay-Away

¡Hola! Everybody...
Today it’s my dear mother’s birthday. I love you mi viejita querida… There are so many stories, but I often joke that my mother led a hilarious life with her children in tow. I’ve posted this several times, but it’s just one on the stories that remind me of my mother. Love you moms, and happy birthday!

* * *

-=[ The Case of the Layaway Men ]=-

We were all crying because the bad men were going to take the TV away.

There was little else in that living room, I don’t think there was even a couch. We would sit on the plastic covered kitchen chairs to watch TV. And that’s what we were doing when these two strange men came into the room and started taking the TV away. I couldn’t have been more than five and my two sisters Darlene and Yvette were 3 and 2 respectively.

We were crying.

These two big bad men were taking the TV away.

There were two things I remember most about that Lower East Side five-story walk-up apartment. One was that the bathtub was in the kitchen which made for funny situations during dinner time. The other was that it had this long, narrow hallway. So long, in fact, that I used it to ride a tricycle up and down its length. My mother was obsessively clean and the worn linoleum would gleam with floor wax and we would take a running start in our socks and slide across that long hallway.

But most of my memories of that apartment weren’t so good because it was the first time I would remember my father not being around. And when my father wasn’t around, things were hard for my mother and we had less to eat, less furniture.

But we had this nice, brand new TV and these strange men were getting ready to take it away, so I cried, and my sisters followed suit. And my mother was standing there, not knowing what to do.

Then she started arguing with these men. At first it was more of a plea. She was actually begging these men not to take the TV away. You see, the TV was bought on the ghetto “lay-away” plan which was actually a scam to rip off those who had nothing to rip off in the first place. You would put an item on “lay-away” and that would allow you to take it home. You paid for the item in weekly installments. The thing was that the weekly installments often added up to more than twice the sticker price. In fact, most of what you got on "lay-away" was used -- items that were taken away from other families who had failed to pay the weekly installment.

Aside from the long, narrow hallway, it was the only form of entertainment we had.

Soon, my mother was engaged in an all-out argument with the men, who seemed to care less and weren’t even paying attention to my mother. You have to understand my mother is a petite woman who barely measures five feet tall -- not an imposing physical presence. So the men were ignoring my mother which made her more pissed off, which made us cry more.

“You can’t do this!” My mother yelled.

And everything stopped. We stopped crying because we knew that tone of voice. We had heard that tone many, many times before and it usually meant someone was going to get their ass kicked. So we stopped crying, perhaps hoping it wasn’t one of us. The men stopped because it was a defiant, authoritative voice. I guess they were used to taking orders and my mother had just barked one out that would’ve made a marine drill sergeant proud.

The pause lasted a split second and the men continued preparing to take the TV and we got back to crying, knowing that it wasn’t one of us that was going to get our asses beat down.

I remember my mother tried pleading one more time to no avail and then I got really scared because when I glanced over to her, she had The Look. I can’t ever sufficiently describe The Look. It was the look of death and it actually made my mother look taller, more powerful, but these guys just weren’t getting it, but we knew. We knew some shit was about to jump off. I felt so bad, I almost warned the men, but, having learned even at that early age that discretion is the better part of valor, I chose to stay quiet.

My mother, seemingly defeated and frustrated, left the room...

And when she came back, she had the largest knife she owned in her hands. It was the same knife used for special occasions for cutting a pernil (roast suckling) or something like that, and she had this wild-eyed look in her eyes. I swear her hair was standing up!

“YOU’RE NOT TAKING THAT TV!!!” She roared.

“You will take that TV over my dead body! My children are not going to suffer.” and with that, she yelled her death roar and made her charge, willing to die.

Now, I was really scared because I feared for my mother’s safety. My mother was small and petite and she was a woman. Surely she wasn’t a match for these two big idiots who didn’t even know better to leave. The men, who had until then been ignoring my mother, freaked out when they saw my mother charging them with this huge knife in her hand. They tried to calm her down, but it was too late, I could’ve told them that. She went after them and the funniest thing happened:

The men started to run!

Or rather, they tried to run, but my mother had them pinned down, slashing at them with her knife and she meant to cut them. Through some miracle, they managed to elude my mother’s slashes and make it out the living room into that long hallway, whereupon they slipped and slid through the length of that recently waxed and gleaming long expanse. Somehow they managed to make it out of the apartment, though my mother almost managed to stab the unfortunate one who slipped and fell.

But that wasn’t enough for her. My mother chased those men down five flights of stairs and down the street where they had their truck parked. They almost didn’t make it. By then my mother had ripped open her blouse and was yelling, “Rape! Rape!” at the top of her lungs which caused all the unemployed Puerto Ricans who happened to be hanging out on the street corner that fine summer day to join in on the chase of these two poor men. I know this because I was running behind my mother the whole time. I’m her oldest, after all.

They jumped in the truck making their final escape in a squeal of tires and a cloud of dust, never to be seen again, a mob of oppressed and frustrated Puerto Ricans on their tail.

There we were in the middle of the street, my mother with a knife in her hand, clutching her blouse closed. She looked at me and said, “C’mon, let’s go home.” Somehow, I remember, my mother managed to look regal, her head held high, and no one dared say a word to her...

