The Open Road: a learning community

Bibliophiles Unanimous! A PLAY READING with Howard, Alan & Andy 1/17/21
2021-01-17 15:00 - 18:00 (America/Los_Angeles)
On Sunday, January 17, 2021, at 3 p.m., Bibliophiles Unanimous! will feature a SPECIAL EVENT: A PLAY READING with Howard Thoresen, Alan Benditt and Andy Larkin! I can’t say too much about it, but it’s going to be FUN! Here’s the Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81054571039

DON’T MISS THIS!!!

peace, love & happiness
Johnny

Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue 1/15/21
2021-01-15 - 2021-02-14
Open Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue

January 15, 2020

Welcome to our fifth meditation and mindfulness dialogue! The numbers below refer to passages from the book Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh. (JS)
*

WITHOUT

Picture nothing.

Nothing is pictured.

And then everything food sex stoplight
yoga mat grocery bag little gnat—

as through a valve
in the middle of that pictured
nothing:

it all comes rushing
like sparks
jetting in the void.

The ocean goes back in the bottle
only when you ignore it.

I flit from station to station,
knowing nothing of meditation.

And I seek out mute buttons
as if there are more than one,
as if it is something that exists

without.

—Alex Tretbar
*

Mr. Barnes, in the December issue you said you wrote the paper (letter) six times over, but know, more times than not, the first writing is always the best, since when re-written over and over you can lose the essence of your writing. Don’t overthink it. The first edition was your rawest, which tends to be most true and to the heart. I find that in journaling, when I go back to read previous entries, I think I should have said it this way or that, but in reality it is its most true and rawest, honest to who you are.

I also would give you this thought in regards to what you wrote about how we all were born upon a set of scales that started to tip in one direction or the other since our birth. I understand your concept of the scale relating to one side being good, while the other is bad. But… Have you considered that there is no scale? In reading #312 None Other Than Enlightenment in Your True Home it seemed to me that the basic premise is that through enlightenment there is no scale. You can see the truth in all things, that truth being the good and bad in all things. Good and bad are one thing: the flower in the garbage and the garbage in the flower.

Mr. Gilbert, so many things this year have showed us that society is in dire need of a change, and that we all need a little more enlightenment. There is a lot of me me me, hate, blame for this or that, or: since you don’t believe what I believe I hate you. I briefly touched on this in November’s issue of M & M, but I will write a little more. On 11/2/20 I read #346 What Separates Us in our book Your True Home. In the message, it talks about labels. Putting labels on people is hurtful and destructive. Labels are what’s currently wrong in society. It’s us vs. them. Labels are something that hurts every one of us. Society uses labels to dehumanize, to separate us into groups, and if we can eliminate labels there can be peace in the world. We are all people on this planet, one society, one human race, and until we get that our society will not be able to heal. Be the one! On society, one human race, one world together.

What I want to write about for myself is about something that really affected me to the point of tears forming when I started journaling. I debated even writing this in the newsletter because of how it affected me and how personal it is to me, but after writing to my friend Jacob Green about what happened, I started to feel empowered to include what happened for everyone in the newsletter. On 12/2/20 I read #316 The Smile of Nonfear in Your True Home. This passage for some reason stirred something inside me. It’s the word “afflictions” that woke this thought, but really the whole bottom half spoke to me. Afflictions have been something I have been struggling with for a large part of my prison sentence. I’ve seen that what I had done to land me in prison these 18 years was an affliction. I concentrated on that “perceived” affliction for those first years, trying to correct where I went wrong. It took many many years to find my path to better and correct who I am, and to this point I, in some ways, didn’t know how I got there, or where I am today. But now, in reading #316, I may have a little more of an idea. I recognized early on that a big part of what I did was founded on a deluded mind and thought pattern that needed correcting if I was to live a life outside these fences. If I couldn’t succeed in correcting my deluded mind, thought pattern and affliction, I didn’t deserve a life outside the fence, or maybe even a life at all. What I saw in myself was only a deluded mind and thoughts, and in doing so I could only see the afflictions within myself.

Somehow, over the years, a slow chip away happened. I found my true mind, and in doing so I no longer only saw my afflictions, but saw much more. Call it enlightenment. I no longer concentrated on my deluded mind or thoughts, which in turn, I suppose, allowed me to truly heal my affliction that got me here to prison. I am still not perfect by far, none of us are, but I truly believe I have healed enough now to start my next chapter in life. A life outside these fences. A life as me and who I am. A life that will allow me to continue to heal and better who I am, the person I know I am and want to be.

Above is what I wrote in my journal. I know that many guys in prison struggle with their afflictions that caused and/or contributed to their incarceration. Some feel they don’t deserve forgiveness, and forgiveness from those you hurt may never come, but forgiveness of yourself is possible. It happens with internal healing and the enlightenment that you don’t need to run away from your afflictions, because with a true mind the afflictions are no longer there. And without afflictions there is only enlightenment; through enlightenment you will see much more within yourself.

Thanks for listening. May peace, love, harmony and mindfulness be with you all.

—Joshua Underhill
*

A meditative mind is silent. It is not the silence which thought can conceive of; it is not the silence of a still evening; it is the silence when thought—with all its images, its words and perceptions—has entirely ceased. This meditative mind is the religious mind—the religion that is not touched by the church, the temple or by chants.

The religious mind is the explosion of love. It is this love that knows no separation. To it, far is near. It is not the one or the many, but rather the state of love in which all division ceases. Like beauty, it is not of the measure of words. From this silence alone the meditative mind acts.

from Meditations by J. Krishnamurti
*

(Here are a few of Michel Deforge’s many meditations from December:)

December 2 #47 The Mind of Enlightenment

It is amazing what a few days of not mindfully breathing, or purpose (practicing) can do to my mental state—more mercurial and more affected by influences. (grrr) It’s my own doing. I can’t blame anyone. Maybe…I can just relax, breathe; and let it be what it is…? (Breathing…) How funny. Today is about bodhichitta and a “goal” of practice—to, ultimately, be able to aid/relieve the suffering of others. Wow! It’s funny because I see myself, right now, being very deep in my own mud/suffering. Getting better, or anything positive, is so far from my experience of now. And, forget about being of help or benefit …Yet, even now, I may learn, and from my learning, another may derive a benefit. If I waste my “now” on later—how/if I’ll be anything—then I’ll miss my lesson on how perfect today’s “mud”-bath really is. (I don’t know why I’m “in” mud today. It’s a metaphor for suffering, being human—made of the same mud as all other humans.) Even when I don’t “like” my now, it really is perfect. Now, where’s my snorkel? I think I lost a shoe! Oh well. It’s perfectly placed for now. (Better?) (Yes!)

December 3 #48 Enjoy a Moment of Nothing

(Taking a moment…) This is the essence of Buddhism, for me. To sit and enjoy doing “nothing.” But, it’s not nothing—(I’m channeling my inner Pooh Bear)—it’s a very wonderful something. It’s sitting. It’s being. It’s breathing. It’s often mind wandering and coming back; then wandering off again. It’s learning to enjoy me, now, in this moment. Breathing and existing (being) in a mindful moment/experience of each now, as the moments pass. Enjoying nothing can allow all the moments of something a little more presence and mindful enjoyability, if I want.

December 7 #49 What is a Leaf?

Thây points out how everything, including me and you, is made from other things. A leaf is composed of so many things, and so many things were critical to the growth of a particular leaf. Life is interdependent. When some say, “We’re all in this together,” I believe this is a deeper meaning behind a rallying cry for some cause. We do all exist in the same world. We share the same air, the same soil, the same clouds, rain, etc. We’re all made of the same elements—reduced to base elements, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, etc. With so much sameness, how can I accept you as different from me? I do…

This is where I see the ego come in. Something tells me that I am special, unique, and unlike everyone and everything else; that there’s no connection whatsoever to anything or anyone else. Yet, if I take away all the parts of me (good or bad) that come from someone else or something else, “I” cease to exist entirely. Without you, there is no me: both in the realm of duality and, also, in the realm of inter-dependence. “I” also can’t continue to exist (survive) without “you.” Too often I attempt to behave as if I am all that is. I think that it is only when I embrace otherness (or others) that I truly begin to live. This is not easy. It requires compassion for weaknesses, mine too. It requires seeing “other” as same—not different or separate from.

Here on paper it is so easy to lay out, contemplate and visualize. In the realm of action/reaction (reality?)—ego, fear, duality, separateness—disconnect happens. I become guarded from you, forgetting how much I need each and every other “you” out there, so “I” can survive too. That’s my journey: finding my way to compassion, vulnerability and interdependence (not co-dependence…).

December 10 #51 Subtle Gestures

I find myself slowing down while reading and snacking—mindlessly. Yet, as I read, and felt my breath I un-deliberately (un-intentionally) slowed down and savored my moments… The sensations aren’t profound, but noticing them seems slightly so. That’s kinda neat; catching all the subtleties, flavor, muscles working, crunching, tasting, breathing, hearing…and then…like that *! (snap) It’s all over. I often find that life’s “best” moments come from those subtle gestures, and they’re often done without guile or deliberateness—they have intent of kindness, but it is a life state not as much as an effort to set out to do a kind act. Words fail to describe ideas fully, the thought carries on all the same.

December 16 #54 Rites of Life

….I have experienced a few of those key moments—ones where flow happened, or where I was perfectly attuned (although I do not recall them, due to lacking focused awareness.) I imagine that by having awareness I could experience the moments completely as they exist in time—maybe learn a lesson of life from the moment, create a deep etched memory, or simply exist in the perfection of that moment, watching as it passes to the next perfect moment—maybe even departing from “time.”

Is life a string of moments haphazardly strung together with no rhyme or reasoning? Can there be more than that, accessed by simply being mindful and aware? I don’t think it needs to be a BIG production, or some fantastic event(s). I like the idea of simple awareness, exercised through each moment—not just on the cushion….

—Michel Deforge
*

#314 Melt the Ice of Knowledge

Often in my experience of living in prison there have been “rules” or “discriminating views” on this or that person. There is an atmospheric influence that enforces racial segregation and fuels hate amongst others. It’s follow the rules, or the road. (As of late, the Road is wide open and lovely. Join me?) Harboring one train of thought as truth, and not having an open heart and open mind, blurs the hidden beauty of truth in others—obstructed by societal upbringings, social media, and other major influences. Abandonment of views, or opinions, is an ice pick of relief, chipping away the cold ice of hate, oppression, single-mindedness, and when you can finally free yourself from the icy blur of lies and deceit, you will find that what you thought was truth was an obstacle holding you from seeing the beauty in the soul of everyone/everything. Having an open heart, open mind, and leaving the views you’ve been taught, you will learn so much, and be able to see life, and live life, with deeper meaning, and understanding.

I send all the Open Road/M & M family and the world Peace Love Happiness and Good Vibes. You all are beautiful and deserve the most!

Till next time

Jake Green
*

Phone Call to Ancient Times

Out on the lawn, under the aspen tree
where I can get good cell reception,
I took a call from Johnny, who began
telling about a friend in prison, in
the hole again for some infraction,
and I stood so still, listening, from
the blackberry thicket a rabbit
crept under the fence to nibble grass
at my feet, a lolloping fist of fur
with whiskers and little ears, with
an inquisitive tremble, amiable ghost
from the lost world we shared
when there was enough for all.

—Kim Stafford
*

I have some thoughts about the “perfect moments” Michel wrote about in his meditations on December 14th and 16th. He mentioned slowing down. I have found that when I’m preparing a meal, if, instead of doing it fast, I slow down, I get great pleasure from cutting the vegetables. This is true for eating the meal, doing the dishes—for any activity, even walking across the room.

Joseph Campbell and many others say that eternity is not a long time, it’s timelessness. We have all experienced countless perfect moments. We don’t remember most of them because they leave no trace. It’s not a problem. We don’t need to remember them. The next one is coming soon. Maybe this is it.

—Johnny Stallings
*

#361: Offering Flowers to the Buddha

This is about impermanence and how we should and should not view it. Impermanence is constant. Often viewed as negative, as decay and death, as loss, and T N Hanh tells us we should enjoy things in their present moment instead of bemoaning their impermanence.

Agreed. But I take it a step further. Impermanence is death in one sense, but also seeds of life in another. Let’s look at nature, my favorite example for everything.

Most people see spring as birth, rebirth, life, growth; summer as lushness, abundance, profusion, light, sun…life.

They tend to view fall as one of dying, decay, shutting down, going dark. And winter? Ah, the ultimate death: dark, cold, still…hibernation (from hibernus, Latin for wintry. And ‘hiver,’ French for winter, etc.)

But when fall comes, I feel most alive, alert, sharp, eager, ready to get-to-work. Nature agrees: bushy, brilliant trees shed their leaves exposing lean, bare, shining, black limbs, looking like they’ve pushed up their sleeves to get ready to work. Their lean or muscular trunks stand sturdily in agreement. And now, without all that busy foliage, we have views beyond, to the hills, the sky. Views ahead. And what lies ahead? More life! Bare limbs, branches, and twigs house and host hundred of birds, perching, hopping about, twittering, swooping down to fetch seeds, insects, worms… Worms! What’s going on in all those fallen leaves, anyway? Life, in the form of worms! Millions of dark red, wriggling creatures burrowing, chomping, aerating their way into and through piles of leaves. Creating mulch! And mulch = life! My garden loves that decayed, death-like stuff. It eats it up! It brings me the biggest, leafiest, fattest, brightest vegetables you can imagine.

What else is happening when all the extravagance of spring and summer is gone? I’ll tell you what: Fungi, that’s what!

Whoa, that creepy, sneaky dark stuff that smells funky and looks weird? You bet!

Mushrooms, lichens, molds, all sorts of fungi = Life! Look at bread, wine, beer, cheese. All created with the indispensable help of fungi. (And what’s pizza without mushrooms, anyway?) And look at penicillin and other antibiotics; ergot, or LSD; fungi chemicals that produce statins! Life savers!

Finally, is winter really death-like? Is it the end of life? Well, are we dead when we sleep each night? Of course not. A good night’s sleep is purely restorative, and a good winter is nothing less. Can you imagine never sleeping but just going full-bore 24/7? Day in/day out, year in/year out? You wouldn’t make it past day two or three. Seasons are nature’s parallel; fall and winter are rest and sleep, but always with restoration and life at the core.

And then we die. Is that the end of it all? Not on your life! I will be cremated and my daughter knows just which mountain wildflower meadow to scatter me in. I will be bone meal for the Avalanche lilies, the valerian, the paintbrush, and they will love me for the strength and life I’ve brought to them.

So (really) finally, all these things produced by the ostensible death of stuff are nothing less that LIFE for the world.

—Jude Russell (alive and well)
*

The Hsin Hsin Ming reminds me of the Dhammapada, a collection of poetry that summarizes early Buddhist teachings. I find the Dhammapada to be very inspirational.

Taking ownership for my biases, I do not understand the representation of Zen Buddhism as it appears in American culture. The Buddha gifted us with clear and concise instructions for training the mind, often referred to as the Noble Eightfold Path. Meditation, lifestyle changes, and challenging our beliefs about “how the world works.” If you read the Buddha’s sermons in a “thematically progressive” order, a very clear instruction manual emerges. Personally, I need that. I’ve never really had a mind for philosophy or theology. But American Zen really advocates this message of “do nothing.” Don’t meditate. Don’t make lifestyle changes. Don’t challenge your beliefs, because all beliefs are false. It is as though the Eightfold Path was completely cancelled out by Zen masters several hundreds of years ago. But I have a friend who ordained and studied at Venerable Thay’s Plum Village, that is a very rigorous study and meditation practice. And people who went to study Chan in China also report: “study and meditation.” I visited a traditional Japanese Zen monastery in Washington, and the monastics there lived and practiced in a very similar manner to the Ajahn Chah monasteries I am familiar with. So, my bias, my prejudice, is I don’t understand American Zen. Traditional Zen uses the same meditation “manual” as my Vipassana meditation practice, the Satipatthana Sutta, “The Four Bases of Mindfulness.” Venerable Thay [Thich Nhat Hanh] is an expert scholar of the Satipatthana Sutta in all of the ancient languages in which it was preserved, and I have a lot of respect for his teaching. End of the day, “their” practices are more similar than dissimilar to what I’m familiar with.

—Shad Alexander
*

Thank you Thich Nhat Hanh, Johnny Stallings
and your wonderful friends!

I am here
I see (or hear or touch) some thing
I know it
Yes (tiny smile) I am meditating
My knowing it
My seeing
and my being here
are somehow
related Yes (chuckle to myself) I am ok
somehow divisions
are eased
can I “feel”
how you also
are breathing
can I deeply
understand
that the
water from a
cloud
is my relation?
the light and gray
colors from
that cloud
come all the
way here
luminous here
can these hard
lines
these
seeming forever
walls
be continually
“eased” “understood”
“held” like a child
I am dissatisfied
crying inside like
a wailing child
or a crazy politician
can I remember
what I said
above
I am here
my fear my dissatisfaction
is here also
but I am holding (embracing) it
like my own mother
like my own niece
like my own beloved lover
I am not
killing my fear my dissatisfaction
my crying child
I am embracing them
breathing a long side
belly and fear
are not unrelated
are they?
Forever
smile
laugh (to yourself – don’t let them
know you are crazy)
I can even
start to
think of your
breathing your
thinking
your pain
as my relation
although these sentences are calming
can you
sit here
for a few seconds
or a short time
without reading
these sentences
just sit here
with the satisfaction
breathing
then with the dissatisfaction
breathing
the pain of the
world is also
yours
smile you are Good
continue forever
make up your
own writing your own
song of the open
let it in form us and
you
how to dance our
loving meditating

—Alan Benditt
(roughly November 14, 2020)

peace, love, happiness & understanding 1/7/21
2021-01-07 - 2021-01-20
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

January 7, 2021

I sent some of Thomas Traherne’s poems to Alex Tretbar, who was inspired by the poem “Wonder” to write “DUST.” First Traherne, then Tretbar:

Wonder

How like an Angel came I down!
How bright are all things here!
When first among His works I did appear
O how their Glory me did crown!
The world resembled His Eternity,
In which my soul did walk;
And every thing that I did see
Did with me talk.

The skies in their magnificence,
The lively, lovely air;
Oh how divine, how soft, how sweet, how fair!
The stars did entertain my sense,
And all the works of God, so bright and pure,
So rich and great did seem,
As if they ever must endure
In my esteem.

A native health and innocence
Within my bones did grow,
And while my God did all his Glories show,
I felt a vigour in my sense
That was all Spirit. I within did flow
With seas of life, like wine;
I nothing in the world did know
But ’twas divine.

Harsh ragged objects were concealed,
Oppressions, tears and cries,
Sins, griefs, complaints, dissensions, weeping eyes
Were hid, and only things revealed
Which heavenly Spirits, and the Angels prize.
The state of Innocence
And bliss, not trades and poverties,
Did fill my sense.

The streets were paved with golden stones,
The boys and girls were mine,
Oh how did all their lovely faces shine!
The sons of men were holy ones,
In joy and beauty they appeared to me,
And every thing which here I found,
While like an angel I did see,
Adorned the ground.

Rich diamond and pearl and gold
In every place was seen;
Rare splendours, yellow, blue, red, white and green,
Mine eyes did everywhere behold.
Great wonders clothed with glory did appear,
Amazement was my bliss,
That and my wealth was everywhere:
No joy to this!

Cursed and devised proprieties,
With envy, avarice
And fraud, those fiends that spoil even Paradise,
Flew from the splendour of mine eyes,
And so did hedges, ditches, limits, bounds,
I dreamed not aught of those,
But wandered over all men’s grounds,
And found repose.

Proprieties themselves were mine,
And hedges ornaments;
Walls, boxes, coffers, and their rich contents
Did not divide my joys, but all combine.
Clothes, ribbons, jewels, laces, I esteemed
My joys by others worn:
For me they all to wear them seemed
When I was born.

—Thomas Traherne (1636-1674)
*

DUST

I came down like an angel
from a gestative mountain

I have no memory
of

Since then loved
ones have told me

About the two
a.m. arrival

The usual bawling
& slap-shock of the other

Side of eternity
since then there have been

So many thens that now
seem second-hand

Like universal lullabies
whispered into the unconscious

Ears of babies my life
is just a transparent bead

On an endless
abacus

But you are there too
& you & you & you

And it seems fitting to me now
that abacus comes from the Hebrew word

For dust

—Alex Tretbar
*

Poetry Lovers: On Sunday, January 3rd, Katie Radditz and Deborah Buchanan hosted a Zoom gathering on the theme of “Favorite Women Poets.” Here’s a link to the web page on the Open Road website, where you will find poems to inspire you and whet your appetite for more:

https://openroadpdx.com/event/bibliophiles-unanimous-favorite-women-poets-with-deborah-katie/

In the last Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue, Joshua Barnes wrote about duality and oneness. He got me thinking about different things, including Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, from Book VII of The Republic. Socrates is doing most of the talking. The other speaker is Glaucon. You may be familiar with it, but it’s one of those things that is worth revisiting and pondering from time to time. So, here it is (in the Benjamin Jowett translation):

BOOK VII.

And now, I said, let me show in a figure how far our nature is enlightened or unenlightened:—Behold! human beings living in an underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the den; here they have been from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round their heads. Above and behind them a fire is blazing at a distance, and between the fire and the prisoners there is a raised way; and you will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the screen which marionette players have in front of them, over which they show the puppets.
I see.
And do you see, I said, men passing along the wall carrying all sorts of vessels, and statues and figures of animals made of wood and stone and various materials, which appear over the wall? Some of them are talking, others silent.
You have shown me a strange image, and they are strange prisoners.
Like ourselves, I replied; and they see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave?
True, he said; how could they see anything but the shadows if they were never allowed to move their heads?
And of the objects which are being carried in like manner they would only see the shadows?
Yes, he said.
And if they were able to converse with one another, would they not suppose that they were naming what was actually before them?
Very true.
And suppose further that the prison had an echo which came from the other side, would they not be sure to fancy when one of the passers-by spoke that the voice which they heard came from the passing shadow?
No question, he replied.
To them, I said, the truth would be literally nothing but the shadows of the images.
That is certain.
And now look again, and see what will naturally follow if the prisoners are released and disabused of their error. At first, when any of them is liberated and compelled suddenly to stand up and turn his neck round and walk and look towards the light, he will suffer sharp pains; the glare will distress him, and he will be unable to see the realities of which in his former state he had seen the shadows; and then conceive some one saying to him, that what he saw before was an illusion, but that now, when he is approaching nearer to being and his eye is turned towards more real existence, he has a clearer vision,—what will be his reply? And you may further imagine that his instructor is pointing to the objects as they pass and requiring him to name them,—will he not be perplexed? Will he not fancy that the shadows which he formerly saw are truer than the objects which are now shown to him?
Far truer.
And if he is compelled to look straight at the light, will he not have a pain in his eyes which will make him turn away to take refuge in the objects of vision which he can see, and which he will conceive to be in reality clearer than the things which are now being shown to him?
True, he said.
And suppose once more, that he is reluctantly dragged up a steep and rugged ascent, and held fast until he is forced into the presence of the sun himself, is he not likely to be pained and irritated? When he approaches the light his eyes will be dazzled, and he will not be able to see anything at all of what are now called realities.
Not all in a moment, he said.
He will require to grow accustomed to the sight of the upper world. And first he will see the shadows best, next the reflections of men and other objects in the water, and then the objects themselves; then he will gaze upon the light of the moon and the stars and the spangled heaven; and he will see the sky and the stars by night better than the sun or the light of the sun by day?
Certainly.
Last of all he will be able to see the sun, and not mere reflections of him in the water, but he will see him in his own proper place, and not in another; and he will contemplate him as he is.
Certainly.
He will then proceed to argue that this is he who gives the season and the years, and is the guardian of all that is in the visible world, and in a certain way the cause of all things which he and his fellows have been accustomed to behold?
Clearly, he said, he would first see the sun and then reason about him.
And when he remembered his old habitation, and the wisdom of the den and his fellow-prisoners, do you not suppose that he would felicitate himself on the change, and pity them?
Certainly, he would.
And if they were in the habit of conferring honours among themselves on those who were quickest to observe the passing shadows and to remark which of them went before, and which followed after, and which were together; and who were therefore best able to draw conclusions as to the future, do you think that he would care for such honours and glories, or envy the possessors of them? Would he not say with Homer,
‘Better to be the poor servant of a poor master,’
and to endure anything, rather than think as they do and live after their manner?
Yes, he said, I think that he would rather suffer anything than entertain these false notions and live in this miserable manner.
Imagine once more, I said, such an one coming suddenly out of the sun to be replaced in his old situation; would he not be certain to have his eyes full of darkness?
To be sure, he said.
And if there were a contest, and he had to compete in measuring the shadows with the prisoners who had never moved out of the den, while his sight was still weak, and before his eyes had become steady (and the time which would be needed to acquire this new habit of sight might be very considerable), would he not be ridiculous? Men would say of him that up he went and down he came without his eyes; and that it was better not even to think of ascending; and if any one tried to loose another and lead him up to the light, let them only catch the offender, and they would put him to death.
No question, he said.
This entire allegory, I said, you may now append, dear Glaucon, to the previous argument; the prison-house is the world of sight, the light of the fire is the sun, and you will not misapprehend me if you interpret the journey upwards to be the ascent of the soul into the intellectual world according to my poor belief, which, at your desire, I have expressed—whether rightly or wrongly God knows. But, whether true or false, my opinion is that in the world of knowledge the idea of good appears last of all, and is seen only with an effort; and, when seen, is also inferred to be the universal author of all things beautiful and right, parent of light and of the lord of light in this visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the intellectual; and that this is the power upon which he who would act rationally either in public or private life must have his eye fixed.

Bibliophiles Unanimous!: Favorite Women Poets with Deborah & Katie
2021-01-03 - 2021-01-16
Dear Bibliophiles
On Sunday, January 3rd, Deborah Buchanan and Katie Radditz hosted a conversation about Favorite Women Poets on Zoom. We had a good turnout. It’s a big subject! They began talking about Japanese women poets:

Tankas from 4th – 19th century Japan
Ono no Komachi
While, waiting for you,
My heart is filled with longing,
The autumn wind blows—
As if it were you—
Swaying the bamboo blinds of my door.

Tanka stresses the beauty of life and nature, but there is a strong feeling of yearning in many tanka. The shortness of life, the transient nature of seasons and love.
First known poetry perhaps is the tanka written as letters between women in Japan who were basically imprisoned at home. They started writing letters to one another in simple haiku with hidden messages, the recipient would write back in two lines. Forming a tanka from the Haiku.
Izumi Shikibu. author of The Diary of Izumi Shikibu and was considered to be the finest poet of the time. She also wrote The Tale of Genji considered the first novel. It is full of hundreds of Tankas.

“To the lonely nights
when a robe comes between us,
would you then, you say,
have me add more layers yet
to keep us further apart?”

“Without showing a change in colour
The thing that fades
In this world
Is the flower
Called the human heart.”

“The colour of the cherry blossom
Has faded vainly
In the long rain
While in idle thoughts
I have spent my life.”

“Without a thought
For my black hair’s disarray
I throw myself down,
Already longing for the one
Who ran his fingers through it.“

“On the bamboo leaves
A fine ice fall
Patters and patters.
How bitter
To try to sleep alone!”

Then, Deborah and Katie talked about Emily Dickinson. They read this poem:

Tell all the Truth but tell it slant –
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth’s superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind –

Johnny recited one of his favorite Emily Dickinson poems:

The Infinite a sudden Guest
Has been assumed to be —
But how can that stupendous come
Which never went away?

