Journeys Across the Toll-Bridge

Each of us passes through life with some experience of karma. When I was a little girl, I once spit my chewing gum out on the pavement when we got out of the car to go shopping. When my mother and I returned to the car, the pavement was scalding hot. I forgot entirely about the chewing gum I spit out. But when I climbed inside the car and looked down at my tennis shoes, they were covered in pink chewing gum. At that moment, though I had no word for what happened, I understood karma intrinsically. That karmic bubblegum was a great instructor for me. It taught me that my mistakes would be paid for by one person only: Myself.

Karma is simple: When we do something wrong to another person, either in thought or in deed, we will pay for it. Like a sticky and determined piece of bubblegum, your karma will stick to you and won't relent until you have paid for your error. Karma is never mistaken and only delivers your outcome based on what you've done to receive it. Whatever karmic outcome you have, you can rest assured that you have bought and paid for it prior to its arrival.

Sometimes, karma can be good. Sometimes, it can be bad. But whatever the case, you will deal with your own karma. The process of life and karma will take you across many toll-bridges in this life. You will pay for that walk across the bridge. The payment may be light or heavy, but you will pay. The key is to remember this: You are only responsible for paying your fare--i.e. your karma. And you should never allow anyone else to make you think you have to pay for theirs too.

Hold your head high. Pay what you owe. And keep walking as elegantly and bravely as a mighty elephant through the forest.

A Time for All Things

I learned a long time ago that there is a time for all things, and I made a deal with myself that I would always respect the times when I have nothing to say and therefore nothing to write. Some writers write even when they have nothing to say, but I fear their work suffers from it. My philosophy has always been that, if you want to give to others of yourself, to give of your ideas and your perceptions, then you should write these down only when they would be relevant to those reading your words. So, I've taken some time away to just fill up the empty well inside me and now that it is full once more, I write once more and hope it might be something good for others to read and consider.

Like Thoreau who took time away from the world to live simply and well, to live on the land and by the land, I have done similarly of late. There is nothing in this world that I have found which is more satisfying than physical work--the kind of work that makes you sweat but that at the end of it, you see a clear result. It gives you a beautiful sense of completion that is rarely obtained in writing.

I write a great deal, and I have been recently toying with the idea of a new book project which I've started outlining, but the reality is: I will write the book and then offer it to others for sale. After that, my hands are no longer really involved. It either sinks or swims on its own. If I did my job right, it will sell. If not, it will languish on some lonesome shelf--as it should if I failed. In any case, the project scheme is never really so complete as the process of say, planting new flowers, watering them, and then seeing them flourish.

My life is simpler in some ways when I don't write, but it is also more complicated. When I don't write, I don't express all that I feel. But as far as I'm concerned, it's not always the right time to express your feelings. It's sometimes good to give your ideas and emotions time to grow and become something better in silence before putting it on the page.

Now, it is time for me to share myself once more in a book, so here on the blog, I will be sometimes less present. Just the same, know, dear readers, that I will return when the odd thought comes along that I hope to share. Until then, namaste.

Discipline & Punish

“But the guilty person is only one of the targets of punishment. For punishment is directed above all else, at others, at all the potentially guilty.” 

--Michel Foucault
 

“...if you are not like everybody else, then you are abnormal, if you are abnormal , then you are sick. These three categories, not being like everybody else, not being normal and being sick are in fact very different but have been reduced to the same thing.”
--Michel Foucault

Have you ever committed a crime? Have you ever been punished for breaking a rule? Have you ever done anything that others called strange or different or sick? If you are human and if you have a pulse or have ever had one, you probably have experienced all three. The only difference is the degree of your wrong and the degree of your punishment.

What is punishment, after all, but a society's way of telling the wrongdoer that he or she is wrong and simultaneously of telling anyone who might commit the same wrong that they had better not do what this person has done or they will suffer the same fate?

