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The smell of compassion.

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You see all sorts of things when you work with the public. You smell all sorts too.

I dread warmer days for this reason. Sometimes the counter is just not deep enough to suit. There is always the dilemma – body odor, or perfume? Both are bad for different reasons.

Strong perfume or cologne affects my asthma. I start having a hard time breathing, so I start to breathe very shallowly and sparingly. I’ll make the transaction go as fast as possible just to get them away from me. I think it would be rude for me to just walk away and take a deep breath and come back, but then it is rude to wear so much cologne or perfume that it makes breathing difficult. If you bathe daily and wear deodorant, you don’t need perfume.

But then, sometimes people use artificial scents to cover up the natural ones. That is much harder.

Sometimes the bad odor is a mix of smoking, not bathing, and drinking. If you drink alcohol often enough it comes out in your sweat. Sometimes it is the smell of poverty and desperation. Everything the person puts into their body is cheap. Sometimes the smell is so strong that even if the person isn’t standing there anymore, the smell is. It is like a bad ghost, haunting where they were.

It has to be hard to be in the skin of someone who smells this badly. Some seem to be totally unaware of it. They have gotten used to it. One patron seemed to be aware that he had terrible breath from smoking cheap cigarettes so he’d talk out of the side of his mouth. He’d sort of clench his teeth to talk. He’d then go outside to smoke yet another cigarette. His partner had an entirely different aroma. He smelled of some mixture of cheap cigarettes, gas-station food, and ferret. He seemed totally unaware of the funk that surrounded him. He checks out only DVDs and the smell permeates the plastic on the cases. There is nothing for that aroma except time. I wonder what the next patrons think when they get these titles.

I feel bad for all the people who smell really badly. I want to say something. I want to tell them that they don’t have to poison themselves with cheap food and cheap cigarettes and cheap alcohol. I want to tell them to not treat themselves so cheaply. I want to tell them that everything they are doing to fix their problems is actually causing more problems. I want to save them.

And I can’t. And I shouldn’t.

I’m sure that people wanted to save me when they saw me out doing my errands when I was stoned for ten years. I’m sure that when people saw me glassy eyed and mindlessly smiling they thought that something was wrong but it wasn’t kind to tell me. As long as I wasn’t hurting anybody, let it be. And so they did. I’m sure that I wouldn’t have listened to them anyway. I wasn’t in a place in my head where I could or would listen to anybody.

I am trying to be loving and compassionate, and serve people where they are and as they are, instead of where and as I want them to be. I’m trying to love them on their journey. I’m trying to understand that who they are now is the result of where they have been and I don’t know that story. I’m trying to understand that they are doing the best they can right now, and that even though it isn’t what I think is best, it is what it is.

It is hard. I want them to all slow down and love themselves enough to get off the Ferris wheel, the treadmill, the hamster wheel that our society gives us when it tells us we have to be more than we are. I want to tell them that they don’t have to keep doing it the way they are doing it, because my way is better.

And then I remember that I’m not being loving when I think this. I remember that to not let them make their own choices is to not let them be who they are. Who am I to tell them how to live? Each person has to grow their own way. Each “wrong” choice leads to openings and opportunities. I would not have learned to appreciate working out at the Y if I hadn’t been obese. I would not have learned the secret peace of being sober if I hadn’t been an abuser.

But here’s the trick. Even if they never stop smoking, or drinking, or eating unhealthy food, or doing any number of things I think are “bad”, I have to understand that is OK too. That is the hardest part. I have to know that they may stay just like they are, and that this may not be a stepping stone to health. They may not be a diamond in the rough. They may not ever be a flower in the making.

The ones who smell bad are just the ones whose choices result in that. There are plenty of people who make choices that don’t call attention to themselves, but I might disagree with if I knew.

I remember reading “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” many years ago. Well, I didn’t really read it. I read about a quarter of it. I couldn’t finish it because the narrator kept talking about how sad he was for the people he was with, that they weren’t as enlightened as he was. I knew then that such an attitude was, in itself, not enlightened, and I quit reading.

So now I’m trying to learn this lesson all over again. The minute I try to make someone else into my own image, I’m not respecting them. I can’t fix them. But more importantly, I have to learn that just because they are different from me doesn’t mean that they are broken.

On being lost, and found.

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It is really fascinating to see different people’s reactions to when they hear why I don’t go to my old church any more. Every now and then members of that church come into the library where I work. Sometimes they ask why they don’t see me anymore. Sometimes they don’t ask and I tell them anyway.