And that’s what we did; we went home up five flights to that sad almost empty apartment. She put the TV back, plugged it in and told us that we could watch as much TV as we wanted and that no one would ever take our TV away. She left and got some overpriced, stale meat and other things on credit from the corner bodega. It is said that Cuba, the proprietor notorious for refusing credit to his own mother once, took one look at my mother and decided that was not best time to mention her credit was stretched too far. Later she cooked us dinner, with a Blackout Special as a treat.

And we were so happy.

That was the kind of mother she was: ferocious, fiercely protective of her children. Later in life, it was her power of example that maintained me and taught me never to give up when the odds seemed insurmountable. It was also her fierce love that nurtured and protected me, serving as beacon to a path for becoming a better man. I believe that if I were to carry my mother on my back for the rest of her life, I still could never repay her…

I love you Moms

Sunday Sermon [Sex, Spirituality, Ego ]

¡Hola! Evertbody…
I don’t know about where you live, but here, at the Center of the Known Universe, it’s been hawt! Don’t get me wrong, I love heatwaves, love the beach, the humidity – the full catastrophe of summer in the Big City.

* * *

-=[ Sex, Your Higher Power & Ego ]=-

We moan, we grin, and we roll apart
for some small talk
after our little piece of dying.

It is a feeble reach
for the rational,
some tiny piece of evidence
that proves we are

still alive,

once again in possession of our

separate selves,
once again intact.

-- Edward-Yemíl Rosario ©

Your Higher Power, however (or if) you conceptualize it, is love.

When we are relating to the things and people around us with care, compassion, and consideration, we naturally radiate that love and joy. When we are not handling things in that manner, our spiritual life -- our consciousness of the ever present energy of the Universal Principle -- will be blocked by our apathy. In the interest of honesty I will say that there are times when I do not embody such caring, but I am trying.

To go off tangent for a moment, I know of at least one woman who probably doesn’t like me too much these days and most likely would rather not hear from me… ever. I said at least one, but there are most likely more. The irony is this: until we can undo the karmic entanglement we have created, we will be forever linked. The relevant point being that if you want to be rid of me, then you’ll have to love me first. LOL

I laugh, but I’m serious -- but I digress…

By not caring or being inconsiderate, we create an environment equal to that of a psychological pig sty. In that sty of negativity, not caring often means casting judgments on others. Anyone who’s ever been in a committed relationship will agree that this can be clearly evident as an expression we have taken to bed.

Part of intimacy in bed, aside from the obvious, is sleeping together, something both men and women often take for granted. In actuality, sleeping together is a profoundly intimate, trusting experience, although we have all at one time or another abused that intimate comfort.

How many times have you been in bed, irate because you knew the person next to you was “wrong” but wouldn’t admit it? What did that get you except righteous indignation, as you maintained this intimacy with a bad taste in your mouth, or a tense stomach? The fact is you could have bypassed that righteous indignation.

Perhaps your response might be: “I tried. I mean, if s/he would only admit s/he was wrong, everything would be fine.” To that, I will only say that I’m not talking about trying in that way. That’s just exacerbating the conflict.

Or, another response you might have is, “If only he’d stop being such an arrogant asshole, I might let him in.” To that I would say that’s not “in”; that’s merely allowing your lover out of the judgment jail you put him in the first place.

There are other ways, if you’re willing to put down the defense.

When you’re lying there with your lover in bed, you might instead opt to give them a light massage and as you’re doing that saying something along the lines of, “I don’t like being separate from you. I don’t care anymore about right and wrong. All I know is I want to be with you and to care for you, and for you to forgive me.”

Your response to this might be to object, to say that why you should be the one to forgive if you were the wronged or injured party. Another person might say, “Give Eddie a massage?!! After what that psycho muthafucka said to me?” My response to you and to that form of thinking is that the best thing you can probably do is send the ego packing. To paraphrase a wise person, people say, “I want to love.” I say, drop the ego (I), do away with the desire (want), and what are you left with?

I will say this: be careful about sticking to your guns because you might then find yourself locked into playing the role of gunslinger for the rest of your life. And believe me, once you get with the way of the gun, there will always be another relationship around the corner for you to gun down or to gun you down at the not-so-OK Corral.

I’m just sayin’

If you desire to be with someone in warm, loving, caring, caressing support, I suggest you step out of ego-centered world of the Mini Me, and opt instead for that tender moment.

Love,

Eddie

Aristocracy

¡Hola! Everybody...
Regarding the ongoing saga of my back: it’s worse... I’m going to the doctors this afternoon... Thanks to everyone for their concern and wishes.

* * *

-=[ The Aristocracy ]=-

“I believe in aristocracy... Not an aristocracy of power, based upon rank and influence, but an aristocracy of the sensitive, the considerate, and the plucky. Its members are to be found in all nations and classes and all through the ages, and there is a secret understanding between them when they meet. They represent the true human tradition, the one permanent victory of our queer race over cruelty and chaos. Thousands of them perish in obscurity, a few are great names. They are sensitive for others as well as themselves, they are considerate without being fussy, their pluck is not swankiness but the power to endure, and they can take a joke.”

-- E.M. Forster

Put that in your pipe and smoke it. LOL

Love,

Eddie

Motherhood and "El Lay-Away"

¡Hola! Everybody...
Today, I want to wish all women a Happy Mother’s Day. It doesn’t matter if you’ve never given birth to a child. Some of the most powerful mothers I have ever known never had children of their own. My aunt, Fefi, who would’ve celebrated a birthday this past week (May 8^th), was everyone’s mother. She raised more children than you can shake a stick at and if she were alive today and met you, she’d be your mother too.

