Meditation Posture.

When I was first studying Buddhism I was daunted by meditation because I read so much about having the right posture, sitting in the "correct fashion." I read about the Full Lotus position the Half-Lotus position and the Burmese position. I was over-whelmed by the detailed nature of meditation positions and I was worried that I was going to "make a mistake" I read about teachers who would hit you on your head or back if your posture didn't adhere to the complicated "rules."

I was so intimidated that I didn't attempt meditation for a long time. I don't know how many times I tried the different "sanctioned" positions, only to fall off the cushion. I heard about monks who meditated for days on end in these positions and I wanted to sit like those great monks that I was reading about. I thought that If I didn't sit like a master Yogi then I wasn't a "good Buddhist." Or that I wouldn't realize "Enlightenment." That was before I understood more about the nature of so-called "Enlightenment." By the way, I prefer saying "Awakening" as Enlightenment is such an over-used, little understood word.

But let's face it, not many of us are contortionists so we have to find a position that is both relaxing yet still beneficial to our meditation. I'm not a very flexible person and have short legs and a long torso/back so the first thing that I set out doing was to find the right cushion. I tried many different ones and finally settled on The Mountain Seat Zafu from The Monastery Store.

The Monastery Store store set out to design a revolutionary series of meditation cushions in response to over-whelming demand for cushions that minimize discomfort for those who have injuries or are not so flexible like myself. Their final products were the result of extensive orthopedic research which align your spine while maintaining optimum comfort. The cushion starts with the familiar buckwheat base which helps cradle your hips and weight with a top layer of memory foam that conforms to your backside to assist in maintaining a restful meditation posture.

I chose the large size which is a taller cushion than most (it's their tallest size). It is recommended for those with less flexibility, chronic injuries and knee problems. It relieves back stain for those of us with long torsos. These cushions are a bit expensive but I found it worth the price as it has helped my hip strain (I have bad hip joints) greatly. Plus, I went through regular meditation cushions like Kleenex tissue so in the long run this is a better buy and it's made out of quality material so it is built to last.

I then experimented with different postures and finally settled on just sitting simply on the front end of the cushion with my legs crossed in a basic fashion. It was more comfortable and reduced fidgeting throughout my meditation and thus keeping me from being able to focus on my breath and center myself. So my advice is to find your own way of sitting if you can't do the traditional styles. Don't let anyone tell you that you MUST meditation a certain way. I understand that there are "recommended" positions but no one body is the same.

Here's another tip that I discovered to be useful for me. Don't worry about sitting absolutely still like a statue because not many people can do that I personally do not think that is the most important aspect to meditation. Of course sitting still is important to help maintain a feeling of calm, balance and focus on one's breath and the present moment. However. If your leg falls asleep then by all means, PAY ATTENTION TO IT!!! Meditation isn't about suffering, after all the point of meditation is to alleviate suffering not create more. If you leg falls asleep (goes numb) then just simply extend it out to bring the circulation back to your leg and return to your breath. Then when your leg feels less numb and more comfortable then you can fold it back with the other leg again or just keep it out front. Similarly, if your hip hurts, then rub it a bit and breath deeply to connect your body to your breath. Or stretch your back out for a few seconds if you feel your muscles strain or tighten.

It is OK to pay attention to your body this way, a big part of meditating it to pay attention to subtle changes in the body and mind. If you leg is sore in the present moment then that's fine, give it a gentle, loving rub. The present moment is full of any number of varied experiences. Once your feel your body relax a bit more after rubbing the sore area then you can fold your hands together again. The main thing is to be aware--awareness through being mindful of all the changes around us during meditation is part of awakening and liberating the mind.

If you can do the traditional meditation postures then by all means maintain that routine but only if you it doesn't hurt your body so bad that the pain is all that you can think about during your session. Suffering through pain is not what meditation is about. No one is a "better Buddhist" because they can sit through shooting pain, that's just stubborn and (in my opinion) a waste of time. So find what works best for you and enjoy!!

Oh and more one item. I don't want to make a big deal out of this but if you would like to make a donation to the blog then you can find the button to do so below my profile on the right hand side of the screen. Thank-you in advance for your donation should you be so kind to offer it.

Addendum:

I felt like I needed to add something to this post to clarify some things that have been mentioned in the comment section. I didn't mean to come off as an ordained teacher. I was just offering up some tips that I have found useful in my humble practice. I'm by no means any kind of Enlightened Master, just a well meaning practitioner.

I can't meditate in the formal, traditional manners. So I developed my own style to enable me to meditate. Otherwise I most likely wouldn't sit at all. And i know that this might not be acceptable to some but I am just trying to do my best. So right now this is my best, sitting the way I described.

Maybe in my next incarnation I'll inherit a body more flexible but until then I'll meditate the best way that I know how. All I know is that many have taught me to "start where you are" and well, this is where I am.

~Peace to all beings~

My Friend...

So John McCain picks up the endorsement of our governor AND Rudy Giuliani. Does that mean two big, fat, bi-coastal states in his pocket?

I used to admire John McCain, in the days when he stood up against the Bush tax cuts, joined Russ Feingold in the attempt to get serious campaign finance reform, and seemed to support a relatively liberal social agenda.

Not any more. Not since he turned out to be a political clone of George W. Bush, but older. I don't hold age against him. Age is fine, if it comes with wisdom. What it seems to come with in McCain's case is further entrenched conservatism.

And I don't like his smile when he says, "My friend." It fails to hide the daggers.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/31/2008

So, the tendency of our childish nature is to take small things too seriously and get easily offended, whereas when we are confronted with situations which have longterm consequences, we tend to take things less seriously.

~Tenzin Gyatso

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Ask Not...

A number of observers more qualified than I to pass judgment on George W. Bush’s State of the Union address earlier this week have noted the absence of the slightest trace of a call for Americans to sacrifice or to share significantly in the burden of the current crises that afflict us. It was all a matter of “trust”—a word that occurred at least a dozen times in the speech, and about which I am writing at greater length in my Huffington Post blog, to be posted shortly. It was a matter of “You trust us, we have the solution to every problem. Just do my bidding, and everything will be okay.” Well, this was the subtext, anyway.

Given the record of the Bush administration in coming up with solutions to serious problems, I say “Fat chance.” No more trust from this quarter, at least. Not that there ever was much anyway.

The most offensive part of the speech, for this listener, was the mockery this “President” chose to heap on those ready to make a sacrifice to help those less fortunate, and to get the country back on track. “Others have said,” he proclaimed, delighted with his own incisive sense of humor, “they would personally be happy to pay higher taxes. I welcome their enthusiasm. I’m pleased to report that the I.R.S. accepts both checks and money orders.”

