Month: July 2024

It helps me to remember that many people are victims of ignorance. Sometimes that lack of awareness is a result of the intention of individuals. They choose to remain in their bubble of not being aware. Sometimes the lack of awareness is an outcome of a culture that does not educate young and old. Sometimes the lack of awareness is imposed on individuals by those wanting to maintain power.

There was outrage expressed by some because of features of the Olympics’ opening events. I’m not that surprised that there has been such a reaction from people of religion. When one lives within the structure of religion, the tendency is to view the world through the images of the religious world. I think that the world exists independent of religion, and some religious people even try to make the world around them conform to their religious notions, such as the attempt to limit a woman’s right to choose.

There are cultural benefits from religion, but ignorance is often one of the results of religion. People choose to remain in their bubble of not being aware. Anti-intellectualism is common in many religious groups. Power is maintained within religious organizations by restricting awareness and maintaining ignorance. Dogma clouds awareness and perpetuates ignorance. Indoctrination obscures a clear vision of reality.

It is not unusual that believers become victims of ignorance.

My normal sensory apparatus only perceives that part of my world I consider “seen”. I typically rely on all forms of unseen aspects of reality, such as gravity, magnetic fields, electricity and electronic waves. I am aware of the effects, but many factors remain unseen. I think there is much more that is unseen and yet to be discovered.

I am realizing that I live in an ocean of the unseen. Plants have a level of intelligence I have, until now, never been aware of. They have a relationship with me that has been unseen. I am constantly being affected by an unseen barrage of the past from my ancestors. I am learning to recognize the sharing of intelligence with others without any normal sensory connection. I am beginning to think that the unseen future hovers on the edges of my awareness.

While much of my world is typically unseen, I think it is not beyond my awareness. I am getting small glimpses of that unseen dimension that suggest that I can learn to “see” the unseen.

I am trying to become more localized in my attention, my actions, and my presence. So much of my expansive human environment can be a ready source of anxiety, and there is little I can do about it. While I am generally aware of the broad community, I am drawing closer to the community immediately available to me. I am becoming localized.

I have several small groups in which I am interested in seeking refuge and support. These are the same groups into which I am putting more energy and attention. There is the assortment of neighborhood people who come into my garden. I encourage people around me to share in my garden and I go out to meet them when they venture into the back yard. I am in several book groups, and I put energetic attention into the time we spend together. In each of them, emphasis is placed on our experience as well as on the content of what we are reading.

I have a small group of Master Gardeners that I stay in close touch with. We share our common interest in plants, but we also focus on one another. I meet regularly with a small group of parents who have trans children, and we share our experiences and support one another. My sangha is a place of refuge and shared experience. My two kids are an on-going point of attention and engagement.

There, of course, are more intimate individuals, those people to whom I am drawing closer and closer as I localize. I find I am more generous and receptive in the sharing of hugs. Drawing closer and localizing includes being physical.

I am convinced that even while I am localizing, I am mirroring kindness, intimacy and benevolence into the wider more expansive community. What happens in my small groups actually radiates out into the whole world around me. While my emphasis may be on becoming more attentive to small communities, the effect is beyond localization. Perhaps it is an antidote to globalization.

For me, concentration is not the same as mindfulness. It seems that while concentration may actually be a prerequisite for mindfulness, it is only an initial step. My mindfulness includes an embodiment of the object of concentration. Concentration is a focus of my attention, an activity of my mind. Mindfulness is a focus of my whole being, my whole body and all that is involved with me being me. Mindfulness is for me a full body/mind engagement, an experience, more than a simple mental activity.

It has been a struggle for me to understand the practice of reciting the 5 and the 14 Mindfulness Trainings, also traditionally called Precepts. The recitation alone is not an engagement, and does not seem to be connected to mindfulness. I can see that mindfulness might lead to, even be a precondition for the Precepts. But focusing on the Mindfulness Trainings or Precepts is not mindfulness. It is more like checking a box that a task has been well completed.

Concentrating on the meaning of the Precepts may inspire ethical behavior. It may, more importantly for me, be a check whether I am behaving in an ethical manner. But focusing, reciting and concentrating on the Precepts is not an exercise in mindfulness.

I have for many years paid attention to improving my skill of concentration. That skill still serves me well. More significantly, I am now learning to fully engage my body/mind in frequent acts of mindfulness. Sometimes, the experience of mindfulness goes on and on. It is not an isolated engagement but a continuous engagement. It is so much more than concentration.

On my shrine, there is a card that I once made and sent out to friends. It has this quote:

“So are we all called to be lovers, to bear one another’s burdens and share each other’s joys.”

That aspiration has been a guide and attitude for fifty-six years. It continues to be a backdrop to my daily commitment. I have not always lived by it, but my intention has remained the same. My experience of what it means has deepened as my heart opens up in a loving way more and more frequently.

When I sent out that card, I had no idea that it would remain with me and be a part of my life. It is more than a memory. It is a reminder of who I am, who I have become.

Why all this fuss over whether someone considers themselves male or female? Everyone has both a masculine and feminine element in their nature. There is even a time in our physical development that even sex is indistinguishable. We all get to decide which, if either, we want to express. We decide which, masculine or feminine, we want to emphasize. I and everyone else have both, and neither exclusively.

For me to not embrace both would be to resist, frustrate and contradict who I am. This is true of all of us. I refuse to be entangled and constrained by the delusions of our culture.

I will be both male and female. I embrace and encourage each aspect in me. I choose wholeness, not division or separation. While I may mostly wear the trappings of a male in our culture, the female is alive and active within me.

I relate to the female in others. I am aware of the female and relax into it. I enjoy it. I don’t need to try to possess it because the female is already mine and part of me. I choose the manner I will identify with the female in me and in others. The same is true of the male in me. I choose the degree to which I embrace maleness in me and others. I want there to be my balance. I want both.

I relax around both masculine and feminine elements around me. I accept both, I do not feel threatened but enlivened by what I experience. I embrace and absorb what I see. I do not choose either. I choose both.