The problem comes in when we consider that it seems what is "wrong" in 2011 or what was wrong in 1911 or 1711 are very different matters. Why is what was wrong in the 1600s not wrong today and vice versa? Is "wrong" an objective matter or is it decided by the groups who hold power at a given time? It seems that it is very much a matter of who holds the power.

In the early days of America, a woman could be clapped in the stocks for no more than disagreeing publically with her husband. In the 19th century in both England and the U.S., a woman or a man could be placed in a mental institution with no proof that she or he was actually mentally ill. During the 1600s, a European citizen who disagreed with the church could be branded a heretic and burned at the stake.

To a modern audience, these terrors sound impossible, yet they were all too real for those who came under the watchful eyes of the power-mongers of the aforementioned ages gone by.

In contemporary America, in matters of discipline and punishment, why and how do the power-holders get to make the decisions regarding so-called moral recourse against so-called criminals? It is sad to note that, the United States has more prisons than all the other nations in the world combined. Most of the prisoners in our teeming jails are in for drug crimes and in many cases crimes for which other countries would only require a fine to be paid. Is this reasonable?

I think it might be a good time to ask the questions: Can we place everyone who doesn't agree with those in power in prison? Can we place everyone who commits even the slightest infraction behind bars? At this rate, it appears that our national leaders want to put these questions to the test.

Everyone is subject to arrest at some point in time if they break--in even the slightest way--the law. The sad thing is that most of us don't ever stop to ask questions about crime and punishment until we are the ones in the hot seat. Unless you land in a courtroom with a judge staring you down, you may not care one way or the other about criminal matters or punishments either. But one day, what will you do if you do err and do get caught and no one--including you--has asked or will ask the questions? You'll go to prison, and then it will be entirely too late for questions.

As citizens of the world, it is our job to ask the hard questions now so that we can prevent a prison nation from being all the U.S. is known as around the world.

We need to criticize most sharply the structure of our current system. As Foucault rightly puts it, we need to challenge all of the assumptions and unexamined ways of thinking that these kinds of wrongful practices are based on so as to "make harder those acts which are now too easy. ”

The Power of Beauty

Marion Cotillard--French Beauty

When the world seems dark and humanity finds no comfort anywhere, we look to beauty for some ray of hope amidst the gloom. There is beauty in the rain clinging softly to the vine, beauty also in the eyes of Marion Cotillard--so blue and so still.

There is beauty in the melodious singing of Billie Holiday and of the old man who sits quietly alone in a room listening to her songs and daydreaming of Marilyn Monroe whose photograph decorates his lonesome wall. Beauty is in the leaves falling, the sun fading, the moon rising, the heart pounding. Beauty in a dancer's movements, beauty in a lover's kisses.

Always, no matter what the hour, no matter how dire the fates we suffer, we can find if we but look. It is not necessary for it to be pure or perfect. It can be perfectly imperfect and gorgeous for that reason. Beauty is the most complete vision of the eternal love from which we all came and which still resides in each of our souls or else why would we all of us, each separate being, still be so drawn to it like a young babe is drawn to its mother's breast?

Beauty is the guide for the weary. Share some beauty today or find some where it still exists and love it for beauty is truly precious in a world like the one we inhabit.

An Excerpt from John Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn

Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,
'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,'--that is all
Ye kno on earth, and all ye need to know.

Between Joy & Sorrow

There is a space which lies between joy and sorrow, between love and anger, between hope and despair. It is the sacred place known in eastern religions as the state of harmony. How precious a space it is and how often it seems impossible to find. But it is not impossible. The answer to obtaining it, however, is not a simple one. There is no single way to find harmony and balance. However, if you truly wish to attain it, then it is necessary to be honest with yourself first.

Many people make the mistake of thinking that equilibrium can be found by denying their negative emotions, by pretending that bad things don't happen, and by repressing all complicated feelings. However, the opposite of this is actually closer to the truth. We have to acknowledge and deal with all the negative and the sorrowful and the upsetting in this life. We can't just push it downward. That will end us up with a tumor, a heart attack or a stroke in due time.