Ha ha ha. It happens that I am among those pitiable people. I am not as fortunate as some, but more fortunate than many. From having lived for many years in Europe, I know how relatively little Americans are asked to pay in taxes, and I am always bewildered—and frankly irritated—by the whining self-pity that characterizes virtually every conversation on the subject over here. Speaking for myself, I would prefer to have good schools and transportation systems, a humane medical health care program, and care for the poorest of the poor. (I would prefer, of course, to spend a good deal less on weapons and the technology of destruction, and regret what I judge to be a misuse of the money that I pay, but that’s another issue.)

To be mocked by the childish sarcasm of this man is galling. It is doubly galling when he uses the privileged platform of his formal address to the nation to indulge in such inanities. I wish that the Congress of the United States had the balls to impeach him for his abuse of office and the Constitution, and for his lies.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/30/2008

Encountering sufferings will definitely contribute to the elevation of your spiritual practice, provided you are able to transform calamity and misfortune into the path.

~Tenzin Gyatso

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Sailing 'round and 'round (toward God?)

The Buddha Diaries Recommends:
Sailing to Byzantium
(posted by Cardozo)




"You don't have the right to be here," Kullervo, author of Sailing to Byzantium, writes in the introduction to his blog. In the same introduction, Kullervo goes on to say he will "block users or IP addresses who detract from rather than add to what I'm trying to do here."

Those who choose to sail along with Kullervo despite such plainly-worded threats will quickly discover why those threats might be necessary. In some respects the blog is agonizing. It is the faithful record of the author's spiritual journey - a journey with an ostensible destination (the truth about God, as far as I can tell) but which is ever circling around, drifting, and spasmodically changing course. Mormonism, Christianity, Druidry, Buddhism, Hinduism, Atheism, and Agnosticism are explored and re-explored. Its kind of like watching a goldfish swim around in its bowl - its always going, but where?

So we can understand why certain frustrated web-surfers (not known for their patience) might lash out against Kullervo's meandering journey with comments along the lines of "For God's sake, PICK SOMETHING already!" But we also understand why Kullervo would want that frustration weeded out of the mix, why he continues to write, and why he wishes to do so in a community of fellow seekers.

Because while the canonical chroniclers and mediators of western culture - from de Cervantes, Dickens and Austen all the way to Spielberg - would have us believe that journeys always move forward eventually (otherwise why turn the page?), the truth of our human experience is usually far more circular. As a result of staying so true to the achingly slow trajectory of the real-life individual human search for meaning, Sailing to Byzantium is perhaps a little pathetic. ("Sometimes I don't feel like believing in Jesus," Kullervo writes in one characteristically vague yet stubbornly truthful passage.) But it is pathetic in the ways so many of us are pathetic. No one likes to think, for example, that they are repeating the same mistakes they made in college, carrying around decades-old emotional baggage, or (as in Kullervo's case) still struggling with their faith. But, in all likelihood, they are.

Which is why, despite its unsatisfying lack of emotional closure and its suspicious attitude toward new visitors, Sailing to Byzantium is one of the more refreshing and interesting personal blogs on the web. We highly recommend a visit there.

[Incidentally, we don't mean to suggest in this review that Sailing to Byzantium is simple-minded for all of its circuitousness. We simply chose to focus on what we took to be the most interesting aspect of the blog's overall impact. But...you'll see for yourself. ]

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/29/2008

Just as we should cultivate gentle and peaceful relations with our fellow human beings, we should also extend that same kind of attitude towards the natural environment. Morally speaking, we should be concerned for our whole environment.

~Tenzin Gyatso

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Barack Obama: An Inspiration to the World.

Don't worry, even though this post is about U.S. Senator Barack Obama, who is running for president here in America, and despite the fact that I am supporting him and plan on voting for him in the primary, I am going to try hard to not talk too much politics. I try to limit political talk here on this blog, I have another one for that stuff.

I want to instead talk about Barack Obama the person. There is no debate that Mr. Obama is a brilliant, gifted man and he could have taken any number of jobs in the private sector making a lot of money. However, Barack felt his talents were needed elsewhere and that he felt a calling to help others. So instead of taking a lucrative position at a prestigious law firm he went to work with the people in the poverty stricken, violent neighborhoods of Chicago. This wasn't always easy for him as many didn't show up to his meetings intended to motivate community leaders such as church pastors. But Obama kept at it.

He has a deep, ingrained gift of listening to people, truly listening and realizing that their suffering was his suffering. In many cases, people who are struggling just want to be heard by someone. They want to feel like someone understands their situation and has faith that they aren't stupid, lazy or worthless because they are poor, sick or homeless. Obama has a way of uplifting people and leading them to a place where they can believe in themselves again. He gave these people hope that better times were possible and that united with others, they could improve their lives and regain their dignity once more. His compassion is on full display, he couldn't hide it even if he wanted to. The very fact that he went to work for those who often have to voice to seek assistance shows that this man has a deep reservoir of compassion and loving kindness. His smile glows that kindness and when his eyes smile you can see his love for others. This is a talent that he still has today, when I hear him speak I feel inspired, uplifted, filled with hope, compassion and yes sometimes tears of joy from feeling understood. He is the first politician that upon hearing them speak, I felt chills of inspiration throughout my body.

Working in those neighborhoods stricken with just about every problem imaginable, Obama was able to bring people of all races, ethic backgrounds and religions together to work as a united unit of people to bring the change that they all so desperately wanted and needed. He understand what we call in Buddhism, oneness, inter-being or interconnectivity. He knew that society is only as strong as the "weakest" link in the chain. He knew that he couldn't feel content knowing that others were suffering and realized that his happiness and that of others is intermixed with the lives of others. He is a rare person that is able to channel many people's hopes and dreams for a better community, a better country and a better world.

To hear him speak is to be inspired to be a better person and a better member of society. He speaks with convincing sincerity that change is not only possible but inevitable just like the Dharma teaches us. He understands that we all too often fear change and only see the bad side of change but he has a way of uplifting people to see the greatness in change, to see the great possibilities in change. His infectious, positive energy beams brightly like a lighthouse in a world so depressed, cynical, tired and lost in the darkness of fear and delusion. It is hard not to feel uplifted by his unflinching optimism and faith in humanity. He has convinced me to believe again that our greatest days as a society are still ahead of us. He is not only inspiring but stands firm as a rock in the face of negativity, criticism and fear. His confidence is admirable as he isn't arrogant about it. Instead, understands how to channel it into the lives of others to assist them in finding their own confidence and greatness that is already there but hidden under layers of fear, self-doubts and pain.