Deborah talked about Diane Di Prima and read this poem by her:

Poem in Praise of My Husband

I suppose it hasn’t been easy living with me
either,
with my piques, and ups and downs, my need for
privacy
leo pride and weeping in bed when you’re
trying to sleep
and you, interrupting me in the middle of a
thousand poems
in the middle of our drive over the nebraska
hills and
into colorado, odetta singing, the whole world
singing in me
the triumph of our revolution in the air
me about to get that down, and you
you saying something about the carburetor
so that it all went away
but we cling to each other
as if each thought the other was the raft
and he adrift alone, as in this mud house
not big enough, the walls dusting down around us, a fine dust rain
counteracting the good, high air, and stuffing
our nostrils
we hang our pictures of the separate worlds:
new york college and san francisco posters
set out our japanese dishes, chinese knives
hammer small indian marriage cloths into
the adobe
we stumble thru silence into each other’s gut
blundering thru from one wrong place to the
next
like kids who snuck out to play on a boat
at night
and the boat slipped from its moorings, and
they look at the stars
about which they know nothing, to find out
where they are going.

Deborah and Katie shared this poem by Naomi Shihab Nye:

Shoulders
A man crosses the street in rain,
stepping gently, looking two times north and south,
because his son is asleep on his shoulder.
No car must splash him.
No car drive too near to his shadow.
This man carries the world’s most sensitive cargo
but he’s not marked.
Nowhere does his jacket say FRAGILE,
HANDLE WITH CARE.
His ear fills up with breathing.
He hears the hum of a boy’s dream
deep inside him.
We’re not going to be able
to live in this world
if we’re not willing to do what he’s doing
with one another.
The road will only be wide.
The rain will never stop falling.

Nancy Yeilding read this poem by Barbara Crooker:

It’s Monday Morning

mid-November, the world turned golden,
preserved in amber. I should be doing more
to save the planet—plant a tree, raise
a turbine, put solar panels on the roof
to grab the sun and bring it inside. Instead,
I’m sitting here scribbling, sitting on a wrought
iron chair, the air cold from last night’s frost,
the thin sunlight sinking into the ruined
Appalachians of my spine. I know it’s all
about to fall apart; the signs are everywhere.
But on this blue morning, the air bristling
with crickets and birdsong, I do the only thing
I can: put one word in front of the other,
and see what happens when they rub up against
each other. It might become something
that will burst into flame.

Dave Duncan read the first two stanzas of “The Cry of the Children” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning:

Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers,

Ere the sorrow comes with years ?

They are leaning their young heads against their mothers, —
And that cannot stop their tears.
The young lambs are bleating in the meadows ;
The young birds are chirping in the nest ;
The young fawns are playing with the shadows ;
The young flowers are blowing toward the west—
But the young, young children, O my brothers,
They are weeping bitterly !
They are weeping in the playtime of the others,
In the country of the free.

Do you question the young children in the sorrow,
Why their tears are falling so ?
The old man may weep for his to-morrow
Which is lost in Long Ago —
The old tree is leafless in the forest —
The old year is ending in the frost —
The old wound, if stricken, is the sorest —
The old hope is hardest to be lost :
But the young, young children, O my brothers,
Do you ask them why they stand
Weeping sore before the bosoms of their mothers,
In our happy Fatherland ?

Here’s a poem from Wisława Szymborska that Katie and Deborah chose:

Possibilities
I prefer movies.
I prefer cats.
I prefer the oaks along the Warta.
I prefer Dickens to Dostoyevsky.
I prefer myself liking people
to myself loving mankind.
I prefer keeping a needle and thread on hand, just in case.
I prefer the color green.
I prefer not to maintain
that reason is to blame for everything.
I prefer exceptions.
I prefer to leave early.
I prefer talking to doctors about something else.
I prefer the old fine-lined illustrations.
I prefer the absurdity of writing poems
to the absurdity of not writing poems.
I prefer, where love’s concerned, nonspecific anniversaries
that can be celebrated every day.
I prefer moralists
who promise me nothing.
I prefer cunning kindness to the over-trustful kind.
I prefer the earth in civvies.
I prefer conquered to conquering countries.
I prefer having some reservations.
I prefer the hell of chaos to the hell of order.
I prefer Grimms’ fairy tales to the newspapers’ front pages.
I prefer leaves without flowers to flowers without leaves.
I prefer dogs with uncropped tails.
I prefer light eyes, since mine are dark.
I prefer desk drawers.
I prefer many things that I haven’t mentioned here
to many things I’ve also left unsaid.
I prefer zeroes on the loose
to those lined up behind a cipher.
I prefer the time of insects to the time of stars.
I prefer to knock on wood.
I prefer not to ask how much longer and when.
I prefer keeping in mind even the possibility
that existence has its own reason for being.

And here’s a poem by Wisława Szymborska that Jude Russell read:

The Three Oddest Words

When I pronounce the word Future,
the first syllable already belongs to the past.
When I pronounce the word Silence,
I destroy it.
When I pronounce the word Nothing,
I make something no non-being can hold.

Jeffrey Sher read a poem by Mary Oliver:

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Here a poem by Ada Limon:

The Raincoat

When the doctor suggested surgery
and a brace for all my youngest years,
my parents scrambled to take me
to massage therapy, deep tissue work,
osteopathy, and soon my crooked spine
unspooled a bit, I could breathe again,
and move more in a body unclouded
by pain. My mom would tell me to sing
songs to her the whole forty-five minute
drive to Middle Two Rock Road and forty-
five minutes back from physical therapy.
She’d say, even my voice sounded unfettered
by my spine afterward. So I sang and sang,
because I thought she liked it. I never
asked her what she gave up to drive me,
or how her day was before this chore. Today,
at her age, I was driving myself home from yet
another spine appointment, singing along
to some maudlin but solid song on the radio,
and I saw a mom take her raincoat off
and give it to her young daughter when
a storm took over the afternoon. My god,
I thought, my whole life I’ve been under her
raincoat thinking it was somehow a marvel
that I never got wet.

Nancy Yeilding didn’t know if she could get through this poem by Denise Levertov without crying. She was encouraged to give it a try:

The Fountain

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water
to solace the dryness at our hearts.
I have seen

the fountain springing out of the rock wall
and you drinking there. And I too
before your eyes
found footholds and climbed
to drink the cool water.

The woman of that place, shading her eyes,
frowned as she watched-but not because
she grudged the water,
only because she was waiting
to see we drank our fill and were
refreshed.
Don’t say, don’t say there is no water.
That fountain is there among its scalloped
green and gray stones,
it is still there and always there
with its quiet song and strange power
to spring in us,
up and out through the rock.

Here’s a poem by Gabriela Mistral, the first Latin American to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature:

Riches

I have a faithful fortune
and a fortune lost.
One’s like a rose,
the other a thorn.
What was taken from me
I still possess:
the faithful fortune
and the fortune lost,
and I’m rich in purple
and unhappiness.
Oh how I love the rose
and how the thorn loves me!
Like round twin apples
after the frost:
the faithful fortune,
the fortune lost.

(tr. Ursula K. Le Guin)

Here’s a poem by our current national Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo:

Perhaps the world ends Here

The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.

The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.

We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.

It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.
*

Nancy Yeilding also recommends:

“Late August” by Mary Chivers
“For a Friend Lying in Intensive Care Waiting for Her White Blood Cells to Rejuvenate After a Bone Marrow Transplant” by Barbara Crooker
“A Gift” and “Witness” by Denise Levertov

Deborah and Katie also recommend:

“A New National Anthem” by Ada Limon
“Sweetness,” “Give Me Your Hand” and “Song of Death” by Gabriela Mistral
“Some People” by Wisława Szymborska
“The Burying Beetle” by Ada Limon

Deborah asked me to add this:

Also please add that we only skimmed the wealth of African American poets:
Gwendolyn Books (first black woman to win the Pulitzer), Lucille Clifton, June Jordan and now a whole bevy of current ones: Tracy K. Smith, Nikki Finney, Claudine Rankin, Natasha Tretheway.

And for American Indian women poets, there are, in addition to the stellar Joy Harjo:
Natalie Diaz (her breakout book, When My Brother Was an Aztec), and Oregon’s own Elizabeth Woody.

There were lots more poems! You shoulda been there! Maybe you were.

Deborah recently published three books of poetry: The World A Well, Layers of Sediment and Moment Before. You can order them from her at: dlbadger@gmail.com.

We ended our Zoom gathering with Deborah reading one of her unpublished poems:

Unannounced

The grass moved
inhalation exhalation
as the animal slept
still but for breath
covered by the sky’s night
wind in the orchard
deeper shadows under dark firs

We find the grass bowl
in early morning, still warm
stalks flattened not by wind
but impress of being
a nest one might say
yet in soil not air
a vibrant emptiness

While we slept unaware
another life another world
passed by
inextricably connected
yet unknown
how many each moment
these transparent threads

Breathing the same air
walking so closely

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus
2020-12-25
DEAR EDITOR:
I am 8 years old.
Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
Papa says, ‘If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.’
Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

VIRGINIA O’HANLON.
115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

—Francis Pharcellus Church, Editor of The Sun, September 21, 1897

peace, love, happiness & understanding 12/24/20
2020-12-24 - 2021-01-06
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

December 24, 2020

I believe the soggy clods shall become lovers and lamps…

—Walt Whitman, from Song of Myself
*

Since water still flows, though we cut it with swords,
And sorrow returns, though we drown it with wine,
Since the world can in no way satisfy our cravings,
Let us loosen our hair tomorrow and go fishing.

—Li Po (701-762 A.D.)
*

Found Kin

Ardent champions of comradery,
our found kin hold a cherished place
inside the chest cavity.
Stumble into our lives when we
need you most.
Battle back the self-doubt with
Deeds, Words, Actions, Presence.
Blood being equally without consequence
or measured sacred.
Embrace me found kin with gentle
acts of friendship.
Keep the wolves at bay, my hearth fire
heart stoked.
Against the oppressing laden storm of
Breathing upon this mortal stage
Found kin, I love you.

—Jeff Kuehner
*

Elemental Thoughts

Storm grey clouds frequent windy days,
Shedding their sadness on the land
Before moving on.
I watch them through my window pane,
Wishing they would stay awhile
or maybe take me with them;
For a storm grey cloud at heart I’ve become,
In need of a good wind to push me—
Until I too shed my sadness.

—Joshua Barnes
*

THE MEANING OF THIS

We are a feather
made of wings made of birds

No boos
cheers or other
interruptions

On our way up

Yes our body has fallen
apart

But finally we are floating

Like this & this
is what we wished for
relishing in our not
expecting it

Here is the inverted valley
& every blade
of grass on the godhead asking

What are you
& who is your name

—Alex Tretbar
*

I do hope you enjoyed my depressing poem. Here is another attached to this letter. It’s a piece I’m working on, but it has been hiding from my attempts at trying to bring it to paper. Where do all these words hide, anyway? Maybe it really is in between the blank spaces of every page and sentence. I wish I knew!

Hindsight (2020)

Hold your breath a little while
The reaper’s hounds are on the loose,
Trailing along their invisible chains
Extinguishing life like a hangman’s noose.

Hindsight: Speaking of history, history’s made
Though the irony remains in man’s surprise;
For we’ve opened the door to find again
A trojan horse in a man disguise.

The questions now—Will we learn?
Will these lessons keep and pass?
Or will the hounds come again
When comfort blinds us of our past?

But worry not, just hold your breaths,
For now just try to dodge the noose;
And watch the hounds’ chains grow taut
When pharma bears its golden goose.

—Joshua Barnes
*

Think Twice

If you think once, that’s good—
you’re ahead of the game. But do
yourself a favor, and think again.

Think for yourself, for number 1.
Then think for others, and see
how you are woven into we.

Think for today, necessity.
Then think for what comes soon,
and after, all that rich unfolding.

Think for your allies, then for “enemies.”
Think for the human, then for Earth.
Think for comfort, then for deepening spirit.

When anyone demands an answer, say,
“I am of two minds. Give me a moment.”

—Kim Stafford

Your Sovereignty

By law, your house is your castle—unless they have
a warrant to enter, sift through your stuff, is your
fortress, unless the bank holds the deed, or you rent
at a landlord’s whim, unless it’s a tent by the river
waiting for the sweep, a doorway with a blanket,
a place to stand by the road with your sign, a park
bench bed claimed at dusk, unless you are an inmate
in solitary concrete cell with stories behind closed eyes
your treasure, unless you flee, a refugee running by night
with only your coat and muttered clutch of words for
water, please, bread, prayer, brother, sister, home,
unless you are a tribe, your usual and accustomed places
torn away by someone’s treaty, one who never saw
dawn come over a prairie, forest, camas meadow,
unless you are a wren, your home thickets
skinned, plowed, paved, and you are made
to move, adapt, or die, so just before you fly,
on a wire you sing a last ravishing run,
the song your shred of sovereignty.

—Kim Stafford
*

Winter Feet

Early morning walk
Down Broadway
Inner city sidewalk
Still dark
Still cold

Ezra, a man I’ve come to know,
Sleeps in a doorway
His blue tennis shoes neatly placed
Next to his head

His bare feet
Extend out from the heavy blanket

I walk on
Then turn around
Gently pull the blanket over his feet

Ezra whispers a sleepy thank you
I start to leave
He kicks the blanket off

Feet once again bare
To the bitter cold
Life as he lives it
Exposed

—Esther Elizabeth

Daily Bread

Another Vet with little means
has found ways to appreciate slices of life
He goes by many names
I call him Joseph
He waits outside the café in his
electric wheel chair
with his dog Buffy snuggling on his lap,
four stuffed animals in the basket behind him—
two dogs, one monkey, one cat
On each side two
decorative colorful wind whirls

I leave the café with leftovers
What do you have for me today
Hash browns, chicken sausage,
whole wheat toast

This is better than last week’s donut,
laughs Joseph
This is a real feast, thank you
Now let me offer you a blessing
before you walk on

I weep now remembering his words, the
sincerity with which they were spoken

Dear God as I know you
Bless this servant—
As she offers me this day my daily bread
I ask you to offer her whatever she needs,
for we are all in these troubling times together
serving one another in love
Amen

Amen Joseph
Amen indeed

—Esther Elizabeth, two poems from Encounter: Poems of Engagement

Esther asked me to include her email address. Here it is:

estherwelizabeth@gmail.com
*

What Issa Heard

Two hundred years ago Issa heard the morning birds
singing sutras to this suffering world.

I heard them too, this morning, which must mean,

since we will always have a suffering world,
we must also always have song.

—David Budbill
*

I hope these poems keep you warm.

May all people be happy.
May we live in peace & love.

Johnny

Bibliophiles Unanimous!: Poetry's Task with Kim Stafford 12/20/20
2020-12-20 15:00 - 17:00
Dear Bibliophiles!

On December 20th, at 3 pm, our Zoom gathering will be hosted by Kim Stafford, who recently completed two years as Oregon’s Poet Laureate. Here’s the (new) link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81054571039

December 12, 2020

As I sat still this morning at my writing desk, before turning on the light, in the darkness and silence the weather in my mind began to clear from yesterday’s worries and conundrums, something began to come into focus. In time, I turned on the light, and wrote down this thought:

A loss is first a pang, then a memory. Then , by writing or telling, it may become a story. Then, if told with curiosity and courage, the sorrow becomes a possession, an element of identity, and finally a treasure, a smudge of wisdom.

Then, as my habit each morning early, I explored this thought by shaping it into something like a poem:

Schooling Sorrow

When a sorrow’s young, it’s pure—stunned
pang at breakup, betrayal, failure, death.
You weep, rant, brood, slump. And then

in the morning, sorrow starts its epic
journey into memory, becomes an island
in your archipelago of sufferings.

Then, if you are strong, and lucky to have
a listener—you begin to apprehend its quirks,
to tell it, shape it, watch it grow into a story.

And if you tell your story well, with curiosity
and courage, it then becomes a possession,
and in time a treasure, a smudge of wisdom.

This can be your gift, your offering—but
if you don’t school your sorrow into story
it can never be your friend.

—Kim Stafford

Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue 12/15/20
2020-12-15 - 2021-01-14
Open Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue

December 15, 2020

Welcome to our fourth meditation and mindfulness dialogue! The numbers below refer to passages from the book Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh. (JS)
*

Dear M & M Dialogue,

Greetings to all the mindful ones and those learning the art of being mindful. And don’t worry if you are new to mindfulness, even the ones who have been practicing mindfulness for awhile are still learning to be mindful.

I am no expert in mindfulness, but reading a message a day from Your True Home has been a wonderful experience and ritual, which in itself has brought me joy and mindfulness. Then Johnny suggested that I journal my thoughts, feelings and whatnot on my daily reads, so I have started doing just that, which has brought me a new level of mindfulness and joy.

At first I thought I would have little to say, if anything at all, for most of the daily messages, but I have found that to be a wrong assumption. Some of them are only one or two lines, although I try to keep them short in order to be sure I get my point across and so that others can understand what I’m saying. Anyway, here are a few excerpts from my journal:

10/25/20 #354 The Energy of Love: Love yourself! Without that first, there can be no true love in your life. You cannot love another, nor they love you without truly loving yourself first. This reminds me of a saying I found that takes today’s love and yesterday’s suffering (10/24/20 #355 Your Suffering Needs You) and puts them together.

“To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering, one must not love. But then, one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer; not to love is to suffer; to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore, to be happy, one must love or love to suffer, or suffer from too much happiness.” (By unknown.)

Once you have mastered self-love, love of another will find you and satisfy your need to be loved. To master that will make not only them happy, but you will be happy too. I’d rather suffer with love than suffer without love, and suffering from too much happiness sounds wonderful to me.

10/27/20 #352 No Enemy, No Savior: I honestly struggle with the meaning of the words “self” and “nonself.” Does it mean self is like yourself and nonself is like other people? I that is the case, I think of neither. We are all part of humanity. There is no self or nonself, there is one. One planet, one society, one humanity, one human race, and one love which is love for all.

That is it for me this month. I could write more, but Johnny said he can’t publish all my journal entries, as he has to leave room for others. Upon my release, I plan to loan my journal to Johnny to read and publish the entries he sees merit in. Peace, love and happiness to you all.

—Josh Underhill
*

(Michel is keeping a meditation journal on an almost daily basis. He sent a treasure trove of meditations. Here are the first three of twenty. Hopefully, we’ll be able to do a special edition of the Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue that features more of Michel’s meditations.) (JS)

November 5 AWARENESS OF BODY

Thây spoke first of sitting meditation; which reminds me of Zen—always the “sitting,” “just sitting” (shikantaza). I’ve been told that this act of simply sitting (or sitting simply?) is the foundation of all mindfulness practice. While this may be true, I found value and calm from sitting. In the Zen class here at TRCI, pre-COVID, that is what I experienced: sitting for no reason but to just sit (simply). I often struggle to make time for this in-cell. A book, recently gifted to me, talks about healing past traumas through several steps; the first involves an awareness of body. The author’s idea is that one effect of childhood trauma (no matter the intensity/severity) is the disconnect from body awareness. There are times when I would rather not be so aware of this body’s goings on. There are other times when I wish I could be more tuned-in to what is happening with my body. I guess I’ll be thankful for the times I am aware—pay more attention—and learn to “lean in” to the less aware times: hoping that paying attention when I’m more aware will leak over and affect the not-so-aware times. The body is always present. It is easy to become numb or ignore whatever is being experienced as common. I think by not being mindful of the “common” it is more challenging to become (or be) mindful for the extra-ordinary. It looks like I access the parts of life I think I’m missing out by paying better attention to the ordinary ones.

November 6 CONSTANT TRANSFORMATION

IMPERMANENCE: Thây’s first word today. Ouch! One of my biggest life challenges has been accepting the reality of change—nothing in my world can conquer impermanence, it’s all subject to change at some point in some way (even if it is just how I “see” it). I used to hate change. I still am not very fond of it; changes have often caught me unawares and have seemed to my small mind like “BIG” upheavals and trauma in life.

As I review my history: the problem was my efforts to fight for permanence, resisting entropy. Maybe, one day, there will occur a major change, where we all get nirvana, paradise, heaven, or whatever, and this place of “perfection” might be permanent. I am beginning to wonder if that would be “good.” I recall a saying Jake and Sara used with us last year on Julius Caesar: “‘Perfection’ is boring.” It’s true. For my experience to be “alive” it has to be imperfect, mutable, transient, “impermanent.” The alternative is a kind of “Groundhog Day” sort of life, where it is always the same, predictable, “Boring!” It is hard for me to not desire to be “safe.” Predictable is safe. Reliable seems safe. Change is not, because I may not know something, or how to do something. So, I’m weak. I’m vulnerable. I’m not safe. That place can be scary and difficult to live in, without some level of fear (“concern”).

Learning to be comfortable with “me” and what I can do helps, as I learn to be comfortable with IMPERMANENCE. Thây had two more words which stood out for me today. Within each, separately or together, I may find an answer: SELFLESSNESS, INTERDEPENDENCE. (hmmm….)

November 9 THE GREAT INSIGHT

I like, and I’m even attracted to the idea that we all can become a buddha—fully enlightened being. Further, while “becoming,” we are all already Bodhisattvas on the journey; aiding and benefitting others’ journey. I am also aware, and like the idea, that we are all already buddhas and have only to discover the buddha within. Both of these line up in agreement, as the second describes what I see/understand as the journey. Isn’t that always the challenge?: Getting out of the way of reality as it is, not as ego (“I”) tells a story to convince the self that reality is something totally different. I see ego as the source of duality and suffering—the idea of a separate “self” identity. I don’t have confirmation (complete), but this seems to be a portion of the truth.

—Michel Deforge
*

“Teaching is not done by teaching alone. It is done by how you live your life My life is my teaching. My life is my message.” Thich Nhat Hanh

This is not in the book Your True Home, but it is by TNH, and when I read it I thought of my parents.

My parents lived the life they loved. They hiked and backpacked and climbed mountains; they played the violin, viola, piano and harpsichord, and welcomed twice weekly chamber music gatherings in our home. They read for hours everyday; the library and bookstores were constant haunts. And art, all the time. They were nerds. They caused me constant embarrassment as a teenager.

Over dozens of years my mother took in friends of theirs and friends of ours who were struggling in life – for weeks, months, sometimes years. This was often to our young and selfish consternation: “Why do the Jacksons have to come again for Thanksgiving? Their kids always have snotty noses!”

Every two months, my mom and dad donated blood. “Why in Heaven’s name wouldn’t we?” my puzzled mother mused.

There were vegetable gardens and flower gardens and small tree farms. I smacked my lips waiting for blueberry pie, then watched as my mom picked and gave away our entire crop most years. “What about your own family’s needs?” we whined. Dad joined in on that one, but he also grew and gave away every fir seedling he nurtured to Christmas tree size. One year he said, “Don’t worry, I’m planting a new crop and I’ll make sure to save you one.” Good luck, he was 90 years old at the time.

So their lives were their teaching. There was no didactic teaching, no conscious ‘modeling’ to achieve ‘results’ in their daughters. They just lived life with passion and dedication.

Of course now I donate blood every two months, and am hitting 150+ units drained from my system, having started when I was 18 yrs. old. (“Why in Heaven’s name wouldn’t I?” when someone asks me why.) And hiking, backpacking and wildflowers are my passion. I have huge gardens so I can give away baskets of golden raspberries and strawberries, and yes, blueberries. I grow way too many peonies and iris so I can cut huge bouquets to give away. I read, read, read, and do art, art, art.

And if I’m not mentoring, tutoring, or otherwise being engaged in connection with others not like me, I am at a loss for meaning in my life.

—Jude Russell
*

138 I Think, Therefore…

This insightful page has inspired my Yoga routines lately! When I do this form of Yoga, I treat it like meditation. For me, it’s been a struggle my whole life to just “sit there” and not “be” with so many things constantly on my mind. It’s been nice to just be in the moment and focus on form, breathing and not everything else. For me to truly be there in that moment I cease all those fleeting thoughts for those 30 minutes every other day. Then, when I’m done, I enjoy the practice so much I begin doing stretches while practicing mindfulness. This has become my favorite part of my days lately, and it’s very peaceful. I encourage everyone to, at the very least, stretch and practice just being.

—Jeff Kuehner
*

Wandering Thoughts

My friends, I must be honest. I have written this paper six times over!

I started out writing about good and evil, page 156. Setting out, I had in mind an ideal of vanquishing good, evil and the universal duality….But I lost!

Duality has successfully wriggled its little fingers into every last nook and cranny; it won’t be going anywhere soon. And after thwarting my attempts at the highest level, it opened my eyes.

I’ve realized my “Not Sowing Karma” theme is wrong. Let me elaborate; we all were born upon a set of scales that started to tip in one direction or the other since our birth. There will come a time when we all will make a choice to either live with balance, or not. Without balance you can only tilt in one direction, until eventually you fall. With balance you will never fall, you only have to get there. Only then is there a chance of escape. Escape. Everyone seems to think there are a variety of ways to escape, but true escape is when you live in every moment and every thing is balanced.

Duality seems to offer a reasonable solution, and offers the key to any that seek.

Could co-existing be the harmony we seek, could it shine light on the hidden path? The wonder of wonders keeps me wondering still…

Well guys, those are this month’s thoughts. Let me apologize if it seems a little screwy. To be honest, I didn’t think something that seemed so simple would really be complex. Maybe it’s both!

Ahhhh, I’ll sign off now, before I have to re-write it all.

peace & love & everything else

—Joshua Barnes
*

From Thich Nhat Hanh’s book Be Free Where You Are, pages 37-40.

Being able to practice mindful breathing under duress, in an emotional state, or any unhealthy mindset. This is most likely a life long journey of practice and patience. “An emotion is only and emotion, we are much more than an emotion.” If we can recognize an emotion before it gets us on to becoming a wreck, then we can put it under a mindful breathing exercise and meditate on it, “you will see that you are strong—strong enough to withstand the storm.”

But, “don’t wait until you have a strong emotion to practice. If you do, you will not remember how to practice. You have to practice now, today, while you are feeling fine.”

I will speak for myself. So often when an emotion arises that I don’t want to have I bury it. But what happens when there is no more room for them?

This practice of mindful breathing to calm the storm or just wait it out without incident is the key, for me, to getting through many a bad day.

There are many forms of breathing. The point I am trying to make is: let’s just take a look at what is going on in the inside of us, grab ahold of it and examine it under a practice of mindfulness, calm breathing, and then maybe we can get a better understanding of what it is that makes us tick…or get ticked off.

Thanks to everyone who writes in the M & M dialogue. This is fun.

—Brandon Gillespie
*

#89 An Invitation from the Buddha

Mr. Underhill, I am really glad to hear you have started your countdown. I think that reading a passage a day is a good way to finish your set. I know you as a very good, caring guy and I wish you all the success in the future. Never forget all you have learned these last years and the good people you have met along the way

The first line of this—“We live in a time when everyone is too caught up in the preoccupations of everyday life,…”—how true this is for this year! It seems everywhere we turn there is nothing but blame for this or that, or: you don’t believe the things I believe, so I hate you. I believe our differences should be the thing that makes us love and understand each other all the more. Our uniqueness is one of the most special gifts we have.

I think taking the time to discover who we are, really down deep, is the true essence of life. When we start to understand ourselves more deeply, we can then open our eyes to the way others feel and have compassion for their ideas. We must remember that we are all brothers and sisters on this earth. It doesn’t matter what geographical location you come from, or the shade of your skin. These things have nothing to do with a person’s character. If we could stop and tell someone hello, give them an honest smile when we see they have a frown on their face, or, if you have to, tell a corny joke. I am sure, if the response isn’t immediate, that they will think about it later and hopefully have a moment of joy—that some stranger would say something so stupid to them. These little things we can do for one another to me are the true nature of life.