Yet, when confronting the negative, we have to avoid reacting negatively to it. This will only add very bad karma to our future if we choose to respond to it with bad intentions toward others. Instead, what we must do is accept our feelings and express our anger and even our fear in healthy ways. For me, boxing is the answer. I spend a great deal of time boxing my way through whatever is bothering me. Running also works for some people. Martial arts is another excellent choice. Either way you decide to go, you simply have to let out the negativity you feel or it will destroy you and any chance you have of equilibrium.

After we are able to fight through our negative emotions, we can use yoga to center ourselves. I highly recommend Swami Sivananda's books on yoga to help get started in practice. His words have helped me more than I can express. Through yoga, then, you can find harmony in that calm center, that silent place where no one else intervenes except the Tao. You carry that with you forward then in all you do and live in the sweet space between joy and sorrow.

But it is absurd to think this is attainable without constant work. Finding balance is as difficult as finding joy, but if you work at it every day, every time you feel negativity rising up, you will eventually defeat it.

The Limits of Language

Marlon Brando, Helen Mirren, James Dean, Asia Argento, Anna Magnani, Vanessa Redgrave, Natasha Richardson, James Franco, Cate Blanchett, Marion Cotillard. All actors with tremendous talent who share one quintessential quality which makes them each great--their tremendous power of physical expression.

Each of these extraordinary actors uses language beautifully, but more powerful than any word they have ever uttered is their ability to communicate sheer volumes of thought, emotion, and depth of insight with their eyes, hands, mouths, fingers, feet, stomachs, legs, torsos. These are the actors I prefer watching because they do not rely on the cheap substitute of language to express what a look or a moment of frozen stillness can express wordlessly.

As a writer, I realize that my calling language "cheap" is probably a bit hostile to someone who doesn't know me. But the truth is that, though I've been writing since my youth and I've seen quite a few winters since then, I find that language can only take us so far. It has profound limits. And beyond language there is a vast realm of greater truth found in pure physical being. Maybe it's only to be found in erotic moments where two people come undone and lose themselves entirely, or perhaps in moments when we just let go of words. In those moments, we forget to lie, and that is beautiful.

In film and on stage, I love more than anything else to watch the actors who understand how beautiful the unspoken word can be. Natalie Portman delivered a bold and almost damaging performance as the darkly brilliant dancer Nina Sayers in Black Swan. The very best of her moments in that film were those in which she said nothing, when she just let her beautiful, elegant body and those dark, haunted eyes speak for themselves. There was more poetry in her sad movements and sudden shifts of mood than in all the words of Shakespeare's sonnets.

Silence is something so few people seem to appreciate anymore. I thank my lucky stars that I can still watch movies where great actressess like Portman and Mirren and Blanchett explore silence as a mechanism for powerful communication. I find it galvanizing and as bracingly beautiful as a clear mountain stream in northern Montana at sunrise.

Through a Glass Darkly



Helen Mirren in 'The Debt'




For now we see through a glass darkly; but then, face to face. (Corinthians I: 13:12)

I spent this Sunday, September 11, 2011, at the cinema watching Helen Mirren work out a complex, dark, and utterly brave character's destiny in a rock-solid, white-hot performance in The Debt. The film runs in flashback between the present day and 1965 when three characters worked together as special agents to capture and bring to justice a horrid Nazi war criminal called the Surgeon of Birkenau. In the scenes of the past tense, the role of Rachel is played by the beautiful young newcomer Jessica Chastain. In the present tense, the role of Rachel is played by English cinema's greatest actress, Helen Mirren. Her face, chiseled by time and scarred with one hook-like line across her right cheek is more beautiful than ever. What is it about the woman that makes her still appear like a gorgeous lioness despite the fact that she's pushing 70? In any event, the film is a beautiful one which examines the issue of 'truth' and 'deception.' It is a central issue in the character Rachel's life both as a young woman and an older one who has lived with a horrible reality in her mind for 40 years.

