Doing Well

Still having a lot of issues coming up lately, mostly with the kids, and that part will always be a struggle now that we are no longer together.   I’ve decided that I’m going to start marking some of my old posts as private, I don’t think that they’ll be really helpful for anyone else going through a similiar situation, and I don’t want them to define me.   I recently read an article about catharsis not actually being all that helpful in us learning to deal with emotions, so I think I’m going to try to start focusing on the future, and what I want to create with my life, rather than on what I lost in the past.

Imaginary Advisors

I his book Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill discusses the idea of creating a boardroom of imaginary counselors, the people, alive and dead, that would would most like to model our lives after, and gain insight and advice from.  I’ve thought about this for years, and lately I’ve taken to studying some of the people I most admire.  Here is the beginnings of my list.  I’ll flesh it out more as I continue studying.   Right now I’m reading a biography of Franklin, as well as many of his own works.

Benjamin Franklin, A master of industry and frugality.  Quick wit, recognizing the power of the printed and spoken word, especially when used subtly.   An extraordinary networker, that brought both people and nations together.  He recognized the power of combining both civic duty and professional gain.

Albert Einstein Brilliant mind, non-conformist, an amazing mix of spirituality and science.

Thomas Jefferson Our only scientist president.

Richard Feynman Ever curious, always questioning, “What do you care what other people think?” Always funny.

Mahatma Ghandi, steadfastly standing up for what is right without violence

Buddha

Lao Tzu

Dalai Lama The only person on this list I have had to opportunity to hear speak.

Napoleon, Perhaps one of the greatest leaders of men ever.

Other people that I have or intend to study that don’t quite make this list:

Jesus

Nietzche

Sun Tzu

Warren Buffet

Jimmy Buffet

Windows and Blogs

I’ve seen a lot of comments on my blog about how I’m always down, or always thinking about CC.  And Bridget has received a lot of comments on her blog about how much I don’t appreciate her, or am taking advantage of her, based in part on some of the complaints that she has posted about me.

I think it is important to realize that when you read someone’s blog, you are peering through a window in to their life.  You are not seeing their entire life.  It’s like peering through someone’s bedroom window and concluding all they do is have sex and sleep.  Or looking in to the kitchen and concluding all they do is eat.   These blogs only show a portion of our life, so before jumping to conclusions, please keep that in mind.

Breakfast with Buddha

I finished reading Breakfast with Buddha last night.  The wordsmithing is fantastic, especially if you like intricate descriptions of food.  The beginning and especially the ending were a bit weak in my opinion.  The story starts out with a typical upper middle class man who is tricked by his sister in to taking a road trip with a Rinpoche.  There is a lot of discussion of the similiarities between all the major religions, and the Rinpoche describes himself as belonging to all of them if you ask.  Most of the lessons that he provides during the trip should be fairly familiar to anyone that has studied Buddhism.   That portion of the book I really enjoyed, and I do think I picked up a few tidbits from it.   There are two that stuck out to me.  Otto, the main character asks what is the meaning of life, and Rinpoche picks up some dirt and dumps it in to his water glass and stirs it up.  Later on he goes on to explain that this is like life, the more bad things we do, the more the dirt gets stirred up, and the more cloudy our mind becomes.  As we start making positive choices, our mind begins to clear, and we can begin to see clearly.

The second one, which had more personal meaning to me at the moment, he took a petal from a flower and placed it on the table, and put a tea cup over it.  He explained that the pedal is the inner being that exists within all of us, but that we all build up this armor (the tea cup) that prevents others from seeing that, we do that through being hurt, and developing attachments.  So when you see someone doing something out of anger, or malice, what you are seeing is the armor, and in some cases that armor is very thick.  As Buddhists, we need to focus on the inner petal, even if we can’t see it.

Hatred

In this world, hatred is never conquered with hatred. Among human kind, violence is never stopped by counter violence, injuries can never be healed by revenge and retaliation. The only way is reconciliation, letting go, and forgiveness.

–Buddha

Something to think about, both in my family life and the world at large.

Lead vs control

CC made a comment a while back that I need to control everyone around me.  I don’t think that is accurate, at the moment, the only person I want to control is Bridget, and even that I don’t think would qualify as a “need”.  I do think that I need to be a leader, not in every situation, but often.   Being a leader isn’t necessarily about control.  It’s about helping and guiding others, it’s about being trusted.  Yeah, there is a certain amount of choice that goes along with it.

In dancing, someone has to lead, and as long as the dance is fun, the exact order of the moves doesn’t matter.  When the other partner does not not trust you to make the “correct” choice, and starts trying to lead as well, everything falls apart.  Yeah, there may have been some messed up moves, maybe a missed step or two, but you still have to let them lead, or find a new partner.  If you try to lead when that isn’t your role, neither partner is going to end up enjoying the dance.  If that is the person you want to dance with, then you need to just go with the flow, accept the mistakes, and trust.  Your trust will help them become a better dancer, and leader.

I do think that in my relationships, I need to be the leader, or it just needs to be a casual thing on the side.

Finding Peace

I attended a class at the Buddhist Center today about finding peace.   Here are my notes, I’m not going to put it together in a coherent essay, it’s just snippets that I got from the class.

Stress is a creation of the mind, triggered by external circumstances like work and jealousy. It comes about because we feel like we are losing control of a situation, there is too much going on.  We can’t blame the circumestances, the reality is that we never could control external things to begin with.   What you have lost control of is your mind.