I’ve pared down the story to what is essentially an elevator speech. It is short and to the point. I explain how the church experience that we are being served doesn’t match up with the Church that Jesus came to create. That it isn’t about us giving all of our tithe money to support a building but the Body of Christ. And that Body isn’t just the church members but everybody. I point out that Jesus didn’t tell us to have ministers or a division of lay and ordained.

It is interesting to note the reactions. Some people start to turn away from me, to actually try to leave. I think they feel threatened by my ideas. An alarm clock is certainly threatening to people who are asleep.

I would have had the same reaction to anyone saying what I’m saying about five years ago. How dare you attack my church?

But now I think about what church is, really. Who are we serving? Who are we following?

One person I talked to said that the church is being run like a business. He said that the former priest did the same thing. And yet he still goes. He said his wife refuses to go to that particular church because of the priest who is there. I’ve met others with the same sentiment.

But it isn’t the minister. It is the whole idea. We are doing it wrong.

The minister is being duped too. She’s bought into the system. She has the most to lose, so her ego is tied to it.

And sometimes I find a sympathetic ear. Sometimes I find another rebel. Sometimes I find someone who feels the same way and is also searching, also feels that something is wrong. Sometimes they tell me that they are going to other churches. They are shopping around.

They haven’t yet realized like I have that the problem is bigger than that minister or that parish.

We have to strip the whole thing down and start all over again. We can’t fix it from the inside. I tried that. I was viewed as crazy. I still am by many of those who still go to that church. Declaring someone as crazy is the fastest way to discredit someone, after all. It is the fastest way to silence someone.

I’ve not gone silent. I’ve just gone away. And in leaving I’ve found a large community of people who are just the same as me. They love Jesus, but they weren’t finding him in the church. We can’t all be crazy. Perhaps there is something more going on. Perhaps we are the only sane ones. Perhaps it is just like with “The Emperor’s New Clothes” – perhaps we are the only ones who are seeing things the way they really are.

Getting kids to read.

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I know too many people who let their children decide what they are going to read or if they are going to read. This is the same as letting them decide what they are going to eat. No child is going to make good choices. They are going to go for the comic books and the candy. That is why you are their parent. You are there to direct and guide them.

Just like a potter with a lump of clay, the potter shapes it and molds it until it is tall enough and strong enough that it will be useful. It has to be shaped in such a way that it can endure the heat of the kiln and the wear and tear of use.

Children have to be shaped so that they can be strong too. They need to be shaped so that that are good people and helpful and kind. They need to be shaped so that they can survive out in the world and not crack.

So in the same way that you wouldn’t let a child pick out all of his food when he is only going to go for cake and chips, you can’t let him pick out his books when he is only picking out what is essentially junk food for the mind.

Now we all need a little junk food reading every now and then. It is important to let kids have some control over what they select. They need to learn that reading is a pleasure and not a punishment. They need to feel that it is fun and not work. But a solid diet of junk food results in a sick body. A solid diet of junk food reading results in a sick mind.

If you let children have total control that is the same as the potter letting the clay have control. They will be an unformed lump at best. They will be spread all over the place at worst.

Don’t know what to recommend to your child? Go to your local library and ask a librarian. They are there to help. You don’t have to do this on your own, but you do have to do this. The mind you save will be your child’s. The world you will save will be your own.

Cold complaint

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The people who complain most about the cold weather are always the same people who aren’t dressed for it. They have dressed as if the weather is what they want it to be, rather than what it is. Something seems pathological about this. It also seems common.

The easiest way to be unhappy is to focus on what you don’t have rather than what you do have. If you are living in the past or the future you are not living in the now. If you aren’t in the now, nothing will satisfy you.

You are using the wrong template. Round peg, square hole and all that. If now is the round peg and you are trying to fit it into your expectations of how things were in the past or how you think they will go in the future, you’ll rarely be happy, because then isn’t now.

People who complain about the cold never have a hat on, never have a thick coat on, or if they have a coat they don’t have it zipped up so it isn’t insulating them. Hearing them complain is like watching someone hit their head against a wall and then they wonder why they have a headache.

I’ve given up telling people to get a hat or a coat when they complain. They always have an excuse. Secretly they just want to complain. They want to show off how miserable they are. They are being martyrs. Small martyrs, but martyrs nonetheless.

