Alana's Dharma Blog

Dear Readers, this blog is a direct continuation of the previous so, if you haven’t read last week’s entry then please do head back there and read it before you continue here.

A Roundabout Way to Discovering I Need to Understand Rupa+Nama

MN: What do you feel about this?

https://youtu.be/bMYGYY-WunE

A: So on the video I feel nothing extreme. But the reason is I don’t, in my heart, view eggs as babies so no fodder to excited my heart. But I have had a pretty big breakthrough on the birds already. Punchline: just because I don’t see a cause it doesn’t mean one doesn’t exist.

MN: Love this

A: Very briefly, on another note: I really saw quickly I cried about the birds because I see myself in the birds. I have known for a while there is hidden little Alana that feels like a victim of the world whose suffering seems causeless, and so not fair (she is in homeless Alana story too). At least in this life I think it all starts with my borderline personality disorder mom, who would be fine one sec and then freak the next, for what seemed like no reason at all. I spent most of my childhood in terror for myself and then trying to protect my brother. Now though I know she has been diagnosed with a disease that is at least a factor in this behavior, so it’s not without cause.

Deeper: Take the mammogram story, I saw my picture was incomplete (thought only possible outcomes were macrocalcifications that were worse or stable) because I was bound to imagine (4) outcomes in only the limited way my picture allowed (based on memory, 3s). When another outcome happened, I saw it is not just that anything can happen, but that the reason I don’t understand that fact is because my view of the world is so limited.

Now, though I see I can apply the same lesson to causes (since causes are just past effects) all  my assumptions that abuse/suffering is for ‘no reason’ versus abuse/suffering for being for a reason arise from my limited picture (permanently stuffed with my standards, shoulda and colored by my Alana colored glasses) versus complete picture of the world.

MN: I like this about seeing that your view is limited

A: I am watching for changes since the contemplation (which as a reminder to you readers, was something Neecha asked me to do at the end of the last post so she could help me further) and feeling 100 percent sure on freeing-up my ideas around worthy and good; at the wat this AM I did not think “not worthy” when a friend  anamodannaed with me and I did not think everything LP said in his teaching this morning was a personal commentary on my moral failings.

MN: This is good, can you pinpoint why though?

A: On good, the uproot came from contemplating on my need to be ‘good daughter’ by always making my mom happy: I see that I made-up the standards of being a good daughter someone who always makes mom happy (because I think by making her happy I can be protected from her wrath) and then kept trying to live up to my imagined standard, suffering because Inevitably failed since her happiness is in her heart.

A: Deserve was easy, I didn’t think I deserve a bed at retreat, but I got one so clearly my concept of deserve does not govern the world.

MN: If you see that your mom’s happy is in her heart, do you feel unable to make your mom happy, then?

MN: Inevitably failed, so does that mean you’ll always fail?

MH: So what does govern the world?

A: I Inevitably fail because I can’t always make my mom happy and there is an unspoken always in my belief that a good daughter makes her mom happy.

I sometimes make mom happy, but not because of my standards of good daughter. But because my form + my actions, in certain environment/ circumstances, meets the standard for ‘happy’ that my mom has in her own heart.

This l think is one angle of how my heart world and the real world are connected.

To answer that question more broadly…rupa’ (real world) is like food pellets in a video game. My character (memory and imagination, 3&4) eats them to get bigger and to get powers to win the game. It is like rupa is some conduit material in which signals run 2 ways. I want to make mom happy so she loves me and I feel like a good daughter. So l use rupa to transmit the message. I buy her gifts, I take her on trips, I do shit in the real world. This is food pellets for influencing my video game. Then I read the rupa she ‘gives back’, a smile, a frown, a gift and word and use it to confirm my success making her happy and therefore being a good daughter. This is food pellets making me big. If I feel like either I lack the rupa tools to make  my Mom happy (and thereby convince myself of my goodnes), or that the rupa of her response ( facial expressions for example) don’t signal my success then shit isn’t how it “should be” and I get angry. Something like this is how the heart world and the real one connect. Still need time to clarify a bit more

A: I don’t yet know exactly what governs the world. But I suspect it is something like that video game world where everyone is trying to collect food pellets (rupa’) to get bigger and have powers and then prove just how big they are by testing their powers in interaction with other players.

MN: You’re on the right track with the rupa and nama connection. Rupa is tangible form, nama is the intangibles: feeling, memory, imagination, sensation . Just have to sort it out a bit more.

A: Anyway, all this is part of what governs connection between heart and real. What governs real I know the answer is Karma, cause an effect, arising and ceasing, that was then and this is now, but my heart isn’t fully convinced. I know I need more evidence

A: On the topic of watching for changes since the contemplation:

1) I am less likely to get runaway imagination with Eric and talking about our future. Example, he said our fantasy dog was a bread I don’t care for and I didn’t even bother to argue because I saw so clearly what idiot would argue over a fantasy dog.

2) Seeing other conditions like what to eat where to go lessen but not sure because could be post retreat daze, it happens to me sometimes. I’ll keep you updated I feel like I need to test in the wild not my imaginations.

3) I am seriously less sure what I believe is really true. Not 100 percent yet, but last night we went to a dinner and a flickering neon was hurting my eyes so I asked to change tables. The waiter pointed to one just a foot or so away and said it was the only one so we could move there. My first though was it’s still so close to the light it won’t make any difference. Immediately, before I spoke, I saw it might. So I said we would try it. In truth, it was a little better, but still hurting. But it wasn’t the same…

A: Overnight, I decided to revisit the topic of good because it feels a little murky and I suspect it’s a huge key for me. The thing is, I know it is not in a situation, but in my heart…When LP moved his hand and asked where slow was I saw that if it couldn’t be found in a hand. It arises in my mind based on my own interpretation which is based on context and a multitude  of things that move faster and slower.

Even though I see good lives in my heart, not the situation, I still feel there is some judgement in my heart that is correct. And even if I see that my changing picture of the world (like geese, more info) changes my judgement, I still believe there is a complete picture that exists that if I saw would allow me to judge. And I still feel that judgement could be correct even if it is different from what happens in the actual world. And even if I see the same judgement isn’t appropriate in all circumstances because causes and conditions are different I feel that case by case I can make a correct one in my heart.

I suspect it is because I don’t really understand where the judgment comes from. Or I know it is me but I don’t clearly see the mechanics. Resultantly, I don’t really see the connection between the heart world and the real world.

I have already gotten to the fact that possible is an important condition for my idea of goodness. And my idea of possible comes from memory. It is why before I saw heard a story about a Thai lute maker generously giving free music classes and helping feed and educate kids in his village, I never thought I had to do that to be good, but after I heard about it I felt burdened by ‘one more good I had to be now that I saw that good was possible’. But I can’t seem to get further than this. I can’t quite see exactly how imagination works with this.

MN: Why do you think the lute maker is a good person, or what do you think that what he was doing was good?

MN: And when things exist in your heart, is there any overlap with the real world? Or are your views and reality mutually exclusive?

MN: The more I think about it, the more I think that what is missing is the conclusion.  It is like you’re saying:

I thought qualities like “safe,” “good,” or “worthy” were determined by tangible, worldly cues – but now I realize that those qualities are defined in my mind, they don’t exist in those tangible things in an absolute way.