Standing for equality for all people is in his DNA. He is the product of a mixed marriage, his mother white and his father black. He understands the ignorance and fear that motivates people to want to divide society into separate groups. He spent several years during his youth living in the diverse country of Indonesia where he gained further insight into how different yet similar the world can be. He spent time in Kenya with his grandmother and came to know and take pride in his African roots. He may not be a Buddhist be he understands and lives many of the Buddha's teachings, one major one being understanding that all sentient beings are equal and have worth.

Like the Buddha, Barack Obama learned in his early adult years as a community organizer that poverty is the root of much suffering in the world. He saw how poverty seeps into people's lives like a poison that drives people into a life of crime and overall suffering. He understands that to bring people out of poverty is to improve society as a whole. He is known as a uniter, he is quite gifted at being able to bring about compromises that work for all sides involved.

Unlike many politicians he has faith in ordinary citizens and sees them as equals and the foundation of his movement, unlike many others who see ordinary citizens as worthless and tokens to amass to gain money and power. He knows that he wouldn't be where he is in life without countless others. He doesn't forget his roots and where he came from and I think that helps him remain humble and grounded in reality. This is practicing the Dharma teaching of no-self or selflessness where despite having great confidence in himself and seeking power in the government he realizes that his power is nothing without using it to vastly improve the lives of others. He understands that his mission in life isn't just about him but rather about us, everyone. I can see in his eyes and hear in his words and know in his actions that he doesn't think he is above or below anyone else.

In dedicating his life to serving others he is a great example of Right Livelihood. He could have been a very successful, wealthy lawyer and helped many people but his sights were set higher knowing that serving in public office he could help even more beings. That kind of self-sacrifice is rare and very admirable.

He tries to adhere to Right Speech when he speaks because he uses his words to uplift rather than destroy, to heal instead of hurt. True like all of us he sometimes doesn't say the right thing but overall I believe he understands the power of words and weaves them in a way that is helpful and not hurtful.

Barack is a man of peace and you can see that in his eyes and loving smile. When many others were for the Iraq war, he stood on the side of peace. He understands deeply that peace must be
a key aspect to a thriving and loving society. I can feel that this peace stems from a vast pool of peace within his essence, that he is at peace with himself and therefore able to help others feel at peace as well.

Barack Obama may not be a Buddhist (he's Christian and of course Christians share these same values) but he lives many of the teachings of the Dharma and I think that is a big reason why he is the inspirational figure that he is today.

~Peace to all beings~

The Holocaust--Revisited

Readers who have followed these pages for a while will know that the Holocaust is never very far from my mind. I'm not sure of the reason: I'm not Jewish, though my wife Ellie is. But I am of European origin, and of an age to have personal experiences of World War II. I was much aware, as a child, of the conflict whose effects were so devastating just to the south of us, in London, and which raged in the skies above us and across the Channel. But I had no idea, of course, of what was happening in the concentration camps, and I think that my family knew about it only after the liberation of those camps beginning in 1944.

With the history, the Holocaust has remained like a great shadow in my consciousness, always present, and never far from the surface. I believe this to be true of most Europeans of my generation. The unimaginable barbarity of those who perpetrated this ultimate act of inhumanity and the unimaginable suffering of those who died and those who managed to live through it--these are not easily repressed or forgotten by anyone who lived in a world that allowed them to occur. When American leaders rattle sabers, preach righteous, nationalistic patriotism, and argue in public about how much torture is permissible, such people shudder with dread lest those memories be forgotten.

Two reminders came my way last week. A while ago, we had placed in our Netflix queue the movie "Steal a Pencil For Me," without knowing much about it, and it arrived in the mail and sat for a few days before we got around to watching it. It's the very touching love story of two elderly Dutch Jews, looking back at the time they spent in a way-station concentration camp in Holland (not a death camp, but no Disneyland, either,) where they managed to fall in love in a few stolen moments before being transported off by the Germans to worse camps to the east. Both survived, by miracle, got back together after the war, and lived--as they say--happily aver after.

Remarkable about the documentary was the spirit of this now aging pair, the joy and gratitude they share with family and friends, the depth of humanity achieved in part, surely, through the intensity of their deprivation and suffering. Their capacity to love seemed multiplied exponentially by the tenuousness of their survival as young people, and the witness they bore to the suffering of others.

Shortly after seeing this film, I found myself with a copy of Primo Levi's "Survival in Auschwitz" in my hands. It must have been around the house for a while, unread, and I'm honestly not sure how it surfaced from among the stacks and shelves, but there it was, and I opened it up--and could not put it down.

Primo Levi, you'll remember, survived the last year of Auschwitz and lived, barely, to be liberated by the advancing Russians--only to die, as suspected suicide, forty years later in his native city of Turin. "Survival" is the story of that year--a powerful description of life in the camp, of forced labor under the worst of circumstances, the lack of food and adequate shoes and clothing, the intense cold, the mud and filth, the shared bunks where sleep was constantly interrupted, the constant beatings and the fear of "selection." Survival involved the surrender of all normal moral codes, of friendship and respect for the property of others, of love and compassion for those who compete, tooth and nail, for the necessities of life. It also involved innate smarts, ruthlessness when necessary, a willing suspension of emotional response, a constant alertness--along with a kind of meditative distance from the surrounding reality.

Levi is not only a keen observer--that, too, is a survival tool--but also a moral and social philosopher. Consider this: in ordinary life, he writes (life, that is, outside the camps,)

a man is not normally alone, and in his rise and fall is tied to the destinies of his neighbors; so that it is exceptional for anyone to acquire unlimited power, or to fall by a succession of defeats into utter ruin. Moreover, everyone is normally in possession of such spiritual, physical and even financial resources that the probabilities of a shipwreck, of total inadequacy in the face of life, are relatively small. And one must take into account a definite cushioning effect exercised both by the law, and by the moral sense which constitutes a self-imposed law; for a country is considered the more civilized the more the wisdom and efficiency of its laws hinder a weak man from becoming too weak or a powerful one too powerful.

These are thoughts as applicable today as when they were written, or in the time they were written about. We look around us and see evidence of this balance of social and moral contingency being lost. We risk descending into a place where the powerful are ceded too much power, and where the weak are allowed too easily to crash down into that "total inadequacy in the face of life" that Levi describes as existing in the camps. All the more reason, then, to be vigilant. All the more reason, in this political year, to listen carefully to those who seek to lead us.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/28/2008

The creatures that inhabit this earth be they human beings or animals are here to contribute, each in its own particular way, to the beauty and prosperity of the world.