The woman my son calls mother is not the fruit of her womb. But she is as close to a mother he will ever know.

My sister Darlene never had a child but her instinct for nurturing and compassion is present in everything she does.

My mother wouldn’t allow us to have pets, but she would welcome fragmented people into her home the way other mothers collected stray animals. The exiled, the unforgiven, the broken, the traumatized were the cast of characters that populated my childhood. And as much as my mother helped these poor souls, a few would turn on her and I would shake my head and ask my mother why she bothered, and she would look at me and say, “There’s a God and He sees everything, it’s not for me to judge. You help because that’s what you are supposed to do.”

It took me almost a lifetime to understand that wisdom…

My moms basically led a hilarious life with her children in tow -- here's a story I always remember...

* * *

My mother as a young woman with my sister Darlene

-=[ The Case of the Layaway Men ]=-

We were all crying because they were going to take the TV away.

There was little else in that living room, I don’t think there was even a couch. We would sit on the plastic covered kitchen chairs to watch TV. And that’s what we were doing when these two strange men came into the room and started taking the TV away. I couldn’t have been more than five and my two sisters Darlene and Yvette were 3 and 2 respectively.

We were crying.

These two big bad men were taking the TV away.

There were two things I remember most about that Lower East Side five-story walk-up apartment. One was that the bathtub was in the kitchen which made for funny situations during dinner time. The other was that it had this long, narrow hallway. So long, in fact, that I used it to ride a tricycle up and down its length. My mother was obsessively clean and the worn linoleum would gleam with floor wax and we would take a running start in our socks and slide across that long hallway.

But most of my memories of that apartment weren’t so good because it was the first time I would remember my father not being around. And when my father wasn’t around, things were hard for my mother and we had less to eat, less furniture.

But we had this nice, brand new TV and these strange men were getting ready to take it away, so I cried, and my sisters followed suit. And my mother was standing there, not knowing what to do.

Then she started arguing with these men. At first it was more of a plea. She was actually begging these men not to take the TV away. You see, the TV was bought on the ghetto “lay-away” plan which was actually a scam to rip off those who had nothing to rip off in the first place. You would put an item on “lay-away” and that would allow you to take it home. You paid for the item in weekly installments. The thing was that the weekly installments often added up to more than twice the sticker price. In fact, most of what you got on "lay-away" was used -- items that were taken away from other families who had failed to pay the weekly installment.

Aside from the long, narrow hallway, it was the only form of entertainment we had.

Soon, my mother was engaged in an all-out argument with the men, who seemed to care less and weren’t even paying attention to my mother. You have to understand my mother is a petite woman who barely measures five feet tall -- not an imposing physical presence. So the men were ignoring my mother which made her more pissed off, which made us cry more.

“You can’t do this!” My mother yelled.

And everything stopped. We stopped crying because we knew that tone of voice. We had heard that tone many, many times before and it usually meant someone was going to get their ass kicked. So we stopped crying, perhaps hoping it wasn’t one of us. The men stopped because it was a defiant, authoritative voice. I guess they were used to taking orders and my mother had just barked one out that would’ve made a marine drill sergeant proud.

The pause lasted a split second and the men continued preparing to take the TV and we got back to crying, knowing that it wasn’t one of us that was going to get our asses beat down.

I remember my mother tried pleading one more time to no avail and then I got really scared because when I glanced over to her, she had The Look. I can’t ever sufficiently describe The Look. It was the look of death and it actually made my mother look taller, more powerful, but these guys just weren’t getting it, but we knew. We knew some shit was about to jump off. I felt so bad, I almost warned the men, but, having learned even at that early age that discretion is the better part of valor, I chose to stay quiet.

My mother, seemingly defeated and frustrated, left the room...

And when she came back, she had the largest knife she owned in her hands. It was the same knife used for special occasions for cutting a pernil (roast suckling) or something like that, and she had this wild-eyed look in her eyes. I swear her hair was standing up!

“YOU’RE NOT TAKING THAT TV!!!” She roared.

“You will take that TV over my dead body! My children are not going to suffer.” and with that, she yelled her death roar and made her charge, willing to die.

Now, I was really scared because I feared for my mother’s safety. My mother was small and petite and she was a woman. Surely she wasn’t a match for these two big idiots who didn’t even know better to leave. The men, who had until then been ignoring my mother, freaked out when they saw my mother charging them with this huge knife in her hand. They tried to calm her down, but it was too late, I could’ve told them that. She went after them and the funniest thing happened:

The men started to run!

Or rather, they tried to run, but my mother had them pinned down, slashing at them with her knife and she meant to cut them. Through some miracle, they managed to elude my mother’s slashes and make it out the living room into that long hallway, whereupon they slipped and slid through the length of that recently waxed and gleaming long expanse. Somehow they managed to make it out of the apartment, though my mother almost managed to stab the unfortunate one who slipped and fell.

But that wasn’t enough for her. My mother chased those men down five flights of stairs and down the street where they had their truck parked. They almost didn’t make it. By then my mother had ripped open her blouse and was yelling, “Rape! Rape!” at the top of her lungs which caused all the unemployed Puerto Ricans who happened to be hanging out on the street corner that fine summer day to join in on the chase of these two poor men. I know this because I was running behind my mother the whole time. I’m her oldest, after all.