So if your initial assumption is incorrect, then what is correct? That everything exists in our minds? But if that is absolutely true, how is it that we feel can similar things (disgust over a dirty cafe bathroom, touched by generosity, etc), and how can we feel dissimilar things (you are afraid of A but I am not, I find B useful but you do not)? What is the relationship between reality and view? Is there overlap? Or is it really mutually exclusive, as it seems you’ve found it to be?

A: It is because cold does exist and so does hot. But where on the spectrum I find any particular cup of water is based on my own interpretation of the temp of that water in the moment. Which arises based on my experience and perceived needs. Someone else can think that same cup is cold or hot based on their own relative situation. But in no case will their assessment and mine be exactly the same ( because we are each subject to different factors and conditions from which we make the judgment,). But the sammutti of the words hot and cold has something to do with why it may feel the same or different as mine????? Reaching here

So in sum we can all read rupa’, but our thresholds are what is different. My threshold is what is in my heart and that changes based on circumstances. Or rather it is not that hot exists and cold exists, but that temperature exists and it exists on a graduated scale. This is impermanence.

MN: Keep thinking about this. Because if everything is in each of our individual minds and it doesn’t really exist elsewhere, why can we have consensus on the moment when water turns “hot” or “warm” or “cold”?

And what is “hot” or “cold” or “clean” or “dirty”, really, if it doesn’t exist how you once thought?

A: Because we can have similar enough causes and conditions in a particular moment that for that time our thresholds across individual more or less agree. Hot or cold or clean or dirty is a relative term I suppose…

I’m stuck…

A: It is something that changes. It changes in the world and it changes in my heart. In the world it changes based on the rules of rupa’. So it will freeze at 0 and boil at 100, in my heart it changes based on my personal particulars.

So If I just jump out of the hot spring that is at 102 degrees into water that is 99 degrees the new ware is cold, If I jump from the snow into 99 degrees water it is hot.

MN: Is hot and cold generally the same for humans? For instance, desert temperatures are hot, arctic temperatures are cold.

A: I suppose it is in that we all have a body

MN : And the thresholds for human bodies…?

A:  And like water boiling at a certain temp, there is certainly a temp where we humans will experience hot or cold

MN: Is human hot and cold the same is kangaroo hot and cold? Or penguin hot and cold?

A: But if I am an Inuit I might have a different threshold for cold than a Miami person. Penguin and python definitely have different thresholds, not just for what is comfortable but what is actually livable

MN: Agreed. So what does this tell us? In terms of “hot” and “cold” What is the basis for determining these sammuti conventions?

A: Our experiences, our needs, our form

Try again: our types

No, I’m not yet sure what that means

But types feels right

MN: Is “hot” for humans a mere arbitrary definition, relatively defined? Is “hot” for penguins, monkeys, snakes, turtles, whales, lions a mere arbitrary definition, relatively defined?

Is there really nothing in “hot”? Does it really not exist? Does it only exist in the mind?

If it is indeed only in our minds, then if we don’t think it, then it won’t exist?

A: Fuck thanx. Ok it does exist and our rupa’ as humans defines it somehow

But what exact degree is comfortable or desirable is in my heart?

That degree I would actually call hot arises on my experiences

That somehow is not clear…But I know we are bound by rules of rupa

MN: Focus on rupa, the 4 elements. Rupa versus nama. Dont limit yourself to humans. Look at all living things, like how I asked about different animals. Humans have too many layers to see through in order to get to the raw truth. But with animals it is more factual and straightforward

A: Any other tips on exactly what the Four elements means?? Can I think in terms of atoms and laws of physics and chemistry?

MN: Atoms and molecules are too complicated! They didn’t need that for enlightenment during the Buddha’s time, or in the Thai back country, so we don’t either.

Try to see what role the 4 elements play in defining a thing or a concept. How does it work with the mind? How does it work apart from the mind?

Alternate ways to see the elements

The earth element – solid matter

The water element – liquid

The wind element – movement, pressure

The fire element – warmth

A: Thank you

MN: The more I think of it, the more you’re just lacking a conclusion, and that’s probably because the rupa was sacrificed for the focus on the nama intangibles. But they must go hand in hand. My assessment is that if you can understand rupa’s role in your newfound understanding, it’ll balance out.

Dear Readers, this blog is a direct continuation of the previous so, if you haven’t read last week’s entry then please do head back there and read it before you continue here.

Following my big retreat contemplation, Mae Neecha was a massive help ‘course correcting ‘ and rounding out my contemplation. For the next  week  or so she was my  virtual sherpa, helping prod me, guide me and answer questions through an ongoing Line Chat. There is so much content in this Chat, I am going to do my best to break it into ‘bite-sized’ portions over the next few blogs at natural breaking points. I am also going to edit and trim a little bit in the interest of space/time and add a few highlights/headers if I think something needs to be particularly called-out. But, though it is quite an unusual format for this blog, I am going to keep as much intact as possible and share a transcript of our conversation.

I am choosing to go this rout for a few key reasons: 1)  I believe the thinking process –the getting stuck, and lost and needing to pivot and try a new line of thinking and  little-by-little discovering — is just as revealing as the ultimate conclusions; 2) I was so in the ‘zone’ for the few days after retreat, this line conversation, and my practice,  was essentially continual — I thought, I reached-out when I had either a question or thought I had an answer. As a result, this transcript is pretty unique in my own notebook because it is a ‘real-time’ record of wisdom dawning, not just a recording of what I remembered and wanted to write down at a later time.  So,  even though it makes for a not-so-easy read,  I want these blogs to preserve the dialogue and not just be a neatly summed-up conclusion (although I will offer a synthesis of all of this and where it took me towards the end of this chapter if you do just prefer to wait).  So buckle-up…its another Buddhisty ride ;).

My Guess on The Origin of the Contemplation and the Need to Test/Observe Myself to Explore It’s Implications

MN: Upon reviewing what you’ve written here (and not what i interpreted from what you told us today) my question is – is it really as absolute as you think it is? That it is all in your heart?

It seems that before, you thought your thoughts and the world were one, inseparable. But now that you’re seeing the separation between reality and your reality, is it a complete separation?  Entirely different? Wholly unrelated?

A:  Thank you … I guess  maybe went too far in the other direction…

On the birds — there is still an Alana that feels a victim/sorry for myself that  the birds brought out. Testing my feelings and thinking more about this, I think I actually uprooted 2 Biggie’s for me:goodness and deserve.  The rest I will work on in the context of bringing a bit more balance to my view. I was in such a deep contemplative  state (never had that happen before) it’s like a dream where more stuff is coming back to me in pieces. There is way more here–like for the first time I was actually able in my mind to share my merit and to take joy in other people’s accomplishments, I guess because I wasn’t worried they would take away from my worthiness or add to my pile of good mountains I needed to scale. Anyway, I am going to keep at it. For a few hours there I felt so free and eyes opened. It was nice and a good motivator to keep on keeping on. I will consider the connection between my reality and outside reality as clearly there must be one or karma wouldn’t exist. Any tips on where exactly to start?