~Tenzin Gyatso

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/27/2008

In our struggle for freedom, truth is the only weapon we possess.

~Tenzin Gyatso

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Art Fairs

I'm not a fan of art fairs. I went to two of them yesterday. I'm still not a fan of art fairs.

The reasons are many. First, there's too much art. There are hundreds of booths, each one over-hung with wares. It's mind-boggling. Pretty soon, the eyes glaze over. You can't see anything any more, and what you do see all begins to look the same. Second, there's too much boring art. The art fair is not a place to challenge the mind. It's all about commerce and really has nothing whatever to do with art. It's to do with wares. Third, it's taxing on the body. Hips, knees and feet begin to protest after the first hour or so. After four or five hours, they're shrieking. Take me home!

There are more reasons, of course, but why go into them? At art fairs, I'm not sure whether to despair--that so many poor artists are vying for the attention of so few, not to mention the dollars in their pocketbooks.. Or whether to be awed by the infinite ingenuity of the human mind, that it is capable of such wildly diverse creativity.

I'm not a fan of art fairs. I went to two of them yesterday. I'm still not a fan of art fairs. I'll try to remember to post some pictures later...

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/26/2008

Whether we are rich or poor, educated or uneducated, whatever our nationality, color, social status, or ideology may be, the purpose of our lives is to be happy.

~Tenzin Gyatso

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Yael Naim: "New Soul."

I love this video and decided to post it here as a musical interlude. It is so happy and light, I also like the lyrics. You U.S. readers might recognize this song from the Apple computer commercial advertising their new thin laptop, air. In addition, the t-shirt giveaway is still taking names for the drawing. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this video/song as much as I do:

~Peace to all beings~

The Artist

I had this dream about Than Geoff (Thanissaro Bhikkhu)who was still a monk, yes, but of a different order, more Catholic than Buddhist, more brown- than saffron-robed, with a knotted rope at the waist. Curiously, he himself appeared only briefly in the dream, it was instead a brother monk who was our escort.

Than Geoff had taken over (bought?) this house where a friend of ours once lived. He had completely re-modeled it, removing a rather fussy, grand-scale fireplace that had been the previous owner's pride in order to expand the wall space. For it was now apparent that Than Geoff was a gifted and prolific artist--something we had never known about him before. The walls everywhere throughout the house--it soon appeared that it was something of a mansion--were covered with his work, paintings, construction works and assemblages in a variety of media, etching plates... an infinite variety.

I was particularly struck with one piece, installed in the space where the fireplace had been. It was a large-scale, enlarged photograph of the detail of an abstract painting, in which multi-colored, squiggly horizontal lines of thick, rich paint created something of a landscape, while the blue "sky" above was inscribed with a text in large penciled handwriting--though I remember nothing of the words except that they ended in "the Almighty." (Perhaps this was why, or because, I took Than Geoff to be a Catholic rather than a Buddhist monk.)

There's little else to tell, except that a woman kept appearing to ask where luncheon should be served. Otherwise, the dream was nothing but a guided tour of Than Geoff's renovated mansion, and his art.

I'm not good at remembering my dreams. I may have remembered this one because I was talking on the telephone, yesterday, about dream recall with my friend Michael--about whom I dreamed, and wrote in this blog, a couple of days ago--and about his experience with lucid dreaming. I suspect this dream about Than Geoff had to do with the wonder of the creative mind, and with the beauty of its infinitely rich interior.

Any thoughts?

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/25/2008

Every man has the basis of good. Not only human beings, you can find it among animals and insects, for instance, when we treat a dog or horse lovingly.

~Tenzin Gyatso

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Racism

I happened to read HeartinSanFrancisco's entry yesterday about casually accepted racist attitudes in her blog, Guilty With an Explanation on the same day that Ellie and I got into a discussion with our gardener (yes, we are that spoiled!) about the election. He asked us, in fact, whether we had seen the most recent debate--the one where Hillary and Obama got into a head-to-head. He emphatically would NOT vote for Obama, he said, because if a black man were elected there would be uppity blacks rushing around all over with chips on their shoulders, proclaiming that "we" owed them something.

Strange reasoning, perhaps--even grotesque. But what struck me was the casual, unselfconscious racism--not unlike that of HeartinSanFrancisco's grocery store clerk. In addition to this comment, our friend offered up the joke that it would be good to invest in bananas if Obama were to be elected! This, from a man of Latino origins--legal, certainly, he has been here for many years and speaks unaccented English--and one who is approaching retirement age but remains ineligible for both Social Security and Medicare because he did not make his individual contributions. The above evidence to the contrary, he's a good-hearted man, if a little improvident, and has eked out a generally satisfactory living with his gardening business. He has been with us for, I'd say, twenty years. (I'm guessing that he doesn't read my blogs!)

The ignorance--I'm assuming that it comes out of ignorance, not malice--is breathtaking. It leaves us open-mouthed in sheer astonishment, trying in vain to "understand" it. But the truth is surely that it is more widespread than we have allowed for, as we think about the current year's politics and political attitudes in this country. Racism is mind-less, uncontested, bread-and-butter truth for a very large number of "good" Americans. It remains to be seen whether it will affect the outcome of the elections. Is it true, as these two examples seem to suggest, that a black man can not yet be elected President? I hope not.

I have to add that I'm disgusted by the recent Clinton tactics, and that I believe--reluctantly because I had thought better of them--they're playing consciously and cynically to the kind racism that we're talking about here. The suggestion that Obama seeks to emulate Ronald Reagan and Reaganism and that he believes the Republican "ideas" he spoke of to be good ones is beyond absurd, but this kind of rhetoric plays to the uneducated, undiscriminating, literal mind. As Buddha Diaries readers know, I was first for Kucinich, until the media succeeded in nudging him out of sight, then for John Edwards, hoping that he can resist that same powerful trope. I'll still vote for Edwards in the California primaries, and hope that many others will see the light and join me. A sad commentary on the otherwise truly wonderful fact that we have a woman and a black man running, with a serious chance at being elected.

Should it turn out to be a choice between Clinton and Obama, I would until now have been torn between the two. I'm wondering at this point if I'll be forced to hold my nose and vote for Clinton despite her recent relentless nastiness. And Bill's. To think I used to like him...

(By the way, I have been getting some wonderful responses to the entries on my Huffington Post blog--some of which are cross-posted here. If you have a moment, check them out!)