They jumped in the truck making their final escape in a squeal of tires and a cloud of dust, never to be seen again, a mob of oppressed and frustrated Puerto Ricans on their tail.

There we were in the middle of the street, my mother with a knife in her hand, clutching her blouse closed. She looked at me and said, “C’mon, let’s go home.” Somewhow, I remember, my mother managed to look regal, her head held high, and no one dared say a word to her...

And that’s what we did; we went home up five flights to that sad almost empty apartment. She put the TV back, plugged it in and told us that we could watch as much TV as we wanted and that no one would ever take our TV away. She left and got some overpriced, stale meat and other things on credit from the corner bodega. It is said that Cuba, the proprietor notorious for refusing credit to his own mother once, took one look at my mother and decided that was not best time to mention her credit was stretched too far. Later she cooked us dinner, with a Blackout Special as a treat.

And we were were so happy.

That was the kind of mother she was: ferocious, fiercely protective of her children. Later in life, it was her power of example that maintained me and taught me never to give up when the odds seemed insurmountable. It was also her fierce love that nurtured and protected me, serving as beacon to a path for becoming a better man. I believe that if I were to carry my mother on my back for the rest of her life, I still could never repay her…

I love you Moms

Open Letter to Conservatives

¡Hola! Everybody...
We do live under the Chinese curse of “interesting times... ” Consider the following: a center-right president, winner in an electoral landslide, backed by a democratically elected legislative branch, passed a conservative healthcare reform bill. Three branches of our democratically elected government came through on their collective promise to reform healthcare, passed a conservative, pro-business reform bill, and conservatives call that a Nazi takeover -- comparing it to tragedies such as the Pearl Harbor and 9/11 attacks.

And not one major mainstream news source sees anything wrong about this...

* * *

-=[ An Open Letter to Conservatives ]=-

If the only prayer you say in your whole life is “thank you,” that would suffice.

-- Meister Eckhart (c.1260-c.1327)

For some time now, the fRight Wing has really challenged my spiritual practice. It gets increasingly more difficult to muster any compassion for what I see as the ugly side of the American psyche. It’s so much easier to forget that though this political ideology is rooted in ignorance, those whop adhere to it are also human beings. It’s difficult to recognize that in their ignorance, not only do they bring suffering others, but also to themselves.

I see the signs of hate, racism, and homophobia; the bullying, the arrogance, and it gets my Chango up and running. How could so many people have so much hate and aversion for their own kind?

To be sure, not all conservatives are alike, but even in the best of times I view conservatism as I would an emergency brake on a car: it’s a necessary tool best used sparingly. Today, we live in an extreme conservative world here in El Norte, and it’s literally killing tens of thousands here and untold millions abroad. The fRight Wing today has morphed into a belligerent, authoritarian mob, and it doesn’t take much to see them as pure evil. In a sense, what goes for the right today is malevolence. But to succumb to stooping down to that level is become just as intolerant and authoritarian.

Many people see political orientation as a continuum on a line, but I see it more like a Moebius Strip: even progressive values can morph into the authoritarian mindset that is the hallmark of conservatism.

Therefore, I am writing this letter to all conservatives thanking them and expressing my gratitude for all that they bring...

I thank homophobic fRight-wingers because they remind me how easy it is to lose sight of someone’s humanity simply because they have a different sexual orientation than mine. They remind me that I must live consciously.

I am grateful for their intolerance because it incites my own intolerance and reminds me that if I become intolerant of them, then I have become as them.

I tip my hat to the barely disguised racist contempt for people of color because it reminds me that social justice is a life-long task and to fall back into a false sense of security of a “post-racial” America is to risk losing whatever civil rights gains we have made.

Not all conservatives are extremists, I’m sure. But even that soccer mom from New Jersey, who will swear to you she’s a liberal (or worse a “moderate”) rejoices in the killing of “other” women and children in “other” countries because she thinks it will keep her children safe. She is not a monster or something evil; she is part of the banality of contemporary American life. I cannot hate her, for she is my friend.

Conservatives are our family members, goober cousins from Texas who have forgotten where they come from and that no matter how much they toe the conservative line, to many on the right, they’re just a bunch of Spics. Conservatives are our brothers and sisters who in their blindness and fear talk about “niggers” behind closed doors.

Conservatives challenge my spirituality on a daily basis. They challenge me to dig deep inside, to seek a way to find compassion in spite of their hate and blindness. So, I thank them today. I thank them for forcing me to deepen my practice because it’s easy to care, love and respect those we get along with and care about, but it’s a whole ‘nother level to extend the same for those who wish us harm.

Thank you, Tea Baggers, Neocons, so-called “libertarians,” and “moderates” for keeping it real for me; for reminding me that when I lose sight of your humanity, I lose mine.

Love,

Eddie

Sunday Sermon [F.E.A.R.]

¡Hola! Everybody...
It’s Sunday and off in the distance a little, I can hear the church bells... I am not a Ken Burns fan but I am looking forward to viewing his series on the history our national parks (The National Parks: America’s Best Idea). For the first time in history of humankind, land was set aside for the pleasure of the common folk, and not just the aristocracy. Manifested in our parks is the vision of a society guided by the values we like to say we hold dear. For those of us who despise our government (We the People... ), perhaps it would worthwhile to watch this...