MN:  You’re already on the right track – it seems that you just need to shake it a bit so everything settles. I’d think more about the birds, as that is clearly a point that needs a bit of adjustment. Whatever snags tells us that there needs to be some balancing.  See if you can apply your new understanding to various past issues, and present issues. I’m interested to hear about the progress and any changes you notice.

MN: Before that night, did you have any outstanding phobias to fix? How do you feel about your phobias now, compared to before

A:  On phobias, none that were that extreme…But, I think I know what may have kicked all this off…last week I had to go in for a ‘you turned 40 mammogram’ and I was anxious. Back story is I had a mammogram in my 30s for boob pain. The scan showed no problem with the boob that hurt but microcalcifications in the other breast.

Usually they are benign, not always. I followed them with regular screenings for a few years when my doc and I decided they looked stable so should stop mammograms due to risks and wait to go back till now. But when I went to make the appointment I got scared I had made the wrong decision about not keeping up with annual scans. The mammogram was fine and I asked the radiologist about the calcifications. She said they had all but disappeared, that it was normal for that to happen sometimes.

Before the scan I had been reminding myself of the impermanence of the outcome. I thought, very binary, the calcifications can be stable or be worse. I was stuck on that view. But after the radiologist told me the calcifications disappeared I immediately realized my real wrong view. I never imagined these calcifications disappearing. In my picture of the world I didn’t even know that was a thing. But when I heard the results it was the first time I truly had my heart touched by the fact that absolutely anything can happen.

I don’t know why I think that was the catalyst of the zone, but somehow it feels right.

MN: Was it something that hit you especially hard, realizing that the option that actually happened was not one of the 2 options you were prepared for?

A: Yes. I have been trying to collect evidence on this idea of really honestly anything is possible. But nothing stuck like the mammogram. So so clear. Since my picture was incomplete, I was bound to think about outcomes in only the limited way my picture allowed. When another outcome happened I saw it is not just that anything can happen, but that the reason I don’t understand that fact is because my view of the world is so limited.

That I think is why when you tell me to connect my heart to the world I agree. I still have two big weakness on this:

1. That like those geese in the nature video we watched (where baby geese had to jump off a cliff and some of them die), everything has a reason (in the video it is clear the geese nest on high to avoid predators that eat eggs but when the eggs hatch the babies, yet unable to fly, must jump from high cliffs in order to head down to the beach were their food supply is found, with these habits at least some of the geese in a litter live thought some die). But since I don’t see those reasons, I feel it is unfair, unjust, indignant SHOULD. That is part of why the birds in the park hit me. I still don’t understand my secret shoulda. The ones that seem ok, that seem compassionate. I only hit on the seemingly negative ones.
2. I spend so much time on my inside stuff, I am blurry on consequences and karma. I don’t think about it much. Which makes sense because I have been so afraid if I look too close it will be even more discouraging and I might just quit, which I have worried about a long time now. After the contemplation though I suddenly feel less trepidation about looking at karma and consequences. It started this morning.

MN: And now what is your view of the world and its possibilities?

MN: Karma in its simplest definition is just cause and effect

A: As far as my view on possibilities, I would say that  I am seriously getting there, but not there fully.

Re karma –yes, but I have been so colored by moral goodness by Alana’s definition, and my endless mountains to climb to be as good as other people, that in my mind it has been a scary monster of judgment and consequences for all of my wrongs and imagined wrongs. So I couldn’t really look at that monster

MN In terms of possibilities, I’d consider situations in which you don’t already see all the possibilities and reasons – whether or not the result seems compassionate or fair – how do you see them now?

For instance, news stories about a society’s customs that seem odd or are incomprehensible to you.

In order for me to better understand your realization and its implications, I have to understand the changes that followed… what those changes are, what else needs addressing or scrubbing. So right now it is experiment/test mode.

Test your triggers, situations that would normally rub you the wrong way, things that you typically enjoy/detest and ask how you felt about it before and how you feel about it now. And what changed?

A: I see. I am still trying to find the changes myself. I will test for them and see what I can glean stay tuned…

Hello Dear Readers — recently I have had a few folks ask me what I have been contemplating on lately, so I thought, “What the hell…why not kick off the New Year with another sequence of ‘Interruption in Our Regularly Scheduled Program’ blogs to share a few of those aha moments that have come to me recently. So, here we are, about to get all out of order again ;). In the next couple of blogs I will share a big contemplation from the 2019 retreat and then some of the ‘course correction’ and synthesizing work I did afterwards.

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On the last night that I was at the 2019 retreat I had one doozy of a contemplation. It felt like it burst-up outta no where and it really knocked my socks off. In this blog, I am sharing the ‘content report’ about that crazy contemplation that I sent to Mae Neecha the following day and her reply . IMPORTANT: This contemplation was a starting place, but when I shared my report with Mae Neecha and Mae Yo they suggested I needed some serious ‘course correcting’ to round these thoughts out and to keep my practice on track; the course correcting conversations and contemplation will unfold over the next few blogs.  So these next few posts really will need to be read as a series to get a comprehensive pic. Yay for sequels and cliff hangers, its like a real TV program after all.

The Original Contemplation Sum-up

Hey Mae Nee,

I wanted to thank you and Mae Yo so much for all your help and support for so so long. I have had a really big breakthrough in my practice and I want to offer it to you both in gratitude.

Really long I’m afraid so a little hard to cover it all here, but I’ll give you the punchline first and then share a bit about the journey to get there:

Punchline: I clearly understand that my emotions, my imagination, my hopes and my beliefs and my sense of belonging arise in my heart and is separate from what exists in the world. I am also damn sure that I suffer because what I think the world should be and what it actually is are different things and that there is literally no way for my heart to control the world.

It all started last night, LP Nut was teaching a group and ask Ora where her need for her mom’s approval lived? She didn’t quite get the question so I started asking where various objects in the Wat lived, table, stove etc.  Finally LP Nut waved his hand and asked where slow lived… It hit me so hard that it lives in my heart. I closed my eyes and started thinking… I went through a bunch of ideas — good, safe, control, mine, value, hope, want and systematically asked where they all lived. I used my own experiences and past contemplations to test and confirm they are all in my heart.

Some highlights:

— Control: the first place I looked was in my body, but I can’t even control my body, I have asthma I can’t breathe without meds. I peed myself from supplements to make me healthier. If my own body can’t control itself there is no way control exists outside my heart.

–Safety/comfort – I tend to ‘read the rupa’ in an environment to gauge safety comfort. A few weeks ago we were at a Hotspring and the rupa was just right, nature, Zen gardens, etc. But after getting out of the bath Eric passes out. I had never seen someone faint before and the horror is still fresh. I was splashing Eric’s face, yelling for 911, afraid he was going to die. After he woke and I calmed I saw it, if this place, this rupa, were really safe and comfortable how could Eric have “almost died” ( which I know now he didn’t but at the time it felt so real).

Belonging — I started thinking about my bag on the floor. I saw in my mind clearly the rupa was on the floor, but the “my” was in my heart.  I thought about that NY house and how before I bought it, when I had a fantasy of how great it would make my new NY life it was already mine in my heart and how even before I sold it, when I was over the whole thing and hated it, how it had stopped being mine. If mine was really in the house how could my sense of it change so drastically. It has to be in my heart.

