Posts from — May 2011

Beginning today, I would like to introduce you to the Six Paramitas or Transcendent Actions. They are six steps that, if undertaken with commitment and understanding, have the power to change the world.

The first paramita is Generosity. Usually, when we think of generosity, we conjure an image of someone giving something away to those who have not. In his seminal work, Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism, Chogyam Trungpa writes: [Read more →]

Thank you so much for all who have sent me their good wishes, post-surgery. I’m healing very well. Still mostly sleeping, but I think that by next week I’ll be back to a partially normal schedule. I’m going to try to write about my strange health issues that led to the surgery (an open cholecystectomy, if you will) and if you love surgery stories (yes, some people actually do), this one is a humdinger. xxoo

Now back to our regularly scheduled performance.

The other day, I was talking to my friend Bridget about her new guy. He was everything she said she wanted: smart, handsome, funny, gainfully employed in a creative profession, and committed to the same social causes she was. Most awesome of all, sex was h.o.t. You know, the kind where your lips touch and all hell breaks loose. Who knows why this happens with some and not others, it just does.

They’d been together for almost six months and she was really, really happy. And also really, really anxious. [Read more →]

8a EST. Having my gallbladder removed for reasons I can explain later. In fact, getting to the point of having this prosaic medical procedure (the most common surgical procedure in the US, I’m told) has been anything but prosaic and might actually make a decent story. (Which I suppose is true for everyone who has it.)

For reasons relating to this story but that will go unmentioned for now, the surgery has to be open, i.e. not laparascopic. Meaning incisions and the like. General anesthesia. Several hours (or more, I’ve been warned terrifyingly) on the table.

A complex procedure.

I look forward to awakening with further  tales from the bardo.

Well, hell, at this point I’m just looking forward to awakening. Like, completely. Hey! That might not be so bad.

Much love to you who partake of this blog and The Open Heart Project and wishing you all the joys of awakenment.

What is meant by a “contemplative view?” Rather than probing your thoughts and feelings for a storyline (i.e., what does this mean about me, my past, you, our relationship?), you simply see your thoughts and feelings. Observe them. Take them in. Allow them to be as they are without seeking to manipulate them at all. You’ll see some stuff you like and some stuff you may not, including your habitual patterns and the anger, depression, or doubt that are locked up within them. [Read more →]

I’ll try to keep myself open up to you.

That’s a promise that I made to love.

Joni Mitchell

I read this quote today on someone’s Facebook page and a better instruction for love, I can’t find.

The foremost allegiance is to love itself and this is a pledge you can actually honor, as opposed to the pledge to always love another person, which as anyone who has been in a relationship for more than, say, two weeks, knows is not always possible. Sometimes you feel love and sometimes you don’t.

However, acting lovingly is always possible. By this, I don’t mean being sweet and nice all the time. I mean being yourself all the time. All. The. Time. And, even more interesting, inviting your beloved to be herself all the time, too. [Read more →]

On Monday, I wrote a little about my response to Osama bin Laden’s killing. Upon hearing of his death, most people expressed heartfelt and understandable relief that our hunt for one who wished to destroy us was over. Others participated in “celebrations” that seemed tinged with what could be described kindly as poor sportsmanship. The question I was trying to raise was this: if we must kill (as in this case), is there a way to do so that will increase chances for peace (which is why we did it in the first place) rather than violence?

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“In the Shambhala warrior tradition, we say you should only have to kill an enemy once every thousand years.” –Chogyam Trungpa

So, Osama bin Laden is dead. We killed him. There really was no choice. We were clearly in an “us or them” situation and if we didn’t kill him, he was going to continue to do everything in his power to kill us.

As Buddhists, we are supposed to abhor all killing, but what do you do when someone is trying to kill you? Obviously great theologians have pondered this question for millennia and I’m not going to try to pile on with my point of view, which would be totally useless.

Instead, I’ll pose this question: How do you kill your enemy in a way that puts a stop to violence rather than escalates it? [Read more →]