So while I’m using this as a “wake up” call like I’ve written about recently, I’m also ignoring it in a way. I’m not commenting on it to the person, either for or against. I’m not saying “Yes, you’re right, it is cold” or “It is winter, you know”. To comment on it is to reward it, to approve of it. Remember attention is energy, even if it is negative attention. For me to say anything, for or against, is to teach this person that this self-harming behavior is acceptable and they should continue it.

I knew those child-rearing books would come in useful.

Self made self.

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I find it fascinating how easy it is to create a brand identity. You can print your own business cards, address labels, and letterhead. You can put your logo on hats, t-shirts, and water bottles. Anything that you can imagine can be printed with your own name and logo. You can print your own book and publish your own website and blog. It is all very easy and inexpensive, and pretty amazing. So where is the line, or does there need to be one? What makes someone official? The logo? The certification? The experience?
For some jobs they ask for four years of school or four years of equivalent experience. They are considered equal. However, way too many people go through four years of school and they still don’t know anything when they graduate and get hired. Another person at the same job can have four years of experience behind her, but no diploma. So what does the diploma mean? Somebody else thinks you might know how to do something? You test well?
Maybe there is something to just doing it anyway and not waiting for someone to give you permission or certification or credentials. They say the suit makes the man, after all. So maybe the book makes the author.
Maybe we have entered into a time when people don’t have to do it the old way. Maybe we have entered into a time where self publishing doesn’t have the air of desperation it used to. It used to be called a “vanity press”, but now famous people are self-publishing and essentially giving the finger to the big publishing houses. They are doing it all themselves and taking all the money.
Maybe people have just gotten tired of waiting for someone to invite them to the dance and they decided to put on their favorite shoes and go and have a great time. The more you do for yourself, the more control you have over it.
I sold beaded jewelry I made on my college campus. I had all my creations in a metal Bahlsen cookie tin. I did fairly well, and learned a lot about human psychology. It was amazing how many women were so proud of my creativity and entrepreneurship. It was also amazing how many men wanted a piece of the action.
Several men said they could “help” me sell my jewelry, for a cut. They said would show off and take anywhere up to 25%. They never volunteered to help me for free, or take the time to help me make the jewelry in the first place. I felt like they were being pimps. I’d do all the hard work and they’d get some money. This hardly seemed fair. I always said no.
So maybe it is the same with schools and credentialing. Maybe they just want their cut. You do all the work and they give you a piece of paper for all your trouble. Maybe it is the same with publishing houses. I do all the writing and they get all the money.

Peacemaker – heal thyself.

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I am feeling very grateful and blessed right now. I’ve just been granted the opportunity to take a class in nonviolent conflict resolution at a price I can afford. Then when I mentioned it to a member of the library administration, he suggested it may be possible to do it for free, with the library paying the difference. And then facilitate such meetings for the library. Basically, get paid to make peace and foster understanding, right where I am.

I feel like a door is opening.

It isn’t opening on its own. I’ve done a lot of work to get here.

Many years ago I was afraid to go anywhere but my neighborhood. I was afraid of driving. My bipolar disorder had scared me into staying close to home. I’d gone a few hours away from home years ago and had enough of a problem with my disorder that all my stuff had to be packed up for me and I had to be driven home. It was embarrassing. It was frightening. It was enough to keep me from traveling by myself for many years.

And then I decided that I could not let this diagnosis define me. I could not let it tell me what to do. So I started pushing myself. I started taking classes, on my own, downtown. Sure, it isn’t another city, but downtown Nashville has always scared me. Well, really it is the drivers and not the destination, but you get the point.

So I took a class called “Diversity in Dialogue” through the Scarritt Bennett center. That introduced me to the circle process, where people learn how to listen to each other openly. I took a second class to try to understand how the process works. I think that this kind of open, honest communication is what the world most needs.

I also took a class on Pastoral Care. That was far more intensive, but added to my training. It too was downtown, and it challenged me even further.

I attended a “Southern Sulha” – based on the Middle Eastern conflict resolution process.

I tutor students with learning disabilities and/or have English. I’ve done this for at least five years, most recently kindergartners.

I’ve read dozens of books to help me understand different perspectives, different cultures, and how to relate to people.

I keep taking classes and going to events that are all leading toward this goal.

It is like I am doing an independent study, and creating my own curriculum. Some of the classes have been paid for by work or my former church.

What is the thing that unites them?