* * *

-=[ Feeding the Demon ]=-

Fear: Fuck Everything And Run

The following is based on a true event, but it reminds of a story I read about a long time ago...

I took the train last night and, as is often the case on weekends, the NYC transit system is a complicated mess. Most of the construction and structural upgrades occur during the weekends, so trains are re-routed, stations by-passed and it’s almost impossible to keep track. As a result, there are usually mobs of clueless tourists moving about aimlessly in our transit system. Part of being a New Yorker is often adopting the duty of a de facto tour guide.

And so it was last night, when a rather attractive woman approached me for assistance. I assured her the oncoming train would take her to her destination (she and I were getting off on the same stop) and, as she struck up small talk, we got on.

As we entered, I felt immediately sensed something weird in the car. Everyone seemed tense and, sure enough, there was a person talking very loud, using profanity, and it had everyone ill-at-ease. As a New Yorker you learn to ignore such outbursts. Paying too much mind often serves to encourage unwanted behavior, so being able to ignore unusual behavior becomes second nature to most New Yorkers. Unfortunately, Tourist Lady wasn’t a New Yorker and she committed infraction no.1: she made eye contact with the individual, who seemed especially belligerent. I took her by the elbow, guiding her to a transit map with the outward intention of showing her where she should get off, Inwardly, I was also trying to deflect the unwanted attention she was eliciting. I hoped that this would help sever the connection between Belligerent Subway Dude and Pretty Tourist Lady would be broken.

No dice...

She was pretty and Belligerent Dude, who was apparently drunk, asks Pretty Tourist Lady if she needs some assistance with directions. Pretty Tourist Lady (who’s not drunk, merely naïve), answers, in what could have been construed as a snobby dismissal, that no, she didn’t need help (and I believe she showed a little eye-roll to boot).

This, of course, sets Belligerent off who starts in on her, making comments about her that weren’t too nice. Naïve Tourist Lady, sidles over closer to me and realizes that she probably shouldn’t have paid any mind to Belligerent Dude because he’ drunk. Belligerent Dude thinks she is a snobby bitch.

Belligerent responds by talking about Pretty Tourist Lady's tits, her legs, I mean, he’s just going off on her, and I know she’s embarrassed. Out of the blue, from the other end of the car, a man yells out, “Shut the fuck up, already!” and Belligerent, as if on cue, goes off on that individual. In fact, he threatens the individual, who I shall call Capt. Save-a-Ho, with a severe “beat down.” Once Capt. Save-a-Ho realizes that he will have to exert more than bravado in order to handle Belligerent, he calms down a little, but Belligerent, who’s also a big dude, gets right in Capt. Save-a-Ho’s face and challenges him. Actually calls him a “fuckin pussy,” adding that he will “kick his motherfuckin ass” for good measure.

Capt. Save-a-Ho suddenly remembers the next stop is his and gets off. Of course, I’m sitting there hoping Belligerent finds something else to do, but fuckin Tourist Lady is still staring at him. So, Belligerent sits right across from us and continues his running commentary on Tourist Lady’s physical attributes. And I’m sitting there thinking that reading my book is all I want to do. And now, he’s starting to get on my nerves.

Finally, I tell Belligerent, “Listen man, why you gotta disrespect me like that? Can’t you see she’s with me? I mean, how would you like it if someone talked about your woman like that right in front of you? That shit ain’t right... ” I added a few choice words of my own and stared right into his eyes, hoping that my once vaunted “psycho” I-don't-give-a-fuck look hadn’t softened from lack of use, but it wasn’t working. Tourist Lady also chose this point in time to move away from me a little, apparently undecided whether to bail out or not.

Belligerent responded by informing that he was, in fact, on his way to meet his woman, and if anybody spoke to his woman in the manner that he was speaking to Tourist Lady (now my woman), he would kick that motherfucker’s ass. It was an obvious challenge, but one I was going to ignore.

I looked at him as if I was tired and before I could say anything more, an older man sat next to Belligerent and, in a soothing voice, began talking to him. At first Belligerent was hostile to the old man, but because the old man was non-threatening and seemed genuinely interested in him -- asking him about his girlfriend and how she was -- Belligerent took his focus from me and started talking to the old man.

In a loud voice, Belligerent began talking about his “woman” enumerating all her great qualities, and how he couldn’t wait to see her. The old man continued in this vein, asking more questions, generally communicating the feeling that he was interested in Belligerent’s story -- in him as an individual. Eventually, as Belligerent continued to vent and he disclosed more and more, he revealed that he hadn’t seen his woman in a long time, and that he wasn’t sure that she would see him, and with the old man’s prompting, Belligerent's cracked a little as he continued to talk.

He had just come out of jail, he told the old man, and he didn’t really have anyone. All he had, he said, was that he was headed to the last known address of the woman he loved, but he was afraid that she wouldn’t be there, or if she was, if she would even accept him.

As the train arrived at my stop and I got off (with Tourist Lady), the last thing I saw was the old man comforting Belligerent, who had completely broken down sobbing like a child...

Love,

Eddie

The First Noble Truth

¡Hola! Everybody...
If you have ever liked anything I wrote, or read something here that made you think, get hard or moist, or if I ever schooled you, or insulted you, made you cry or laugh, or attempted to seduce you here, then please consider voting for my blog. If you’re not on Multiply.com (where a version of this blog is posted), you might have to register. However, some of you know me from the now defunct Y360! and Multiply. In any case, go fuckin vote for me (“translucence”) here!

click here

* * *

-=[ Responding to Suffering ]=-

... an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man.