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/24/2008

People get into a heavy-duty sin and guilt trip, feeling that if things are going wrong, that means that they did something bad and they are being punished. That's not the idea at all. The idea of karma is that you continually get the teachings that you need to open your heart. To the degree that you didn't understand in the past how to stop protecting your soft spot, how to stop armoring your heart, you're given this gift of teachings in the form of your life, to give you everything you need to open further.

~Pema Chodron

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The Politics of Greed

(Note--Here is what I read about greed from the Buddhist point of view, in the Mula Sutta, as translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. "Greed itself is unskillful. Whatever a greedy person fabricates by means of body, speech, or intellect, that too is unskillful. Whatever suffering a greedy person — his mind overcome with greed, his mind consumed — wrongly inflicts on another person through beating or imprisonment or confiscation or placing blame or banishment, [with the thought,] 'I have power. I want power,' that too is unskillful. Thus it is that many evil, unskillful qualities/events — born of greed, caused by greed, originated through greed, conditioned by greed — come into play." Does that sound like anyone we know?)

Sorry, Gordon Gekko notwithstanding, greed is not good. Call it karma. Good old American greed—the greed that the oft-invoked “Reagan Revolution” thrived on—is coming back at us, and it’s not good. I’m no economist. Just a humanist and a bit of a Buddhist, and I look about me in the world today and I see the human cost of greed. And it’s not good. In today’s news reports, we hear about the tumbling of the world’s financial markets… but in the ripple effects of this rich person’s game, real people are really suffering, throughout the world.

Suppose we take George W. Bush and his economic policies as the apotheosis of Reaganomics, what hath he wrought? Deregulation has allowed greed to thrive virtually unchecked in the corporate world for the past, oh, twenty years, and we have a world-wide increase in the pollution of our environment, the rapid depletion of our increasingly scant resources, obscene profits, and very little to show for it all in the way of benefit for humankind. We have seen government finding nefarious ways to subsidize those who need it least, while those who need it most eke out a meager living if they are fortunate enough to pull in a double income. We have seen corporate lobbyists capitalize on their stranglehold on public servants, furthering their interests without regard for the public weal. We have seen a general decline in the quality of products: what used to last for years now lasts, if you’re lucky, for a few months before self-destructing or becoming redundant.

Our need for supremacy as a nation—another kind of greed—has led us into wars and threats of war, and has caused us to squander the wealth with which we were once entrusted in the perpetration of wanton acts of destruction and death. As consumers of by far the greatest share of the world’s resources, our greed for more and our unwillingness to make the smallest sacrifice has led us to spurn all efforts to spare the planet from our predatory demands. The richest nation in the history of the world seeks only to become richer.

We have been assured incessantly by the man in the Oval Office and his minions that “our economy is strong,” yet that majority of Americans who live in the real world look about them and see nothing but shambles. The housing and mortgage crisis is surely nothing if not the result of our greed—the greed of lenders and the greed of borrowers. A few short years ago, we looked around and saw nothing but the imagined profits of our real estate investments, and went out and spent them, fully expecting to make more. We put ourselves in hock even as our corporate and political leaders were busy putting our business and our country in hock. We have succeeded in selling off our children’s and our grandchildren’s birthright. The fallout from greed is widespread globally and across the generations.

When those who founded this country asserted the rights of the individual, they surely did not foresee the day when individual greed would run roughshod over the sense of obligation to one’s fellow human beings. They surely did not foresee the day when candidates for the office of the presidency would be falling over themselves to claim the heritage of predecessors whose policies caused so much despair and deprivation in the lives of so many of their fellow citizens. The evidence is invisible only to the blind and those who choose not to see. And those founding fathers surely did not foresee the day when voters could so easily allow themselves to be blinkered by their reluctance to contribute to the common good and seduced instead by the illusion of their short-term interest.

Greed, it seems, can bring momentary satisfaction when its demands appear to be fulfilled. But in so doing it rots the human soul, and its eventual return is yet greater dissatisfaction, unappeasable appetite, and the dread fear of deprivation. That’s karma. It affects us all.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/23/2008

Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other. One inspires us, the other softens us.

~Pema Chodron

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"Free Burma" T-Shirt Giveaway.

During the terrifying yet hopeful protests in Burma recently, I wanted to show my support for the cause and immediately began blogging during those intense days trying to bring awareness to as many as I could. Yet I wanted to do more and since there weren't any demonstrations against the military junta crackdown in my area, I looked for other ways to show my solidarity.

I wanted those in my relatively sheltered community who tend to be disconnected with the rest of the world to know of the crimes occurring on the opposite side of the world against the Burmese people and sangha. This led me to buy a "Free Burma" t-shirt so that I could show my support and hopefully raise awareness. I found a site online which sold a nice looking one and ordered it. However, when it arrived I realized that not only was it the wrong size but that it was a girl's t-shirt. I'm a somewhat bulky guy and a girl's shirt wouldn't even fit over my head!! So obviously It wouldn't work, therefore I contacted the online store and told them of the mishap. They were very helpful and said that they would exchange it for the right size if I sent it back. However, I didn't get around to sending it back within the allowed time frame so now I'm stuck with this shirt.
I want someone who really cares about this issue to have it and wear it so I decided that I would like to give it away to one of my readers here. I would like to extend this opportunity to all of my readers around the world but I can only afford to ship it to someone in either the United States, Canada or Mexico. That being said, I would be more than willing to send it to any other country than the three mentioned above but I can not afford the shipping costs. So if you would like the shirt and live outside the USA and Canada then just send me the money to pay for the shipping via Paypal. Please know that you can trust me that I'll indeed send you the shirt. I would never steal your money. I'm not perfect but I like to think I'm a very honest person and a faithful Buddhist and so please take my word that your trust in me will be taken as sacred.

I wondered what would be the best way to select the "winner" (I hate that word, it's so exclusive) of this t-shirt so I figured the easiest thing to do would be to place everyone's name who is interested into a hat and just pull a name out. I would do this with the utmost confidentiality and honesty. In fact, I will have my wife pull the name out of the hat as she is one of the most honest and unbiased people I know.

Therefore, if you wish to enter the drawing then just post a comment and I'll use your screen name, write it on a piece of paper, fold it in half several times and place them into the hat. If you're an anonymous person then just use whatever name that you want but don't just use "anonymous" because there are others that might use the name "anonymous" as well. I will then hold the hat just above my wife's head and have her reach her hand up and pull a name/piece of paper out of the hat. And that will determine the "winner." I hate to use that word "winner" but it's the only one that I can think of. I've leave the contest open for two weeks or so.