Hate– I remembered a day I was practicing Dharma hard sitting in a cafe in NY. I practiced all day contemplating on the topic of my hatred of the city, and I was so absorbed in it I noticed people were honking and it wasn’t bothering me. Usually honking is trigger number 1. Of NY hatred, but I saw on that day that not having it arise in this circumstances meant the hate didn’t live in NY it lives in my heart.

Hope– I thought about Eric and my retirement fantasy, our Koi pond and camper van and travel and I asked where it was? It clearly doesn’t exist anywhere outside me so that hope/fantasy can only live in my heart.

Value– I thought about how when my dad was alive I truly believed my values was in him, in being his daughter and in his approval. But he died and in my mind I searched his corpse for the value but I didn’t find it there, I see I still feel valuable, so it can’t have been in him but in my heart. More specifically in my heart lives my imagination of what value is and it changes based on circumstances. What I value when I am in CT and NY is different. What I value in my job has changed. I thought about my money and in that minute I saw it has no value in itself, it only buys me things I think I will want in the future, things I think will make me a certain thing even though, punchline again, the qualities I imagine in the things I buy –fashionableness, beauty, impressiveness are in my heart. And since everyone else’s version of these things are in their own hearts how can mine possibly have the effect I desire?

At which point it became clear to me that there is no magic wand that allows me to take what is in my heart and exert control on the outside world with it, the two must be separate.

Then I contemplated on should, this was a biggie , I thought about a trip to Japan where we got lost. I was so upset because we weren’t where we were supposed to be. But I saw that should is in my heart and it is not what happened in the real world. I thought about politics and how viscerally I feel like this shouldn’t be our democracy, but it is so should doesn’t live in the world it lives in my heart. Then I thought about my Dad dying. I didn’t think I should lose a father when I was so young or so fast, but I did. Then I remembered I thought it wasn’t fair my dad, who I loved died when it should have been someone else, that I hate, and that is when I saw that all my suffering comes from the difference between the should in my heart and the reality on the ground.

I considered my body and asked why I think it is so special. I internalized my dad’s corpse. Genes, blood, facial features, elements like my own, but he is dead and gone. Plus he was so special to me and yet he is gone. How will my own beliefs in my specialness save me, how can it make me different from him and the hundreds of other corpses I recalled seeing on the news.

I thought about my body, clothes and special more. I remembered my wedding dress fitting, about the shape of my body in the dress, about how special and loveable I felt when I looked in the mirror and then I remembered the dress of no value to me anymore, torn and in the back of my closet, how can special or loveable be in the dress I asked? Then I thought more about some specific clothing moments some outfits that made me feel so special. But then I thought of all the clothes that I tried on in the same store over the years and how they felt like an indictment, of my fatness of my saggingness, of my aging.  I think about the truth that get dressed pains me, makes me self-critical about style about weight. I thought how it like playing Barbie with myself and it’s not really that much fun. Barbie and her outfits are nothing without my imagination to animate them. The meaning can’t be in the clothes or the body, it must be in my heart.

Finally I touched on worthy. I didn’t feel worthy to get so many anamodanas and a thank you card from the kids for the school donation, but I did. I didn’t feel worthy to get a bed those retreat when everyone else slept on the floor. When the last fires struck I got out day one and when I heard about all my office mates suffering with the smoke I felt unworthy to have been free while they suffered. But I saw if what I believed worthiness is dictated these things then they wouldn’t have happened so, guess what, my concept of worthiness must be in my heart .

I have started thinking how sad/scary the world is that it works this way. I went to the park and all the birds ran as I walked by and I thought I mean you no harm, but because you birds act on your own imagination that lives on your little hearts you don’t know, you scurry in fear. How many times have I suffered because what I imagine I need to be scared of will come true? How many days has my heart hurt over my mother and how many times have I hurt her because of it? How sad is it that I have been part of pushing Eric to work so hard to we can have the things and future that lives only in my heart?

Anyway there is more, topics but this gets across the main gist.

I then when back and started parsing a little today. Seeing that I need to use this technique/ weave the fact that my crazy lives only in my heart with a bit more evidence on my imagination of the future lives only in my heart and that it also can’t magically change what happens in the real future/outside world.

When I contemplated I saw a clear Ubai ( well clear to me anyway). That it is like those animation screens that are popped over a real world image. Before, it looked so much like those cartoon characters are actually in the world, but now I see the top screen is just an overlay that can be popped off, my inside heart’s crazy crap was just overlaid on the world, but now I see it is a separate screen.

Anyway really long here so I will sign off after one more though.

Ok now my warm wishes,

A

Dear Reader – this blog is a direct continuation of the preceding blog, An Interruption in Our Regularly Scheduled Program – Goodbye Goyard Part 1. If you have not yet read that post then please go back and read it before you start on this next entry. 

I am looking around myself at all these items I have laid out to consign, each one telling me a truth about myself and about this world. A part of me so desperately wants to hang on to many of these items, a purse I may ‘need’ later, a pair of shoes just-in-case they are the perfect match to an outfit I don’t even own yet. I want to keep items because they are expensive, precious, because they have special meaning to me.

But most of these items I have chosen to consign have been unused for a while; these items are a ‘tell,’ they expose the fact that I really have no idea what the future will hold, what I will need (otherwise would I have bought a bunch of expensive shit I barely used?).  And besides, I have already learned that even the largest collection of objects doesn’t insure I will have what I need when I need it; I had a closet full of dresses and I didn’t have a single gown when I needed it for a work event. A house full of stuff, and not a single object could free me of feeling trapped when I moved to New York (actually objects -namely a new house I hated and money from my husband’s job made are what keep me trapped), or of feeling despair when I lost my father. 

• There are 3 brand new green purses, with tags still attached, sitting on the floor. Each one is identical to a purse I had in the past, that I loved and wore regularly. As the original bag showed wear, I began to worry about whether in the future I would be able to find that same bag again. So I stock piled a bunch of the same bags bought while still in season and stored in my closet for later use. I bought these bags to make me prepared. But, if they really did prepare me for a future, wouldn’t they have been worn as part of that future? The were not. My bag preference changed .So these three new green purses are showing their true colors — they are powerless to do what I thought they would do. They are powerless to make me a fashionable, ever prepared, woman.

• Then there is the fur coat I had bought the thing when we first considered moving to NY . I had an image in my mind of what a fashionable, NY winter style would be, and it definitely involved mink.  By the time I actually did move to NY, I had learned a few things: 1) a down jacket is warmer, easier to clean and way   more comfortable. As fashionable as fur may be, winter requires function as well. 2) I fucking hate NY. I can barely stand being outside long enough to get cold. Who needs to peacock around in a fur coat when they are miserable and crushingly depressed?  So this coat sure as hell didn’t prepare me for NY, otherwise it would have whispered to me “don’t fucking go!!!”

• A $400 orange sun hat from a little known fashion brand. I remember when I bought it imaging that it would make me so chic on trips to Miami or Hawaii, but its brim is so big I literally can’t see to walk around in it. Tripping over your own feet is not very chic…

I was so enamored with my imagination of what these objects did that I ignored impermanence — would I even need them and what are the 2 sides?