—Aaron Gilbert
*

Thanks to everyone who wrote last month. It is very moving to read about your experience of meditation and of Thich Nhat Hanh’s writing.

Johnny asked if I might write about some of my experiences hearing Thich Nhat Hanh speak. I have heard him several times, but the only time I remember the content of the talk was the first time, on the eve of the first Iraq war in 2003. He began by saying, “Bodhisattva George Bush and Bodhisattva Sadham Hussein had a quarrel.” And in my heart I did a little bow and thought, “You’re a better man than I am!” He explained that a Bodhisattva is responsible for many beings, which, certainly, Bush and Hussein were. Thây (that’s what his students call him) said that the United States had barely begun to recover from the psychic damage of the Vietnam war, and there we were embarking on another. He spoke about the young men, the soldiers in both countries, whose lives would be wounded by their experiences, and the pain this would inflict on both countries after the war had ended. I don’t suppose he could have foreseen all the little wars to come, including Afghanistan, the longest war in our history; twice as long as the Vietnam war, and counting. The other night I heard that Trump’s vaunted withdrawal of troops on the ground in Afghanistan only means that there will be more bombing, hence less targeted violence, hence more civilian casualties. Thây said, “I have not practiced enough, I have not practiced deeply enough…” and then he began a kind of litany: “you who are a teacher, you who are a student, you have to practice with us; you who are an artist, you who are a filmmaker, you have to practice with us…”and so on. This wasn’t really his talk, which he also gave… it was his response to the news of the day.

Thây suggested that each one of us in the audience could adopt a veteran, a young person who had been damaged by their experience of war and who could be helped to heal by being befriended. We could invite them into our homes, break bread with them, become real friends. I haven’t done this, I confess, although I have attempted to “adopt” some people who have been hurt by other circumstances of life. I’ve talked with many veterans who are on the streets, and, of course, the healing is mutual. It’s not a question of one helping the other–if a connection is made one can be a friend, even if the encounter is only for a few minutes. Johnny has embodied this approach to life as fellowship.

There were many other things in this talk–a lot of the breathing exercises in his book The Blooming of a Lotus were given that night. He told a story about his own war experience as a monk in Vietnam, counting bodies of bombing victims and the song they sang about the beauty of the sky and earth to keep themselves in remembrance of the gifts of life. He talked about someone bringing him food and he said, “I got enlightened” which is to say it awakened him to the blessing of preparing food, serving it, enjoying taste, even in these circumstances. He said, “Enlightenment is always about something. Buddhist enlightenment is about the nature of the self.”

So what is the nature of the self? If you practice with Thich Nhat Hanh and sit quietly you see that the self is always changing. It has no permanent identity. In the image of Suzuki Roshi, “I” is like a swinging door that comes in and goes out with the breath. A swinging door is not a fortress. It has a relative amount of importance, but not much; certainly not enough to start a war over.

As I look over what I have written, one thing that I notice is the absence of self-cultivation. Meditation is not about getting better. “Meditation” has been co-opted by the American religion of self-enhancement: we want to be better, thinner, stronger, more beautiful, wealthier, and we also want to be smarter and calmer and wiser, and we think of these properties as products that we can purchase for money or time. The meditation salespeople tell us that “practice” is a good tool to put in our shopping basket along with face cream and exercise and vegan or paleo diet and vitamins, eight glasses of water, and all the rest of it. But in Thây’s “Buddhist enlightenment” we meditate to end suffering, to see clearly, to meet life in all its beauty and horror as it is, to get over ourselves and befriend our fellow creatures. We don’t need years of practice and we don’t need to cultivate special psychological states; right now in this very moment, breathing in and breathing out, looking into the eyes of the veteran, or the neighbor (who well may be a veteran) or the cashier or our partner, we can be present, awakened, kind. I have arrived! says Thich Nhat Hanh; we have already arrived in our own true home.

—Howard Thoresen
*

My homework for today: study my distress and dissatisfaction. Doctors, nurses, and therapists use this format to diagnose physical/mental ailments, the SOAP format. Bhikkhu Analayo recommends applying the same format to our distress. Identify the problem by its (S) subjective and (O) objective components, (A) assess the cause, and then make a (P) plan. My problem today and every day is that I WANT THINGS TO BE DIFFERENT than they actually are. That person shouldn’t be rude. The rules shouldn’t be so arbitrary. The soup should not be so hot, and it definitely should never be cold. The subjective is my experience of distress/dissatisfaction/discontentment. The objective, the cause of my distress, is my desire for things to be different. (Notice the cause is NOT the “errant” situation!) The assessment is that I really need to learn how to accept things as they are OR be more effective in making necessary changes (complaining is not changing). The plan, using the jargon of this meditation tradition, is the Eightfold Path, or learning to behave differently, shift my mental focus, and learn to understand how the world actually works, as opposed to how I fantasize it works. YTH #7, 19, and 317 relate to this.

—Shad Alexander
*

As I sat still this morning at my writing desk, before turning on the light, in the darkness and silence the weather in my mind began to clear from yesterday’s worries and conundrums, something began to come into focus. In time, I turned on the light, and wrote down this thought:

A loss is first a pang, then a memory. Then , by writing or telling, it may become a story. Then, if told with curiosity and courage, the sorrow becomes a possession, an element of identity, and finally a treasure, a smudge of wisdom.

Then, as my habit each morning early, I explored this thought by shaping it into something like a poem:

Schooling Sorrow

When a sorrow’s young, it’s pure—stunned
pang at breakup, betrayal, failure, death.
You weep, rant, brood, slump. And then

in the morning, sorrow starts its epic
journey into memory, becomes an island
in your archipelago of sufferings.

Then, if you are strong, and lucky to have
a listener—you begin to apprehend its quirks,
to tell it, shape it, watch it grow into a story.

And if you tell your story well, with curiosity
and courage, it then becomes a possession,
and in time a treasure, a smudge of wisdom.

This can be your gift, your offering—but
if you don’t school your sorrow into story
it can never be your friend.

—Kim Stafford
*

Dear Johnny

Thank you for your continued support and love through all you do. I have very much enjoyed (and do continue to enjoy) your recent newsletters. Funny thing, to me at least, is I keep feeling like I want (almost to a need) to give you something profoundly insightful to share and lately felt at a loss, as I’ve read so many things (in your publications) that seem to already say what I would say. So I keep trying to think of something new and exciting—still, to no avail. Then, recently (last week), not trying to think of anything, a concept occurred to me on the subject of fate and “predestiny.”

Throughout my life I’ve pondered fate, choice and destiny. There have been many times in my life when I’ve wondered about the “what ifs.” What if I had made a different choice at any number of crossroads in my life? Would I still be the same person with the same resolve? At times the “could have beens” seem whelming, at best. Recently, the idea occurred to me that maybe both fate, that you make choice, and predestiny both exist simultaneously. The example, or visualization, that came to me is that maybe life, our experience, is like a long, vast river filled with twists, turns, smooth parts, rapids, falls, obstacles, and that our “fateful” choices steer us around or into these, yet we still eventually arrive at the same “pre”destination, no matter what course we take in this river.

Anyway, it’s a concept I’ve been mulling over lately.

—Joseph Opyd
*

I’m interested in co-creating “culture that nurtures” with you, my friends. In #214, “I Don’t Need These Things,” Thich Nhat Hanh says: “…negative forces are everywhere. When you turn on the television, for instance, you run the risk of ingesting harmful things, such as violence, despair, or fear.” Elsewhere, he talks about “mental junk food”—ideas and images which don’t nurture us.

It’s not possible to avoid mental junk food, but it’s unhealthy as a regular diet. Where is healthy food to be found? Everyone gets to figure this out for themselves. I’m prejudiced, but I think our monthly meditation and mindfulness dialogue is healthy food. Many of the people participating in this dialogue are currently living in prison—an environment which has a lot of negativity in it. Whether we are living inside or outside of prison walls, it’s important to choose wisely what we read, what we think about, how we spend our time. Life is short. Each day is precious.

Because most television fare feels unwholesome to me, I’m trying to create my own culture, my own world—one I want to live in. I make an effort to create an inner world that is rich in meaning, that makes me happy, broadens my understanding, nurtures peace and love in my heart. For me, certain writers are very reliable in this regard. And I’m always on the lookout for the next book that will teach me something new, delight me, give me a fresh perspective, open my mind and heart.

—Johnny Stallings
*

To: The Open Road & all its Travelers!

Hsin Hsin Ming is fantastic. It’s odd, your choice of subject, as this is exactly what I’ve been thinking about.

It’s funny, because while I’ve been trying to untangle my own gordian knot, the answers I sought were in front of me the whole time; but, unlike the hero in the story, I used a different way of slicing through my knot. Though I will admit, the process was much the same.

I believe one purpose of that story was to show that when we conform to a certain belief, or thought process, we are limiting ourselves, and in doing so will only fail.

I have been limiting myself for a very long time, but, thankfully, we all can change!

As I said in my last letter, I’ve come to the conclusion that indifference will never do. Balance, on the other hand, is a very different story. When using both the positive and the negative, you allow them to cancel each other out. The same goes for weights and counterweights. This, when done correctly, would leave you floating happily in between, neither drifting to one side or the other, but in the middle…Balanced.

The Hsing Hsin Ming said: “…Make the smallest distinction and heaven and earth are far apart…” and “…If you want to experience it, don’t be for or against anything…”

The only way I can see this working is by achieving balance, and, like I said before, there is only one way to balance the scales.

This led me to my next thought and another very helpful piece: “…Caught in duality, how can you know oneness?”

You know, I puzzled over this for a long time, and then, when reading the next line, found a wonderful answer staring up at me from the page….Unity and understanding. Two beautiful words. Unity is balance and understanding is realizing there can be no balance when striving towards any one thing alone.

I don’t think the texts are about condemning duality or escaping it, I believe they speak of duality being the weight and counterweight, the true keys to achieving balance, “oneness,” in order to escape the samsara. We are caught in duality and must make it work. Duality is in man’s nature for a reason, and like the wise words on page three say: “…following our nature, we are in harmony with the way, wandering freely, without a care…”

And here is where I’ll make my last stand with a final quote: “…to accept everything is to be enlightened…”

Peace & love

—Joshua Barnes
*

Today, December 13, is Bodhi Day, the Buddhist holiday that commemorates the day that the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, experienced enlightenment. In Thailand, where my youngest son has lived for the past eight years, there are numerous temples that display the key moments in the Buddha’s life in a frieze that goes around the inner walls. So that we might step into the scene along with his disciples and remember the teachings.

I thought it would be a good time to tell the story of the Buddha’s awakening and the happiness derived from following his teachings. It may be familiar to most of you but worth hearing over and over. I have studied with Thich Nhat Hanh for many years and taught classes with Rev. Bob Schaibly. These teachings are for all; there is no reason to be a Buddhist or practice Buddhism as a religion. But it is good to know the essence of what we are talking about and to honor the original source.

Bodhi Day is observed in the Buddhist traditions in Asia from India and Japan to Thailand and Vietnam. Bodhi Day serves as a reminder of the wisdom that is naturally available to us all, the wisdom that comes from looking deeply in the present moment, of cultivating our minds, and recognizing that everything is interconnected.

Siddhartha, was born around 530 BC. He grew up in India, as a Prince born and raised into a wealthy family, who lived surrounded by beautiful gardens in a spacious palace. When he was born his parents were told that their son’s destiny was to be a great warrior or he would become a great spiritual teacher. His parents wanted him to carry on with their established life, they wanted a warrior. Like all parents they also wanted their son to be safe and grow up satisfied. So they tried to isolate and protect him from the world and meet his every need and desire. But as he grew into his teenage years and adulthood he felt like he was imprisoned. Sound familiar!?

One night Siddhartha and a servant went out of the palace gates into the surrounding villages.

They first came upon an old man who was stooped over, using a walking stick, and balding.

Siddhartha asked, what does this mean? His servant explained that this is Old Age.

They went on and came upon an ill person with sores who was in terrible discomfort. The servant explained to Siddhartha again, this is Illness.

They then came to a corpse in the road. And Siddhartha was shocked and asked again.

And his servant said, All living things pay a price for life and this is Death. Siddhartha was frightened by all this suffering.

Then they came upon a simple ascetic carrying a begging bowl, who did not want anything to do with commerce and the travails of the modern world. We too recognize this.

Siddhartha soon decided to leave the palace and follow the path of the ascetic to see if he can find release from his fears and this suffering. He went out into the world dressed in his servant’s clothes, an 18 year old young man. He went in search of knowledge with this group of poor and dedicated ascetics. He fasts to the point of exhaustion and realizes ultimately that this will not work for him.

The life of hedonism in a palace as a prince and a life of starvation are not giving him any more understanding about the world. So he adopts what is called The Middle Way.

He sits, determined to pay attention to what is happening. He sits under the Bodhi tree, meditating until he comes to some wisdom. He overcomes all temptations after a period like 40 days and 40 nights. He realizes enlightenment and in the moment of touching the earth he takes it as his witness. He finds that concentrating on our breath we can be happy in the present moment. One of his most important teachings is about calming the mind so that we are not overwhelmed by our emotions of fear and anger. From that day on he started teaching the eight-fold path to inner peace.

Compassion and understanding are what comes from mindfulness and meditation and the practice of looking deeply at our and others’ suffering. Compassion then can come about and one can move from being to acting without being overcome. Without compassion fatigue. This story is related to the western story of the Good Samaritan who helped another without worrying about the consequences from the rules of his religion or culture.

The Buddha in his enlightenment came up with an eight-fold path to follow for living with awareness and happiness for ourselves and others. The essence of the teachings are based on the five remembrances of the human condition that is a reality for each of us:

I am of the nature to grow old.

Oh how we try in vain to keep our youthful looks. We even find it hard to believe we are not still our younger selves when we look in the mirror. Even in our seventies we can feel close to those young adult years.

I am of the nature to become ill.

If we live a healthy life we often feel it is not fair if we get sick, as though it was a justice issue. We all will become ill as life goes on.

I am of the nature to die.

This is something live most of our lives in denial about. In our culture especially we keep death hidden away.

Everything that I care about will pass away.
This is the teaching of impermanence. Everything changes. We will lose those we love, and our possessions, and even our ideas and ideals.
Only my deeds will survive me.

May I act well to make a world that is lovely and loving. What we do, and how we do thing things makes a difference. This is the secret of peace and happiness and freedom.

Remember to pass it on, pay it forward, even with a smile, but especially with our stories.

I’m so glad you all are enjoying our monthly sharing of Mindfulness and Meditation!

Peace and love, I miss everyone in person. Be well.

—Katie Radditz

peace, love, happiness & understanding 12/10/20
2020-12-10 - 2020-12-23
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

December 10, 2020

Aristotle and Phyllis by Rick Bartow

Charles Erickson

Andrew Larkin

Hugo Anaya

from Jake Scharbach’s sketchbook

peace & love

Johnny

Bibliophiles Unanimous! MYTHOLOGY with Will Hornyak 12/6/20
2020-12-06 15:00 - 17:00
On Sunday, December 6th, storyteller Will Hornyak will lead a lively Zoom conversation about MYTHOLOGY at 3 pm. Don’t miss this!!! Here’s the link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82169567543

Into the Mythic!
The world’s oldest stories are like venerable ancestors whose voices still speak, offering insights and strategies for dealing with contemporary issues and predicaments. Because myths describe great times of upheaval and change, they are especially relevant to us during times of radical change in our own world. Storyteller Will Hornyak will consider some ideas from mythologists Lewis Hyde, Joseph Campbell, Martin Shaw and Michael Meade about the vital nature of mythology and a “mythic sensitivity” to the world. We’ll discuss how various myths have shaped our lives and our own personal connection to mythology.

COLLISION REPAIR: Jake Scharbach at Froelick Gallery
2020-12-03 - 2021-01-30
Sisyphus, Titian 1548, painting by Jake Scharbach, oil on canvas, 60″ x 48″

Dear Friends of the Open Road

Nancy’s nephew, Jake Scharbach, has a show at the Froelick Gallery from December 1, 2020 – January 30, 2012.
Here’s a link to the exhibit:

https://privateviews.artlogic.net/2/1cdd977e49691fb0c6d57e/

If you live in the Portland area, be sure to see the show! Froelick Gallery is open by appointment, Tuesday – Saturday, from 11 am to 5:30 pm.

Here is a link to a conversation with Jake about his art:

https://youtu.be/cbVVcRRxU2A

peace & love
Johnny

Hsin Hsin Ming by Seng Ts'an
2020-12-01 - 2020-12-14
hsin hsin ming
by seng ts’an

the great way is not difficult
it has no preferences

when love and hate are absent
all becomes clear

make the smallest distinction
and heaven and earth are far apart

if you want to experience it
don’t be for or against anything

conflict between liking and not liking
is the disease of the mind

if its deep meaning is not understood
we strive in vain to quiet the mind

it is perfect like vast space
nothing lacking, nothing left over

accepting and rejecting
we can’t see the essence

don’t get entangled in outer things
or abide in inner emptiness

when the mind is still
all views disappear

trying to quiet the mind
is just more activity

caught in duality
how can you know oneness?

when unity is not understood
both activity and quietude are failures

if you deny the reality of things, all things are lost
pursue emptiness and you stray even further from it

the more talking and thinking
the farther you go from what is

stop talking and thinking
and there’s nothing you can’t understand

return to the root and find meaning
follow appearances and lose the source

look within for just a moment
and go beyond appearance and emptiness

changing appearances in this empty world
seem real due to ignorance

don’t seek truth
just let go of your views

don’t remain in duality
take care never to go that way

choosing this or that
the mind is lost in confusion

duality comes from the one
but don’t be attached to the one

when the mind is still
the ten thousand things do not offend

when things don’t affect you, they cease to exist
no thought, no mind

without an object of thought, there can be no thinking subject
without a thinker, there are no things

things are things because of the mind
the mind is the mind because of things

if you want to understand mind and world
see them as ultimately one emptiness

in this emptiness the two are one
it contains everything

don’t distinguish between coarse and refined
and you won’t be for this or against that

the great way is vast
to live in accord with it is neither easy nor hard

those with narrow views are full of doubt and fear
the more they hurry, the slower they go

clinging has no limit
we go down the wrong path

in accord with nature
nothing comes or goes

following our nature, we are in harmony with the way
wandering freely, without a care

fixed ideas can’t encompass what is true
they sink into darkness, become unhealthy

don’t trouble your mind
why shun this and desire that?

if you want to take the one vehicle
don’t reject mental or sensory experience

to accept everything
is to be enlightened

the wise man does nothing
the fool shackles himself

the dharma has no distinctions
they come from our foolish attachments

seeking the mind with the mind
isn’t that a big mistake?

illusion creates concepts like tranquil and disordered
illumination destroys liking and disliking

all pairs of opposites
are created by our ignorance

dreams, illusions, flowers in the air
why bother trying to grasp them?

profit and loss, right and wrong
get rid of them once and for all

if the eyes don’t close in sleep
all dreaming ceases naturally

if the mind makes no discriminations
the ten thousand things have one essence

understanding the mystery of one suchness
difficulties are forgotten

see all things as equal
and all will return to naturalness

no descriptions or analogies are possible
of this state where relations have come to an end

arrest motion, and motion ceases
move stillness and stillness is gone

when dualities are abolished
how can there be one?

in the end, things are ultimately
not subject to law

for the unified mind in harmony with the way
all striving ceases

all doubts are cleared up
established in right intuition

nothing remains
there’s nothing to remember

empty, clear, your light shines
without mental effort

thought can’t reach this
beyond knowing, imagining, feeling

in the realm of things as they are
there is no self or other

if you want to approach and enter it
just say “not two”

where there are not two, all is the same
there is nothing that is not included

the wise of all times and places
enter into this source

truth cannot be increased or decreased
one moment, ten thousand years

no here, no there
the whole world right before our eyes

the tiny is as large as the vast
when boundaries are gone

the vast is as small as the tiny
when there are no limits

what is, is not
what is not, is

any other view
must be abandoned

one thing is all things
all things are one thing

when you’ve understood this
there’s no need to worry about not being perfect

the stable mind is nondual
intuition and mind are not two

beyond words
no past, no future, no now

–version by johnny stallings

some notes:
The Hsin Hsin Ming is the earliest known Zen writing. Seng Ts’an is the Third Zen Patriarch. He lived in China from 529 to 606 AD. The First Zen Patriarch was Bodhidharma, who lived in the 5th or 6th Century, and is credited with bringing Zen (or Chan) Buddhism to China from India.
The origin of Zen Buddhism is the Buddha’s Flower Sermon. One day the Buddha held up a white flower. Mahākāśyapa realized enlightenment, and smiled.
The first Zen text comes a thousand years later.
The “great way” referred to in the opening verse is the Chinese word “tao,” which also stands for ultimate reality in Taoism. The “it” in verses 4, 6, 7 & 14, also refers to the Tao.
Translating Chinese is problematic. I am not a scholar of classical Chinese. I’ve made this version as accurate and clear as I can by consulting many English translations.
I hope you find it helpful in your meditation and mindfulness practice.

May all people be happy.
May we live in peace & love.

–Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 11/26/20
2020-11-26 - 2020-12-09
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

November 26, 2020

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
wich is natural which is infinite which is yes
(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)
how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?
(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

—e. e. cummings (1894-1962)
*

Giving thanks. There’s nothing more important. It’s the difference between living in Heaven or Hell. Something so simple. And yet, some people’s brains accidentally got programmed to complain. I usually start the day by noticing the miraculousness of everything, without exception, and then…feeling grateful. Every day a day of thanksgiving.
*

Poetry

And it was at that age … Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don’t know, I don’t know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don’t know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names,
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire,
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.

—Pablo Neruda (Chilean Nobel Prize-winning poet, 1904-1973)
*

Kim Stafford sent us an approach to a daily writing practice. And some poems.

Writing as Ritual: Four Elements of a Daily Writing Page
A chapter from a work in progress, Writing for Happiness, by Kim Stafford

Be the Eric Snowden of your inner life.

I had been writing for years, by fits and starts, when my father’s death opened a
new path for my life as a writer, and as a seeker. By his last will and testament, I
inherited the care of his twenty thousand hand-written pages of daily writing
from the 1950s through the day of his death in 1993. William Stafford’s writing
practice had been invisible to me when he was alive, because he rose before
dawn to write, and I did not. All through childhood, I would see the literary
magazines where his poems were published appear on the coffee table — Crazyhorse,
Poetry, Cimarron Review — and every year a book or two would come forth. When people
would ask him, “Bill, when is your next book coming out?” he would often answer, “Which
one?”

How did he do that? Simple: he wrote something every day, and his books
were made from about one day’s writing out of eight that he found worthy.
A few weeks after my father died, I started to carry the reams of his scribbling
down from the attic, and leaf through his pages one by one. His scrawl was a
challenge, and I sometimes needed a magnifying glass to examine the tangle of
feral words to tease the meaning forth. But overall, I began to see four elements
in his practice that worked together in a way both practical and mystical.

I want to consider what my father’s daily writing pages contained, and how
they worked for him — and how something like his approach might work for any
of us who choose to give such daily writing practice a try. His pages, which are
now housed in the William Stafford Archives at Lewis & Clark College, exhibit a
varying daily mixture of four prevailing elements:

1. Each page begins with the date. Is that even worth mentioning? Well, it turns out to be strangely helpful — in the act of writing, and of course for keeping track of the writings. “Once I write the date on a piece of paper,” he said once, “I know I’m okay. I have made it to my writing.” This is the “open sesame” move of the daily writing practice, for by jotting the date down on a page, you have accomplished the most difficult first step: you have shown up, and you have begun. The pen is active before any wisdom is required, and you have stepped humbly into what William Stafford called “the realm where miracles happen.”

2. Then, often, the page would begin with some prose notes from a recent experience, a few sentences about a connection with friends, an account of a dream. This short passage of “throwaway” writing, it turns out, is very important, as it keeps the pen moving and gets the mind sniffing along through ordinary experience. I call this stage “the boring prose.” You are beginning the act of writing without needing to write anything profound. No struggle, no effort, no heroic reach. Just writing.

3. Then there will sometimes be an “aphorism” — a freestanding sentence, an idea, a question, a note about a pattern he perceived, a puzzle. With the aphorism, as we call it in his pages, William Stafford would write a sentence that “lifted off” from daily experience to observe an emblem of thought, a truth, an idea, or a private joke. (“It still takes all kinds to make a world, but there is an oversupply of some.”) This provisional understanding from daily life begins to raise the writer’s attention out of the mundane into the gently miraculous realm of poetry. It is your own koan.

The aphorisms in William Stafford’s daily writing rarely become part of the poem to follow (though a few of his poems are built from a series of such lines). Most often, they are little wonders left to resonate as private treasure, threshold, key. A bell has been struck, bringing the writer to attention.

4. Then he would write something like a poem… or notes toward a poem… or just an exploratory set of lines that never became a poem. Sometimes there might be a single line of lyric mystery. But he had taken a few steps up the ladder from silence in the general direction of song.

To write the date, some prose, an idea, and then poetic lines beyond prose — this can begin a process for distilling from ordinary experience the extraordinary report of literature. For this day, again, you have given yourself a chance to discover worthy things. Nothing stupendous may occur … but if you do not bring yourself to this point, nothing stupendous will happen for sure … and you are likely to spend the balance of your day in reaction to the imperatives of the outer world — worn down, buffeted, diminished, martyred.

William Stafford’s use of these four elements is capricious. Many pages, especially in his later years, show only the date followed by a poem. His long practice has speeded the process. And even in his early years, he can go many days without preliminary prose or aphorism—or he can jot a series of aphorisms as if he has been saving them to record in a rush.

Most of us do an assignment shortly before it is due. (That’s often true for me.) It’s better to begin the project when it’s first assigned, not when it’s due. And, I realize, again and again, it’s even better to practice self-directed searching, writing, thinking on the page — when there is no assignment given. This empowers the free range of mind, of “hands-on thinking.” By something like this daily practice, you build up a personal sheaf of riches, a democracy of inner voices, an archive you can draw from as needed for work and pleasure over time.

My students once said to me, “You give us a deadline for our writing. But who gives you a deadline?” A terrible sentence came to my mind: “Death is my deadline.” There are myriad latent discoveries in me. Daily, I must bring them forth. For this reason, several years ago, I made a vow to perform this four-part practice every day. What works for me is to do this four-step process first thing, before daylight. I’ve decided to enlist all four elements each day—the date, of course. And then there is always something to scribble about from the day before—the boring prose. And then—what now seems an essential element in the process—the aphorism. To wait for a thought, which always appears, given time and welcome, is the prelude to true practice. The aphorism is the hinge that begins to turn memory to thought, event to idea, scribbling to design. Then a poem, something like a poem, notes for a poem.

This four-step process on the page became a more mysterious form of beckoning when I learned an idea from Buddhism while traveling in Bhutan. Each place, I learned—each experience, each person, each dream, text, encounter—may offer four ways of knowing:

the visible
the invisible
the secret
the deeply secret

So there it is again: the date—visible. A scribbled memory from the day before—the invisible, but palpable. The thought—a secret episode of the Buddhist “unborn.” And then … then whatever mystery may come next, a secret so deep it will not appear unless you use something like this process to welcome what you didn’t know until you do.

As I tell my students, if you follow this four-step process, or something like it, you may not compose something of lasting value every day — but it will be a better day! It will be a day that begins with your own appointment with silence, with attention, with welcome. Something like this structure can lift your writing into a realm of episodic discovery reaching beyond a simple journal or diary, worthy as those habits can be. Gradually, inexorably, you will accumulate riches to return to, an archive of discrete beginnings to nurture on the path of your devotions.