Peace. Peaceful understanding. People actually listening to each other. Not debating. Being OK with having different viewpoints. There’s more, but that is a good start.

The irony? I don’t talk to my brother. Long time readers of this blog know the story. It was more peaceful to sever the relationship than to continue it. Every time we talked there was a huge misunderstanding and fight. No matter what I said he twisted it into something malicious. It seemed healthier to quit than continue.

Sometimes you have to know how not to do something in order to know how to do it. I know what peaceful communication isn’t. I know what pain results from it. And I also know it takes two to communicate.

Compatibility test

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If you want to find out if someone is compatible with you, do any activity where you have to work together. This is true for business or personal relationships.

Simply ordering a pizza is a good indicator of whether you can get along with each other.

Does he want all meat, and you think meat is murder? Is she allergic to all your favorite toppings? Do you have to get two separate pizzas to both be content? This does not bode well for a harmonious relationship.

Try doing a jigsaw puzzle together. Does he try to work on the same area you are working on, getting in your way? Does she get jealous when you finish an area before her?

You both don’t have to do the same things or be exactly the same. That would be a little weird. But you do both have to work well together, encouraging each other and building each other up.

Relationships are a lot like three legged races. If you aren’t working together, you are going nowhere.

Weather Bell

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People talk about the weather all the time. I’ve decided to see it as alarm bell signaling me to wake up.

It is mindless talk, really. “Boy, is it cold out there!” or “That wind is fierce!”

I used to say something like “Yeah, you’d think it was February or something!” Because it is February. Cold and windy weather are what define February in America. It isn’t a surprise. Freaking out over it makes no sense. It is normal.

If it going to be especially cold or windy, like more than normal for winter, then it is forecasted. Every day before I leave the house I know what the weather is expected to be like. I know whether to wear a thick coat or a thin one. I know to bring my umbrella or not. I know if I can wear my regular hat or I have to wear the one with a lanyard so it won’t blow away in a gust.

All these people who are surprised by the weather seem to be the same people who are surprised by life in general. They wonder how they got old and infirm. They wonder why they have no money saved up for retirement. They wonder where their health went.

If they can’t be awake enough to pay attention to something as simple and everyday as the weather, then how can they be expected to plan any further ahead? Just that day is enough of a challenge.

Sometimes the weather is a surprise. My grandfather said that a weatherman was the only person who could be wrong fifty percent of the time and still keep his job. But in general, what people are talking and/or complaining about with surprise and consternation isn’t a fluke weather pattern. It is something that is expected and was predicted, sometimes as much as a week earlier.

So I’m seeing it as a bell. I’m seeing any statement about not-out-of-the-ordinary weather as the same kind of bell in a church that calls people to services. It is the call of the muezzin. It is the tornado siren.

It is a bell that says – Wake up. Notice what is happening. Time is slipping by. Notice it.

Day One Day

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I just saw a music video that involved looping. Now, while the music wasn’t my thing, one of the loops was. While setting it up, the lady sang into the mike the words “Day one” over and over, very close together. After a while, it sounded like she was saying “One day” and not “Day one” anymore. Something was fascinating to me about that.

Is she talking about the beginning of something, or she waiting for something to begin? Is it the present or the future she is talking about? And in a way, are they are the same?

It reminds me of the book “Be Here Now.” It is written in such a way that it also says “Be Nowhere.”

I often hear and see things like this. I often get an “echo” and receive multiple meanings of things. It is just how my brain is wired. Perhaps it is why I’m an artist. Perhaps I had to become an artist to process this phenomenon.

While it is unusual and I like it, it is also a bit of a juggle. I have to determine which experience that the world receives so I know what to share, and then study the experience that I got on my own and ponder it.

Sometimes looking at multiple sides of things is helpful. Sometimes it is confusing. Sometimes it is an amazing gift that opens doors in my head.

I think that this gift is part of why I can tutor people with learning disabilities. Not only can I “hear” what they are trying to say but can’t get out, I understand the multiple signals they are receiving.

We are just radio receivers after all, you know. Our senses are just receivers of information from the world, and from our Creator. Sight, sound, smell, touch, taste – all of these senses tell us information about the world around us. All of our sense organs are mechanical, physical things, though. And they are different for each one of us. No person sees the color we collectively refer to as “pink” the same way as another person. It is a construct we agree upon. This shade is “pink” but this one is “red” and this one is “mauve” and that is just the way it is.

But it isn’t.

We are faulty radio receivers. A tube is broken. The dial sticks in one area. The wiring touches in places.