These objects tell me about how piss poor my powers of prediction are. They show me that with new facts new needs arise. With new needs, new objects are sought out. But aren’t there always going to be new facts? That is part of what my daily impermanence contemplation has been telling me.  So am I just going to keep rotating through new items endlessly? Living to acquire and then dispose of stuff as the inevitably new patterns arise?

My body changes, my clothes are always aging and changing too. Its just that it often happens so slowly and subtly I don’t notice for a while. My hope is born out of duration, that I can look sexy for at least some time, that this object will help me do it. But if I really think about it, the hope itself is based on my turning a bling eye to the change that is always occurring. The heart belt is proof that there was a phase before and there will be one after. The only question is am  I willing to keep cycling through these phases? Are they worth it?

Dear Reader, I hope you will indulge me in one more present day (Oct. 2018) interruption, on the topic of self and self belonging, before we get on with our usual program… 

 I was thinking about the upcoming Kathina ceremony, an important holiday in the Buddhist tradition, and decided I really wanted to make an offering to the temple – to the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha – that means something special to me. It’s hard to explain, but I felt like money alone simply wouldn’t do. Sometimes, when I give money it feels like donating food when I am full; I wanted this gift to feel like donating when I’m still a little hungry.  I wanted it to be a bit of a sacrifice, a bit of a stretch, I wanted to feel like I was really giving something of personal value. 

A few years ago, my husband bought me the purse of my dreams, a cute but classic bag from Goyard. The truth is, I never really used it a lot, it seemed so precious I feared damaging it. Plus, my style had changed and it really wasn’t something that felt like it fit. Still, it sat in my closet, a ‘just-in-case’ item with too much sentimental value to part with –the perfect offering. I called the consignment store and told them I had something to sell, the proceeds of which I plan to donate to the temple.  

The more I thought about it, the more items I decided I wanted to part ways with: A Burberry skirt, Chanel shoes, an Etro jacket, LV coat, that adorable Chloe belt with a pixie on it… By the time I had really gone through my closet I had a pile of 50 items on the floor ready to sell and then donate the proceeds to the temple.  

Now, lets be clear, this is not the blog where I tell you I have become and ascetic; rest assured, there are still a number of lovely Louis Vuitton bags living in my closet. And yet, as I looked at each item I own, my mind went through an exercise of weighing its use, value and meaning to me now versus the value of using that object to benefit the dharma, to make merit and to grow my own practice. Time will tell how this act, how the thoughts it stirred-up take shape. But, in the next blog, I simply want to share the contemplation that occurred to me as I laid all my items on the floor and dedicated the merit of the offering before the consignment store came to haul everything away…till next week…

Before I close-out the Suffering and Self – Yummy portion of this blog, I feel compelled to share a few modern-day (Aug 2018 and Oct. 2018) contemplations on the topic of myself and my belongings, while it is still ‘fresh’. Only, instead of focusing on how my belongings feed and care for the self, I observe how actually, I am a slave to these belongings. As with all the other Interruption in Our Regularly Scheduled Program blogs, we are, for better or worse, brazenly skipping through years of contemplations…fortunately, I think this one is pretty easy to follow. So Dear Reader, lets do the time warp agaaaaaiiiinnn:

I was recently in Boston and took a guided tour of the Black Heritage Trail, a path that links more than 15 pre-Civil War sites important in African-American history; the stories of American abolitionists (folks who fought for the elimination of slavery) were a central theme of this tour.

I was totally captivated as the tour guide began sharing the story of a husband and wife — Ellen and William Craft — who through cunning, disguise and luck were able to escape slavery and flee to freedom in Boston. The story however was just as captivating to folks back in the 1800s, when press got wind of the Craft’s amazing escape, they started printing it in newspapers. When their old slave master, in Georgia, got a hold of a paper with their story in it, he decide to send slave hunters to Boston to capture his famous slaves and return them to him. And so we, as a tour group, stood at site of the famous showdown between William Craft and a group of abolitionist versus the slave hunters…( you will need to go to Wikipedia for the rest of the Craft’s tale, I have my own to tell here).

It got me thinking…the slave owner clearly thought the Crafts belonged to him, that they were his property. Obviously though, with my modern sensibilities, that seems crazy – you can’t own another person. The Crafts also thought their life belonged to them, but, did their circumstances really bear that out? These are folks who were born into slavery, who spent most of their life forced to do the will of others. Then, after a brief time of freedom, they again found themselves forced to fight ( and ultimately flee). Can I really say that people whose every action is dictated by someone or something else are free? Do they ‘belong’ to themselves?

The tour went on and my thoughts did too, till about 2 weeks later (yesterday 8/29/18). I had wanted a new phone, something durable with a long battery life, and after weeks of research decided on just the phone; I dragged Eric to the AT&T store to both buy the new device and to switch carriers (Verizon, my old carrier, did not stock the phone).  The phone worked fine when we walked out of the store at 9 PM. The next morning though we had no service. Fuck Fuck Fuck! I was in a panic. I had made a huge change, spent a bunch of money, and now I had a phone that didn’t get reception in my house. My stress level was through the roof, so much for controlling my phone…all that research, a provider switch, and here I was with a piece of crap that didn’t actually make calls in my house. Fortunately, an email tipped me off to the problem, I had put a wrong number on the application form. It was, after all that stress, a matter of a short call to AT&T to get the line up and running. Whew.

I took one brief sigh of relief before I realized I was running late for my workout. I ran out the door, again stressed and toughed it through a killer boot camp class. Without even time to shower, I had to run again…I had an appointment to get my car serviced. It was off to the mechanic.

It was already noon, before I was in a loaner car, on the way home. Suddenly it dawned on me: I have spent almost every minute since I woke, plus a ton of stress, in service of my belongings. First I stressed about, then serviced the new phone. Then I sweated it our while I serviced my body. Then I scurried along to bring the car in for service. When I got home, the first thing on my list: laundry in service of my clothes.

I think I own these objects, I control them, I use them. But, like the Crafts, my life is a continual reaction to these things. Am I free? Do they belong to me? Because, it really is starting to seem like I am a slave to my objects.

“Fine”, I think to myself, “I spend time, energy, care for these belongings, that is a price I am willing to pay, for something reliable. For something consistent, for something I can count on”. But hold on a moment there: Are these objects really being consistent, reliable? The phone needed attention because it wasn’t working. The body needed a workout because at my age, its 2 weeks of sedentary living to flabby. The car needed a service because without oil it just doesn’t run. My day was, as it was, precisely because all these objects fail. They decay, they break, they are –yup, you got it—subject to impermanence.

Plus, if I am really being honest with myself, the care I put into these objects the concern, the jaw-breaking stress, is not just for the objects and their obvious functions, it is just as much (maybe more) for the object’s secret function – what I believe they do to care for and feed myself.  The phone is not just a phone after all, it is a safety blanket that bestows me with knowledge, keeps me from getting lost, from being alone, it is my invincibility shield in a lonely dangerous and confusing world; right up until my GPS fails, like it did the other day, and I end up in the ghetto.  The car is a status symbol, showing my wealth and my sensible decision making (it’s a nice subtle BMW X1, not a Porsche after all); right up till my brother Jew shames be for driving a BMW, a company that supported the Nazis.  The fit, shapely body proves I am in control, of myself and of my life; right up till too much green coffee extract has me peeing myself.