We have to get our mind under control.

We feel stress because our mind tends to exaggerate things, turn molehills in to mountains.  We tend to exaggerate how wonderful something is, and then it is disappointing when reality can’t live up to our expectations, think, buying a new toy, or a new partner, or a vacation.  How many times have you met a girl and thought, life would be perfect if she were my girlfriend, but once you get to know her better, you realize she isn’t that great?  We also tend to exaggerate how bad something is, and create problems or ill intentions of someone else that are much bigger in our head than in reality.  Sometimes to deal with this, we have to gain a new perspective, through distance (hey, that sounds like a good idea)

Meditation is a way of maintaining our mind.  The uncontrolled mind will make things worse.  We need to look at how fortunate we are, the examples given in class were yeah, our job may be hard, but at least we don’t work in a coal mine, or don’t have a job and are homeless.  Another example that I remember from another teaching, possibly buddhist:  Have you ever had a toothache?  Do you remember thinking, if this toothache would just go away, I’d be happy.  Well, do you  have a toothache now?  So be happy.  Other examples, owning a home should be an enjoyable thing, we should be thankful for the shelter, and for the trees outside that provide beauty and shade, instead, we complain about maintaining the house, and raking leaves.

Focus on the fact that you have a job, and that you can’t wait to go to work, to have the opportunity to do something beneficial to others.

Leap out of bed in the morning, being grateful because we are so fortunate.

Start off the day in a buoyant frame of mind.  Stop our mind from exaggerating.

Impermenance

When we realize our problems are temporary our stress is reduced.  Everything is impermanent.   We continue to hold on to situations once they are gone, and relive them over and over in our head.

People are impermanent.  We think the person in front of us is the same person we had an argument with yesterday, but they aren’t, the person before you has already changed.  People don’t remain the same and static and unchanging.  Yesterdays problems, people and things have ceased.  For todays person to arise, yesterdays person has to have gone.  Everything from the previous moment is gone.  Stop trying to grasp the impermanent.   (I know, I need to listen to that part, I need to focus on relationship transition)

Be light and creative

Bad sitations are an opportunity to clear up bad karma.  We need to approach them with a light mind, and seek creative solutions.  The example given was artists that create art out of trash, they take the bad things in life and create something new, something good.  Our teacher is giving us the artists tools to create something beautiful out of whatever comes in life.  We can transform unpleasant situations in to the opportunity to practice patience, or compassion, or kindness.  With a light and creative mind, all of life can be  playground.

If we try to run away from stressful situations, they will chase after us.  Because they are in our minds, and our mind comes with us.

Stay focused on the present.  Bad things in the past don’t exist.  Bad things in the future don’t exist.  Bad things in the present are an opportunity.

We are given all this raw karmic material, and we are only limited by our imagination on what we can do with it.

She said if it helps, when when you feel a negative emotion rising, you can imagine me in front of you saying “Stop that silly mind!”

Meditation for the Renunciation of Samsara

We cannot avoid the suffering of dissatisfaction by frequenty changing our situation.  We may think that if we keep getting a new partner or a new job, or keep traveling around, we will eventually find what we want.  But even if we traveled to every place on the globe and had a new lover in every town, we would still be seeking another place and another lover.  In samsara, there is no real fulfillment of our desires.

(not my words)

Expectations

More thoughts about expectations.  I think that CC and I have been trying to get different things out of this relationship, and not communicating very well on what we were looking for.  I was still holding on to the old relationship, but not really living up to my end of it.  She was looking for something different, but didn’t feel that she could communicate that to me.  She didn’t feel I could change, which is partially my fault, I gave her plenty of reasons to think that I couldn’t, although we never actually discussed it.  It’s ironic, she didn’t discuss it because she was afraid that I would leave her, so instead she finds it in someone else and leaves me.  I suppose in a way that could be about taking control of her own life as well.

I think I’m doing better lately, I’m definitely sad about the agreement to not have any expectations of each other except kids and finances.  I know it’s for the best, but it’s definitely hard.

CC made a comment recently that she wants the guy she met 11 years ago.  I’ve been thinking about that and I wonder if that person ever really existed.  I think a lot of it was an unrealistic image created by her need and perpetuated by me.

Cherishing others

Todays lesson from the buddhists was about cherishing others.  Essentially cherishing others means wanting them to have happy, fullfilling lives.  By learning to cherish others we can lessen the effects of bad emotions like anger, jealousy and greed.  If we want others to be happy it’s hard to get angry at them (that generally doesn’t make anyone happy).  If we see our partner expressing emotion towards another, you shouldn’t be jealous because you cherish both of them and want them to be happy.  She did make an interesting comment about “as long as it doesn’t go too far.”  I wanted to ask why is there a limit on cherishing others and wanting them to be happy, but did not get the opportunity.  A friend of mine commented that she always enjoys her partners partners because they have one big thing in common, they both love the same person, I thought that was a very enlightened way of looking at it.

One thing that the Dalai Lama mentioned in the Art of Happiness is that it isn’t that we should see others as more important than ourselves, but we should see them as equally important.

I need to bring a notebook with me next time, there were many things I wanted to write or think more about, but I’ve forgotten most of them by now.  It was good for me to practice meditating, I still have a long way to go, but at least I think I’m headed in the right direction.