At the end of the film, I drove homeward and stared out at the brilliant blue sky and thought of the fact that it was 9/11 and I thought of what happened on just such a beautiful day in 2001 at WTC, New York City, USA. I thought of how the people in the two towers were thinking or feeling that morning before the unimaginable happened. They (like the rest of the country and the world) had no idea what was coming for them that morning. How could they have known? And how different life would have been if they/we had known.

Similarly, the characters in the Debt have no idea of the outcome of their actions over their lifetimes. They had no idea how their contact with this Nazi zealot would alter them. And even though Rachel, the main character at the heart of the story is brilliantly intelligent, she couldn't see the outcome. If she or the other characters had known, perhaps their lives, though disrupted and collapsed, might have been less sad, less horrible.

Finally, as I was pulling into my driveway, I thought of the book Journal of a Foreign Correspondent by William Shirer. It is one of the greatest books ever written, as far as I'm concerned, by a consummate journalist who wrote about everything he saw and heard in Berlin, Vienna, and then Prague as Hitler was beginning his reign of terror. And even though he felt sad and unsure of the future, he and the rest of the world, had no conception of the level of sadism this man was prepared and willing to take out on the whole of Europe and the Jewish people. Even though Shirer was a clear-eyed and astute a journalist as ever lived, even he couldn't see the outcome of Hitler.

All of this reminds me of what Paul wrote in Corinthians, 'for now we see through a glass darkly; but then, face to face.' I wonder what life would be like without the darkened glass which veils the future and the truth from us. I wonder if in the afterlife we will see clearly all things, as Paul says, and feel delight in finally being free of the world and its lies. In the end, I am not sure if it is better to know the truth or worse. But given the inquisitive nature of my mind, I would say that come hell or high water, I'd rather have the truth. Sooner rather than later preferably.

The wisdom of the Buddha helps us understand that if we learn to discern between truth and lies, between reality and non-reality, we are on the path to enlightenment and freedom in this lifetime. So, for the sake of our heart's potential joy, let's set our sights on learning to discern better. Always, to discern better.

No Time for Self-Pity



Cheetah--Fastest Land-Roaming Mammal

Being a devoted lover of wildlife, in particular, the great wild cats of the African plane, I am an ardent student of their natures. My particular favorite is the cheetah. This cat is to my mind the most beautiful and elegant of the great cats. His speed is breathtaking, and despite the carnage that results after he stalks and then slaughters his prey, I love to watch him crouch and then go into a full gallop as he chases a Tommy Gazelle across the African plane. I could spend hours watching this desparate and beautiful battle for survival and have done many times as the Animal Channel permits me to do sometimes on Sunday mornings.

The beauty of the cheetah is his predatory nature. I admire the way such a predator regards his prey as the essential element in his survival.  As wildlife experts so often point out, cheetahs (like all great predators) have no long-term memory with respect to their failures as hunters. The cheetah knows that he is just as likely to fail as to succeed when he sets out to kill a Tommy. He always bets on winning. He never gives only half to the hunt and kill. He always gives all and chances are good he will succeed in killing his prey. But, if the cheetah did spend all his time mourning over that day when he failed to kill the Tommy, he would never eat again, and he would die. He knows this. His survival depends on his ability to focus on the now.

How unfortunate that we as humans cannot learn the great lesson of the cheetah. Instead of forgetting about our failures in our lives, we tend to focus always on what we didn't succeed at. What if your very life depended on your ability to stay in the now? What if you would never survive with any joy or pleasure if you thought at all about your past mistakes?

We may not have to look at things in this extreme a fashion, but perhaps it would do us all good to consider the wisdom of the east in the matter of survival. If you believe (and I certainly do) that tomorrow is not guaranteed and that right now, this instant, is the best and most beautiful thing we can aspire to, then won't we be happier and less anxious, indeed, less tragic, if we live for this moment and not always be planning for tomorrow or yesterday?