At the heart of it (I’m afraid this is months of contemplations our little time-warp skipped, so you are just going to have to take my word on this), what I want most deeply, what I delude myself into thinking I am special enough to achieve one day —  if I just push, work, act good, upright, moral, and muscle hard enough, — is a little garden-like world where everything is perfectly manicured, in bloom, beautiful and fragrant and just to my liking, always. In my mind my objects are my spades and hoes, tools to help me build my little garden.

But, any of you guys who have gardened before know, gardens take a ton of work, and there is always something dying, rotting, stinking, it is never the imaginary refuge I think, I hope, to build.

Back during the times of slavery in this country, salve holders used to say that “slaves are content with their servitude”. So what about me, am I content? Do I want freedom or will I strengthen the chains of my bondage with lies about my stuff, myself and this world? I for one am vigilantly taking note of all the times, ways, I’m a slave to my objects. I am watching my servitude, seeing how many hours of each day it consumes. Here is to hoping this path winds its way to freedom ASAP.

So Dear Reader, as a re-cap, we are taking a break from our regularly scheduled program and interrupting this nice, orderly, temporally linear(ish) blog about my practice with an intrusion from the present day…. inspired by the filth, noise, overcrowding and rudeness of NYC…I bring you part four in my blog about hate.  Last week, we left off with a real shift, a lightening of my hate load brought about by my seeing it for what it really is — a feeble, delusional, poorly functioning, attempt to hide my own ugliness by  distracting myself with the ugliness of others.. Somehow, just seeing hate for what it is took away the sting. This then will be the last instalment in my ‘Hate Interruption’, I will share just a few more follow-up thoughts directly from my notebook.

On Karma:

For the last year or so I have been caught by a simple paradox: Everyone reaps the fruit of their own karma, so I know moving to my own hellish NY arose from my karma. But, I just didn’t get-it — how did I end-up in a city filled with such ugly,  angry, vengeful, inconsiderate people? How did I come to occupy a ‘ hell’ for these types? Maybe karma is broken….

After my hate contemplation I understood: I sometimes behave in ugly, angry, inconsiderate people ways, I am one of  ‘those’ people too . My karma drew me here just like it drew all of ‘them’. Karma worked just as it should, my own delusion is what kept me from understanding the cause of my experiences.

On Alana the Avenging Angel:

In my mind, the violence I would bestow on the honkers and litterbugs and shovers was justice. It was punishment that they deserved and it was my job to make sure they got it. But, even if someone ‘deserves’ punishment, is it my role to dole it out? Is this how the world works; if there is an injustice done, Alana needs to be there to avenge it or else the law of karma will break and people won’t experience the effects of their actions?What does this really have to do with me anyway?

Clearly, at the heart, this is about me only because I make it about me. I have rules, standards, I create and then in my own mind I judge people according to them. Since they are mine alone, who else would enforce but me. But that is not really karma, karma is a universal law, the law of cause and effect, and it operates just fine without me.

And in so far as any ‘punishment’ is due to all the ugly, angry, vengeful, inconsiderate people out there (myself included), aren’t we already experiencing the some of the effect of our hating? I know the burning, searing pain in my heart that comes when anger and impatience arise, I am guessing the honkers and huffers and pushers and shovers feel the burn as well. Does Alana really need to do anything to help someone else have their moment of hell? The only one  my hate and my vengeful is ‘paying back’ is myself.

On Compassion:

When I get frustrated and speak harshly to Eric, I want to be forgiven. When I am inattentive to my mom and  Seth, I want them to give me a pass. When I am a neglectful student, I want my teachers to still teach and believe in me. When I am ugly, I want my friends to still support me. Each of these times, I want my loved ones, everyone really, to see these moments are not who I am. I want another shot, a redo. And, surprisingly, I so often get them. Despite so many flaws, I still have folks who love, care for, believe in and teach me.  

So why can’t I give a pass to the honkers and pushers and eyrolles and litterbugs? If I don’t believe my ugly moments are me, if I think I should get a pass, forgiveness, why am I so fast to want to punish these transgressors? Why do I think I am so special, so much more deserving?  In fact, doesn’t my harshness make me a little less ‘special’ and worthy in the end?

Final Thoughts:

So much of my energy is spent trying to confirm my goodness, i.e. the qualities I value. When it comes down to it, these are really just qualities  I  value because I have been taught them or they have been useful to me. My friends and family help affirm my goodness, my lovableness. My job affirms my usefulness and skill, my city (SF) affirms my chillness, my clothes and body affirm my beauty and in-controlness, my wealth affirms my safety. So much effort and does it work? If SF could really affirm my chill, how in the hell did I find myself Alana- Angry-Avenging-Angel of Fire and Doom?

So Dear Reader, as a re-cap, we are taking a break from our regularly scheduled program and interrupting this nice, orderly, temporally linear(ish) blog about my practice with an intrusion from the present day…. inspired by the filth, noise, overcrowding and rudeness of NYC…I bring you part three in my blog about hate. We left off last week with a moment of realization: Hate is not built into the situations where I feel hateful,  the seed of hate lies in my heart. So, the question DeJour is a repeat of last weeks question, asked again, with greater wisdom, as the starting place:

If it hurts so bad, why do I gotta be such a hater?

Once I saw it was me, myself, that was creating the hate, it was time to go back and re-ask, why oh why do I do this hating when it hurts soooo bad? What are the hidden benefits?  What is my self thinking?

So, one of the problems of getting all out of order in this Interruption of Our Regularly Scheduled Program is we have skipped over a few big contemplations that serve as building blocks for this hate clarifying moment. So we do need a little pre/re-cap:

A while back I was contemplating a question: Why do I create a self anyway? What does it accomplish? I decided that my sense of self helps me sell a lie, smooth the narrative of this world over a bit, it whitewashes, chooses what  facts to include and which to ignore.  The self is like a storyteller, and it is usually telling stories where I am the hero…

How is my storyteller self making me a hero this time?

I started thinking about those stories you hear sometimes — about gay people who are homophobic, black people who are racist; I feel like they must hate something in themselves to tell these types of stories. I live in this city, I am a New Yorker, but I hate New Yorkers. I am in the same boat. Maybe something I hate in myself is at the root of my hate for this city and its inhabitants.

I see this city, and its people, as rude, careless, inconsiderate, violent, vengeful, self absorbed. All those traits on clear display at just one traffic light, with 100,000 horns a’blaring. But what happens if I look inwards? If I internalize?

The truth is I am way worse than those honkers.  Honkers hurt strangers and passerbyers, for a fleeting moment, with their carelessness, inconsideration, violence, vengefulness and self absorption. I have been careless and inconsiderate with my flesh and blood (see blog about my brother or this one about my Mom ), family who feel the sting of my actions so acutely. I have been violent to neighbors (I once locked my nextdoor neighbor in a rabbit’s cage for trying to steal my brother as a playmate, blog to come) and vengeful with friends (see this story about Candy and our cycle of abuse), people who have cared for and supported me. I have been too self absorbed to see the pain of people in my own community (see this blog about a store owner in my old hood), shirked responsibility in the most intimate corners of my life (see blog about my ex lover).