Let me give you a few more details and measurements for the shirt:
It is a U.S. women's xxl (2xl) red t-shirt with yellow/orange lettering which blends to a deep orange red (see photos). The website says it is fitted which means that it is tighter around the body and maybe smaller than the size says. They didn't have the exact measurements for a woman's xxl fitted t-shirt. So here are the measurements for a regular woman's xxl shirt, I'm hoping that they are quite similar. Anyway, here is the information: Chest size: 52 inches, Length: 30"

Good luck to all participants!!

~Peace to all beings~

Two Films

It was a strange pairing, I have to say. We had DVDs of two movies, and watched them one after the other on Saturday evening: "No Country For Old Men," and "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly."

"No Country" came first. I had been puzzling over the title for a while, knowing the quotation so well but not being able to recall where it had come from. A friend reminded us yesterday, reading the W.B.Yeats poem at our meditation, Sailing to Byzantium. "That is no country for old men," it starts. The key lines, so far as the film is concerned, are these: "An aged man is but a paltry thing,/A tattered coat upon a stick, unless/Soul clap its hands and sing..." And these: " Consume my heart away; sick with desire/And fastened to a dying animal/It knows not what it is..." I found the movie powerful, but bleak. A terrific performance by Tommy Lee Jones as a tired old sheriff who has seen more than his share of greed and violence, anger and despair. Far from the old Western sheriff, the Gary Cooper who sees evil and is willing to risk even his own life to remedy it, this character essentially surrenders to his impotence. As one of our sitting group members pointed out, he provides the moral core of the movie, recognizes good and bad, and ends up clinging sadly to what's left--his dreams. But along the way he makes countless promises he fails to keep, to protect the innocent and punish the evil-doers and the moral of the movie seems to be that evil triumphs--even if its victory is a pyrrhic one. As I saw it, it was a despairing picture of the human condition: suffering without hope of either release or redemption.

What a contrast, between "No Country" and "The Diving Bell," whose hero is literally trapped in a condition that seems to invite nothing but despair, but which brings about instead an extradorinary liberation. Here the hero, Jean-Dominique Bauby, until now at the center of the good life as editor of Elle magazine, is felled suddenly at the age of 43 by a devastating stroke, losing everything but the movement of a single eye--with which he manages to write a deeply moving account of his condition. The story leads from the moment of his awakening from a coma right up to his death, shortly after the publication of the book.

I have written previously about this beautiful, short work, the at first despairing words from within the "diving bell" and the discovery of the "butterfly"--the freedom of the human mind and the compensatory joys of the imagination. Julian Schnabel's film is an extraordinary visual interpretation of Bauby's poetic words. A painter--with two previous powerful feature films to his credit--Schnabel manages to convey both the darkness and the beauty of Bauby's experience in images, shifts of focus and camera movements that seem at times to take us inside the narrator's head and allow us to experience his frustrations, his anger, his sense of impotence, and his moments of triumph. He films all this like a painter, with passages of pure abstraction and kinetic color, along with grand gestural sweeps that remind us of his work on canvas.

Two powerful films, then. I found both of them compelling, richly visual viewing. Through my Buddhist window, though, "The Diving Bell" wins, hands down, as a life-affirming vision of the power of the human mind.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/22/2008

A further sign of health is that we don't become undone by fear and trembling, but we take it as a message that it's time to stop struggling and look directly at what's threatening us.

~Pema Chodron

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Martin Luther King Jr. Day is Extra Special This Year.

I'm sure Dr. King would be very proud to see the first viable African American candidate for president in Senator Barack Obama. Who also became the first African American candidate to win the Iowa caucus.

It is a huge achievement for a country that has been so bitterly divided by race and we should not fail to note how important this is regardless of who wins the nomination for the Democratic Party.

We know, however, that there is still much to do when an entire city of mostly African American citizens is flooded and left helpless by an out of touch government. We know that there is still much to do when we see a noose hanging from a tree in a school yard in that same state. We know that there is still work to be done in knowing that our prison system is disproportionately filled with young African-American men. We know that we still have mountains to climb when the confederate flag still flies in South Carolina and Mississippi.

Dr. King was a humble man who was friends with the Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh and would nominate the meek Buddhist for the Nobel Peace Prize. Which showed how selfless King was as he was already a great man of peace himself at that time. But like Nhat Hanh King was bigger than his ego and that is what made his efforts into a movement that literally changed a country.

It is a wonderful reminder of oneness, that we can not accomplish great things in this world without joining together and living the reality of inter-being. It was no wonder that King and Nhat Hanh bonded in friendship as Buddhism fits beautifully into the civil rights leaders vision of a united community of brother and sisters.

May we keep Dr. King's dream alive and keep striving forward for greater equality amongst all people.

Let us not become complaisant and lull ourselves into sleep thinking that racism and segregation do not exist in 2008. Let us join hands and unite to continue to bring this country and world together as one and never cease to break down walls of injustice and discrimination.

I will close this post with the words of the great man of peace himself, Dr. Martin Luther King Junior:

I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality.... I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.”

-Martin Luther King, Jr.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/21/2008

When you begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to discover that it's bottomless, that it doesn't have any resolution, that this heart is huge, vast, and limitless. You begin to discover how much warmth and gentleness is there, as well as how much space.

~Pema Chodron

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Elvis Presley's Shirt

I think there must have been
something that led up to this, some
forgotten back-story, as they call it,
since I woke with Elvis Presley’s
shirt, neatly folded, in my hands.
It had one of those Nehru necks
and was beautifully embroidered
around the upper chest with pastel
flowers. This was a fund-raising
event, I understood, for charity,
perhaps, or a political cause, since
my friend Michael had brought it
in as a donation. Since Michael
has been a professional musician
in his time, I guessed he once
had played in Elvis Presley’s
band and that Elvis had given him
this flowered shirt as a gesture
of appreciation. It was a mystery
to me why my friend Michael
had decided now to part with it
no matter what the circumstance,
and I woke up thinking, this shirt
must surely have both sentimental
and serious monetary value, having
once belonged to Elvis, how strange
to be sacrificing it in this way;
but then I’ll admit that my friend
Michael was, as indeed was Elvis,
a bit of a mystery to me anyway.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/20/2008

We habitually erect a barrier called blame that keeps us from communicating genuinely with others, and we fortify it with our concepts of who's right and who's wrong. We do that with the people who are closest to us and we do it with political systems, with all kinds of things that we don't like about our associates or our society. It is a very common, ancient, well-perfected device for trying to feel better. Blame others. Blaming is a way to protect your heart, trying to protect what is soft and open and tender in yourself. Rather than own that pain, we scramble to find some comfortable ground.