Forget about regret, my friends. It is useless. Think instead of yourself as a beautiful, fast, fearless cheetah. Now is your moment, not yesterday or tomorrow, but right now. Run. Live. Love. And enjoy it with all your heart now. I virtually guarantee you will be happier if you live each moment this way.

Gradations of Character

Color and light filter through our gaze in gradations. White becomes gray and gradually black. A bright sun becomes dimmer and dimmer. Or alternately the sky, on a dark moonless night, becomes lighter and lighter as the sun rises at dawn. Our character also exists on a scale of gradation. No one is defined by a single act--whether that act is noble or ignoble. All of us, as human beings, are blessed with divine propensities. Our divinity is made manifest more brilliantly depending on our soul's stage of development. Some people spend no time whatever focusing on their soul; hence, they are not manifesting their highest potential divinity. Others are focused constantly on their soul's education, and their divinity shines out like a brilliant golden light.

We all have moments of grandeur and moments of horror in our lives. It is important to remember that no single moment makes an entire life. If we build upon the past, learn from our errors, and attempt to make ourselves better human beings, then no matter what we have done in the past, we can rise above it. As the Buddha tells us, 'we create our own future every moment.' I believe in the truth of Buddha's words because I began rebuilding my life one step at a time some years back.

In 2006, I had a very unfortunate moment in my life when a felony and an arrest ended most of my dreams. Since that time, however, I have dedicated myself body and soul, to overcoming the past. I like to think that since that mistake, I have grown, that I have gone through gradations which have now brought me to a higher plane in terms of spiritual consciousness.

If you have made mistakes, remember that if you acknowledge those errors and move forward without repeating them, you can find yourself in a far happier state of existence than ever before. As Jesus taught, "Ye shall know them by their fruits." I believe in this fully. If you devote your soul to good deeds--thoughts and actions--you will see good fruits--good karmic results. If you devote yourself to ignoble deeds, you will bear rotten fruit.

You don't even have to believe in God to know this is the truth. Physics and science teach the same thing: Every cause will have its effect. If you set out to hurt another person, you will see a very negative effect for yourself. It's the law of the universe. The negative effect may come later than you think, but it will arrive, I assure you.

I have reaped what I sowed with respect to the past. But, now I am happy to say that I have found good fruit begin to ripen in the garden of my life. It is only because of the gradations--the gradual shifts toward nobler choices in my life--that I have found such good fruit.

Plant a good seed today, my friends. Let go of the bad seeds you want to plant--to hurt others, to rob them, to take pleasure from them--and instead plant a noble seed of love. Watch it grow as you yourself will grow in goodness and love.

Death Before Dishonor



Antonio Ordonez



One should die proudly when it is no longer possible to live proudly.--Nietzsche

The Marines have a saying, "Death before dishonor." Like many sayings used to boost morale, it has its drawbacks as a cliche. Yet, taken for what it means in its purest sense, 'death before dishonor' is a sentiment that I admire. What is honor? It is a quality possessed by few men. It is that rare characteristic which describes a man who stands by the strength of his convictions no matter what. It is a quality which a man whose words and deeds match possesses. It is the characteristic which means a man will die for his beliefs.

It's hard to live honorably. If it were easy, then everyone would be doing it. And since the world is shamefully lacking in honorable men, we have to look hard to find them. But since the world is short on supply of honor, why not step up to the plate and try to be honorable ourselves?

There are drawbacks, of course, it would mean being honest at all times. It would mean telling people what you really think instead of what they want you to say. It would also mean losing quite a lot of friends. But what good are they if they have no honor and won't stand up to defend yours? They are useless.

So, I choose the path that sets me apart: I live by honor and pride. And, as Nietzsche said, "One should die proudly when it is no longer possible to live proudly." I would infinitely prefer death to giving up my honor. It is my very honor which gives me pride.

My ethics are basic: If I love you, I love you completely. If I stand for you, I will never forsake you. If you lie to me, I will consider it a dishonor and never speak to you again. If you attack me, I will fight you. And when and if the day comes when I cannot live honorably, proudly, I will welcome death with greater ease than I can express.