This is my darkside, the Alana I don’t want to be, the stories I rather not tell myself. So I tuck these personal tidbits away and I do the easy stuff from day-to-day.  I act cool and friendly in shops, always give cars ahead the right of way, I never ever honk; self ignores the little nasties and builds ‘evidence’ of that sweet, kind, go lucky Alana, the hero I want to be.   Hero needs an anti hero, and who better than the pushers, honker, litterbugs, ya know all the stuff I’m not. They are the monsters — the careless, inconsiderate, violent, vengeful, self absorption fuckers out there. No need to look inside, to scratch the veneer off Hero Alana.

But this city puts a spotlights on those traits in myself, the dark ones I hate. When I am in SF, surrounded by warm, considerate, easy going people, it’s easy to be those things myself. That is the Alana I want, so I act the result, put myself in circumstances where I can be hero Alana. But here in NY, with  each shove, honk, sneer and eyeroll — each perceived slight —  my heart burns with thoughts of vengeance, destruction, and punishment. And as I imagine publicly whipping the the offender, it’s hard not to catch glimpses of carelessness, inconsideration, violence, vengefulness and self absorption in myself.

The mechanics are so simple really, how could I have hidden the truth from myself for so long? I create standards of hero-ish behaviors that flatter myself at the expense of others. But, my storytelling self needs more punch to sell the hero alana pitch. Enter hate, to really punctuate the difference between myself and the villains, to make sure I don’t become one of those villains myself. But, don’t my murder/whipping/fire from the sky fantasies prove I have become the villain? No, no, my mind, my self, can’t handle that story, so I add another dash of hate, it has worked before. Then I  add a pinch of delusion, that my rage is righteous, to protect the city, and others, I am a punishing angle not a violent, shoving thug…

As much as it hurts, hate’s deep, dark, hidden benefit is that is hides the truth about myself, of my own darkside that I don’t want to see. But, I do see. Like a bully that has been stood-up to, like a night light to illuminate the shadows, somehow with just a glimpse of the truth, my chest became lighter and I could literally feel the weight of my hate beginning to subside.

So is it over? Hate-filled alana dead and gone? I don’t know, really only time will tell. I still want to go home to SF, I still rather not live in NY, but the hate, for the moment anyway, seems to have lost its bite.  Afterall, even if I have a long way to go, I actually do want to be a ‘good person’, and in the cold, harsh, light of day, can I really believe being a hater is going to get me there?

So Dear Reader, as a re-cap, we are taking a break from our regularly scheduled program and interrupting this nice, orderly, temporally linear(ish) blog about my practice with an intrusion from the present day…. inspired by the filth, noise, overcrowding and rudeness of NYC…I bring you part two in my blog about hate. We left off last week exploring all the pain and suffering that comes with being a hater. So, the question DeJour:

If it hurts so bad, why do I  gotta be such a hater?

I’m going to give a shout-out to LP Nut. At the last retreat he gave me a new tool, a new question to ask myself to help me better penetrate my wrong views: If I know a belief  is grounded in a wrong perception already, if it causes me pain, why do I do it? What do I gain? And is that perceived gain actually real –i.e. do I get what I want from the wrong view I cling to? If so, to what degree and at what cost? Whats the data points that the view is helpful/true? Here we go…an insight into my stream of consciousness dharma practice…

1) I hate to protect my self: I need to draw a line in the sand, between things that I hate (that’s you fucking litterbugs) and me, my self-righteous self.  I am a woman of boundaries, of strong standards (see the last blog on this), there is right and there is wrong. To protect my values, my sense of self as a person who maintains those values, I hate. To ensure that I never accept the standards of NYC (the filth, honking, rudeness), I never become a New Yorker, I put up my magical shield of hate.

Where is this self I am so busy protecting? Is it homeless alana self or compassionate alana self? Is it SF alana self or NY alana self?  When I was vegetarian alana I had one set of moral standards and as meat eating alana I have another. So both self and standards changed. And…once I changed from vegi to meat eater shouldn’t old vegi Alana hate new meat-eater Alana?

What are the mechanics by which hate protects me anyway?  Perhaps it is like how I saw fear (see blog Killing the Crazy): Hate motivates certain protective actions, teaches me what to avoid and what to embrace. But, if it worked, how did I end up in a place I hate anyway? If hate really worked to protect me, surround me with things that I value, — why do I have to keep flying back to NYC and facing a place I hate — why don’t I live safely back in SF already? F-You Hate, you are doing a piss-poor job at  keeping me safe!

2) I hate to keep my body safe. At least hate can help keep my physical body safe right? To be a warning against things and people that might do me harm, Rupa (form) I have learned is dangerous.

But, here is the crazy thing, just the other day I read an article about how NYC is actually the safest city in the country. My belief, that all the things I hate here are a big warning sign to run for my life, is contrary to all actual evidence.

3) I hate to protect my karma. I seek to surround myself with good rupa (form), good people, good circumstance to prevent getting used to, learning to accept, lower states. But the hate, the anger, the standards I use to build my bubble world of ‘good’ are actually making me murderous (see the last blog for details). And  seriously, can I really prevent lower rebirths with hate? I don’t need a Buddhist book to tell me the answer to this one — if hate actually worked to keep me from hell states, from circumstances I find repulsive, I could leave NY for good. Trust me, I have enough hate in my heart, if it were the ticket to escaping my NY hell, I would be outta here already!

The Money Moment

I was deep in thought  when something happened, I notice that despite being on the streets of NY, with filth and blaring horns, I wasn’t feeling hateful. But, as I started thinking more about my hate of NY, that hate began to grow again in my heart. Just like with fear (again see the blog Killing the Crazy ), in that moment I saw the truth: Hate is not fixed, it can come and go, it is not built into the situations where I feel hateful.

I know I have said it 1000 times, I am the cause of my hate. But, for the first time since I moved to NY I finally got it. If the hate were outside me, built into a walk on the streets, I wouldn’t have had a moment of freedom from that hate. Moreover,  the fact that the outside circumstances remained the same, but my own thoughts turning to hate caused hate to arise point to the TRUTH: the seed of hate lies in my heart. A lightning strike only starts a fire when there is something on the ground to burn. All the lightning in the world, all the honking, all the filth, can only set my heat on fire if the the fuel is already there waiting to burn. Obvious right? I knew that already, but my heart only believed  after I watched lighting strike.

And so Dear Reader, with a moment of clarity, a penetrating understanding of the truth, it was time to play my favorite dharma game: Lets do the same thing over and over again — Stay tuned for next week’s blog  Why Ya Gotta Be Such a Hater? 2.0. Where I go back and ask myself the same question again: Since it is clearly me, why exactly do I do it?

Well Dear Reader, it has been about a year since the last interruption from our regularly scheduled program and, at risk of starting an unintended holiday tradition, I will beg your pardon for interrupting this nice,orderly, temporally linear(ish) blog with yet another intrusion from the present day….