~Pema Chodron

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/19/2008

Compassionate action starts with seeing yourself when you start to make yourself right and when you start to make yourself wrong. At that point you could just contemplate the fact that there is a larger alternative to either of those, a more tender, shaky kind of place where you could live.

~Pema Chodron

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Up Close and Personal: John Edwards

They say he's angry. John Edwards, I mean. And I say, well, why not? So am I. Aren't you? I like that bumper sticker that reads: "If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.

And now, having successfully and unceremoniously booted Dennis Kucinich from the presidential race, how long will it be before the media try the same exclusionary tactic with Edwards? This white male provides them with less fodder than a Hillary or an Obama, woman and black—the drama that they thrive on and that boosts their ratings. It's an uphill battle for him in the media, against those "front-runners."

I heard Edwards speak in downtown Los Angeles yesterday. I’m sure it was just the standard Edwards stump speech—I had heard most of the sound bites before, but there was a definite thrill to hearing it delivered in person, in a crowd of cheering supporters.

I had driven downtown to hear the speech at a Service Employees International Union event, and I was glad I’d taken the time and the trouble to go. More than ever, I conclude that he’s the right man for America at this critical moment in our history, that he has the passion, the fortitude and the kind of training that’s much needed in facing down the powerful special interests that control the political direction of the country. He sees it like I do: that the poor, the working people and yes, now even the middle class need a President who not only understands their predicament but will stand up for their interests.

Don’t get me wrong. I think that both Clinton and Obama are good choices. It’s great to have an embarrassment of riches amongst the Democrats. And compared to what’s being offered on the other side—by way of both candidates and ideas—these people are models of democratic principle. What I’m hearing on the other side is nothing but the attempt to out-Bush Bush or, just as bad in my book, out-Reagan Reagan. That we have reached the sorry state in which we find ourselves as a nation today, I attribute in good part to the sway of supply-side economics, false patriotism, and the pathetic, self-first mantra of tax cuts we have heard since Reagan’s day.

John Edwards promises to end Bush's war and to attend to such matters as the minimum wage, health care for all, a fair tax code, improved education and employment opportunity for those who have been sidelined by the system, and resistance to the influence of profiteers and lobbyists. I believe him. You get a sense of the man when he walks by, within a couple of yards of you, even if you don’t quite get to shake his hand. The French call it a frisson. You catch a whiff of the humanity, the personal power he projects. To actually hear him speak without the mediation of the television screen is to catch some of the genuine passion in which his words originate, some of the personal outrage that fires them, some of the gut-level strength it will take to make the changes that so many of our politicians like to talk about, but on whose lips sound like nothing more than words.

To stand in the crowd as he speaks is also to be infected by the passion and drive of his supporters, to feel a need for change that comes out of deeply felt frustration, even desperation. It’s not just seven years of Bush. Those years simply brought matters to a head: the cracks in the dike have burst, like those all too literally in New Orleans, leaving swaths of chaos and despair in every direction that you care to look: the absurd, unnecessary and disastrously-conducted war; a health care system that enriches the insurance companies even as it leaves millions un- or underinsured; a shredded social safety net; an economy in disarray and, surely, entering recession; a rising unemployment rate; schools that fail to provide even the most rudimentary basics of education for too many of our children, especially the children of the poor; a for-sale electoral system that makes a mockery of democracy, rather than a model; a shattered reputation and widespread mistrust abroad… the litany is endless and all too familiar.

As it see it, Edwards is right. This is no time for timid half measures, for accommodation of the interests of the very wealthy. This is not hat-in-hand time any more. This is a job for the ruthless trial attorney who’s neither afraid nor ashamed to go for the jugular, and who has the skills and the experience to do it. This is the time to stop pandering to the basest interests of the voters and to make some significant demands of Americans. It’s time to demand the sacrifice of just the smallest piece of the comfort and convenience to which we have all grown accustomed, in order to grow in strength as a society and, indeed, as a model to the world.

If not now, when…? If not I, then who? I myself think that John Edwards has it right. The worse things get—and they seem to get worse by the day—the more right he seems to me. He’ll need every ounce of energy and enormous popular support to overcome the bias of the media, but I persist in thinking that it can be done.

Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/18/2008

There's a reason you can learn from everything: you have basic wisdom, basic intelligence, and basic goodness.

~Pema Chodron

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 1/17/2008

If we learn to open our hearts, anyone, including the people who drive us crazy, can be our teacher.

~Pema Chodron

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"A Deeply Religious Non-Believer..."

"I am a deeply religious non-believer... This is a somewhat new kind of religion." -- Einstein

I love this quote. I came across it in a book I'm reading in connection with my next "Art of Outrage" podcast contribution. The book is the  "Second Diasporist Manifesto," by R. B. Kitaj, a kind of aesthetic testament left by this important artist who died by his own hand at the age of 74 last October. A series of random but deeply connected thoughts on art, art history, love and lost love, the post-war art scene, Judaism, the great traditions of Jewish history and culture (Kafka, Spinoza, Freud, Wittgenstein... and, yes, Einstein,) and Kitaj's commitment to what he wanted to be a genuinely "Jewish art", the book has a number of quotations of this kind that he keeps coming back to.

"A deeply religious non-believer..." That resonates. I have religion "down the bones." I was brought up with it. All that personal history doesn't simply dissipate, it pervades the body-mind. What was lost along the way was the belief in some ineffable being overseeing human affairs--and making a pretty poor job of it, if you ask me!--and in an afterlife of reward for the good and punishment for the rest of us. Karma makes sense to me. It works in this life. Heaven and hell do not. Oh, sure, we create our own little heavens and hells, but that's not what the Christian concept is about.

Of his own religion, Kitaj says "The main religion I believe in is Kindness, and I fail at that too often."

That resonates, too.

When we start out on a spiritual path we often have ideals we think we're supposed to live up to. We feel we're supposed to be better than we are in some way. But with this practice you take yourself completely as you are. Then ironically, taking in pain - breathing it in for yourself and all others in the same boat as you are - heightens your awareness of exactly where you're stuck.

~Pema Chodron

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Sans Kucinich...

... the debate went on. "It's down to three!" NBC's moderator, Brian Williams, announced portentously to kick things off. No, it's not. He conveniently passed over the fact that NBC had been fighting all day to keep Congressman Dennis Kucinich off the table. Kucinich, to my knowledge, is still running for President. He just doesn't happen to be in this corporate network's fantasy horse race, staged to boost their ratings and make them money.