What one person experiences through her senses isn’t the same as what another person experiences. We sometimes don’t realize that. And that is where the confusion starts. What I see and what you see isn’t the same thing. What we both talk about is something in the middle, something that we have agreed upon.

It is, in fact, something that doesn’t even really exist.

Sometimes we don’t even realize this. Sometimes we do, but we don’t realize that the “ideal” thing that we are talking about isn’t there, and we’d really be better off talking about what each one of us sees, really, right there in front of us.

If we can’t even honestly talk about what we see right in front of us, how can we even begin to honestly talk about ideas and concepts as vague as “equality” and “peace” and “compassion”?

But perhaps this is all the heart of compassion. Perhaps if we can just begin to understand that each one of us experiences the world in a different way, and that if we tap into that and share our collective and divergent perceptions we can create a unified whole in our heads. Perhaps if we work together instead of against each other – perhaps if we are patient with ourselves and with each other – we can actually start to understand each other and the world we live in.

One day.
Or day one.

Perhaps the future is right now.

A pain in the gut.

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A regular patron came in recently. Well, by regular I don’t mean he is normal. I mean he has been in often for the past several years. His paranoia has gone to new heights. He makes my former boss’ end of the world preparations look like child’s play.

He has a thirty year supply of seeds. He is raising his own food, and not just vegetables. He is raising sheep and goats and chickens. He even has a beehive.

Or at least I think he has all this. He might just be preparing to be prepared. It is in the works, at least.

He believes that you can’t trust anyone or anything. He believes that the government is out to get us all. He might be right. Who knows?

I’ve noticed that all these preppers don’t seem like happy people. Somehow all of this stocking and storing, this training and testing, doesn’t seem to be making them content. Somehow, instead of getting a sense of calm that they have everything under control and their lives are free from worry about other people and their perceived lack, they seem even more wound up.

I understand some of their desire to fend for themselves and not trust other people. When I was in college, we had to do group assignments. The group had to do the research and work on a project. Rarely did I get to pick the group I was in. I usually ended up doing all the work because I didn’t trust the competency of my fellow students. I didn’t want my grade to be adversely affected by their slack.

So the preppers are doing the same thing, but instead of their grades being affected, it is their lives. They think everything is going to hit the fan and it will be every man for himself.

I can handle only so much of this kind of talk. He has shared some of his theories with me in the past about how things are going to go south and I always feel physically bad afterwards.

I want to be present for people. I also want to be open. I want to study them as well. Sometimes I have to allow myself into situations that are uncomfortable for me in order to personally grow and learn.

But this time was different. Perhaps it was a cumulative effect. Last night’s rambles weren’t especially paranoid, but somehow I was affected adversely.

I started to feel a pain in my stomach shortly after our conversation ended. Now, it might help to know that I have a hernia. I thought it was acting up. I got it when my Mom was dying and I had to lift her from her bed to get her to the bathroom. I remember the feeling of my muscles in my abdomen snapping from the strain. She wasn’t especially heavy her whole life, and she was even less so then because of the chemotherapy, but I wasn’t trained for that kind of lifting.

I’ve strengthened my abdomen quite a bit in the past few years with water aerobics and yoga, but that kind of injury never fully heals. I’ve learned that if I do a forward fold it usually helps.

Not so in this case. I waited a bit, and then went to the bathroom. While sitting there, I thought about this pain. It kind of reminded me of the pain I had when I was in my first year of college. That wasn’t a pain from any physical illness, but it manifested in a physical way. It was a pain from stress, from anxiety, from fear. It was the pain of being too far away from everything I knew and facing a whole lot more of the unknown.

Then, I went to the student health services and they, in their ignorance, gave me an anti nausea pill that knocked me out for half a day.

I didn’t want to be unconscious, but I also didn’t want to be in pain.

So I prayed. What do I do, Lord?

The answer? A hard exhale. Just like in yoga class, the ocean sounding breath. Just like one teacher says “Fog up that invisible mirror in front of your beautiful face.” So I did it. Huhhhh.

And I felt instantly better. I did it a few more times and the pain was all gone.

And now I think I’ll have to tell that patron that I can’t listen to his prepper paranoia any more.

Just like finding out that I am allergic to a certain food and I no longer eat it because it makes me sick, I have to do the same with people and ideas. If they make me sick, don’t let them in my head.

But it is also good to know that the answer to every question is just a question away.