-- Jimmy Carter

A lot of people get a quizzical look when I tell them I’m a practicing Buddhist. I understand that I may not fit the stereotype of a spiritual seeker: I cuss a lot, get angry, sad, happy, horny -- the full catastrophe! LOL I certainly demonstrate little patience and don’t tolerate fools easily. What’s more, I am politically motivated, an engaged activist. Too often people don’t see the connection. From my perspective, spiritual practice is not as an escape from the world, but a way to engage it in a conscious and ethical manner.

In short, my activism is a response to suffering. I mean, look around, there seems to be a lot of it going around, and, as the historical Buddha very likely put it, there’s a lot of suffering in life. Indeed, Buddhism’s first truth is simply an acknowledgment that to live is to know suffering (dukkha). But what is suffering?

I have a simple formula for suffering. For me, suffering is pain (what is) combined with stress (what we bring to it):

pain + stress = suffering

I gave it away early in the post because I need to construct my post rather quickly today. LOL

Let me expand on this a little just so we can create a foundation. Suffering arises because when we experience pain -- when we are injured or startled, or are treated unfairly -- we normally react by lashing out at others and even at ourselves. We are conditioned to believe that this will somehow lessen our pain. It’s almost like shooting yourself in the foot as a response to being shot. In Buddhism, the image of two arrows is used. We act in such a way that a second arrow is shot, at us or others, on account of the pain of the first arrow. When we shoot the second arrow, we “pass on” the original pain. We have to admit, if we look at this critically, it’s a childish coping strategy. If we’re honest with ourselves, however, we recognize that we all do it to a certain extent.

So! According to my “formula,” suffering can be understood as a kind of resistance or reaction to the pain of the present moment. We tend to react physically, emotionally, and/ or mentally when we experience unpleasant sensations, emotions, or thoughts. With physical pain, the tendency is to become tense or to contract around the area where the pain is coming from as if this will somehow lessen the pain. Some doctors say that 80 percent of what patients experience as pain is the not the result of the original cause of the pain, but rather the resistance to the cause. See?

pain + stress = suffering

It’s the same with emotional pain. A perceived slight from someone close to us, or the break-up of an intimate relationship, will result in a flood of emotions, culminating in psychological and often physical pain. We might generate anger (more on anger in a later post), judgments of others, and ourselves, and rationalizing it. The tension usually builds compelling us to seek release from the pain through food, shopping, sex, or mindless entertainment. As humans, we do this individually and through groups, as well as in our communities and nations.

For me, the work of spiritual practice is not to get rid of the pain, but rather to learn how to open to pain and suffering, when they appear in ourselves and others. In this way, I can learn to be present with the pain, but without suffering and without compounding the pain.

My political work and activism is informed by this framework of responding to pain. The people you see spreading all the hate and vitriol are effectively causing themselves and others suffering. It’s a suffering based on the delusion that we are somehow not connected. Compassionate responses to such behavior can manifest in many different ways. Sometimes it can take the form of what I learned to call fierce compassion. Its modern-day equivalent would be called “tough love.” A lot of what I’m seeing today calls for this type of compassion. The tricky part -- indeed, the hardest part -- is maintaining a compassionate attitude in the face of so much mindless hate.

Love,

Eddie

Sunday Sermon [The Heart of the Matter]

¡Hola! Everybody...
Whenever you relive an insult -- or think or dwell on it -- you have repeated that same insult. In this way, you relive and re-experience all the insults of your life.

Think about that...

* * *

-=[ Forgiveness ]=-

All isms end up in schisms.

-- Huston Smith

Several years ago, I was having a very rough time at a community meeting. I was trying to educate a group of people on the effectiveness of alternative to incarceration programs. For me, it was a no-brainer: treat the root causes and crime decreases. Treat the addiction and it has a double effect. It’s more effective and cheaper than incarceration which is extremely expensive failure. Address education meaningfully by investing in smaller classroom size and making schools more accessible to parents and we prevent crime before it ever begins. I had the charts, the facts -- in short I had everything I thought I needed to help people see that locking up millions of individuals (mostly young people of color) wasn’t a very smart or effective way to create a moral and just society.

Man, was I getting beat up that day! LOL

At one point, during an intermission, this young white man came up to me and asked if he could address the audience briefly. I don’t why I trusted this individual, I had never seen him before, and I had had it to here

::grabs dese nuts::

... with angry white men. But inwardly acknowledging that the meeting couldn’t possibly get any worse, I shrugged and told him, “Go ahead, finish putting me out of my misery.”

He got up and told of how two men brutally murdered the woman who raised him, his grandmother -- the only family he had. He told of the agonizing pain and hardship; the anger he felt; of how he wanted those who took his grandmother’s life to be punished -- to have their lives taken also. Then he spoke about something that floored everybody. He spoke about his journey from being consumed with vengeance to forgiveness. In the process of speaking of that healing process, he managed to do what all my facts and charts didn’t: he opened people’s hearts to the possibility of a different community; of a different society. A society based not on revenge and killing and an “eye for an eye,” but a society predicated on empathy and compassion and equality. I was never so moved as when I heard this man speak so openly about being torn down only to be arise again. What a lesson! And, no, he wasn’t a religious man, at least not in a rigid sense.