A mention, at the very least, of his desire to be there would have been a courtesy. Not a word. Not a word about his absence from any of the other candidates in the course of the debate. And we call this a democracy! No, I repeat what I have insisted in the past, it's an oligarchy we live in, run by the wealthy and the powerful, who will fight in the courts to impose their choices on "the people" and to silence--successfully, once again, in this case--those who oppose them.

So far as the other candidates were concerned, the debate went well. I'm persuaded that all three are articulate, knowledgeable, caring, capable people. I have been not a little dismayed, this past week, by the spat between Obama and Clinton, and by the hay the media have been making of this opportunity for drama and dissent. Still, compared with what we have now in the Oval Office--and with the choices on the other side--all three are shining examples of sanity and concern. They share much in their vision for the betterment of this country and the world. I would confidently vote for any one of them. But my first choice is still John Edwards. Well, Kucinich, and then John Edwards.

(Don't forget, if you're interested, to check in on my progress on A Diet of Choice.)

An Important Plea.

Colin of Awakening the Buddha Within Us came to me with a special plea and I am passing it on to you as well:

To: Kong Meng San Phor Kark See Monastery

THE 100 MILLION MANI RECITATION RETREAT was held annually by Kong Meng San
>Phor Kark See Monastery of Singapore (PKS) for some 5 years, and have since
>became an inseparable part of our spiritual lives. Unfortunately, there's
>news that PKS might not hold the Retreat this year 2008. This year's
>retreat was shadowed by His Eminence Drubwang Rinpoche's passing away in
>Singapore, a day before the Retreat itself.

>He had passed away on the same
>day he landed in Singapore. Despite bad health and much dissuasion from
>other Rinpoches, Drubwang Rinpoche insisted on his journey to Singapore
>lead the Retreat. It was specifically explained by His Eminence Garchen
>Rinpoche during the Retreat that it is Drubwang Rinpoche's wish for the Om
>Retreat to continue year after year, after his passing. I personally
>believe his choice to pass away a day before this event has great
>significance and he might have foreseen that after his passing, this
>greatly beneficial event will end abruptly.

I also felt strongly Rinpoche's
>love for all beings. His teaching and message put forth through his actions
>are too profound and wide for me to put into words here. Please send the
>message to all who cares for Dharma to appeal to the management of Kong
>Meng San Phor Kark See Monastery NOT to let this annual Retreat end. Email
>them, write to them, approach and talk to them. Let them recognize that this
>is no longer just a PKS event, but a precious inheritance left behind by
>Drubwang Rinpoche and PKS management has the responsibility to keep it
>alive.

>Sincerely,
>The Undersigned

Please forward to your friends this message, ask them to sign this petition:

If you have a blog, do post it on your blog to spread awareness to it. If you can, please forward this message to your friends so more people can show support and keep the OM Retreat alive. Thanks!

>May peace be with you,
>Colin
>____________________

A Diet of Choice

The last thing I need is another blog. I have two of them already, The Buddha Diaries and Accidental Dharma. Not to mention my blog at The Huffington Post. But this one will be a little different. It will require less thought and writing… but more real-life attention. It will be called "A Diet of Choice."

Here’s the thing. I woke up yesterday morning and stepped on the bathroom scale. I was not pleased with what it had to tell me. It’s not that I’m obese, just a few pounds overweight for my age and height, ten pounds maybe. Well, maybe fifteen. And it’s not just what the scale tells me, it’s how I feel. I’m uncomfortable with the extra weight. It weighs on me, like a winter coat. My clothes feel uncomfortable.

I look at others who lack the bulge above the midriff that I have, and I realize that they are healthier than I and, yes, that they do look better. Not that it’s about cultural imperatives or aesthetics. No, it’s truly about how I feel about myself, and about the realization that this is an area in my life where I am still being driven by reactive patterns rather than by consciously-made choices.

I’m reminded of my battle with cigarettes, years ago. I started smoking at the age of thirteen. By the time I was forty, I was hopelessly addicted to the filthy weed. I was all too aware of the consequences to my health, and had plenty of aggravating reminders from my wife and daughter—which made it all the harder to give up: I didn’t want anyone telling me what was good for me and what wasn’t. So I started “trying” to give up.

I tried everything, from will power to nicotine patches to phony cigarettes to… well, everything. Nothing worked. I would manage to “cut down” or even stop altogether for a few days, but then I’d be back again, sneaking cigarettes like a teenager when I thought no one would know and disguising the results with breath mints and mouthwashes. I would stop buying cigarettes—and start bumming them from fellow smokers. I kept telling myself No, no, musn’t, shouldn’t, can’t… And nothing worked.

Nothing worked, until the day a reformed smoker suggested making it a matter of choice. Give yourself permission to smoke, he said. Carry cigarettes wherever you go. Stop saying No and Mustn’t. Try saying, instead, I can, I give myself full permission to light up… but I choose not to. I choose, instead, the positive things: no smelly clothes, going to sleep at night without a pounding heart, walking up a few steps without losing my breath. Perhaps, even, a longer life.

Then it worked. I don’t know about others, but it worked for me.

So I hereby give myself permission to eat and drink as much and as often as I want to, but undertake to be conscious of the choices I make and aware of their consequences. And this will be the place where I hold myself accountable. The blog…

(More about goals and intentions a little later in the week. This is just to get me started.)

I understand that this particular journey might be of little interest to anyone else. In my other blogs, I try to talk about things that will have some meaning and resonance for others. Here, it’s about me. It’s about my choices. It’s also about practice and consciousness. If anyone chooses to check up on me, I welcome their kindness. I’ll welcome their comments and support. If not, not. I choose to check up on myself.

For yesterday, the choices were as follows: multi-vitamins with half a glass of cranberry-apple juice and a small bowl of cereal at 7:30 AM, with half a banana, half a dozen grapes, a scatter of raisins and a little milk—with just a splash of half and half which happened, unusually, to be in the refrigerator. Oh, and I forgot my cup of morning tea. All these were, thus far, my choices.
After gym, at 11AM, I made myself a Canadian bacon sandwich with an English muffin spread with butter. Delicious. And a cup of instant coffee with milk and sweetener. On our return to Los Angeles, I chose to eat a bowl of leftover spicy couscous with chick peas and red peppers, PLUS a small melted cheese tortilla AND half an apple. Too much. More than I needed.

Then, at dinner, a small bowl of Ellie’s delicious home-made squash soup with two crackers and a green salad. And a glass of white wine.

I swear I will not bore readers of The Buddha Diaries with such details again. Those interested are invited to follow me to "A Diet of Choice."