Based on the legacy of William Stafford, as explored further in my own practice, I offer this four-part daily writing ritual as a kind of hands-on meditation. And with this pattern, I propose a year of daily exploration founded in your own version, as it evolves, of this daily practice. What will it be like to experience the kind of sustained and sustaining life of writing you have long imagined?

—Kim Stafford
*

While many have been locked down at home, what’s it like to be homeless, to watch the already fragile future dissolve, your landmarks of support and certainty vanish? Here’s a poem for anyone feeling adrift in the face of change. I hope you can support programs that help those currently living outside…

My Sheltering Sky

When I was born, when I was helpless, there were stars
Above me blue in their midnight galaxy.
When I was hurt, there were scars no one could see.
When I was growing, the sun was dimmed for me
By killing silence where there should have been a song.

Did you hear a song when you were young,
A chorus that sang your name with love?
How many little ways were you reminded of
Your worth, your chance, your path to rise above
Your struggles, a way to feel that you belong?

One night by the river when I couldn’t sleep
For streetlights glittering the water dark,
I looked above my troubles where I saw a spark,
Another world, a guide, a star to mark
My destination far beyond my pain.

On that shore I felt there was fatal door
I could step through into waters cold
To quench my life before I got too old
In sorrows, hard tomorrows, I could fold
My arms and plunge into the deep.

But then I looked above it all and saw
My shelter, my sky where stars were calling
And I felt that I was falling up instead of down,
And I wore some kind of crown
That gave me my ticket to the dawn.

Now I find there’s work, and worth, and wonder.
Though I know my sorrows won’t be completely gone,
Someone helped me carry on and find
A wealth in heart and mind
That helps me know I finally belong.

For I looked above it all and saw
My shelter, my sky where stars were calling
And I felt that I was falling up instead of down,
And I wore some kind of crown
That gave me my ticket to the dawn.

Poetry Doctor

How do you feel?
How, exactly, have you
learned to feel — to be
touched, to apprehend?
These twinges you have —
of compassion, empathy, pain —
how long have you had them?
Have they grown more intense
with age? Do they manifest at
sunset? At dawn? In the presence
of beauty? Of suffering?
Does your heart ever skip?
Do you ever feel dizzy
with delight or shame? Has
the grace of a few right words
ever blurred your vision? Caught
your breath? Has your heart
ever become a drum when
a song’s words told you
who you are in secret?

I’m afraid my diagnosis
must remain incomplete
without further tests:
Neruda, Dickinson, Basho.

—Kim Stafford
*

“Peace, love, happiness & understanding” will be bi-weekly from now on. The next one will come out on December 10th. See you then!

peace, love & gratitude

Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 11/19/20
2020-11-19 - 2020-11-25
Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati, Peter Oppenheimer and Nancy Yeilding

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

November 19, 2020

“Peace, love, happiness & understanding” goes out to people who live in prison and to people who don’t. We might imagine—if we don’t take a little time to think about it—that people who live in prison are not free, and that those who don’t…are. But our experience shows us that many people “on the outside” have all kinds of fears, problems, obligations, addictions, et cetera. They are not free. And if we take a moment to reflect, it’s obvious that every prison resident has her or his own subjective reality. “On the inside,” too, some people have a greater sense of inner freedom than others. Nancy Yeilding sent this essay in which she talks about what she learned about freedom from her guru:

Finding Freedom’s Firm Foundation

When I met Guru Nitya in the early 1970s I was, without knowing it, in the traditional state of a seeker of truth, described in India as being frighteningly tossed about by the waves of the ocean or being like a deer caught in the conflagration of a forest fire, not knowing which way to turn. My state was one that I shared with many young people of that time, and many people of all time. Although blessed with many good fortunes—loving care in my childhood, an excellent education, free from having to face the extreme deprivations of hunger, poverty, abuse, or slavery, or to live in the midst of war, which still afflict many millions of human beings—I was miserable. Every place I had looked for meaning and purpose in life had turned to ashes.

In high school I became happily involved with a local church, which offered good companionship, the opportunity to participate in good works, and the chance to sing beautiful music. However, as I learned more about the organization and the required set of beliefs, the first of which demonstrated some pettiness of spirit and the second of which began to affront my intellect and sense of reality, I slowly drew back, disappointed.

As I came to learn of the Civil Rights movement, of what made it necessary, and of the brutality that was often directed at the courageous people standing up for equal rights, the governmental and social institutions of this land I had been taught to regard as the world’s “knight in shining armor” began to look suspect. Then US involvement in the Vietnam war—which led to the killing of civilians, the wholesale destruction of the land of Vietnam itself as well as of its neighbors, the death, wounding, and soul-torture of many young men forced to fight, to die, to kill, or to face prison or exile and being branded as cowards and traitors—shattered any sense of pride I’d had about the nation and undermined hope for the future. Along with many others I felt compelled to oppose these actions by letters and petitions, and by nonviolent protests and demonstrations. Although these actions had more positive impact than is usually acknowledged, still the government continued to perpetrate violent crimes against humanity, such as through CIA support of the coup to assassinate and overthrow the government of fairly elected Allende in Chile, which was replaced with a reign of terror, along with indications that this was only the tip of the iceberg in terms of immoral and heinous activities covertly conducted around the world.

At Stanford, students discovered that the grand university that had opened so many doors for us—to the bounty of human culture in art, music, literature, to deep insights offered by psychology, anthropology, sociology, the latest in scientific discovery, and so much more—was deeply implicated in the war “machine,” through research on campus and through links to the companies that were making the bombs and Agent Orange. We protested, we brought about some changes, but our hearts were sad as our eyes remained open to the links that expanded the “military-industrial complex” to the “military-industrial-educational complex.”

During university years I fell in love with a fellow student, who, like every other healthy young man at the time, lived with the threat of being drafted to fight in a war he felt was immoral, so upon graduation we took two steps to provide some protection: by marrying and joining the Teacher Corps, which offered its participants a degree in education and a teaching credential and the opportunity to contribute by working in underserved inner city schools (and a draft deferment!). We were posted to Kentucky, where I discovered that I was ill-suited to early childhood education (the program we were placed in) and that the social environment was like stepping back in time fifty years. Skills I had honed at Stanford—of thinking for myself, of speaking up and speaking out—served only to alienate me from most everyone, who wanted no rocking of the boat, especially by a woman. I left the program and began to flail about, trying out many different ways to contribute to alleviating injustice, poverty, discrimination, and violence, unsuccessfully seeking meaningful work and community. Under the weight of my increasing distress, our marriage disintegrated.

I often became aware that the refrain of a popular song at the time was singing within: “any day now, any day now, I shall be released.” It was one expression of my deep yearning for freedom, though at the time I would not have been able to articulate freedom from what or freedom for what. After returning to California I worked in various jobs, and explored many possible avenues to meaning and happiness, none of which proved lasting or deeply fulfilling. My life had the freedom of a will-o-the wisp: I went where the wind carried me. Although will-o-the wisps are delightful to see, sparkling in the sun as they waft through the air, and though living as one had many charms, real freedom was elusive, as I was also living on an emotional roller coaster and often felt adrift. Once or twice my path crossed that of an old Stanford friend, Peter Oppenheimer, who each time told me about the teacher he had met in India and his strong feelings that I should meet him too. Then, on a spring day in 1973, he invited me for lunch at the San Francisco apartment where he and Guru were staying, hosted by some friends.

In those days, teachers from India often passed through the Bay Area, where they typically appeared at huge gatherings, treated with a good deal of reverence and fanfare, rarely approachable by those not in the inner circle. So the first thing that struck me about Guru was that he was unassuming and available. He was even one of the cooks of the lunch! When we sat down he pleasantly engaged in conversation with everyone, all of whom made me feel welcome. He had a way of making everyone laugh often. The whole afternoon had a relaxed flow. It was so pleasant that when I was invited to return the next day I readily agreed.

That day the invitation also was extended to come along to hear a talk he was giving to a group at a friend’s house. During the talk Guru began to speak about the universal Self that was also the most intimate core self of each of us:

Inexhaustible qualities of consciousness can be experienced as “I” in me and as “I” in you. It is the same cosmic “I,” the Word, the Logos, that is expressed as the boundless universe—boundless both in time and in space. The transient “I” has the same substance as the eternal Self. What is here and what is yonder there cancel out in the silence of the unutterable and the unthinkable.

It was like a bell ringing within as I resonated with what he described. Finally, here was someone saying what I had always sensed to be true and, importantly, doing so in a way that did not offend my intellect. I wanted to know more.

As I was being welcomed, I drove each day to spend time in the apartment on California Street, and to go along to whatever talks were happening. After some days Guru pointed out that his time in the US would soon be over and he invited me to stay with them for the rest of the time. I happily agreed. I made several new friends, some of whom are dear friends to this day. There were delicious meals, lovely outings to parks and beaches, deeply meaningful classes . . . and at the core of it all was this remarkable person who—besides being wise and brilliant and funny and creative and loving—was happy, happy in a way that was different from what I had ever encountered before.

He was happy and complete in himself, not looking to any thing or any one to meet some need, which would then make him happy. The image came to me of a fountain that continuously circulates. He was like a continuously circulating fountain of happiness, with plenty to share. That engendered a deep feeling of trust, trust that I need have no concerns about being manipulated or “used” in any way, for here—amazingly—was a person who needed nothing from me! It gave me a freedom I had never experienced in a human relationship before. Unsought and unanticipated, a surety of dedication to the wisdom and love embodied by Guru arose within me right from those early days.

For the next eight years, to the extent possible given limited finances, I oriented my life around Guru’s teaching visits to the US. I increasingly traveled, lived, and studied with him whenever he was in the US, and eventually joined him in circumnavigating the world: with stays in California, Oregon, Hawaii, Australia, Singapore, India, and Europe. In order to have money to support myself, I worked at a graduate department of a university in San Francisco, I cared for an elderly woman in Palo Alto, I worked as a typesetter and printer in Portland, as a landscape gardener in Hawaii, as a receptionist in an alternative health clinic in Australia, a secretary at Stanford’s Learning Assistance Center . . .

Through those years a dynamic inner and outer process was taking place. Slowly, bit by bit, Guru exposed the falsity of the props that held up my faltering though intransigent ego, whether based on background, education, intellectual equipment and attainment, companions, appearance…. At the same time, through his university classes (Portland State, UC Sonoma, Stanford, University of Hawaii, University of New South Wales), his public lectures, his books and articles, and informally and privately, he spread before all of us a vision of the vast panorama of the cultural, philosophical, and spiritual heritage of humanity, giving us maps and keys to find and unlock the treasures. He revealed the profound gifts of the Bhagavad Gita and the Bible, of the Upanishads and the Tao Te Ching, Heidegger and Sartres, the Buddha and Ramana Maharshi, Shakespeare and Kalidasa, Einstein and Eddington, Spinoza and Kant, Jayadeva and St. John of the Cross, Van Gogh and Beethoven, Basho and Rumi, and so much more, vividly helping us to see the links between wisdom-teaching and the creation of beauty and our own lives. Even more, his own living example of love for each moment, each being, and every aspect of life created an atmosphere in which we had the opportunity to attune ourselves to that vision and those possibilities.

His vision was vast and the spotlight of his teaching highlighted a myriad of insights. At the same time it was clear that the philosophical vision and life example of Narayana Guru, as profoundly manifested in his life through his relationship with his Guru, Nataraja Guru, was central. The teaching stories he told of his experiences as a disciple of Nataraja Guru were heart-touching and deeply stirring, setting off inner reverberations that continue to echo with profound meaning. They inspired me to read everything of Nataraja Guru’s that I could get my hands on: The Word of the Guru (The Life and Teachings of Narayana Guru), Autobiography of an Absolutist, One World Education, One World Economics, his unparalleled commentary on the Gita, his commentary on Saundaryalahari, and even his magnum opus, Integrated Science of the Absolute. Each such encounter was like entering a new world and, at the same time, having the opportunity to examine my own past, my experiences, my assessment of them, my conditioning, my thought patterns, and to throw out superstition, prejudice, confusion, and replace it with clearer thinking and openness.

I soaked deep into Guru’s own writing as well, especially once I started taking dictation of his books, articles, and letters, and beginning to edit his books. Most profound was the opportunity to devote a hundred days to an in-depth contemplation and application of Narayana Guru’s One Hundred Verses of Self-Instruction (Atmopadesa Satakam), which took place in Portland in 1977-78. In the course of those classes, Guru spoke about freedom in ways that articulated not only my inner yearning, but the way I could feel my life blossoming:

The passing moments of our lives are to be made lively and rich. One thing I have learned in my life is that the moment that comes will not come again. It’s gone. You can see the moment approaching. Receive it with open arms. Glorify it by enriching it with your joy, finding a new value, a new sense of direction in life. Have a renewed sense of wonder. Thus, that moment becomes eternalized in your life, it is a moment to be remembered and to be proud that you could live it so well. . . .

The only thing is that you shouldn’t drift into darkness. Don’t look at the world as something horrid, but as beautiful, divine. Every bit of it. Then we know we are the creators of our own fate. Not through this individual ego with all its vagaries, but through a full affiliation with the eternal, supernatural light that enriches everything. Only then will we have the strength to become masters of the situation, the whole beauty of creation, the beauty that has painted the petals of the flowers, which has given shape to the butterflies and birds, which makes the mountains look awe-inspiring and the oceans look vast, which makes the clouds float so gracefully overhead. This is where we find our true freedom.

You belong to the same overmind of beauty. Not with your ego but with your spirit. Participation in it will reveal to you the divine artist in you, the divine musician in you, the divine intelligence, the divine creator, the divine lover, the divine unifier, the divine peacemaker within you. It’s such a blessing to be in this world, to be born here and to live here.

And:

I can go from the physical world of experience to a dream experience to a deep sleep experience. If I go still farther I won’t be able to make any distinction at all between the subject and object. The world of the seer and the world of the seen come together until both are canceled out and effaced. One comes to a neutral area of unity. Once we know that there is an aspect of knowledge which effaces or cancels out the physical world, the heaviness of phenomenality is not felt any more.

From this you gain a new freedom. The freedom is to relate yourself to the phenomenal world, with all the laws which operate in it, and yet to keep within a calm repose by which you can sit on your own seat of absolute certitude as a witness.

Guru made it very clear that certain kinds of freedom were dead ends for those seeking lasting happiness and meaning in life, such as the freedom of rejecting all that had come before, the freedom of nihilism, the freedom of pursuing lifestyles based on self-destructive behaviors, the freedom of amassing wealth and property. At the same time he was not encouraging a withdrawal from participation in life. His own life abundantly demonstrated the freedom of relating to the phenomenal world, with all the laws that operate in it, and yet keeping within the calm repose of a witness, resting on absolute certitude, even when the passage through that world presented inevitable bumps.

He inspired all who came to him to learn more about the phenomenal world, to uncover its secrets through science, history, anthropology, sociology, literature, art, music, and through paying close attention to and peering beneath the surface of what presented itself to us right where we were, wherever we were placed in life. At the same time, his classes, his instruction in meditation, his illumination of the mystical truths revealed by seers and poets, and, above all, his silence, glowing with serenity and fullness, led us inward to our own essential nature.

We all encounter, to greater and lesser degrees, the obstructions to freedom presented by concrete reality, ranging from natural forces to our own nature, from the behavior of others in our work places and families to economic constrictions, and especially the terrifying dynamics resulting from injustice, oppression, war, and natural catastrophe. The great wisdom of Guru’s approach lay in not denying such dynamics, but in making it clear that we each play a significant role in either exaggerating or minimizing their impact, as well as revealing our capacity to understand them more deeply and deal with them more effectively.

His own life offered daily evidence, in the form of writing articles, convening meetings, and giving talks to expose and combat injustice and temper political and religious clashes, writing popular books that revealed the world’s cultural treasures as well as profound philosophical expositions, counseling thousands of people, with deep psychological acuity and profound spiritual guidance, taking action himself such as by sweeping a village road in need of cleaning or planting potatoes to provide needed employment as well as food or advocating for women’s health care or sponsoring celebrations of art, music, drama, and poetry. At the same time, how he dealt with his own physical suffering and disability provided a living example of what is possible when our identity is with the witness and not the suffering body.

I learned that the firm foundation created by insightful participation in the transactional realm, paired with imperiencing our identity with the limitless light of consciousness, supports freedom of ever-expanding dimensions: the freedom to wholeheartedly commit to manifesting our highest values; the freedom to explore widely and deeply as a blessed lover of life; the freedom to create unhampered by internal and external messages of inadequacy; the freedom to give open-heartedly without being stifled by fears of being taken advantage of; the freedom to be aware of ourselves as part of the ocean of all-pervading love. . .

The gift of such freedom is a priceless treasure for which words are an inadequate expression of the gratitude that continually arises in response. Life itself becomes the manifestation of gratitude and the celebration of love.

—Nancy Yeilding

Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue 11/15/20
2020-11-15 - 2020-12-14
Drawing by Charles Erickson

Open Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue

November 15, 2020

Welcome to our third meditation and mindfulness dialogue! The numbers below refer to passages from the book Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh. (JS)
*

M & M Dialogue Group,

I regret that I have not opened my copy of Your True Home to start reading the wisdom within, nor that I have not written sooner in response to and for the M & M newsletter. As we all know, things seem to get in the way and/or we make excuses, but something happened yesterday that moved me to embark on something. I reached my one year mark, 365 days until I get released, and so I will read one wisdom each day, completing the 365 pages of the wisdom within, realizing “My True Home.”

In the book, I believe I will find that, as #1 says—“Your True Home is in the here and the now. It is not limited by time, space, nationality, or race”—although I have 365 days until I go home physically, my true home is not limited by time or space, those 365 days. My true home is here and now within me. It is also like that saying, “The home is where the heart is,” and my heart, and love, is within me. As long as I keep love within me, my home will be in the here and now.

My 365 days until release started yesterday, October 14th, so I also today read #2, One Hundred Percent. Although I look forward to reading #365—notice I did not write the heading name, as I have not looked forward in the book to that final day—I also have thoughts of my life after these 365 days are over, but I am still in the here and now. “Be there truly. Be there with 100 percent of yourself.” I can only take one day at a time, it’s all any of us can do.

I look forward each day to reading a new wisdom from the book, growing and finding a deeper meaning in life and within myself. With the added benefit of seeing the bookmark move closer to the end of the book, signifying my physical release home. To all of you reading M & M Dialogue newsletter, may peace, love and happiness be with you and within you.

—Josh Underhill
*

Responding to a couple of comments from the October newsletter: Johnny posits two seemingly dichotomous versions of “nirvana.” Either it can be accessed by a few rare souls who practice for many lifetimes; or it is an omnipresent perfect moment that is accessible to anyone who takes a moment to look for it. I wish to endorse a middle ground. Using one of the Buddha’s many definitions of Nirvana (and exercising a certain amount of editing):

“The practitioner may attain such a concentration…that the practitioner has realized the complete cessation of greed, hate, and delusion…Nirvana is realizable even during this lifetime.”

Historically, hundreds of thousands of people achieved Nirvana during the same generation, and maybe they number in the millions across the generations. So, not so rare.

But to Josh Barnes’ point, this state of mind seems very elusive. Omnipresent perfect moment though it may be, we have trained ourselves to see only imperfection. We can thank popular media, our parents, their parents for countless generations, society at large, and most especially our own selves for our preoccupation with imperfection. But there you have the problem, we have to untrain some old habits before we can “awaken” to the perfection around us. Venerable Thay describes this at #1, the namesake passage for YTH.

—Shad Alexander
*

I’m happy that Shad responded to what I wrote about nirvana in the October dialogue. I was hoping that this meditation and mindfulness dialogue would evolve into more of a dialogue as it goes along. Unsurprisingly, his perspective is a little different than mine. I don’t know. I imagine that the word “nirvana,” like words tend to do, means different things to different people. For me, one of the lovely things about meditation, is that when we sit in silence, we leave words aside for a while. When there is inner stillness, when thought and language fall away, we have no disagreements—not even friendly ones. For a time that has nothing to do with time, we have no problems, no explanations, no wrong views or right ones. No greed, hate or delusions. Whatever you call this, it’s quite a pleasant state of affairs. When we begin the day this way, the whole day somehow goes better. I think of “mindfulness” as the practice of living in meditation—to the extent we can do this, which changes over time and even from day to day. This dialogue is a way for us to share our experience and understanding with each other, and to use words to point to that for which there are no words.

—Johnny Stallings
*

I decided to change the way I am reading my copy of Your True Home. Instead of reading normally, front to back, I am going back to front, because the numbers are a countdown to me being released. Looking at the book, I will instantly know how many days I have left.

On 10/21 I read #358 “So Many Reasons to Be Happy”

I found it refreshing. I so desire to be one with nature, to be in the woods, smell the fresh air and hear only nature. To touch Mother Earth and for her to touch me, feeling her embrace. It has been way too long for me feeling pure nature, and reading #358 at first made me feel sad for what I have been missing, but then I read it again, seeing that “Whenever she sees us suffering, she will protect us.” In this moment I am in now, she is protecting me with the knowledge that soon I will have the chance to feel the woods and her embrace once again. I cannot wait for that day.

Reading #355 “Your Suffering Needs You,” on 10/24, reminds me that every aspect of ourselves, whether good or bad, needs our attention. All the good or bad within us are the things that make us, and they all require attention. But then #350 “Goodness Is Always in You” shows us all that, no matter the bad things we’ve done, there is goodness within each of us. Then, on 11/2, I read #346 “What Separates Us” and labels are something that hurts every one of us. Society uses labels to dehumanize and to separate us into groups, and if we can eliminate labels there can be peace in the world.

—Josh Underhill
*

October 7, 2020 THE SUFFERING OF THOSE WE LOVE

HOLDING AN EMOTIONAL STATE WITH MINDFULNESS—WOW! That’s a lot to “ask.” Having just finished reading For Your Own Good, I am, also, able to see others’ suffering more easily (than my own). Seeing, holding, even accepting my own suffering (a response to stimulus) and my own causes of suffering is not “easy,” especially to do with compassion….

Maybe I can…have some compassion for an other, and for this other (who is the same in suffering as all others)…holding with mindfulness (of the human “condition” we all share), a feeling or sensation, tied to an emotional state, and allow space to experience the “feelings.”

October 8, 2020 A LOVE LETTER

My first thought: “How wonderful! I’d love to receive one.” In this message he speaks of transformation: first within, then in another. That real love is required to accomplish such a task is awesome. To mend a broken relationship could take a whole life of time…. Is it so hard? No. I am often just so scared of being rejected, turned away, not even seen for my effort….

October 15, 2020 SELECTIVE WATERING

….I find that, in spite of doubts, if I maintain certain spiritual practices then I like the person I seem to be and this experience rarely seems fraught with insurmountable challenges. But, if I let these practices all fall away completely, even for a few weeks, then I descend to a dark place where I don’t like “me,” and everything is a challenge I can barely face, let alone master; life gets really hard and suffering ensues….

Maybe if each of us finds our path to travel on, and focuses more on the journey—making the most of each moment, and enjoying each moment (as best as we know and are able in that moment)—instead of any destination, then, maybe, we will end (personal) suffering and enjoy the experience of life more.

October 16, SOVEREIGN OF THE FIVE ELEMENTS

….I already have all the skills and capacity to live any life I want. I only need to live that life fully, here, now….I am sovereign of my existence. No one else on Earth directs this life I live in any way. My thoughts, feelings, words, actions are all “mine”…. Getting still enough to experience my “true self” at the core is my goal for mindfulness practice—to get behind those ego-stories, to see beyond those limits to reality.

October 19, 2020 CENTURY OF SPIRITUALITY

….I am thankful that a spiritual life is no longer the domain of religious elites—selected, born, or bought into such a life. Not everyone sees this, or desires to do so. I feel a gratitude that my life experiences have afforded me opportunity to learn this lesson and apply it in my lifetime….

October 21, 2020 THE SEEDS OF HAPPINESS

The first paragraph is a personal reminder that I am the one (and only one) responsible for the story I tell “myself” about the experience “I” have of reality as it exists….

I like the metaphor of life as a garden where I plant and water seeds, pull weeds and even work to “transform” my landscaping to be whatever I choose for it to be. I have a level of control over “my” life. How I choose to exercise my control will impact my results (life experiences)….

October 22, 2020 THE ART OF MINDFUL LIVING

….I can practice being mindful at any time, anywhere, while doing anything. This is powerful! It is a blessing to be able to do this mindfulness thing….

I like the idea of stopping, from my daily hustle and bustle, to enjoy breathing. Breathing helps me connect or remember that I am alive….

October 25, 2020 THE ENERGY OF LIBERATION from Be Free Where You Are by Thich Nhat Hanh

What first caught me in this talk was that anyone and everyone, including me, has the “seed” for mindfulness and concentration…. I don’t need a monastery, or a special rite, or a fancy religion. All I need to do is focus on whatever I am doing in this moment, enjoy the breath I am blessed with, and let the rest of the whatever drop away….

I think that’s awesome! I have always thought it was “easy,” but never found a way to explain it. Thây does so eloquently—probably all the years of practicing.

October 28, 2020 NO BEGINNING, NO END #30

Once again, Thây emphasizes that now is all that is and everything I need is already present, here in and/or with me now. When I go looking out there (outside myself)—to others, to the past, to any possible future, to things to places—I can never find peace, whatever I am seeking. When I begin to turn inward, embracing what is within me already, I find peace, freedom, happiness: nirvana. It’s all right there, just waiting for me to find it, as it always was.

November 3, 2020 THOUGHTS FROM 10/15 MINDFULNESS NEWSLETTER

I agree, or find personal resonance, with your thoughts on #247 NIRVANA IS NOW. Since everything I’ve learned from Buddhism is about learning to focus on and live in the “now,” why should Nirvana be anywhere or anytime other than now? My biggest challenge in life is tied to now presence; paying full attention to the “now” I experience, well…now. I find it very easy to get lost in past “realities” or future dreams.

I also resonate with Brandon G’s thoughts about cookie cutter life: seems deeply connected to challenge of now-presence. Before prison, even inside, too, it gets easy to develop a routine (cookie cutter life) and stay in this “rut.” “It’s comfortable,” I’ll say to self. I once had a counselor point out that a “rut” is only a grave with the ends knocked out. Cookie cutter life, comfortable life—it’s just happy in a rut!

Michel Deforge
*

The Secret behind Our Strife

I, so sure of myself, so ready
to explain why I am right—
I live in a body that will die, and all
my brave words be gone to the sky.

And you, with your shouted reasons
I am wrong, you live in a body
that will fall, be still, be mourned
for the peace you might have found.

Shall you and I, knowing this now,
set our strife aside, pause our proclamations
into curiosity, listening to see what we
might learn, one from another?

—Kim Stafford
*

What to say about meditation?

Thanks for all the beautiful writing in the last edition!

Every month or two I teach beginning meditation for my Zen temple. I love doing it, but after many years I have a bit of a routine, so last time I taught, I thought I would go back to Dogen, the 13th Century founder of Soto Zen Buddhism in Japan, and see what he had to say to beginners. In vintage Dogen style, he starts off by saying that everything is perfect and complete as it is, so what is the point of doing some kind of practice? The Way is right here and now, so what is the use of study, meditation, and other efforts to “improve”? And yet, we know that we become distracted, angry, confused, and have the feeling we have lost our way; in a word, we suffer. We want to be free of our suffering. And we have the example of wise people we admire who practice meditation. Dogen concludes: You should therefore cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following after speech, and learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to illuminate your self. Body and mind of themselves will drop away, and your original face will be manifest. If you want to attain suchness, you should practice suchness without delay.