I think this man was able to touch upon the essential nature of vengeance and forgiveness. Vengeance comes from desire -- a desire to make things “right” no matter what the expense. If you killed mine, then I must kill you. And in the short term, vengeance serves to alleviate our pain. But in the long term the desire for vengeance -- like all unskillful desire -- erodes our basic humanity. It eats at us from the inside until we become empty of anything even remotely resembling an enlightened species. Compassion and empathy comes from the part of the brain that triggers love, creativity, collaboration and, physiologically, it releases chemicals and responses that heal -- that strengthen the immune system and encourages fellowship.

I would suggest a different form of spirituality: one that recognizes a universal energy in everything, the humility to admit mistakes, one that promotes flexibility instead of rigidity, and a willingness to tolerate differences.

And isn’t that a story that mirrors any kind of redemption? Couldn’t such a shift be an evolutionary quantum leap? In fact, this is where we stand today: at the precipice of an evolutionary and spiritual chasm, and leap we must or become the first species to cause its own extinction.

Love,

Eddie

Generosity

¡Hola! Everybody...
I was very busy today -- out in the field. I was walking by the NY’s court district right after the Madoff sentencing was handed down. I snapped this photo -- this is your MSM at work...

* * *

-=[ Generosity]=-

“I should be content to look at a mountain for what it is and not as a comment on my life.”

-- David Ignatow

I work for a non-profit and at the heart of our mission is to work towards helping the members of the communities we serve to “empower themselves.” It’s a serious responsibility cutting across all levels for those concerned. After my own spiritual awakening, I made a decision to make service the centerpiece of my life’s mission, and I realized that not all of my motivations were as pure as I would like to think. There’s a dark side to service and I see it all the time, both within myself, and in my colleagues.

In Buddhism, there are different levels of generosity. One starts at the level of giving because you will amass spiritual “points” for the afterlife or at some point out there somewhere. Some give because they hope they will reap some benefits. Others give, and this very much prevalent, because it gives them a sense of identity: “I’m a good person, see how I helped the helpless little natives?” Others give because religious dogma dictates they give. These are the evangelicals who give if you accept their God and their beliefs. It may not be overt, but the pressure to submit is there. There are many reasons, both good and bad, for service.

I think what’s more important than the service is the motivation underlying the movement to serve. For the most part, service is flavored by what stage of development one is serving from. Service from the egocentric (I care for myself) stage will look and feel much different from service from a person who works from an ethnocentric (I care for my tribe, my country, my nation) and that, in turn, will be different from a person who operates from a worldcentric view (I care for all human beings, regardless of race, color, sex, or creed). Service is a tool and wielded by the misguided can do more harm than good.

I’ll attempt a clearer example: Let’s say you are at an ethnocentric stage of development and you have a moment of awakening or spiritual experience of being one with everything, you might interpret that as an experience of oneness with Jesus and conclude that no one can be saved unless they accept Jesus as their personal savior (this is the “ethnocentric interpretation – you must belong to this one group in order to be saved -- and, no, I am not a Christian). Have a spiritual experience at the ethnocentric stage and it will only make you more ethnocentric

See how it works? You can be at any stage of development, experience the same life-changing event and you will interpret it according how you perceive the world. Now, let me see if I can piece this all together. We all know examples of reborn Christians who have had very powerful spiritual awakenings; they glow, they are radiant, and they are fascists. This is because they are still at the ethnocentric stage, and, bless them, think Jesus is the one and only way. But there is hope yet, research shows that the more spiritual awakenings you experience, the more quickly you move through developmental stages.

So, what the fuck does this have to do with self-centeredness of service, you ask? LOL! Well, the teachings of Jesus and others remain relevant today because of the emphasis on service, what I consider a form of prayer in action. People, it’s easy to utter prayers, doesn’t take much effort, really. However, when our spiritual life is about getting something or arriving at some destination it reinforces the feeling of having a need -- of not being there yet. Wanting anything, including a mate, or spiritual enlightenment, works to solidify a universe in which you are missing what you want.

The only cure for this endless and painful quest is service and gratitude, period. LOL… Fucked up, huh? I mean I always thought it would be Halle Berry, but she’s not returning my phone calls these days.

Here’s one level of service as described the Buddhist literature (and echoed in many religious disciplines): Compassionate service. Compassionate service only comes about from doing the inner work to the point where it takes no morality or effort at all. If you put your finger in a flame, it takes no effort or willpower to pull it out. You feel the pain, and the action is spontaneous. When your sense of self expands to include other things aside from the sack of flesh you call “you” and expand your circle of life, you feel those close to you as yourself. When a mother sees her child in danger, standing in the path of an oncoming car, for example, she does not need religious dogma to know what to do. The intimacy she feels with her child makes her action spontaneous. As our ego membrane becomes thinner, and one recognizes The One Spirit everywhere, all things become more intimate, the connection stronger. Everyone becomes a part of us -- one humanity. It is only then that we live in Jesus’ teachings, and the Buddha’s, and Krishna’s too, and the teaching lives in us.

Service, Compassionate Service, is the only true prayer.

Love,

Eddie

Sunday Sermon (Easter and the Promise of Spring)

¡Hola! Everybody...
On Good Friday, my grandmother, a devout Catholic, would not allow any electronic gadgets to be turned on. That meant no music or TV. And the women would prepare a huge meal consisting of Puerto Rican-style escabeche -- a marinated type of fish dish. We weren’t allowed to eat meat or do much of anything on Good Friday, which was a huge drag for the teens.