The thing is, it’s been about a year since my ill-fated move to NY and I still absolutely hate it here. Through herculean efforts (and a pretty penny) I have devised schemes to spend way less time at ’home’, and these extended trips certainly do ease the pain of my daily life. But, everytime I step foot in New York again my mind/body/heart/soul scream for escape. Actually, to be more accurate, it screams for a great ball of fire to come crashing from the sky and burn this fucking city to the ground. Burn motherfucker burn!!!!…Bringing me to the topic of the day — hate.

I caught myself, walking down the street, mid ‘inferno fantasy’ and realized, maybe it’s time to revisit my hatred of this city via a dharma contemplation. As you will later see (when this blog catches-up to 2017) there have actually been a ton of these contemplations over the past year; but my hopes for a fire and brimstone-y christmas in NYC suggest I may have a little more work to do. The next few blogs will chronicle the outlines of my contemplation which I decided to begin with the topic of suffering.

Hate Hurts Me and the People I Love: For any of you who have ever experienced all-consuming-rage-induced-murderous-hate, you know, it’s not really a walk in the park. Seriously, the feeling of burning hate is its own kind of suffering. I want to be a joyful person. I at least want to be a calm, content person. I want to be the person I feel like I am when I walk down the streets of San Fran, all chill and positive vibing, but this hatred is getting in the way.

And as I ball my fists and huff and puff at the driver who honks, my husband, standing next to me also feels my rage. He sees a hate-filled wife so different than the woman he loved  back in San Fran and he hurts. I grow short, raise my voice, lose my temper so easily when I am already so angry, and who else but the folks close to me, like Eric, is there to get the brunt of my attacks?

But I can’t help it … NY is filthy, loud, people are inconsiderate and self absorbed. I have standards, rules, for how cities and people in them should be. If a standard is failed, a condition of mine goes unmet, I don’t like it. When I encounter a beast like New York, which violates every one of my standards to the extreme, I have hate hate hate. Humm…maybe it’s my standards that cause hate not the city…maybe my standards hurt me and the people I love…

My Hate Inducing Standards are Risky Business: I have such tight standards, rules and a need for order, it bears asking the question –what happens when those standards don’t get met? What happens when Alana moves to NYC? Clearly, as we saw before, one unpleasant consequence is hate. But what risks come along with that?

When someone throws trash on the street (i.e. every 2 minutes) an image flashes in my mind of my murdering them by  tearing open their jugular. Of course,  I would never actually kill, of course, of course, right? But I have hurt people before — when they erode my happy world, fail my standards, take whats mine — as a kid I locked my neighbor in a rabbit cage because he took my little brother away from me as a playmate. I have left spiteful reviews on yelp,  thrown away valuable belongings of an ex, ‘accidentally’  elbowed or stepped on feet in a subway.

Each of these acts is different from murder in their degree or severity not in their nature or kind.  The cause, the hate/need to ‘defend’ myself, remains, and the risk of ‘karmic crime’ lurks with it. I am just waiting for a breach in standards big enough, a violation unforgivable enough, to turn my murder fantasy into reality. Where oh where did compassionate alana run off to?

But wait, there is more. These standards have perils on both sides. When someone is on the ‘wrong’ side of my standard I hate them, I want to punish them. But I use these same standards to shelter my own guilt, to cloak my wrong behaviors and call them  ‘right’ just because they fall on the ‘right’ side of my standards line. When I was in highschool, I had a ‘rule’, I would never mess around with someone else’s boyfriend. There was a guy I liked, already dating another girl, I didn’t ‘mess around’ with him, that would have been wrong. But I flirted, almosted, made him desire me so ultimately he broke-up with the other girl. Still, I did no wrong, I never broke my rule or my standard.  

The honking here is by far the worst offence in my mind. Honkers allow their frustration to drive them to hurt everyone around them, to wildly assault thousands of ears just because their commute takes an extra 2 minutes. I quietly seethe. I plot my imaginary revenge in  my head. That driver and I actually have a lot in common — anger and hate, frustration and broken expectations are what animate us both. But I am on the side of right. I am good, I keep it to myself. I don’t hurt thousands of people around me… I hurt just me, and the people I love, with my hate.

Arbitrary Standards: Clearly, not everyone hates Manhattan. If they did, this city would clear-out and I would finally have some peace and quiet. But alas, it is me. There is something in me that is ruffled by NY. Something about the rupa, the way the form of this place is arranged, that pushed my particular buttons. It violates my particular standards and rules. But here is the thing — these rules and standard are arbitrary. Why is making-out with someone else’s boyfriend wrong, but flirting is ok? Why is littering wrong but getting my stuff from Amazon, which over packages everything, ok? Why is hurting 1000s wrong but hurting 1 or 2 ok? Why is piles of trash on the sidewalk wrong but a messy underwear drawer ok?

In the end, I make my rules, based on what I value, and then I use them to  carve up the world and my own behaviors into rights and wrongs. But these rules, are not the rules that govern the world. If they were, Manhattan would be ¼ the size, sparkling clean, quiet enough to hear a pin drop. Shit as long as I’m at it, fluffy friendly dogs would roam the streets here just waiting to be pet…I make rules that will always be broken and then I suffer the hate, the perils, the misery when things are not the way I want. It begs a question, to be explored in next week’s blog — if it hurts so bad,  why do I gotta be such a hater?

Well Dear Reader, the boxes have begun to dwindle, my stuff has mostly found a home (even if I don’t feel I have), so soon we will be getting back to the regular schedule of blog posts. But, I didn’t want to end this interlude without some final thoughts:

For those of you who are just tuning-in, my new home, New York, is not all I had hoped it would be. Its not what I had imagined. See before the move, I thought my life here would be fun and exciting. I thought my house would be mine, be beautiful, and make life easy. I had a fantasy of Eric and my loving charmed life together, of us embracing the challenges that arose, like a fun new adventure. I was happy, optimistic. I was hopeful.

But then, once I was on the ground, my imagination shifted. Suddenly I started having nightmares of buildings going up to block my windows, of construction disasters, of going broke trying to make it here in NY. I envision the city as a dark, loud and ugly hole that I can only escape on short vacations. I worry it will change me, that the struggle of living here will ruin my relationship.  I feel miserable, trapped. I feel hopeless.

The truth however is New York is what it is — a place with 2 sides, good and bad, a place that is constantly moving and shifting and changing — it abided by this truth before I moved here and it abides by it now that I am here. It abides by it totally independent of me. What has changed is my imagination. When I saw all rainbows and unicorns I was happy. When I saw all tar-pits and booby traps I became sad. My imagination flings me about, takes my heart on an emotional roller coaster and, here is the kicker, what I imagine isn’t even real. Clearly its not real or the imagination wouldn’t have shifted so easily. It wouldn’t have been so one sided and then the other sided. What I imagined to be true would have been true, and that would be the end of the story.

I cause my roller coaster. I cause the suffering of the continual ups and downs. The excitement and disappointment. The hope and the fear. I cause it all with my imagination even though, in reality, all these imaginings, they don’t impact the outcome. They don’t tell how things really are, or predict how they will be (see Killing the Crazy entry for a more detailed analysis of how I divorced my emotion of fear with a necessary outcome. A similar matrix can be applied for how I imagine things will be and how they turn out) .  Basically, I am suffering for free.