I recently came across a talk by Krishnamurti that was in a similar vein. He was asking his audience, “Why do you meditate? Why do you do this thing that various teachers from the East have said you should do? Do you have an idea you will have some extraordinary experience? Are you trying to imitate another person? Ask yourself, why am I meditating? What is my motive?” And then he says, “When you look deeply into your life, when you investigate a question you really care about, you become very quiet and completely still without any effort. Meditation arises spontaneously when you look deeply, without fear, without knowing what you will find.”

Meditation is not self-calming. One idea about meditation is that it came out of hunting culture. When a hunter is waiting for their prey, they must be awake, alert, sensitive, ready; the mind has to be free of distraction and the body has to be relaxed, able to move in any direction. I mentioned this to a friend the other day and he started to imitate his cat waiting for a mouse to come out of its hole. His body became graceful, energetic, ready to pounce but without any tension. His eyes became focussed on the imaginary mouse-hole. The room vibrated with concentration, energy, and stillness. Vegetarians like myself don’t always like this idea, but there might be something to it.

—Howard Thoresen
*

Dear Johnny,

….What I have been thinking of a lot lately is birth and death, rather well known topics. Anyway here are some poems that seem to fit that thinking.

love, Deb

Insight

After we die we hover for a while
at treetop level with the mourners
beneath us, but we are not separate
from them nor they from us.
They are singing but the words
don’t mean anything in our new language

—Jim Harrison

The Old People

Pantcuffs rolled, and in old shoes,
they stumble over the rocks and wade out
into a cold river of shadows
far from the fire, so far that its warmth
no longer reaches them. And its light
(but for the sparks in their eyes
when they chance to look back)
scarcely brushes their faces. Their ears
are full of night: rustle of black leaves
against a starless sky. Sometimes
they hear us calling, and sometimes
they don’t. They are not searching
for anything much, nor are they much
in need of finding something new.
They are feeling their way out into the night,
letting their eyes adjust to the future.

—Ted Kooser

In Memory of Joseph Brodsky

It could be said, even here, that what remains of the self
Unwinds into a vanishing light, and thins like dust, and heads
To a place where knowing and nothing pass into each other, and through;
That it moves, unwinding still, beyond the vault of brightness ended,
And continues to a place which may never be found, where the unsayable,
Finally, once more is uttered, but lightly, quickly, like random rain
That passes in sleep, that one imagines passes in sleep.
What remains of the self unwinds and unwinds, for none
Of the boundaries holds — neither the shapeless one between us,
Nor the one that falls between your body and your voice. Joseph,
Dear Joseph, those sudden reminders of your having been — the places
And times whose greatest life was the one you gave them — now appear
Like ghosts in your wake. What remains of the self unwinds
Beyond us, for whom time is only a measure of meanwhile
And the future no more than et cetera et cetera …but fast and forever.

—Mark Strand

The Hammock

When I lay my head in my mother’s lap
I think how day hides the stars,
the way I lay hidden once, waiting
inside my mother’s singing to herself. And I remember
how she carried me on her back
between home and the kindergarten,
once each morning and once each afternoon.

I don’t know what my mother’s thinking.

When my son lays his head in my lap, I wonder:
Do his father’s kisses keep his father’s worries
from becoming his? I think, Dear God, and remember
there are stars we haven’t heard from yet:
They have so far to arrive. Amen,
I think, and I feel almost comforted.

I’ve no idea what my child is thinking.

Between two unknowns, I live my life.
Between my mother’s hopes, older than I am
by coming before me, and my child’s wishes, older than I am
by outliving me. And what’s it like?
Is it a door, and good-bye on either side?
A window, and eternity on either side?
Yes, and a little singing between two great rests.

—Li-Young Lee

The Archaic Maker

The archaic maker is of course naive. If a man he listens. If a
woman she listens. A child is listening. A train passes like an underground river. It enters a story.
The river cannot come back. the story goes on. It uses some form
of representation. It does not really need much by way of gadgets, apart
from words, singing, dancing, making pictures and objects that resemble
living shapes. Things of its own devising.
The deafening river carries parents, children, entire families waking
and sleeping homeward.
The story passes stone farms on green hillsides at the mouths of valleys
running up into forests full of summer and unheard water.
In the story it is already tomorrow. A time of memories incorrect
but powerful. Outside the windows is the next of everything.
One of each.
But here is ancient today
itself
the air the living air
the still water

—W. S. Merwin

Opus From Space

Almost everything I know is glad
to be born—not only the desert orangetip,
on the twist of tansy; shaking
birth moisture from its wings, but also the naked
warbler nesting, head wavering toward the sky,
and the honey possum, the pygmy possum,
blind, hairless thimbles of forward,
press and part.

Almost everything I’ve seen pushes
toward the place of that state as if there were
no knowing any other—the violent crack
and seed-propelling shot of each witch hazel pod,
the philosophy implicit in the inside out
seed-thrust of the wood sorrel. All hairy
saltcedar seeds are single-minded
in their grasping of wind and spinning
for luck toward birth by water.

And I’m fairly shocked to consider
all the bludgeonings and batterings going on
coninually, the head-rammings, wing furors,
and beak-crackings, fighting for release
inside gelatinous shells, leather shells,
calcium shells or rough, horny shells. Legs
and shoulder, knees and elbows flail likewise
against their womb walls everywhere, in pine
forest niches, seepage banks and boggy
prairies, among savannah grasses, on woven
mats and perfumed linen sheets.

Mad zealots, every one, even before
beginning they are dark dust-congealings
or pure frenzy to come into light.

Almost everything I know rages to be born,
the obsession founding itself explicitly
in the coming bone harps and ladders,
the heart-thrusts, vessels and voices
of all those speeding with clear and total
fury toward this singular honor.

—Pattiann Rogers

—Deborah Buchanan
*
November 12, 2020
Meditation and Mindfulness

#9 I Have Arrived
#44 We Already Have Enough
#130 Appreciating Simple Joys

These three principles express what my heart has followed for most of my life. I have been unaware of ‘wanting more,’ or ‘needing more,’ even though there were many lean years when I could have felt that. But here they are! All expressed far more lucidly than I have ever been able to explain them, or defend them to others, so I am grateful to Thich Nhat Hanh for that.

A few examples: When I married my first husband, we didn’t have a ring, so I used a friendship ring that a high school girlfriend had given me. She got it in Mexico and it cost about $1.00. I liked it. Bill kept asking when we were going to get a ‘real’ ring. I told him I was fine, that I liked this ring just fine. He said, “Boy, you are low maintenance!” And from then on his nickname for me was, “LM.”

Example #2: I had a large piece of art in a gallery exhibit in Portland. The title was, “Affordable Pleasures.” At the gallery opening, a man of considerable means was admiring it, and he chuckled and said, “Ah, I get it. You have to have a lot of money to afford this, right?” In consternation I said, “Well, no. It refers to the subject matter; the broken reflection of the moon on the water. Looking at the moon on the water is an affordable pleasure for everyone.” He said, dismissively, “Oh well, whatever. I’ll buy it!” I said, “No. You won’t.”

Example #3: My dad assiduously pruned and raked and composted everything. He had half a dozen magnificent compost piles. Fluffy, friable, fragrant piles, each was about 6-8 cu. yds. He named them after composers (not composters). My all-time favorite Christmas present was the W. A. Mozart Memorial Compost Pile.

My second favorite Christmas present was from my daughter’s boyfriend; about two dozen cleaned, washed, dried, smoothed out sheets of aluminum foil that he had saved for me from his noontime deli sandwiches. He knew that I used and reused aluminum foil for years, and this was his very thoughtful gift to me.

I have never been very big on ‘goals,’ or ‘progress,’ or ‘consumption.’ I have simple, but innumerable pleasures: Raisins on my cereal, stars in an inkwell black sky, nuzzling my dog’s fur, singing, planting, smell of fir needles in the sun, deer munching on my dahlias, cooking, Goodwill, art, hiking, the seasons…all of them.

To me there is a distinction between pleasures and joy. Pleasure is the ripples of water on the surface. Joy is the deeper down, abiding current. Pleasure is the hot, bright, snappy flame of a fire. Joy is the quiet, calm but intense, slowly glowing embers below.

So again, my thanks to Mr. T. N. Hanh (if I may call him that) for helping me express these thoughts. I don’t know if I could have done it without his guidance with these three principles.

—Jude Russell
*

[See drawing of elephant and sphere at the top.]

Abstract idea/concrete image. Both at once between sleep and waking.

I woke and found this present in mind and made a drawing quickly before it faded away.

The sphere was, simply, everything. The elephant was God.

When I was drinking coffee later, I added fancy titles from out of my memory:
“All and Everything,” title of a favorite book, for the sphere;

and “That which is Other than All that Is,” for the elephant; a memory from my time at college fifty years ago, when I read what a theologian had written about God as “radically other.”

—Charles Erickson
*

Thank you, everyone!

That’s a wrap for our third Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue. If you enjoyed it, please send me something for the December 15th issue. You can use Your True Home or anything else for inspiration. Feel free to respond to something that someone wrote in any of our dialogues, including this one. Share a poem you wrote, or a poem that someone else wrote that you like. Or whatever thoughts might be wandering through your mind.

(If you go to the EVENTS page on this website and click on “Previous Events,” you can find our September and October dialogues.)

May all people be happy.
May we live in peace & love.

—Johnny Stallings

peace, love, happiness & understanding 11/12/20
2020-11-12 - 2020-11-18
Lonnie Glinski as Ophelia and Timothy Hinkhouse as Laertes in the 2015 production of Hamlet at Two Rivers prison

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

November 12, 2020

I got a letter from Lonnie Glinski this week. He wrote this:

The current times are somewhat frightening for society. I know this is antithetical to my recently written statement about only observing, but I cannot help but ache for some peace and compassion when so much of society is embracing dishonesty, hatred and prideful ambitions. Has it always been this way? Have only the justifications for such ambitions shifted from time to time?

Even some demonstrations are teaching hate in the name of love. Some time ago I attended a music concert by an outside religious group. Shocking was the observation that every spoken sentence had to invoke the name of Jesus once, even twice–three times or more were extra credit. Feeling assaulted, like the name of Jesus was a club, I was inspired to write the song I now include. The meaning of which was that the teachings and message of Jesus was left unspoken, unaddressed, as long as the name was invoked again and again.

Somebody Famous

vs 1
Wand’ring through the years
Looking far and looking near
Seeking clues in many ways,
Solutions to the fears
Accidentally finding answers
Empowering one to tears
Heaven inside realized
In the things somebody famous once said
In the things somebody famous once said.

Chorus
Somebody, somebody, somebody famous
Somebody, somebody, you know what the name is
Famous, famous, somebody famous
Famous, famous, somebody famous once said.

vs 2
Somebody famous once said
Love your neighbor as yourself
Let your light shine, keep it high on the shelf
Treat ev’ryone as you want to be
We are all one big family
In the things somebody famous once said
In the things somebody famous once said.

Bridge
For the poor in spirit, heaven realized
The meek shall inherit, merciful in kind
The pure in heart, see God shall he
Those who mourn, comforted and freed
In the things somebody famous once said
In the things somebody famous once said.

vs 3
Somebody famous once said, find your pearl of great price
My burden is light, come to me as a child
Don’t be a camel stuck in the needle’s eye
Follow me and never die,
In the things somebody famous once said
In the things somebody famous once said.
*

Here’s from a letter Lonnie wrote me on October 13th:

Dear Johnny,

Several things you have written and sent to me lately have spoken to me quite close to my recent thought.

One is your being called a hippie. That title has been directed at me lately, since I have let my hair grow out. Dozens have told me, and people currently still tell me, to get my hair cut.

On the one hand, I am shocked by the number of people who seem to care that “I” am growing out “my” hair. Yet, at the same time, I’m entertained by the vehemence and anger toward my hair being long. I find my quick head twirls, so the hair swirls from side to side, does little to assuage their frustration….

And of course your writing about a golden world is related to my recent song topic of “Bloom where you landed.” It’s the bluesy, striking music I put to it that brings it alive for me. But, here it is:

Imagi-
nation never imagined I’d be here today
Lessons learned, tables turned, mistakes along the way
Though I cannot go where my heart longs to go
I gotta bloom where I am, bloom where I’ve landed

The roads I drove, the choices I chose,
the words I spoke and the feelings that grow
Now I cannot go where my heart longs to go
I gotta bloom where I am, bloom where I’ve landed

I’ve travelled through the air to who knows where
I’ve journeyed by water, sometimes wet for hours
I’ve fallen from trees, landing like a nut
Still gotta bloom where I am, bloom where I’ve landed

Standing, crawling, climbing, falling, the winds blew you
Rough or smooth future calling, destination news to you
Help someone like someone helped you
You gotta bloom where you are, bloom where you’ve landed

Bloom like you did in the day when someone cared
Bloom like you did when the way someone clears
Bloom like you’ve done when you felt at home
Bloom where you’re at, bloom where you’ve landed
*

So, that’s what I’m doing, trying to bloom where I’ve landed.

Lonnie
*

On August 20th, Lonnie sent this song:

And They Just Smile

Mentions I hear, someone named Trouble
I try to name the face, but I’m unable
Walk, often-times I hear: here comes Trouble
Taking my chance, turn round really fast…and they just smile

Walk past, sometimes I hear: there goes Trouble
Turning, no one’s there, only empty air
Should I fear that Trouble may be near?
Ask where Trouble went…and they just smile

Chorus
Closed-door community, same faces to see
Seeking notorious version, of this Trouble person
Where can he be found?, not there when I turn around
Please point Trouble out…and they just smile

Chorus repeat

Intense mystery, Trouble passes so nearly
Around and around I go, really do I want to know
Where can he be found?, not there when I turn around
And why, oh why, do they just smile?

Should I be a’worrying, Trouble near concerning?
Where can I go that Trouble cannot follow?
Where can he be found?, not there when I turn around
Really, do I want to know?…and they just smile

Outro (loosely)
And why, oh why, won’t you point him out?
And why, oh why?—come on, help me out
And tell me why, oh why, do they just smile?
And why, oh why, oh why, do you just smile?
*

I began sending “peace, love, happiness & understanding” to friends inside and outside of prison, last Spring Equinox, after COVID arrived. This is from a letter Lonnie wrote last April 22nd that includes another song:

Thanks for including me on your mailing list. The issue I have enjoyed the most so far was the one on humor. Which fits in well with a song that came to me as I lay there between the states of sleep and wakefulness. While I usually have a message or a theme to construct a song, this one came all out of the blue with no premeditation. I had to get up and write it down immediately, or else, like so many others, it fades away like a fog fades to the rising sunshine.

It ain’t me

vs 1
Someone squeezed the last toothpaste, left me an empty tube
Someone used the last shampoo…now what am I to do?
I know it was my cellie, I’m gonna give ‘im hell
But…I live in a single cell

Chorus 1
It wasn’t me, it ain’t me—doing things irresponsibly
It ain’t me, it couldn’t be, always leaving me in some fix
My cellie’s gonna catch hell, don’t care I’m in a single cell
‘Cause it wasn’t me

Bridge 1
I know it was him who ate that last cracker
I know it was him who ate that last chip
I know it was him who used that ticket I know I had
I know it was my cellie, gonna give ‘im hell
Regardless, I’m in a single cell

Chorus 2
It wasn’t me; it ain’t me
Like the Family Circus comic strip, it wasn’t me
Don’t watch same TV shows, nor songs on the radio
I’m gonna give ‘im hell for changing that dial
‘Cause I know it wasn’t me

Bridge 2
He hides things so I can’t find ‘em
Knocks over things I’ve been organizin’
Empties things I know without a doubt were full
I know it was my cellie, gonna give ‘im hell
Regardless, I’m in a single cell

With spending so much time in our cells, others can probably relate.

—Lonnie Glinski
*

Well, that’s about it for the Lonnie Glinski Issue. Thanks Lonnie, for bringing smiles to a lot of faces.

May all people be happy.

—Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 11/5/20
2020-11-05 - 2020-11-11
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

November 5, 2020

Nancy Yeilding sent this excerpt from Love and Blessings, the autobiography of Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati:

When I was in my mid-teens I saw Mahatma Gandhi, the founder and father of modern India. He was revered as a great saint. He believed fervently in the nonviolence of Christ, and he taught that India should be converted to a creed of pacifism. He taught that one should win another’s heart by love.

At that time, Britain was ruling India with full military force. To fight the British forces, which were armed with guns and bayonets, the Indians were made to march with slogans of nonviolence and peace. As a young man I thought this was very foolish. I had been extensively indoctrinated by the Marxist-Leninist groups, even somewhat brainwashed, to believe that the only possible redemption for India lay in a revolution organized exactly as the one in Russia had been. I had been made to believe that all of humanity could be divided into two groups: the exploiters and the exploited, the haves and the have-nots. However, it was difficult for me to decide whether my father was exploited or an exploiter.

This mythical division into two classes, two class interests, and class warfare all looked very reasonable to me. I thought that if only Mahatma Gandhi read a little of Marx and understood his true philosophy, India would be saved. Little did I know that he had lived in England and had every access to all the literature of Marx and Lenin, and that he knew all about revolution. I was so young and stupid, yet fanatically indoctrinated. So I found my way to the inner circle of the saint, and looked for an opportunity to present my gospel of class war to him.

When my chance came, I gave him a non-stop oratory on class warfare, as well as how useless his method of nonviolence was. He listened to me very carefully. That is my greatest surprise today. When I came to my final conclusion, he looked quite calm.

Then he asked me, “Are you sincere?”

That infuriated me: if I were not sincere, would I have gone out of my way to bring him this great message? I shouted that I was very sincere.

He went on, “You are speaking with conviction?”

“Of course!”

“Do you think I have no conviction about what I say?”

I had never thought of that before. I said, “Yes, you must have conviction.”

“Am I sincere?”

“Maybe….”

“Are you not saying something which is in total contradiction to what I say?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t you see the possibility of two people with contradictory views both having full conviction and sincerity?”

“Yes.”

“You are asking me to stand in your footsteps and look. Have you ever considered the possibility of standing in my footsteps and looking? If I stand in your angle of vision, I will see what you see. That’s what you want me to do. Suppose I invite you to stand in my angle of vision and look at the same thing. Are you prepared for that?”

I was certainly not prepared, but I didn’t say so.

He continued, “Young man, truth is many faceted. You can look at it from a number of points of view, and from each angle you will get a different perspective. All that you have said is known to me, but what I see you have no patience to consider.”

I thought that was right. Although I had been listening to him for a week, waiting for my opportunity to pontificate, I had never really listened to him. I was only listening to myself, to my objections to whatever he was saying.

This simple incident was a great turning point in my life. It completely silenced me. Thereafter, when I talked with another person it always occurred to me that there could be one more way of looking at truth. I learned to step down from my pedestal and walk over to the other person’s, to sympathetically get into his way of seeing. To me, this was the beginning of a great discovery of what a wonderful world we live in and how rich our human heritage is.

—Nitya Chaitanya Yati
*

My father was so convinced of the rightness of his opinions that he would raise his voice and try to browbeat people into agreeing with him. It never worked. He got into a lot of arguments and even lost some of his closest friends, because when they failed to agree with him he said abusive things to them that they could not forgive. They stopped speaking to each other.

Unconsciously, I learned to argue from my dad. I had to be right about everything. Mr. Know-It-All. I was self-righteous in my opposition to war—convinced that anyone who didn’t agree with me was dead wrong.

In my twenties, I was one of Nitya’s students. I lived with his teacher, Nataraja Guru, in India for a year. His diagnosis was: “You have too high an opinion of your own opinions.”

Fast forward to 2006, when I began facilitating meaning-of-life dialogues at Two Rivers prison in Umatilla, Oregon. In my proposal to the administration, I named the program “The Stories We Tell Ourselves: How Our Thinking Shapes Our Lives.” The first thing I noticed, sitting in a circle with twelve or sixteen guys, was that we all had different backgrounds and beliefs—different life experiences. Each of us had formed our own understanding of who we are and how the world works. It would be impossible to get everyone to agree with all my views. And it would be disrespectful of them to try convert them to Johnnyism. The beauty of the thing is that we weren’t all alike—like robots. If we listened to each other—without arguing or trying to convince the others to think like us, to believe what we believe—we might learn something.

In 2014, we did the play “Twelve Angry Men” at Two Rivers prison. The play is aptly named. In that jury room, everyone’s anger is on a hair-trigger. And they are all convinced that anyone who disagrees with them is a moron. Gradually, because of one man’s patience, they learn to listen to each other, minds are changed, and the defendant is acquitted.

No one ever seems to “win” an argument. We stop listening to each other. In Nitya’s story above, he says that he hadn’t really been listening, he had been waiting for his turn to pontificate. When I was a teenager, I noticed that my dad didn’t listen to what I said. In the first sentence I spoke to him, he would pick out a word that suggested to him a kind of pre-recorded speech. He didn’t hear the rest of what I said. He made no reference to it. When I finished talking, he would give his pre-recorded speech, based on a word or phrase that I had said early on. I had heard his speech many times before.

At present, it seems that our society has broken down into warring factions—each convinced of the rightness of their side and the wrongness of the other side. One books that illuminates the current situation is HATE, INC by Matt Taibbi. There’s an election tomorrow (11/3/20), and both sides seem to think that if the other side wins it will be the End of the World.

But maybe the world will continue to go round. Outside my window, squirrels are scurrying up and down the old maple tree in quest of seeds. The sky is bluer than blue. I’m happy to be alive on this beautiful green planet.
*

Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948) was mostly known by the honorific title “Mahatma,” which means “great soul.” He is best known for leading a nonviolent campaign for India’s independence from England.

He was born in India, studied Law in London, and became an attorney at the age of 22. He lived and practiced Law in South Africa from 1893 to 1914, where he led a nonviolent campaign for human rights and against racial discrimination.

The East India Company invaded India in the 18th Century and ruled India from 1757 to 1858, when rule of India was turned over to the British Crown and India became a “colony” of Great Britain. When Gandhi returned to India in 1915, he became one of the leaders of the movement for Indian Independence, based in part on his experience with civil rights reform in South Africa.

In the 1920’s and 30’s and up until he was assassinated in 1948, he was the most influential and charismatic of the movement’s many leaders. His ideas about civil disobedience were inspired by Henry David Thoreau and his nonviolence was inspired by traditional Hindu beliefs and by Leo Tolstoy. His successful campaigns of nonviolent resistance in turn inspired Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Nelson Mandela, too, was inspired by Gandhi’s nonviolent civil rights struggle in South Africa, but, unlike Gandhi and King, he said that violence and nonviolence were not mutually exclusive strategies for change.
*

Here are some quotes from Mahatma Gandhi:

If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. We need not wait to see what others do.

A man is but a product of his thoughts. What he thinks he becomes.

Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.

A coward is incapable of exhibiting love; it is the prerogative of the brave.

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.

Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.

Service which is rendered without joy helps neither the servant nor the served.

If we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with the children.

The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.

In a gentle way, you can shake the world.

If I have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it even if I may not have it at the beginning.

Hate the sin, not the sinner.

Glory lies in the attempt to reach one’s goal, not in reaching it.

Whenever you are confronted with an opponent, conquer him with love.

Permanent good can never be the outcome of untruth and violence.

The future depends on what you do today.

To give pleasure to a single heart by a single act is better than a thousand heads bowing in prayer.

Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs, but not every man’s greed.

I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.

You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is like an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.

It’s the action, not the fruit of the action, that’s important. You have to do the right thing. It may not be in your power, may not be in your time, that there’ll be any fruit. But that doesn’t mean you stop doing the right thing. You may never know what results come from your action. But if you do nothing, there will be no result.
*

peace & love
Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 10/29/20
2020-10-29 - 2020-11-04
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

October 29, 2020

Last week I was thinking about loving the Earth. (Why is Earth Day just one day out of the year? Shouldn’t every day be Earth Day?) Kim sent a poem, but it arrived a little too late to be included in last week’s issue. Here it is:

Revising Genesis

And God said, Rest here in the garden
where you belong, where now you know
the good from evil, and so the good may be
your calling. Be home here in beauty and bounty,
and by salt sweat of your close devotion, make Earth
your wise guide, each creature teaching miracles of being
in wing and song, in blurred heart of hummingbird
and deep thump of whale, counting nights
in peace and days in blessing, as you
raise your arms in praise.

—Kim Stafford
*

And he recommended this poem by Gary Snyder:

For All

Ah to be alive
on a mid-September morn
fording a stream
barefoot, pants rolled up,
holding boots, pack on,
sunshine, ice in the shallows,
northern rockies.

Rustle and shimmer of icy creek waters
stones turn underfoot, small and hard as toes
cold nose dripping
singing inside
creek music, heart music,
smell of sun on gravel.

I pledge allegiance

I pledge allegiance to the soil
of Turtle Island,
and to the beings who thereon dwell
one ecosystem
in diversity
under the sun
With joyful interpenetration for all.

—Gary Snyder
*

Katie sent this poem of Deborah’s:

The Color of Eyes

The glacier weeps
icicles, weeps shades
of sky and azure sea.

Blue, blue of the waves,
rippling along sand,
coral, and melting ice.

Cornflowers in summer,
blue among the fields
of green and gold.

Flashing blue eyes
beckoning with silence.

Color of a morning,
color of time,
of mourning.

Blue the song of sadness,
smoky grey in the early hours
blue the color of words.

Oh, blue dripping
over ears, into eyes,
water molecules separating,

then vanishing, atoms alone.

—Deborah Buchanan
*

Robin Schauffler wrote:

Hey Johnny,

Thank you for the ongoing peace-love-and-happiness! We’re all depressed and hysterical, if one can be both at once, but we have to, have to keep remembering what’s good.

And here’s another poem you might want to share:

The poet, Derek Mahon, had just died (October 1), and this poem of his was read by another Irish poet on NPR. He wrote it in 2012, but it feels like today. As soon as I heard it I decided to commit it to memory, and I’m working on that. It helps me go to sleep at night. Everything is thoroughly fucked up, but still, on some most basic level, we will manage.

Love,
Robin

Everything is Going to be All Right

How should I not be glad to contemplate
the clouds clearing beyond the dormer window
and a high tide reflected on the ceiling?
There will be dying, there will be dying,
but there is no need to go into that.
The poems flow from the hand unbidden
and the hidden source is the watchful heart.
The sun rises in spite of everything
and the far cities are beautiful and bright.
I lie here in a riot of sunlight
watching the day break and the clouds flying.
Everything is going to be all right.

—Derek Mahon, from Selected Poems
*

I was listening to an audio book by David Whyte called What to Remember When Waking. He read this poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins, which fits our Earth-loving theme. As always, with his poems, be sure to read it aloud:

Inversnaid

This darksome burn, horseback brown,
His rollrock highroad roaring down,
In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam
Flutes and low to the lake falls home.

A windpuff-bonnet of fáwn-fróth
Turns and twindles over the broth
Of a pool so pitchblack, féll-frówning,
It rounds and rounds Despair to drowning.

Degged with dew, dappled with dew
Are the groins of the braes that the brook treads through,
Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern,
And the beadbonny ash that sits over the burn.

What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.

—Gerard Manley Hopkins

[Word notes. Inversnaid is a little village on the shores of Loch Lomond, in Scotland. A burn is a mountain stream. Coop and comb are the high and low parts of the water. Flutes are grooves. He made up the word twindle. Fells are hills. Degged means sprinkled. A brae is a hillside.]