On Saturday, “The Curse,” as I used to call it, was lifted and music and life would seep back into our household. My mother would make this shrimp dish that’s to die for and we would eat it with real Italian bread, so fresh and hot, it burned your hands holding it.

As a teen, Easter Sunday was a huge holiday. We would beg our (mostly working poor) parents to buy us new outfits and we would all go to Coney Island. In fact, when we were on welfare (which we did several times while growing up) my mother sometimes used welfare money to buy us new clothes! I know many of you don’t like this shit and that’s why I’m putting it out there.

Tens of thousands of teens from all over The City would meet up there to usher in the warmer weather, the promise of spring like a new song in our young hearts.

* * *

-=[ The Promise of Spring ]=-

“All isms end up in schisms.”

-- Huston Smith

I have little patience for the people who lump all of spirituality or belief systems into the same category. I find this with many modern-day atheists. They tend to throw out the spiritual baby with the bathwater. Their favorite refrain is that religions have been at the center of much suffering in the world. In that, they are correct. However, I can level that accusation to any human endeavor -- politics and science, for example. Science, while yielding many fruits, also has been at the center of much hardship and danger. Scientism (which is a form of corrupted science) is just as nasty as any organized religion. I would argue that neither science nor religion is at fault. It's human beings that have corrupted both.

Big fucking difference.

The Easter holiday is one that most resonates with my way of thinking because, like spring, it promises renewal and new beginnings. It’s a story that tells us that we can put together again our fractured lives; that we don’t have to be slaves to our past mistakes. It’s a powerful message. I would submit that the world’s sacred narratives help us make sense of our existence. The problem is that when interpreted literally rather than symbolically, the spiritual essence of religion loses its creative energy and becomes instead a destructive force.

Fundamentalists of any faith are drunk on a rapture of certainty, secure in their righteous belief of an exclusive covenant with God. In that way gay human beings become an abomination. And please spare the bullshit "hate the sin, not the sinner" hypocrisy. In fact, we can say our world today is embroiled in a clash of fundamentalisms as predicted by the great mythologist, Joseph Campbell.

Such thinking exists not only in religion, but in all of us -- whether left wingers, scientists, and secularists alike. We all have an inner fundamentalist right there in our amygdala, the tiny organ in the midbrain that triggers the fight-or-flight response to danger. It also originates from the tendency to attempt to split thinking and feeling that exists throughout the brain.

Which brings me to my Easter story of this year. I write it down now, as I prepare to address a group of worshipers at a local church.

Several years ago, I was having a very rough time at a community meeting. I was trying to educate a group of people on the effectiveness of alternative to incarceration programs. For me, it was a no-brainer: treat the root causes and crime decreases. Treat the addiction and it has a double effect. It’s more effective and cheaper than incarceration which is extremely expensive a tragic failure. Address education -- invest in smaller classroom size and make the schools friendlier to parents and we prevent crime before it ever begins. I had the charts, the facts -- in short I had everything I thought I needed to help people see that locking up millions of individuals (mostly young people of color) wasn’t a very smart or effective way to create a moral and just society.

Man, was I getting beat up that day! LOL

At one point, during an intermission, this young white man came up to me and asked if he could address the audience briefly. I don’t why I trusted this individual, I had never seen him before, and I had had it to here

::grabs dese nuts::

... with angry white men. However, inwardly acknowledging that the meeting couldn’t possibly get any worse, I shrugged and told him, “Go ahead, finish putting me out of my misery.”

He got up and told of how two men brutally murdered the woman who raised him, his grandmother -- the only family he had. He told of the agonizing pain and hardship; the anger he felt -- how he wanted those who took his grandmother’s life to be punished -- possibly to have their lives taken also. Then he spoke about something that floored everybody. He spoke about his journey from a heart filled with vengeance to forgiveness and compassion. In the process of speaking of that healing process, he managed to do what all my facts and charts didn’t: he opened people’s hearts to the possibility of a different community; of a different society. A society based not on revenge and killing -- an “eye for an eye,” -- but a society predicated on empathy and compassion and equality. I was never so moved as when I heard this man speak so openly about being torn down only to be arise again. What a lesson! And, no, he wasn’t a religious man, at least not in a rigid sense.

I think this man was able to touch upon the essential nature of vengeance and forgiveness. Vengeance comes from desire -- a desire to make aright, no matter what the expense. If you killed mine, then I must kill you. And in the short term, vengeance serves to alleviate our pain. But in the long term the desire for vengeance -- like all unskillful desire -- erodes our humanity. It eats at us from the inside until we become empty of anything even remotely resembling an enlightened species. Compassion and empathy comes from the part of the brain that triggers love, creativity, collaboration and, physiologically, it releases chemicals and responses that heal -- that strengthen the immune system and encourages fellowship.

I would suggest a different form of spirituality: one that recognizes a universal energy in everything, the humility to admit mistakes, one that promotes flexibility instead of rigidity, and a willingness to tolerate differences.

And isn’t that a story that mirrors any kind of resurrection? Couldn’t such a shift be an evolutionary quantum leap? In fact, this is where we stand today: at the precipice of an evolutionary and spiritual chasm, and leap we must or become the first species to make ourselves extinct.

Love,

Eddie