This is a charming excerpt from a brief biography on the Gerard Manley Hopkins official website:

He was a man of passion and he was a lover, this poet Gerard Manley Hopkins. As a boy he loved to climb a tree in his family garden in London and look up at the sky and down at the earth. At Oxford University he loved his studies in Greek and Latin and won a brilliant “First” in his final examination. He loved his family and friends and God, he loved music and sketching, he loved hiking and swimming, and he loved beauty, nature, and the environment. As a priest he loved his fellow Jesuits, his students, and his parishioners, and as a poet he loved his creativity and the words and images and rhythms and sounds of his poems.
*

Kim has revised the Gettysburg Address as well as Genesis:

Abe & I

Four score and seven years from now our descendants will inherit on this continent an older earth conceived in diversity and dedicated to the recognition that all creatures live as one. Now we are engaged in a great struggle, testing whether this creation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met in a great community for that struggle. We have come to dedicate a portion of our grief as a final resting-place for those creatures who gave their lives departing from this creation. It is fitting and proper that we should do this. In a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this creation. The desperate creatures, neglected children, vibrant cultures and local ways of being, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The whole earth will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what we now choose to do. It is for us the living rather to be dedicated to the unfinished work which they who struggled and lost here have thus far so painfully clarified. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these tattered beauties we take increased devotion to that cause for which they lost their last full measure of living witness and of song—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not be joined by an endless parade of others long in splendor, suddenly gone, that this whole earth shall have a new birth in welcome to its own, and that reconciliation of all creatures, by all creatures, for all creatures shall not perish from the earth.

—Kim Stafford
*

Somebody else who wrote their own version of the Gettysburg Address was the astonishing beatnik-poet-philosopher-saint-comedian Lord Buckley. He said, “I’m a people worshipper. I think people should worship people.” Just for fun, here’s his version:

The Gettysburg Address

Milords and Miladies of the world of people
most restfully and most humbly
and with the deepest reverence
for the great and precious American Saint Abraham Lincoln.
I shall translate in the modern semantic of the hip,
this new zig-zag semantic,
his beloved Gettysburg Address….

When dey called old Lanky Linc up to de podium
and he dug all dem cats and kiddies swingin’ on the green sward,
great love look come on his Saint face,
and he put dis issue down to ’em, he say:

Four big hits and seven licks ago,
our before-daddies swung forth upon this sweet groovey land
a jumpin’, wailin’, stompin’, swingin’ new nation,
hip to the cool sweet groove of liberty
and solid sent upon the Ace lick dat all cats and kiddies,
red, white, or blue, is created level in front.
We are now hung with a king size main-day Civil Drag,
soundin’ whether this nation or any up there nation,
so hip and so solid sent can stay with it all the way.
We have stomped out here to the hassle site
of some of the worst jazz blown in the entire issue.
Gettys-mother-burg.
We are here to turn on a small soil stash
of the before-mentioned hassle site
as a final sweet sod pad for those
who laid it down and left it there
so that this jumpin’ happy beat might blow forever-more.
And we all dig that this is the straightest lick.
But diggin’ it harder from afar we cannot mellow,
we cannot put down the stamp of the lord on this sweet sod
because the strong non-stop studs,
both diggin’ it and dug under it, who hassled here
have mellowed it with such a wild mad beat
that we can hear it, but we can’t touch it.
Now the world cats will short dig nor long stash in their wigs
what we are beatin’ our chops around here,
but it never can successively shade what they vanced here.
It is for us the swingin’ to pick up the dues
of these fine studs who cut out from here
and fly it through to Endsville.
It is hipper for us to be signifyin’ to the glorious gig
that we can’t miss with all these bulgin’ eyes,
that from all these A-stamp studs we double our love kick, too,
that righteous line for which these hard cats sounded
the last nth bone of the beat of the bell.
That we here want it stuck up straight for all to dig
that these departed studs shall not have split in vain,
and that this nation under the great swingin’ Lord
shall swing up a whopper of endless Mardi Gras,
and that the big law by you straights,
from you cats,
and for you kiddies,
shall not be scratched from the big race.

—Richard “Lord” Buckley (1906-1960)
*

Here’s a link to a performance by Lord Buckley:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuQ-Xt-pDbk
*

I guess while we’re at it, we should include the original:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

—Abraham Lincoln
November 19, 1863

peace & love, y’all
Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 10/22/20
2020-10-22 - 2020-10-28
Photo of sunrise by Abe Green. Abe likes to ski. He took this picture from the top of Big Mountain, which is right next to the town of Whitefish, Montana, where I was born. (JS)

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

October 22, 2020

My friend Mark Alter sent me this poem by Nadine Anne Hura. It got a lot of attention, because it was shared by Jacinda Ardern, the Prime Minister of New Zealand:

For Papatūānuku – Mother Earth

Rest now, e Papatūānuku
Breathe easy and settle
Right here where you are
We’ll not move upon you
For awhile

We’ll stop, we’ll cease
We’ll slow down and stay home

Draw each other close and be kind
Kinder than we’ve ever been.
I wish we could say we were doing it for you
as much as ourselves

But hei aha

We’re doing it anyway

It’s right. It’s time.
Time to return
Time to remember
Time to listen and forgive
Time to withhold judgment
Time to cry
Time to think

About others

Remove our shoes
Press hands to soil
Sift grains between fingers

Gentle palms

Time to plant
Time to wait
Time to notice
To whom we belong

For now it’s just you
And the wind
And the forests and the oceans and the sky full of rain

Finally, it’s raining!

Ka turuturu te wai kamo o Rangi ki runga i a koe

Embrace it

This sacrifice of solitude we have carved out for you

He iti noaiho – a small offering
People always said it wasn’t possible
To ground flights and stay home and stop our habits of consumption

But it was
It always was.

We were just afraid of how much it was going to hurt
—and it IS hurting and it will hurt and continue to hurt—
But not as much as you have been hurt.

So be still now

Wrap your hills around our absence
Loosen the concrete belt cinched tight at your waist

Rest.
Breathe.
Recover.
Heal—

And we will do the same.

—Nadine Anne Hura, 23 March 2020

A note of gratitude from Nadine:

Thank you for the amazing response to this poem! I never expected it to travel so far and wide. Many people have asked who the author is so I wanted to clarify that I wrote this poem on the train home after the announcement of total lockdown was made here in Aotearoa, New Zealand. I felt like I could hear Papatūānuku exhaling in relief as we all began our journeys home. In truth, one month of lockdown is not enough. Even six months would not be enough! We need a total and sustained change of habit, globally and within our own communities. I hope so much we take our time to reflect on the fact that if we can do it to save ourselves for a month, we ought to be able to make similar habit changes for Mother Earth for the long term. The most telling thing for me was how empty our veggie plant aisles were after lockdown was announced – in a crisis, we will turn back to our mother to provide (and of course she will!).Lots of people have asked for translations…

Papatūānuku – Mother Earth (the addition of the “e” in front signals the words are addressed or spoken directly to her.)

Ka turuturu te wai kamo o Rangi ki runga i a koe – means something like, “tears from the eyes of Ranginui drip down on you” (Ranginui is our sky father, it is common to refer to rain as the tears of Rangi for his beloved, from whom he was separated at the beginning of time in order that there could be light in the world). Not long after the announcement we were moving to level 3, it poured with rain in Porirua after many months of hot and dry weather. I could feel my garden rejoicing.

Hei aha – This can be translated in many ways, but I meant it like the English “oh well, whatever”

He iti noaiho – “something small”. Because our sacrifice feels enormous but in reality I think it is not sufficient to truly see Papatūānuku recover. However, in Māori, we often talk about the significance of small actions or gestures. We say “ahakoa he iti, he pounamu.” Although it is small, it is a treasure.

Thank you so much for the support.

—Nadine Anne Hura
*

Here’s a link, (also sent by Mark Alter), to an essay by Nadine Anne Hura, “I’m Reclaiming the Name I Lost”:

https://e-tangata.co.nz/reflections/nadine-anne-hura-im-reclaiming-the-name-i-lost/

(n.b.: As of today, (10/22/20), the United States has 2,525 cases of COVID-19 per 100,000 residents. New Zealand has 39 cases per 100,000 residents. Jacinda Ardern is smart!)

I’m wondering about learning how to love the Earth more deeply, more constantly. I think a good place to look for help with this is from poets.
*

I…peruse manifold objects, no two alike and every one good,
The earth good and the stars good, and their adjuncts all good.

—Walt Whitman (1819-1892), from “Song of Myself”
*

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting—
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

—Mary Oliver (1935-2019)
*

Earth Dweller

It was all the clods at once become
precious; it was the barn, and the shed,
and the windmill, my hands, the crack
Arlie made in the ax handle: oh, let me stay
here humbly, forgotten, to rejoice in it all;
let the sun casually rise and set.
If I have not found the right place,
teach me; for somewhere inside, the clods are
vaulted mansions, lines through the barn sing
for the saints forever, the shed and windmill
rear so glorious the sun shudders like a gong.

Now I know why people worship, carry around
magic emblems, wake up talking dreams
they teach to their children: the world speaks.
The world speaks everything to us.
It is our only friend.

—William Stafford (1914-1993)

Here’s a link to an audio recording of William Stafford reading the poem:

https://voetica.com/voetica.php?collection=2&poet=827&poem=7251

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This poem must be read aloud:

Pied Beauty

Glory be to God for dappled things –
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced – fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.

—Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889)
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Bill Faricy sent this poem:

Weary of those who come with words, words but no language
I make my way to the snow-covered island.
The untamed has no words.
The unwritten pages spread out on every side!
I come upon the tracks of deer in the snow.
Language but no words.

—Tomas Tranströmer (1931-2015)
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Katie Radditz also thought of Mary Oliver:

My Work is Loving the World

My work is loving the world.
Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird –
equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young and still not half-perfect? Let me
keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all ingredients are here,

Which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
that we live forever.

–Mary Oliver

As the bumper sticker with a picture of our planet says:

LOVE YOUR MOTHER

–Johnny

Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue 10/15/20
2020-10-15 - 2020-11-14
Open Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue

October 15, 2020

Welcome to our second meditation and mindfulness dialogue! The numbers below refer to passages from the book Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh. (JS)
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Hello the Open Road! I’m very excited to be part of the mindfulness and meditation group. My experience with Your True Home has provided interesting insight on the riddles I seek to solve, and is filled with wonderful tools.
Today my inspiration for writing , and just inspiration in general, comes from pages 1, 2 and 148: Your True Home, One Hundred Percent and Fearless Bodhisattvas. These three brought thoughts about many things, but some in particular I explored: The Sam-sara, Living in the moment.
A friend once told me, that in order to escape the Sam-sara we mustn’t sow karma, good or bad, and must just be. At the time I thought he was suffering delusions, but I’m not sure that is the case anymore. Maybe he was right, maybe if we live in the moment we truly live, rather than die. I say this because by living in the moment we can escape the constant cycle of dying with each moment as it passes, and escape being born again as another moment arrives. Instead of surfing each wave, sail the sea, move with the wind and tides. Be a piece of driftwood; who cares what happens, because it doesn’t happen until it does, and even then be driftwood.
In a way my friend was right, he was a piece of driftwood and I the wave. But that moment has passed and I am truly home now, fearless, one hundred percent of the time, possessing the key to the great escape.
—Joshua Tyler Barnes
PS…All the meditation writings I read in your last newsletter Rocked! Thanks.
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Thank you for the Finding Deep Calm thing from Kim Stafford. [“peace, love, happiness & understanding,” 8/27/20] I really appreciate it! I’ve shared it with several people and it’s really been an eye opener for perspective…especially right now…
The Suffering of Those We Love #23
How do we cope with the suffering of those we love? I’d surely take their pain away if I could. Makes it a lot easier to keep mindfulness in your heart when those you love are in pain. I can try to hold my anger or sorrow and fear with the energy of mindfulness for them. It’s the least I can do, right?
—Jeff Kuehner
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#75 Your True Nature & #247 Nirvana Is Now
In the legend of the Buddha, it is said that he sat under a tree and realized nirvana. When we hear this story, we wonder: “What’s nirvana?” Nirvana is described as something like “perfect freedom,” or “ultimate reality.” It sounds pretty good. We might think, “I’d like to get that. How do I do it?” In one version of Buddhism, it is very hard to get. Only a few rare souls can attain it, after diligently practicing for many lifetimes. In Thich Nhat Hanh’s version of nirvana, which he equates with the Christian idea of the Kingdom of God, we already have it. It’s not far away or hard to get. It’s who we are. I like that. A perfect moment is always available to anyone. Maybe this moment is perfect.
—Johnny Stallings
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#305 Sit With Your Fear
When I was 10 or so my family was eating dinner with our church’s pastor, I was outside playing with the pastor’s two boys. They had built a treehouse and a zip line from the treehouse to another tree, and they had wrapped a mattress around the tree to soften the landing when using the zip line. The “landing” was basically crashing into the tree, so the mattress was helpful. The treehouse was around 20 feet off the ground, not so high that I had trouble climbing up to it. Oh, by the way, I’m afraid of heights, but using the zip line was a whole different thing. I stepped to the edge, wrapped my hands around the handle, and…well, nothing. I froze. I was yelling in my head to just step off the edge, I’d be fine, but my body would not respond. So I did what any logical 10 year old would do: I told my friends to push me off the edge. They were not too keen on the idea and tried to provide verbal assistance, but their words could not overcome my body’s response. So I again told them to just push me. In fact, I think I yelled it. So the oldest did! Off I went down the line, slamming into the mattress. It was so fun! So up I went, and this time I could step off the edge without assistance.
There are always going to be things in this world to be scared of, sometimes all we need is a willing heart and a friend to give us a push!
Johnny, this has been fun writing for the M & M Dialogue. Thank you! I enjoy writing and I need to practice, but I find it hard to write for myself or for its own sake. Having something to write for is very motivating!
—Cody Dalton
*
Today’s study card encourages me to assess my progress with meditative practices. Quality of life should improve with consistent and genuine practice, and if that is not true, I’m probably not doing something correctly. YTH reflects on this at #129. Meditation results in becoming more anchored emotionally/intellectually/spiritually, and more freedom from emotional ups and downs.
The founder of this meditation tradition outlined several benefits of meditation. “Better sleep.” Check. I sleep great, most of the time. “Wake up feeling refreshed.” That is usually true. “Nightmares will become rare.” Hmmm, I had a nightmare last week, but they do seem rare. “Animals and people will feel drawn to you.” Well, I focus on a mostly solitary existence, but I don’t think I have “charisma.” I will work on this more. “Mind becomes immediately calm.” I’ll rate this 70-30, true 70% of the time, which is a huge improvement over where I was even two years ago. “Complexion brightens.” Seems true. “You’ll die with a clear mind.” Yeah, I’m not ready to test that theory yet. I’ll take that on faith.
—Shad Alexander
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#365
“The moment of awareness,” this is something that we as a nation need. First of all, I am guilty of this. But it is a practice. Something not unattainable. To be aware of what is going on to the left and to the right. To see where we are headed. “We have to wake up!,” this sleepy nation of ours. So many just going through the steps. Cookie cutter lives, if only I had the opportunity to live outside these walls. No better, no worse, just driven. Driven to enjoy bettering myself and those to my left and right.
Let’s start the revolution.
Thanks Johnny.
—Brandon Gillespie
*
Dear Johnny,
As I think I told you, I have taken up golf in my old age, just by accident, since I live a few blocks from a golf course, I thought I would try it just to see what it was like. That was last spring. I quickly found that I loved the game. It is a practice of putting mind and body together in a challenging physical ritual, and at it’s best there is a mystical experience to be had….fleetingly.
I began with no skill and have worked my way up to having a tiny amount. But lately my eighty-year old body has been having trouble finding the intersection of time and space, and I have been playing at the level I was playing at six months ago. Yesterday I played 18 holes particularly badly and came home feeling very frustrated. Of course I went out this morning and practiced, and did a little better, almost certainly because I wasn’t trying too hard to do well.
Then I came home, turned on my computer, and read Beginner’s Mind. It came like a ray of light that if I can play with beginner’s mind, I will no longer get frustrated. I will probably play better too, although that won’t matter any more (yes it will).
Thanks, Johnny, this filled my tank.
Love, Ken
—Ken Margolis
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“So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others’ views, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life.”
—quote by an unknown author from Josh Underhill
*
Yesterday [10/5] I heard that Thich Nhat Hanh has stopped taking food. They expect his “transition” soon. But today I heard that he occasionally stops eating and then starts again. So he is really unchanged. On October 11 he will be 94.
I have been thinking about a teaching of Thay’s that I try to remember often. He said once, “Are you enjoying not having a toothache?” This feels like a profound thought to me. Some time ago I had a pain in my side. It went on for a couple of months and I even went to a doctor, which is rare for me. They didn’t find anything, but the pain went away. Am I enjoying not having a pain in my side? In my school of Zen, “appreciate your life” is a central teaching and it is certainly an important practice. The gift of life, with all its beauty and sorrow, is what we have. We tend to endlessly wish it was “better” but it’s a good practice to once in a while be grateful for just the amazing fact of it. But this other way, the way of remembering that we are free of all kinds of suffering that we could be undergoing and/or have undergone is also good.
That’s my thought for the day.
—Howard Thoresen
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Dear Johnny,
Some time ago you were kind enough to send us a copy of Ashley Lucas’s “Prison Theatre” book, for which I sent you a brief thank-you note. Since then I have had
the opportunity to read the book in more depth and realized how much of your
prison work is discussed. Voodoo Doughnut’s contribution is discussed, as well as that of the Smith Foundation.
However her book is not all about love and roses. Page 146 points out that some of the women inmates [in Eve Ensler’s writing class] had killed people, taken actual lives, which makes evident that all life, particularly including prison life, is often filled with ambiguities and heartfelt remorse for past actions and a need for new beginnings.
Zen philosophy speaks to this concept: Always be a beginner, always start with a fresh mind. Few concepts may be as important to success in prison reform as new beginnings.
Peace and Love,
—Jerry Smith
*
Michel Deforge has been meditating deeply on Your True Home, and keeping an (almost) daily journal. Below are just a few of his meditations. (JS)
AIMLESSNESS
What an idea! I already contain God, I am God (in flesh). I have everything I need to fulfill my destiny/purpose in this life—it’s already present here in “me,” now. I don’t need to strive to be/become anything or anyone! I am already perfected, right now. The only “problem”/“challenge” I face is accepting this reality instead of spinning stories from the ego about being “less than” all this. I don’t stop being the flower, I stop striving, against “myself”; to become what I already am. Some days this acceptance is easier said than done. I suspect the challenges arise when “I” listen to ego’s stories and to all the nonsense (noise) from the ego of others. The only voice I need to hear, like a clarion, is the voice of God within—already complete, already perfect, already fully present in this place/time (now).
*
I AM HERE FOR YOU
I started today’s musings early, got distracted, listening to my cellie tell his tales, and now I am back. I like the ideal I see at the core: life’s purpose. I may not fully grasp how or why “I” am here now, but I can be open to moments as they occur—“you.” (There is a hint of reciprocity, but I find that too ego-centric a thought to fully allow.) My “you” can be anyone/anything as Thich Nhat Hanh points out—self, now, other(s). My thoughts now wander. If I (all of us) approach life from this vantage: “I am here for you,” what would life, “this” world be like, or how different would it be? I see this modeled by Johnny, Jude, Dick, Kristen, Jake, Sarah, Bill, Deborah—ALL our OHOM friends and volunteers, each in their own unique and special way. I have tried and failed at this on occasion. I wonder, is this a deliberate act or a skill to cultivate, or, is it a mindset for life, being open to this moment (now) and what- or whomever is present, as part of the moment, for “me” to be present myself to only this now and all it contains? I like the mental openness, opposed to the striving (grasping?) to do or control; but, just letting be as is…
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FOUNDATION OF LOVE
I agree with this day’s sentiment; yet I know that it is also hard to do at times. Maybe if I can learn (remember) that there is no “you” or “me” (duality) and begin to see everything as a part or piece of the One, All-existent, then maybe it will seem less challenging to love “self,” since the One is love and we (I) are all part of (included within) that One. I suspect the delusion of duality, believing “I” exist separate from “you” and the All-that-is, leads to selfishness. “I” must protect “me.” Breaking down ego can help [me] see that I and you are part of unity. If I can love you, then I can love me, and as I learn to love me better then I can love you better too. I love you!
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EMBRACE THEM WITH GREAT TENDERNESS
….I also enjoyed/related to Aaron’s ideas about feeling lack of worth, as a traumatized child, insecure and uncertain. Are there not times to be tender toward self/other and allow the feeling flow, while reminding self that, “Yes, I am worth the ‘good’ I experience and the ‘bad’ is just suffering over aversions I haven’t yet LET GO. Maybe? I wonder, what child-hurt left myself, Aaron, or others with this scar of doubt? How do we (can we or anyone) heal this harm? Is it preventable? I hope!
—Michel Deforge
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Katie sent a letter from Thich Nhat Hanh and a poem by Juan Felipe Herrera. (JS)
Tomorrow [10/11/20] is Thich Nhat Hanh’s birthday. It is a gift to be able to share together around Thay’s words and his own practice. Below is a copy of what he posted yesterday on the importance of loving our Home, Mother Earth—for peace, world peace.

A LETTER TO THE EARTH

Dear Mother Earth

Every time I step upon the Earth, I will train myself to see that I am walking on you. Every time I place my feet on the Earth, I have a chance to be in touch with you and with all your wonders. With every step I can touch the fact that you aren’t just beneath me, dear Mother, but you are also within me. Each mindful and gentle step can nourish me, heal me, and bring me into contact with myself and you in the present moment.

Walking in this spirit, I can experience awakening, I can awaken to the fact that I am alive and that life is a precious miracle.
I can awaken to the fact that I am never alone and can never die. You are always there within me and around me at every step, nourishing me, embracing me, and carrying me far into the future.

Dear Mother, I make the promise today to return your love and fulfill this wish by investing every step I take on you with love and tenderness. I am walking not merely on matter, but on spirit.

Thich Nhat Hanh
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Basho & Mandela

As Basho has said—
it is a narrow road to the Deep North—as Mandela has said
the haphazard segregation later became a well-orchestrated
segregation
—as Basho has said the journey began with an attained
awareness
that at any moment you can become a weather-exposed skeleton
—think of us in this manner
these are notes for your nourishment—hold them
as bowls of kindness
from journeys of bravery
the will to seek & find the sudden turning rivers & the dawn-eyed
freedom

—Juan Felipe Herrera

—Katie Radditz
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Within the Window Frame is an exercise or project that I adapted from a friend who is an artist and who uses it in her Nature Journaling art classes. Here we are going to use it as a focusing and centering process. We can use writing with this activity, drawing, singing, collage, etc. The methods of “filling the window frame” are not limited to any one mode.
First choose a frame size, maybe one like a big hardback book, maybe one like a small paperback—either cut out the frame from paper or cardboard to use or imagine the size. Then choose something to concentrate on that is near at hand—what is right in front of you in your room, on your table, even out your window. It can be a person or two, an object (your sandwich or meal, a purse, etc.).
Next look at it, in real life or in your imagination, with fuzzed eyes. Don’t look for specifics. Try and see outlines, colors, or emotions. Try this for a few minutes being open to the essence of the situation.
Finally start filling the frame, putting into the window what you see, and that can be either physically or emotionally what you see.
Maybe start with words—a haiku, a short poem, or just the most vivid and necessary words. Then jump to a short story.
Or try drawing in cartoon images. Then maybe a drawing that is as detailed as you can make it.
After doing one of “filling in the window frame” try another, maybe do a few each day. See if you can notice a pattern or see a direction revealing itself. Or maybe just a mood or feeling common to one day, either in your mind or in the situation around you.
This project is a process through which we can begin to see our world and ourselves in more focused and attentive ways, through words or images or both. This is one way of meditating on your world and your outlook—not that they are so very separate!! After awhile you will see threads of connection and understanding.
Maybe you can keep these windows as a journal of your experiences. Maybe come back to them as small frames of insight into an otherwise busy time.
Enjoy.
—Deborah Buchanan
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“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth. I sat at a table where were rich food and wine in abundance, an obsequious attendance, but sincerity and truth were not; and I went away hungry from the inhospitable board. The hospitality was as cold as the ices.”
—from Walden by Henry David Thoreau (quote sent by Jake Green)
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I have been thinking about the power of love lately. We are in some unprecedented times with covid, the wildfires and all the civil unrest. It is a powerful thing to see communities come together and help their neighbors when they are down and feeling lonely and lost. The stories you hear of people who have lost homes due to the fires or loved ones from covid, there are just as many positive stories of neighbors or strangers stepping up to help ease their pain. It can be just a simple sign that tells the first responders how much they are appreciated and to see their reaction when the street is filled with people holding signs and telling them that they love them. I can tell you first hand, recently returned from the fire lines, that after working days on end and feeling tired and burned out, then having people honk their horn and yell their appreciation—it gives you strength to carry on.
Love can come from some very unexpected places when you least expect it and you may need it the most. It is an amazing thing that people are out there that care for their fellow humans. Even when the love might not be directed at you personally, to see others loving others, like I talk about above, can have a huge impact on people. Reading all of your words and the newsletters has been great. When I see that type of thing it makes me want to be a better, more loving and compassionate person. It is infectious.
I recently lost my father who was killed in a tragic motor vehicle accident. He was my rock and I was so looking forward to spending time with him when I got home. I tried to be strong at first, but I started to slip into a very lonely dark place within a month. Nothing made sense and I felt fearful. Then I started to get unexpected support from the community where I grew up. A friend from the past reached out to me and we have been speaking ever since. Their love and support has seen me through the worst of it, and I am feeling excited again about going home and continuing my father’s legacy. Love is a beautiful thing and it knows when you need it most, how others’ compassion and understanding can bring you through dark times and make you feel hopeful again. Neat! Let’s all keep loving one another for the sake of those that may not know they need it.
—Aaron Gilbert
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#53 When You Argue with the One You Love
In my past, when I have argued with the ones I love I always felt like I wanted to just be a million miles in any direction away from them. A lot of my childhood was filled with the ones I loved fighting and arguing. It scared me then and it scares me to this day. When it is all said and done I really just want all of us to be happy, and when I imagine being 300 years away from the one I love, well…the content of any argument is not worth it. I would rather forgive everyone that ever hurt or wronged me, and replace the hate with love and joy and kindness—and fill the argument with peace and love. To forgive is to live in love, to do this is the key to peace, and to have peace is to allow the seeds of love to grow.
—Rocky Hutchinson
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Well, that’s a wrap for our second Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue. Lovely!
The next one will come out on November 15th. It’s a conversation. It goes to just over a dozen people who live in prison and just over two dozen people who don’t. Please write or email me with your contributions. You can respond to what someone else has written, use a poem or text for inspiration, share a poem you’ve written, or your own ruminations.

May all people be happy.
May we live in love.

—Johnny Stallings

peace, love & pollyanna 10/15/20
2020-10-15 - 2020-10-21
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

October 15, 2020

I WANT TO BE MORE LIKE POLLYANNA

Pollyanna: noun an excessively cheerful or optimistic person.

In conversations with people, I often find myself trying to put a positive spin on things. Is there something wrong with me? Could I somehow be (shudder)…unrealistic?! Afraid to face facts?! A Pollyanna?!!!

I always got the impression that there was something horribly wrong with being “a Pollyanna.” But I was beginning to suspect that maybe I am one. I decided to investigate. Just who or what is a Pollyanna? I got the book—Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter, first published in 1913. I read it. I realize that I am no Pollyanna. But now I aspire to be more like her every day.

As the story opens, Pollyanna is eleven years old. She has lived in poverty with her loving father, a minister. He has just died, and now the orphaned Pollyanna has become the ward of her unhappy Aunt Polly. She is a cheerful little girl. Maybe even excessively cheerful. And for this sin she has become an object of scorn for hipsters, cynics, intellectuals, and people who suffer from depression and self-pity—(who probably have not deigned to actually read the book).

Pollyanna likes to play the “glad game,” which her father taught her. Here’s the story of the glad game as she tells it to her aunt’s maid, Nancy:

“But, say, we better hurry. I’ve got ter get them dishes done, ye know.”
“I’ll help,” promised Pollyanna, promptly.
“Oh, Miss Pollyanna!” demurred Nancy.
For a moment there was silence. The sky was darkening fast. Pollyanna took a firmer hold of her friend’s arm.
“I reckon I’m glad, after all, that you DID get scared—a little, ’cause then you came after me,” she shivered.
“Poor little lamb! And you must be hungry, too. I—I’m afraid you’ll have ter have bread and milk in the kitchen with me. Yer aunt didn’t like it—because you didn’t come down ter supper, ye know.”
“But I couldn’t. I was up here.”
“Yes; but—she didn’t know that, you see!” observed Nancy, dryly, stifling a chuckle. “I’m sorry about the bread and milk; I am, I am.”
“Oh, I’m not. I’m glad.”
“Glad! Why?”
“Why, I like bread and milk, and I’d like to eat with you. I don’t see any trouble about being glad about that.”
“You don’t seem ter see any trouble bein’ glad about everythin’,” retorted Nancy, choking a little over her remembrance of Pollyanna’s brave attempts to like the bare little attic room.
Pollyanna laughed softly.
“Well, that’s the game, you know, anyway.”
“The—GAME?”
“Yes; the ‘just being glad’ game.”
“Whatever in the world are you talkin’ about?”
“Why, it’s a game. Father told it to me, and it’s lovely,” rejoined Pollyanna. “We’ve played it always, ever since I was a little, little girl. I told the Ladies’ Aid, and they played it—some of them.”
“What is it? I ain’t much on games, though.”
Pollyanna laughed again, but she sighed, too; and in the gathering twilight her face looked thin and wistful.
“Why, we began it on some crutches that came in a missionary barrel.”
“CRUTCHES!”
“Yes. You see I’d wanted a doll, and father had written them so; but when the barrel came the lady wrote that there hadn’t any dolls come in, but the little crutches had. So she sent ’em along as they might come in handy for some child, sometime. And that’s when we began it.”
“Well, I must say I can’t see any game about that,” declared Nancy, almost irritably.
“Oh, yes; the game was to just find something about everything to be glad about—no matter what ’twas,” rejoined Pollyanna, earnestly. “And we began right then—on the crutches.”
“Well, goodness me! I can’t see anythin’ ter be glad about—gettin’ a pair of crutches when you wanted a doll!”
Pollyanna clapped her hands.
“There is—there is,” she crowed. “But I couldn’t see it, either, Nancy, at first,” she added, with quick honesty. “Father had to tell it to me.”
“Well, then, suppose YOU tell ME,” almost snapped Nancy.
“Goosey! Why, just be glad because you don’t—NEED—’EM!” exulted Pollyanna, triumphantly. “You see it’s just as easy—when you know how!”
“Well, of all the queer doin’s!” breathed Nancy, regarding Pollyanna with almost fearful eyes.
“Oh, but it isn’t queer—it’s lovely,” maintained Pollyanna enthusiastically. “And we’ve played it ever since. And the harder ’tis, the more fun ’tis to get ’em out; only—only sometimes it’s almost too hard—like when your father goes to Heaven, and there isn’t anybody but a Ladies’ Aid left.”
“Yes, or when you’re put in a snippy little room ‘way at the top of the house with nothin’ in it,” growled Nancy.
Pollyanna sighed.
“That was a hard one, at first,” she admitted, “specially when I was so kind of lonesome. I just didn’t feel like playing the game, anyway, and I HAD been wanting pretty things, so! Then I happened to think how I hated to see my freckles in the looking-glass, and I saw that lovely picture out the window, too; so then I knew I’d found the things to be glad about. You see, when you’re hunting for the glad things, you sort of forget the other kind—like the doll you wanted, you know.”
“Humph!” choked Nancy, trying to swallow the lump in her throat.
“Most generally it doesn’t take so long,” sighed Pollyanna; “and lots of times now I just think of them WITHOUT thinking, you know. I’ve got so used to playing it. It’s a lovely game. F-father and I used to like it so much,” she faltered. “I suppose, though, it—it’ll be a little harder now, as long as I haven’t anybody to play it with. Maybe Aunt Polly will play it, though,” she added, as an after-thought.
“My stars and stockings!—HER!” breathed Nancy, behind her teeth. Then, aloud, she said doggedly: “See here, Miss Pollyanna, I ain’t sayin’ that I’ll play it very well, and I ain’t sayin’ that I know how, anyway; but I’ll play it with ye, after a fashion—I just will, I will!”
“Oh, Nancy!” exulted Pollyanna, giving her a rapturous hug. “That’ll be splendid! Won’t we have fun?”
“Er—maybe,” conceded Nancy, in open doubt. “But you mustn’t count too much on me, ye know. I never was no case fur games, but I’m a-goin’ ter make a most awful old try on this one. You’re goin’ ter have some one ter play it with, anyhow,” she finished, as they entered the kitchen together.
Pollyanna ate her bread and milk with good appetite; then, at Nancy’s suggestion, she went into the sitting room, where her aunt sat reading. Miss Polly looked up coldly.
“Have you had your supper, Pollyanna?”
“Yes, Aunt Polly.”
“I’m very sorry, Pollyanna, to have been obliged so soon to send you into the kitchen to eat bread and milk.”
“But I was real glad you did it, Aunt Polly. I like bread and milk, and Nancy, too. You mustn’t feel bad about that one bit.”
Aunt Polly sat suddenly a little more erect in her chair.
“Pollyanna, it’s quite time you were in bed. You have had a hard day, and to-morrow we must plan your hours and go over your clothing to see what it is necessary to get for you. Nancy will give you a candle. Be careful how you handle it. Breakfast will be at half-past seven. See that you are down to that. Good-night.”
Quite as a matter of course, Pollyanna came straight to her aunt’s side and gave her an affectionate hug.
“I’ve had such a beautiful time, so far,” she sighed happily. “I know I’m going to just love living with you but then, I knew I should before I came. Good-night,” she called cheerfully, as she ran from the room.
“Well, upon my soul!” ejaculated Miss Polly, half aloud. “What a most extraordinary child!” Then she frowned. “She’s ‘glad’ I punished her, and I ‘mustn’t feel bad one bit,’ and she’s going to ‘love to live’ with me! Well, upon my soul!” ejaculated Miss Polly again, as she took up her book.
Fifteen minutes later, in the attic room, a lonely little girl sobbed into the tightly-clutched sheet:
“I know, father-among-the-angels, I’m not playing the game one bit now—not one bit; but I don’t believe even you could find anything to be glad about sleeping all alone ‘way off up here in the dark—like this. If only I was near Nancy or Aunt Polly, or even a Ladies’ Aider, it would be easier!”
Down-stairs in the kitchen, Nancy, hurrying with her belated work, jabbed her dish-mop into the milk pitcher, and muttered jerkily:
“If playin’ a silly-fool game—about bein’ glad you’ve got crutches when you want dolls—is got ter be—my way—o’ bein’ that rock o’ refuge—why, I’m a-goin’ ter play it—I am, I am!”

Mrs. Snow is an “invalid,” confined to her bed. Twice a week, as an act of charity, Aunt Polly has her maid Nancy bring hot food to her. Pollyanna volunteers to do it. She tries to cheer Mrs. Snow up:

“They didn’t tell me you were so pretty!”
“Me!—pretty!” scoffed the woman, bitterly.
“Why, yes. Didn’t you know it?” cried Pollyanna.
“Well, no, I didn’t,” retorted Mrs. Snow, dryly. Mrs. Snow had lived forty years, and for fifteen of those years she had been too busy wishing things were different to find much time to enjoy things as they were….
“Oh, I love black hair! I should be so glad if I only had it,” sighed Pollyanna.
Mrs. Snow dropped the mirror and turned irritably.
“Well, you wouldn’t!—not if you were me. You wouldn’t be glad for black hair nor anything else—if you had to lie here all day as I do!”
Pollyanna bent her brows in a thoughtful frown.
“Why, ‘twould be kind of hard—to do it then, wouldn’t it?” she mused aloud.
“Do what?”
“Be glad about things.”
“Be glad about things—when you’re sick in bed all your days? Well, I should say it would,” retorted Mrs. Snow. “If you don’t think so, just tell me something to be glad about; that’s all!”
To Mrs. Snow’s unbounded amazement, Pollyanna sprang to her feet and clapped her hands.
“Oh, goody! That’ll be a hard one—won’t it? I’ve got to go, now, but I’ll think and think all the way home; and maybe the next time I come I can tell it to you. Good-by. I’ve had a lovely time! Good-by,” she called again, as she tripped through the doorway.

Pollyanna returns a couple days later.

“I’ve thought it up, Mrs. Snow—what you can be glad about.”
“GLAD about! What do you mean?”
“Why, I told you I would. Don’t you remember? You asked me to tell you something to be glad about—glad, you know, even though you did have to lie here abed all day.”
“Oh!” scoffed the woman. “THAT? Yes, I remember that; but I didn’t suppose you were in earnest any more than I was.”
“Oh, yes, I was,” nodded Pollyanna, triumphantly; “and I found it, too. But ‘TWAS hard. It’s all the more fun, though, always, when ’tis hard. And I will own up, honest to true, that I couldn’t think of anything for a while. Then I got it.”
“Did you, really? Well, what is it?” Mrs. Snow’s voice was sarcastically polite.
Pollyanna drew a long breath.
“I thought—how glad you could be—that other folks weren’t like you—all sick in bed like this, you know,” she announced impressively.
*

Cheerful and optimistic people are often considered to be not very bright. For many years now, depressed chain-smoking intellectuals have been assuring us that existence is absurd, that life is meaningless and we’re all doomed. As Bertolt Brecht said: “He who laughs has not yet heard the bad news.” But if happiness is just for half-wits, why is the Dalai Lama always chuckling?

The novel Pollyanna brings me back to a favorite them of mine: Culture That Nurtures. That’s what culture is supposed to do: make us feel good, kind, happy, safe. Our popular entertainment—movies, TV, video games—is a barrage of violence. It marinates us in fear, anger, hatred and gloom. Like Charles Dickens, Eleanor H. Porter wanted to make us kinder. People watch “A Christmas Carol” and “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” every year to be reminded of our essential goodness.

Surely there has always been, is now, and will always be terrible violence, tragedy and injustice in our world. It is just for that reason that we need healing stories—stories that remind of our essential goodness, stories that nurture peace, love, happiness and understanding in our hearts and minds.

Last Sunday, at our Bibliophiles Unanimous Zoom gathering, we were talking about Positive Futures and Utopian Visions. Ken Margolis was inspired by reading the book The Corner That Held Them by Sylvia Townsend Warner to announce excitedly that This is Utopia! Jeffrey Sher told us that when Stephen J. Gould was asked how he could be optimistic, he replied: “What’s the alternative?” Dave Duncan told us that David Byrne, formerly of Talking Heads, has started a website called Reasons To Be Cheerful. Here’s the link:

https://reasonstobecheerful.world

I recommended books by David Korten and Charles Eisenstein. There are a lot of their talks on YouTube. Here are a couple links:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRYEHOStmss&t=3211s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKYqbNzAav4

Someone who helps me to be more Pollyanna-like is Thich Nhat Hanh. A lot of his talks are on YouTube. Here’s a link to an interview Oprah Winfrey did with him:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJ9UtuWfs3U

I was just heading out to print up this newsletter, but I happened to check my Inbox and found this poem from Kim. It’s perfect for our theme. Here it is:

Our Next Big Thing

The deal-maker is in denial, Mr. Kentucky
on a tear, the zigzag death toll seeks the sky,
someone gets shot asking for a mask, a naming
party sparks another outbreak, the news is
mega fires and hurricanes, and our fears
come true like wishes turned to curses
that prey upon our foolishness.

So why does the wren still sing? Why
did I see a child skip, a mail clerk grin
in that moment she adjusted her mask?
Why the uptick in random kindnesses?
Dogs don’t stop wagging, or flowers
opening their secrets. We must be
getting ready for the next big thing.

—Kim Stafford
*

When I told Kim that this week’s issue features Pollyanna, he said: “Oh, the Glad Game!” (I’m afraid Kim might have some Pollyanna-ish tendencies himself.) He recommended the cartoon by Gary Larson where two devils in Hell are watching a guy whistle while he hauls brimstone in a wheelbarrow. One says to the other: “You know, we’re just not getting to that guy.”

May all people be happy.
May we live in love.

—Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 10/8/20
2020-10-08 - 2020-10-14
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

October 8, 2020

I like to begin each day in what I call “the Golden World.” One day, some years ago, I sat down and tried to describe it. It’s not easy to describe, since, like everything else, it’s indescribable. Here’s what I cam up with (slightly revised):

THE GOLDEN WORLD

where is the golden world?
it’s right here

what is it?
it’s a place of quiet joy
a place where everything is miraculous

i know i’m in the golden world
when there is nowhere i would rather be

the golden world is paradise
not the paradise that existed long ago

or the paradise that is yet to come

but this one

to get to the golden world
one thing that sometimes helps
is to slow down

rushing around
trying to get somewhere else
we fail to appreciate where we are

when this ordinary world is alive for us
with beauty, with joy, with love, with peace
we are in the golden world

this ordinary world is the golden world
transformed by a shift in the way we see it
or feel it

one of the most astonishing things about us
is our ability to take things for granted
we get used to trees, to the sky, to birds
to each other
to ourselves
to life as we live it

we are just here a little while
we better wake up right now

we are always in the golden world
but when we imagine it is somewhere else
we feel that we are in exile

hoping we will somehow improve
wishing things were different
we miss the blessings we have
the blessings of who we are

a goldfinch doesn’t imagine that it can improve

there is suffering within us and around us
the remedy for the suffering within us is close at hand

as for the big world
it is always simultaneously full of great suffering
and great beauty

if we do not live in quiet joy
in beauty, in truth
in freedom, in love—
what i am calling the golden world—
we cannot transform the suffering

of course, some suffering is built into the world
we are mortal creatures
disease and death are inevitable

but there is gratuitous suffering
we create through our ignorance,
our hatred, our anger, our fear

if we imagine we have an enemy
we are always at war

our inner conflict is the source of much outer conflict
wars begin in the minds of men

there is a stillness
in which there is no conflict
we can live there
or here
in the golden world

the peace which passeth understanding
is our birthright
maybe we forgot
got lost

it’s time to remember
to come home
to the golden world

we are born into the golden world
we learn to understand and to speak a language
it’s an astonishing thing!
we create an identity, a story about who we are
we create a mythos, a story about the world in which we live
these are fantastic achievements!

but, alas!, these stories become the prisons in which we live
we take everything new and turn it into something old

we don’t live in the world
we live inside our descriptions of the world

we are fictional characters
living in fictional worlds

the golden world is this ordinary world
not mediated by thought or language

we touch it all the time
whenever we take a sip of tea
and are not doing anything but taking a sip of tea
we are in the golden world

a quiet setting makes it easier for us to experience the golden world
but when the stillness is strong within us
the whole noisy world is golden

when thought and language are our tools
rather than our masters
they are a blessing
not a curse

when meditation is not just something we do for half-an-hour in the morning
when we live in meditation
we live in the golden world

we are always in the golden world
whether we know it or not
the place we’ve always wanted to get to
is where we are

that which is not born
and does not die
is who we are

in the golden world
there is nothing to strive for

no regret

all our sins are washed away

the golden world is not an imaginary place
the world described in the newspaper is an imaginary place

the golden world is never somewhere else
it is always right now where we are
or not at all

when you are in it
you are not

when you can’t see it
you are blind

when the poet said
“each moment and whatever happens thrills me with joy”
he was in it
and when he said
“Divine am I inside and out,
and I make holy whatever I touch
or am touch’d from”

when another poet felt that he “was blessed
and could bless”
he was in it

another poet clarified the matter when she said:
“The Infinite a sudden Guest
Has been assumed to be–
But how can that stupendous come
Which never went away?”

you can’t get to the golden world by trying to go there
when you are not trying to go somewhere
not trying to do something
not trying to be someone
you might find that you are in the golden world

when i’m in it, i think
“this is my home
i must never allow myself to lose this
even for a moment”

then, later, it’s gone
did i leave the golden world?
or did it leave me?

i find myself in exile
and want to return

i know that that wanting condemns me to exile
and so i seek to find my way home by a kind of indirection
instead of doing something
i do nothing

when the mind is quiet and alert
it doesn’t matter whether “i” am in the golden world or not
the question doesn’t arise
or if it does
it is seen for what it is

the squirrel outside, sitting on a branch
has no ideas about a golden world
and so it lives in the golden world

“the golden world” is a name i give to something
that has no name

to have an identity is to be in exile

am i in the golden world?
or is the golden world in me?

behind each person’s mask
shines a radiant, glorious, perfect being

beneath who we pretend to be
is who we are

at those moments when we see through everyone’s mask
we are in the golden world

when we see through someone’s mask
it is impossible not to love them

for this to be paradise
we have to love everyone
without love, it isn’t paradise

when where we are
and where we want to be
are the same place
we are in the golden world

the seer sees the golden world
the seeker seeks the golden world
the seeker asks: where is it?
the seer replies: where isn’t it?

this is it

you want a miracle?
the poet said:
“a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels”
if that is so
where can you find something that is not miraculous?

there has never been
is not now
and will never be
anything more perfect
more beautiful
more miraculous
than a glass of water

there are miracles everywhere you look
the eyes with which you see
are miraculous
our brains, nervous systems
our heart’s pumping blood
miracles!

that we are alive
and aware
in this world of marvels
is a great blessing

—Johnny Stallings

Beginner's Mind by Shunryū Suzuki
2020-10-01 - 2020-10-14
Beginner’s Mind

People say that practicing Zen is difficult, but there is a misunderstanding as to why. It is not difficult because it is hard to sit in the cross-legged position, or to attain enlightenment. It is difficult because it is hard to keep our mind pure and our practice pure in its fundamental sense. The Zen school developed in many ways after it was established in China, but at the same time, it became more and more impure. But I do not want to talk about Chinese Zen or the history of Zen. I am interested in helping you keep your practice from becoming impure.

In Japan we have the phrase shoshin, which means “beginner’s mind.” The goal of practice is always to keep our beginner’s mind. Suppose you recite the Prajna Parmita Sutra only once. It might be a very good recitation. But what would happen to you if you recited it twice, three times, four times, or more? You might easily lose your original attitude towards it. The same thing will happen in your other Zen practices. For a while you will keep your beginner’s mind, but if you continue to practice one, two, three years or more, although you may improve some, you are liable to lose the limitless meaning of original mind.

For Zen students the most important thing is not to be dualistic. Our “original mind” includes everything within itself. You should not lose your self-sufficient state of mind. This does not mean a closed mind, but actually an empty mind and a ready mind. If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything; it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities; in the expert’s there are few.

If you discriminate too much, you limit yourself. If you are too demanding or too greedy, your mind is not rich and self-sufficient. If we lose our original self-sufficient mind, we will lose all precepts. When your mind becomes demanding, when you long for something, you will end up violating your own precepts: not to tell lies, not to steal, not to kill, not to be immoral, and so forth. If you keep your original mind, the precepts will keep themselves.

In the beginner’s mind there is no thought, “I have attained something.” All self-centered thoughts limit our vast mind. When we have no thought of achievement, no thought of self, we are true beginners. Then we can really learn something. The beginner’s mind is the mind of compassion. When our mind is compassionate, it is boundless. Dogen-zenji, the founder of our school, always emphasized how important it is to resume our boundless original mind. Then we are always true to ourselves, in sympathy with all beings, and can actually practice.

So the most difficult thing is always to keep your beginner’s mind. There is no need to have a deep understanding of Zen. Even though you read much Zen literature, you must read each sentence with a fresh mind. You should not say, “I know what Zen is,” or “I have attained enlightenment.” This is also the real secret of the arts: always be a beginner. Be very careful about this point. If you start to practice zazen, you will begin to appreciate your beginner’s mind. It is the secret of Zen practice.

—Shunryū Suzuki, the Prologue to Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind (1970)

peace, love, happiness & understanding 10/1/20
2020-10-01 - 2020-10-07
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

October 1, 2020

On September 27, at our Bibliophiles Unanimous! Zoom gathering, we were talking about “Nature, Ecology and the Environmental Crisis.” Katie Radditz mentioned Gary Snyder’s essay “Fire, Floods and Following the Dao,” from his book Back on the Fire, published in 2007. She mentioned how relevant it is to our current wildfires in Oregon, California and Washington. That reminded me of Gary Snyder’s great essay from 1969: “Four Changes,” which came at a time when a lot of people were waking up, and which helped that to happen. Later, it was published in his Pulitzer Prize winning book Turtle Island. But before getting to that, I’d like to start this issue with one of Kim’s recent poems:

Holy Smokes

Downwind from where the forest burns
we inhale the cindered souls of trees
that in a whoosh became particulate
and rode the wind to enter us. With
this breath take in the spirit whisker
of a mouse, incinerate wren’s cry
clenched and tumbled from the sky,
moss that leaped from green to nothing,
flailing leaf that in a fiery gasp
rushed through charcoal into dust
inside the billow flame that roiled and—
holy, holy, holy became the smoke-smudge
pall that smuggled mountains into us.

Now freighted for life with dusky mist,
even as we help sustain our neighbors
who lost everything but life, we survivors
are the walking shrine of little lives. We are them,
are earth mind suddenly, to weigh by human choice
what’s best for upward yearning seed of cedar,
footfall of mouse, wingbeat of wren.

—Kim Stafford
*

And now…

FOUR CHANGES

I. POPULATION

The Condition

Position: Human beings are but a part of the fabric of life — dependent on the whole fabric for their very existence. As the most highly developed tool-using animal, we must recognize that the unknown evolutionary destinies of other life forms are to be respected, and we must act as gentle steward of the Earth’s community of being.
Situation: There are now too many human beings, and the problem is growing rapidly worse. It is potentially disastrous not only for the human race but for most other life forms.
Goal: The goal would be half of the present world population, or less.

Action

Social/Political: First, a massive effort to convince the governments and leaders of the world that the problem is severe. And that all talk about raising food-production — well intentioned as it is — simply puts off the only real solution: reduce population. Demand immediate participation by all countries in programs to legalize abortion, encourage vasectomy, sterilization (provided by free clinics), and try to correct traditional cultural attitudes that tend to force women into childbearing, remove income tax deductions for more than two children above a specified income level, and scale it so that lower-income families are forced to be careful too, or pay families to limit their number; take a vigorous stand against the policy of the right-wing in the Catholic hierarchy and any other institutions that exercise an irresponsible social force in regard to this question; oppose and correct simple-minded boosterism that equates population growth with continuing prosperity; work ceaselessly to have all political questions be seen in the light of this prime problem.
In many cases the governments are the wrong agents to address. Their most likely use of a problem or crisis is another excuse for extending their own powers. Abortion should be legal and voluntary. Great care should be taken that no one is ever tricked or forced into sterilizations. The whole population issue is fraught with contradictions, but the fact stands that by standards of planetary biological welfare, there are already too many human beings. The long-range answer is a steady, lower birthrate, area by area of the globe. The measure of optimum population should be based on what is best for the total ecological health of the region, including its wildlife population.
The Community: Explore other social structures and marriage forms, such as group marriage and polyandrous marriage, which provide family life but many less children. Share the pleasure of raising children widely, so that all need not directly reproduce in order to enter into this basic human experience. We must hope that no one woman would give birth to more than one child or two children, during this period of crisis. Adopt children. Let reverence for life and reverence for the feminine mean also a reverence for other species, and for future human lives, most of which are threatened.
Our Own Heads: “I am a child of all life, and all living beings are my brothers and sisters, my children and grandchildren. And there is a child within me waiting to be born, the baby of a new and wiser self.” Love, lovemaking, seen as the vehicle of mutual realization for a couple, where the creation of new selves and a new world of being is as important as reproducing our kind.

II. POLLUTION

The Condition

Position: Pollution is of two types. One sort results from an excess of some fairly ordinary substance—smoke, or solid waste—that cannot be absorbed or transmuted rapidly enough to offset its introduction into the environment, thus causing changes the great cycle is not prepared for. (All organisms have wastes and by-products, and these are indeed part of the total biosphere: energy is passed along the line, refracted in various ways. This is cycling, not pollution.) The other sort is powerful modern chemicals and poisons, products of recent technology that the biosphere is totally unprepared for. Such are DDT and similar chlorinated hydrocarbons—nuclear testing fallout and nuclear waste—poison gas, germ and virus storage and leakage by the military; and chemicals that are put into food, whose long-range effects on human begins have not been properly tested.
Situation: The human race in the last century has allowed its production and scattering of wastes, by-products, and various chemicals to become excessive. Pollution is directly harming life on the planet: which is to say, ruining the environment for humanity itself. We are fouling our air and water, and living in noise and filth that no “animal” would tolerate, while advertising and politicians try to tell us “we’ve never had it so good.” The dependence of modern governments on this kind of untruth leads to shameful mind-pollution through the mass media and much school education.
Goal: Clean air, clean clear-running rivers, the presence of Pelican and Osprey and Gray Whale in our lives; salmon and trout in our streams; unmuddied language and good dreams.

Action

Social/Political: Effective international legislation banning DDT and other poisons — with no fooling around. The collusion of certain scientists with the pesticide industry and agri-business that is trying to block this legislation must be brought out in the open. Strong penalties for water and air pollution by industries — “Pollution is somebody’s profit.” Phase out the internal combustion engine and fossil fuel use in general, do more research into non-polluting energy sources such as solar energy and the tides. No more kidding the public about nuclear waste disposal: it’s impossible to do it safely. So nuclear-power generated electricity cannot be seriously planned for as it stands now.
Stop all germ and chemical warfare research and experimentation; work toward a safe disposal of the present staggering and stupid stockpiles of H-Bombs, cobalt gunk, germ and poison tanks and cans. Provide incentives against the wasteful use of paper, and so on, which adds to the solid waste of cities, develop methods of re-cycling solid urban waste. Recycling should be the basic principle behind all waste-disposal thinking. Thus, all bottles should be re-usable; old cans should make more cans; old newspapers should go back into newsprint again. Establish stronger controls and conduct more research on chemicals in foods. A shift toward a more varied and sensitive type of agriculture (more small scale and subsistence farming) would eliminate much of the call for blanket use of pesticides.
The Community: DDT and such – don’t use them. Air pollution: use fewer cars. Cars pollute the air, and one or two people riding lonely in a huge car is an insult to intelligence and to the Earth. Share rides, legalize hitchhiking, have hitchhiker waiting stations along the highways. Also — a step toward the new world – walk more; look for the best routes through beautiful countryside for long-distance walking trips: San Francisco to Los Angeles down the Coast Range, for example. Learn how to use your own manure as fertilizer if you’re in the country, as the far East has done for centuries. There is a way, and it’s safe. Solid waste: boycott bulky wasteful Sunday papers which use up trees. It’s all just advertising anyway, which is artificially inducing more energy consumption. Refuse bags at the store and bring your own. Organize park and street clean-up festivals. Don’t work in any way for or with an industry that pollutes. Don’t be drafted into the military. Don’t waste. (A monk and an old master were once walking in the mountains. They noticed a little hut upstream. The monk said, “A wise hermit must live there” — the master said, “That’s no wise hermit, you see that lettuce leaf floating down the stream, he’s a Waster.” Just then an old man came running down the hill with his beard flying and caught the floating lettuce leaf.) Carry your own jug to the winery and have it filled from the barrel.
Our Own Heads: Part of the trouble with talking about DDT is that the use of it is not just a practical device, it’s almost an establishment religion. There is something in Western culture that wants to totally wipe out creepy-crawlies, totally, and feels repugnance for toadstools and snakes. This is fear of one’s own deepest inner-self wilderness areas, and the answer is, relax. Relax around bugs, snakes, and your own hairy dreams. Again, we all should share our crops with a certain percentage of bug life as “paying our dues.” Thoreau says, “How then can the harvest fail? Shall I not rejoice also at the abundance of the weeds whose seeds are the granary of the birds? It matters little comparatively whether the fields fill the farmer’s barns. The true husbandman will cease from anxiety, as the squirrels manifest no concern whether the woods will bear chestnuts this year or not, and finish his labor with every day, relinquishing all claim to the produce of his fields, and sacrificing in his mind not only his first fruits but his last fruits also.” In the realm of thought, inner experience, consciousness, as in the outward realm of interconnection, there is a difference between balanced cycle, and the excess that cannot be handled. When the balance is right, the mind recycles from highest illuminations to the muddied blinding anger or grabiness that sometimes seizes us all. That is the alchemical “transmutation.”

III. CONSUMPTION

The Condition

Position: Everybody that lives eats food and is food in turn. This complicated animal, the human being, rests on a vast and delicate pyramid of energy transformation. To grossly use more than you need to destroy is biologically unsound. Much of the production and consumption of modern society is not necessary or conducive to spiritual and cultural growth, let alone survival; and is behind much greed and envy, age-old causes of social and international discord.
Situation: Humanity’s careless use of “resources” and its total dependence on certain substances such as fossil fuels (which are being exhausted, slowly but certainly) are having harmful effects on all the other members of the life-network. The complexity of modern technology renders whole populations vulnerable to the deadly consequences of the loss of any one key resource. Instead of independence we have over-dependence on life- giving substances such as water, which we squander. Many species of animals and birds have become extinct in the service of fashion fads — or fertilizer — or industrial oil. The soil is being used up; in fact, mankind has become a locust-like blight on the planet that will leave a bare cupboard for its own children — all the while in a kind of Addict’s Dream of affluence, comfort, eternal progress — using the great achievements of science to produce software and swill.
Goal: Balance, harmony, humility, growth that is a mutual growth with Redwood and Quail — to be a good member of the great community of living creatures. True affluence is not needing anything.

Action

Social/Political: It must be demonstrated ceaselessly that a continually “growing economy” is no longer healthy, but a cancer. And that the criminal waste which is allowed in the name of competition — especially that ultimate in wasteful needless competition, hot wars and cold wars with “communism” (or “capitalism”) — must be halted totally with ferocious energy and decision. Economics must be seen as a small sub-branch of Ecology, and production/distribution/consumption handled by companies or unions or cooperatives with the same elegance and spareness one sees in nature. Soil banks; open space; logging to be truly based on sustained yield (the US Forest Service is sadly now the lackey of business). Protection for all predators and varmints. “Support your right to arm bears.” Damn the International Whaling Commission which is selling out the last of our precious, wise whales! Ban absolutely all further development of roads and concessions in National Parks and Wilderness Areas; build auto campgrounds in the least desirable areas. Initiate consumer boycotts of dishonest and unnecessary products. Establish Co-ops. Politically, blast both “Communist” and “Capitalist” myths of progress, and all crude notions of conquering or controlling nature.
The Community: Sharing and creating. The inherent aptness of communal life — where large tools are owned jointly and used efficiently. The power of renunciation: If enough Americans refused to buy a new car for one given year it would permanently alter the American economy. Recycling clothes and equipment. Support handicrafts — gardening, home skills, midwifery, herbs — all the things that can make us independent, beautiful and whole. Learn to break the habit of acquiring unnecessary possessions, a monkey on everybody’s back — but avoid a self-abnegating anti-joyous self-righteousness. Simplicity is light, carefree, neat, and loving — not a self-punishing ascetic trip.
(The great Chinese poet Tu Fu said, “The ideas of a poet should be noble and simple.”) Don’t shoot a deer if you don’t know how to use all the meat and preserve that which you can’t eat, to tan the hide and use the leather — to use it all, with gratitude, right down to the sinew and hooves. Simplicity and mindfulness in diet are the starting point for many people.
Our Own Heads: It is hard to even begin to gauge how such a complication of possessions, the notions of “my and mine,” stand between us and a true, clear, liberated way of seeing the world. To live lightly on the Earth, to be aware and alive, to be free of egotism, to be in contact with plants and animals, starts with simple, concrete acts. The inner principle is the insight that we are interdependent energy-fields of great potential wisdom and compassion expressed in each person as a superb mind, a handsome and complex body, and the almost magical capacity of language. To these potentials and capacities, “owning things” can add nothing of authenticity. “Clad in the sky, with the Earth for a pillow.”

IV. TRANSFORMATION

The Condition

Position: Everyone is the result of four forces — the conditions of this known-universe (matter/energy forms, and ceaseless change); the biology of his or her species; individual genetic heritage; and the culture one is born into. Within this web of forces there are certain spaces and loops that allow to some persons the experience of inner freedom and illumination. The gradual exploration of some of these spaces constitutes “evolution” and, for human cultures, what “history” could increasingly be. We have it within our deepest powers not only to change our “selves” but to change our culture. If humans are to remain on Earth they must transform the five-millennia-long urbanizing civilization tradition into a new ecologically-sensitive, harmony-oriented, wild-minded scientific/spiritual culture. “Wildness is the state of complete awareness. That’s why we need it.”
Situation: Civilization, which has made us so successful a species, has overshot itself and now threatens us with its inertia. There is also some evidence that civilized life isn’t good for the human gene pool. To achieve the changes, we must change the very foundations of our society and our minds.
Goal: Nothing short of total transformation will do much good. What we envision is a planet on which the human population lives harmoniously and dynamically by employing various sophisticated and unobtrusive technologies in a world environment that is ‘”left natural.” Specific points in this vision:

A healthy and spare population of all races, much less in number than today.
Cultural and individual pluralism, unified by a type of world tribal council. Division by natural and cultural boundaries rather than arbitrary political boundaries.
A technology of communication, education, and quiet transportation, land-use being sensitive to the properties of each region. Allowing, thus, the Bison to return to much of the high plains. Careful but intensive agriculture in the great alluvial valleys; deserts left wild for those who would live there by skill. Computer technicians who run the plant part of the year and walk along with the Elk in their migrations during the rest.
A basic cultural outlook and social organization that inhibits power and property-seeking while encouraging exploration and challenge in things like music, meditation, mathematics, mountaineering, magic, and all other ways of authentic being-in-the-world.
Women totally free and equal. A new kind of family — responsible, but more festive and relaxed is implicit.

Action

Social/Political: It seems evident that there are throughout the world certain social and religious forces that have worked through history toward an ecologically and culturally enlightened state of affairs. Let these be encouraged: Gnostics, hip Marxists, Teilhard de Chardin Catholics, Druids, Taoists, Biologists, Witches, Yogins, Bhikkus, Quakers, Sufis, Tibetans, Zens, Shaman, Bushmen, American Indians, Polynesians, Anarchists, Alchemists . . . the list is long. Primitive cultures, communal and ashram movements, cooperative ventures. Since it doesn’t seem practical or even desirable to think that direct bloody force will achieve much, it would be best to consider this change a continuing “revolution of consciousness” which will be won not by guns but by seizing the key images, myths, archetypes, eschatologies, and ecstasies so that life won’t seem worth living unless one’s on the side of the transforming energy. We must take over “science and technology” and release its real possibilities and powers in the service of this planet — which, after all, produced us and it. More concretely, no transformation without our feet on the ground. Stewardship means, for most of us, find your place on the planet, dig in, and take responsibility from there. The tiresome but tangible work of school boards, county supervisors, local foresters, local politics, even while holding in mind the largest scale of potential change. Get a sense of workable territory. Learn about it and start acting point by point. On all levels, from national to local, the need to move toward steady state economy, equilibrium, dynamic balance, inner growth stressed must be taught – maturity, diversity, climax, creativity.
The Community: New schools, new classes, walking in the woods and cleaning up the streets. Find psychological techniques for creating an awareness of “self” that includes the social and natural environment. “Consideration of what specific language forms — symbolic systems — and social institutions constitute obstacles to ecological awareness.” Without falling into facile interpretations of McLuhan, we can hope to use the media. Let no one be ignorant of the facts of biology and related disciplines; bring up our children as part of the wildlife. Some communities can establish themselves in backwater rural areas and flourish — others maintain themselves in urban centers, and the two types work together — a two-way flow of experience, people, money, and home-grown vegetables. Ultimately cities may exist only as joyous tribal gatherings and fairs, to dissolve after a few weeks. Investigating new lifestyles is our work, as is the exploration of ways to explore our inner realms — with the known dangers of crashing that go with such. Master the archaic and the primitive as models of basic nature-related cultures — as well as the most imaginative extensions of science — and build a community where these two vectors cross.
Our Own Heads: Are where it starts. Knowing that we are the first human beings in history to have so much of our past cultures and previous experiences available to our study, and being free enough of the weight of traditional cultures to seek out a larger identity – the first members of a civilized society since the early Neolithic to wish to look clearly into the eyes of the wild and see our selfhood there, our family there. We have these advantages to set off the obvious disadvantages of being as screwed up as we are — which gives us a fair chance to penetrate some of the riddles of ourselves and the universe, and to go beyond the idea of “human survival” or “survival of the biosphere” and to draw our strength from the realization that at the heart of things is some kind of serene and ecstatic process that is beyond qualities and beyond birth and death. “No need to survive! In the fires that destroy the universe at the end of the kalpa, what survives?” — “The iron tree blooms in the void.”
Knowing that nothing need be done is the place from which we begin to move.

—Gary Snyder (Summer of 1969)
*

Here’s a link to an audio recording of Gary Snyder reading “Four Changes”:

https://www.garynabhan.com/news/2020/04/four-changes-by-gary-snyder/

peace, love & ecology

Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 9/24/20
2020-09-24 - 2020-09-30
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

September 24, 2020

HOW HIPPIES MAY STILL SAVE THE WORLD

Shortly before the Era of Social Distancing began, my friend Bill Faricy and I were eating granola for breakfast and we got to thinking about hippies and what we have given to the world. Granola, for one. And whole wheat bread. Brown rice. Organic food. Recycling. Yoga. Vegetarianism. Holistic medicine. Natural childbirth and breastfeeding. Nonviolence. Massage. Bright colors! Free love. Good vibes. The list got longer and longer.

The most challenging problem that we humans face is that the way we are living is destroying the ecological health of our planet. Hippies intuited this, and began trying to live in harmony with Mother Earth. The changes were not just on the outside, with long hair and geodesic domes. There were deeper changes in thinking, feeling and imagining.

It was obvious that hippies were not going along with the status quo. The status quo is by its nature static, and resistant to change. The hippies clothing styles were mocked, but the peace symbol and the peace hand gesture—which are now emojis—represented something which threatened the foundation of an economy built on militarism and endless war.

The hippies laid-back attitudes were inimical to the Protestant ethic of Hard Work, and to the Spirit of Capitalism. Great efforts had been made and billions of dollars spent to turn citizens into Consumers and the hippies were opting out!—making their own sandals and growing their own food. At every turn the hippies weren’t going along with The Program, and The Program was designed to create Endless Progress and Prosperity. What was wrong with them?

It turned out that there was something wrong with the global project of turning the planet into a Theme Park for Humans. The War On Nature is one we don’t want to “win.” The hippie chanteuse sang: “They paved Paradise and put up a parking lot.”

I was born in 1951, and I didn’t hear the word “ecology” before 1968 or ’69. Around 1970, the year of the first Earth Day, it became evident to anyone who was curious and who read books that there were too many people on the planet for its “carrying capacity,” and that we were not only cutting down all the trees and catching all the fish, but we were poisoning the world with our toxic chemicals and nuclear waste.

Hippies may have invented granola, and coined the expression “Have a nice day!,” but most of the things on my list of contributions made by the hippies are older things that hippies revived and gave momentum to, like yoga, massage and good vibes. Hippies weren’t the first vegetarians. Credit Buddha and Mahavira for that, about 500 BC, with their doctrines of nonviolence (ahimsa). Hippies didn’t discover organic food. Before pesticides were invented, no one ate food with poison on it. And the alarm was sounded not by hippies, but by Rachel Carson—definitely a non-hippie scientist. But the hippies read her book Silent Spring, which was published in 1965, and started organizations like the Northwest Center for Alternatives to Pesticides (www.pesticide.org).

Hippies started nonprofit organizations by the tens (or hundreds) of thousands. There are currently 1.5 million nonprofit corporations in the United States. I started two myself. There are an estimated 10 million non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the world. Hippies didn’t start them all, but hippies are part of a long tradition of nonviolent revolutionary change from the bottom up.

“Hippies” is a word like “gypsies” that can refer to all kinds of people, all over the world. There is a caricatured picture of the long-haired, barefoot, stoned hippie that the mainstream media perpetuates. And surely there is a shadow side to hippie culture. I’m just giving one hippie’s perspective on positive contributions that hippies have made, and how the Hippie Way of understanding and being-in-the-world can help us to make the transition to the Post Fossil Fuel Era as gently and beautifully as possible.

I don’t want to convert anybody to Hippieism. I became a hippie effortlessly. I looked a certain way, dressed a certain way, and thought and acted in certain ways, and people pointed at me and said: “Look, Martha, a hippie!” I wrote an email to a woman in Lebanon in 2012 and signed it: “peace & love, Johnny.” She knew I was a hippie.

My hair isn’t long at present, and I only occasionally wear a hippie-style shirt from somewhere like Nepal or Africa or Guatemala. But I think like a hippie. I believe in Peace and Love—the core hippie values. I love Mother Earth and everyone who lives here—people, plants, animals, clouds, rivers, stones.

This subject is too big for this kind of short essay. Here are the most important hippie ideas:

Nature is Sacred
Money isn’t Everything; (Money and Wealth are not the same thing)
Local Organic Agriculture
Local Economics
Community
Peace & Nonviolence
Children raised to be free, rather than obedient
Meditation & Mindfulness
Live the life you love; (Do your own thing)
Love Everyone!

I don’t have room to elaborate on all these ideas, but I’ll say a few more things. We can’t continue to destroy the ecological health of the planet. Short term financial profit is not a good enough reason to do it. It’s suicidal. And omnicidal.

One hundred years from now, food will be grown closer to where it is eaten. And most things we need will be made locally. The ecological damage inherent in large scale industrial production is unsustainable. The current economic system is unjust and inherently unstable. That which is unsustainable can’t be sustained.

If all children were raised in a loving, nurturing environment, respected as people, allowed to realize their full human potential and follow their hearts’ desires, our world would be transformed utterly. It’s a tall order. To do it, adults will have to become more loving and kind. At present, at home and around the world, physical, psychological and emotional abuse of children is the norm. (See For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Childrearing and the Roots of Violence by Alice Miller.)

Meditation and mindfulness, which hippies were instrumental in helping to bring from the East to the West, can help us to co-create a Culture That Nurtures, a culture of Peace, Love, Happiness & Understanding.

We need to aspire to love everyone unconditionally. No exceptions. No enemies. No “others.” One Human Family. It’s easy! (Much easier than what we’re doing now.) As Bob Marley sang:

One love!
One heart!

I’ll close this issue of peace, love, happiness & understanding with some Good Vibes:

Love’s In Need Of Love Today

(Spoken.) “When you say that you kill in the
Name of God or in the name of Allah,
You are truly cursing God, for that is not of God.
When you say that you hate in the name of God or Allah,
You are lying to God, for that is not of our Father.
Let us pray that we see the light.”

Good morn or evening friends
Here’s your friendly announcer
I have serious news to pass on to everybody
What I’m about to say
Could mean the world’s disaster
Could change your joy and laughter to tears and pain

It’s that
Love’s in need of love today
Don’t delay
Send your’s in right away
Hate’s goin’ round
Breaking many hearts
Stop it please
Before it’s gone too far

—Stevie Wonder
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=paZEqzrrO-4)
*

What the World Needs Now

What the world needs now is love, sweet love
It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of
What the world needs now is love, sweet love
No, not just for some, but for everyone

—Burt Bacharach
(sung by Dionne Warwick: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfHAs9cdTqg)
*

All You Need Is Love

Love, love, love
Love, love, love
Love, love, love

There’s nothing you can do that can’t be done
Nothing you can sing that can’t be sung
Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game
It’s easy

Nothing you can make that can’t be made
No one you can save that can’t be saved
Nothing you can do but you can learn how to be you in time
It’s easy

[chorus] All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need

[repeat] Love, love, love…

[chorus]

Nothing you can know that isn’t known
Nothing you can see that isn’t shown
Nowhere you can be that isn’t where you’re meant to be
It’s easy

All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need

—John Lennon
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7xMfIp-irg)
*

Get Together

Love is but a song we sing
Fear’s the way we die
You can make the mountains ring
Or make the angels cry
Though the bird is on the wing
And you may not know why
[Chorus] Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another right now
Some may come and some may go
We will surely pass
When the one that left us here
Returns for us at last
We are but a moment’s sunlight
Fading in the grass
[Chorus]

If you hear the song I sing
You will understand (listen!)
You hold the key to love and fear
All in your trembling hand
Just one key unlocks them both
It’s there at your command

[Chorus] Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another right now

—Chet Powers (recorded by The Kingston Trio and by The Youngbloods)
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=deW7_D5qems)
*

And a hippie classic:

San Francisco

If you’re going to San Francisco
Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair
If you’re going to San Francisco
You’re gonna meet some gentle people there

For those who come to San Francisco
Summertime will be a love-in there
In the streets of San Francisco
Gentle people with flowers in their hair

All across the nation
Such a strange vibration
People in motion

There’s a whole generation
With a new explanation
People in motion
People in motion

For those who come to San Francisco
Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair
If you come to San Francisco
Summertime will be a love-in there

—written by John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas (performed Scott McKenzie)
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I0vkKy504U)

peace & love
Johnny

Bibliophiles Unanimous!: PRISON THEATRE Book Tour with Ashley Lucas
2020-09-20 15:00 - 17:00
On Sunday, September 20th, we hosted a virtual book for Prison Theatre and the Global Crisis of Incarceration by Ashley Lucas. We had a good turnout on Zoom–Ashley was in Michigan, Howard in New York, Al and Nick in Seattle, lots of friends in Portland and Carlos from Peru! Prison Theatre was published by Methuen Drama on September 3, 2020. An interview with Ashley is featured in the September 3rd issue of the peace, love, happiness & understanding journal.

The fourth Shakespeare in Prisons Conference is highlighting Ashley’s book. Here are some links:

Ashley being interviewed about her Prison Theatre book:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76dfvyk_bB0&t=6s
Ashley talking with returned citizens who have performed in plays in prison:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28mGM-3t30g
Conversation between Ashley and prison theatre directors. (Note. I’m in this one (JS)):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGYQEqUIUdQ

peace, love, happiness & understanding 9/17/20
2020-09-17 - 2020-09-23
The Platters

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

September 17, 2020

It’s smoky. For the past week, Portland has had the worst air quality of any major city on the planet. And there’s a lot of competition! But, for now, our air is worse than the air in Delhi, India or Shanghai, China. Nancy and I have been joking about meeting in smoky places, like in the song by the Corsairs (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGDvR-7ughY). And then, of course, there’s the Platters’ hit: “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2di83WAOhU). And we can’t forget Smokey Robinson (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mv9cWgkpIZ4). My friend Nick Eldredge is a fan of Smokey Stover. Notary sojack.

Aaron Gilbert wrote that he has been fighting fires. Kim Stafford sent me an email on Monday:

This morning early, reading about inmates on the fire lines, it came to this.

Inmate Fights Fire

When it gets really bad, they want me out—out there
on that fire-line, sweating sparks, staring down flames
I look up to as I dig like some fiend. Dollar an hour
to be a crispy critter to save somebody’s home. Yeah, they
figure the same jinx of brave and stupid got me convicted
might make me right to stand my ground for fire.

Like these boots? Like this hickory handle I flick
back and forth so my shovel slashes dirt, leaves
no food fire can eat? I like leaning back to see
that red sun staring through these skeleton trees
like bars in my cellblock window. And the wind
brings me smoke for free. Free?

When my sentence ends, you think I’ll walk free?
You think they’ll look at me to say, “He’s good”?
They plot their own fire-line to keep me on the dark side.
Got it? Like my face tattoo says “Bad Man. Don’t Hire.”
You can walk out the prison gate, but try walking through
the reputation wall to freedom after they call you felon.

I served my time. Serious good behavior. And after?
Give me a chance. Or shall I say, I’ve been burned.

—Kim Stafford
*

Part of that poem reminded me of Randall Brown’s song “One Second Chance.” I met Randall in the Arts In Prison group at Columbia River Correctional Institution. At one point in his life he was living in Nashville and earning his living writing songs. Just as Kim adopted a persona for his poem, Randall, who never imagined he would actually go to prison, wrote a song about a guy who has just gotten out of prison. Here are the lyrics:

It says here you’re from Houston
And you’re certified to drive a truck
But it doesn’t say what you’ve been doin’
For the last five years
Then he watched his eyes keep readin’
Then he watched his eyes look up
And he watched another job he needed just disappear

‘Cause when they get to the line
Have you been convicted of a crime
They say thanks for comin’ and they don’t call you back
I ain’t askin’ for every job under the sun
I just want one
Second chance

On August 22nd
Little Jacob’s turnin’ nine
But his momma moved him
A half a state away
I left another message
On her phone at home last night
And she finally had her lawyer
Call today

She knows he can’t afford
To take this thing to court
And I’m tryin’ hard to make her understand
I’m not askin’ for every weekend of every month
I just want one
Second chance

I was young and I was stupid
I regret it everyday
I ain’t saying I didn’t do it
But I’ve paid for my mistakes
It’s a lost and empty feeling when they don’t want you around
I’ve finally got my freedom but what good is it now

There’s some day’s when it feels like it’s been a 100 years
Sometimes it seems like only yesterday
We were painting Jacob’s nursery
Counting days until he was here
Next thing I knew I’d thrown it all away
Now I know I can’t go back
To the life I used to have
When I still held the whole world in my hands
I had a job I had a wife I had a son
Now I just want one
Second chance

—Randall Brown
*
Randall says:

I’ve been out almost 2 years. My current job is foreman for a construction company. I’ve just accepted a position as an operations manager for a commercial construction company in Portland.
When I got out I was nervous because of the stigma we get as inmates. But my reentry to society went great. I was able to find work within a few days. I did get divorced while in, but I’ve found a woman who accepts me for me and not my past.
*

Thinking about smoke and fires, I naturally thought of Gary Snyder’s “Smokey the Bear Sutra”:

SMOKEY THE BEAR SUTRA

Once in the Jurassic about 150 million years ago, the Great Sun Buddha in this corner of the Infinite Void gave a discourse to all the assembled elements and energies: to the standing beings, the walking beings, the flying beings, and the sitting beings–even the grasses, to the number of thirteen billion, each one born from a seed, assembled there: a Discourse concerning Enlightenment on the planet Earth.
“In some future time, there will be a continent called America. It will have great centers of power called such as Pyramid Lake, Walden Pond, Mt. Rainier, Big Sur, Everglades, and so forth; and powerful nerves and channels such as Columbia River, Mississippi River, and Grand Canyon. The human race in that era will get into troubles all over its head, and practically wreck everything in spite of its own strong intelligent Buddha-nature.”
“The twisting strata of the great mountains and the pulsings of volcanoes are my love burning deep in the earth. My obstinate compassion is schist and basalt and granite, to be mountains, to bring down the rain. In that future American Era I shall enter a new form; to cure the world of loveless knowledge that seeks with blind hunger: and mindless rage eating food that will not fill it.”
And he showed himself in his true form of
SMOKEY THE BEAR
A handsome smokey-colored brown bear standing on his hind legs, showing that he is aroused and watchful.
Bearing in his right paw the Shovel that digs to the truth beneath appearances; cuts the roots of useless attachments, and flings damp sand on the fires of greed and war;
His left paw in the mudra of Comradely Display–indicating that all creatures have the full right to live to their limits and that of deer, rabbits, chipmunks, snakes, dandelions, and lizards all grow in the realm of the Dharma;
Wearing the blue work overalls symbolic of slaves and laborers, the countless men oppressed by a civilization that claims to save but often destroys;
Wearing the broad-brimmed hat of the west, symbolic of the forces that guard the wilderness, which is the Natural State of the Dharma and the true path of man on Earth: all true paths lead through mountains—
With a halo of smoke and flame behind, the forest fires of the kali-yuga, fires caused by the stupidity of those who think things can be gained and lost whereas in truth all is contained vast and free in the Blue Sky and Green Earth of One Mind;
Round-bellied to show his kind nature and that the great earth has food enough for everyone who loves her and trusts her;
Trampling underfoot wasteful freeways and needless suburbs, smashing the worms of capitalism and totalitarianism;
Indicating the task: his followers, becoming free of cars, houses, canned foods, universities, and shoes, master the Three Mysteries of their own Body, Speech, and Mind; and fearlessly chop down the rotten trees and prune out the sick limbs of this country America and then burn the leftover trash.
Wrathful but calm. Austere but Comic. Smokey the Bear will Illuminate those who would help him; but for those who would hinder or slander him…
HE WILL PUT THEM OUT.
Thus his great Mantra:
Namah samanta vajranam chanda maharoshana
Sphataya hum traka ham mam
“I DEDICATE MYSELF TO THE UNIVERSAL DIAMOND
BE THIS RAGING FURY DESTROYED”
And he will protect those who love the woods and rivers, Gods and animals, hobos and madmen, prisoners and sick people, musicians, playful women, and hopeful children:
And if anyone is threatened by advertising, air pollution, television, or the police, they should chant SMOKEY THE BEAR’S WAR SPELL:
DROWN THEIR BUTTS
CRUSH THEIR BUTTS
DROWN THEIR BUTTS
CRUSH THEIR BUTTS
And SMOKEY THE BEAR will surely appear to put the enemy out with his vajra-shovel.
Now those who recite this Sutra and then try to put it in practice will accumulate merit as countless as the sands of Arizona and Nevada.

Will help save the planet Earth from total oil slick.
Will enter the age of harmony of man and nature.
Will win the tender love and caresses of men, women, and beasts.
Will always have ripened blackberries to eat and a sunny spot under a pine tree to sit at.

AND IN THE END WILL WIN HIGHEST PERFECT ENLIGHTENMENT
thus we have heard.

(may be reproduced free forever)

—Gary Snyder
*
That reminds me of a joke…

What do Alexander the Great and Smokey the Bear have in common?
Same middle name.

And now it’s time to sing along to the Smokey the Bear Song with Eddy Arnold:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Myz93sXW66Y

peace & love

—Johnny

Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue
2020-09-15 - 2020-10-14
Open Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue

September 15, 2020

Welcome to our first meditation and mindfulness dialogue! The numbers below refer to passages from the book Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh. (JS)

#159 A Healing Mantra
Although I myself am locked within walls & a structure of rules, the cosmos still sustains me and it still nourishes me. I am isolated yet I feel no alienation from the world. I cannot touch a tree or a cloud, but yet I still feel them. I know they are there for me just outside the walls. For now, my friends & my family are the light of the sun, and the door of my heart is filled with love, light & sun from theirs. Being stripped to the simplest form of oneself will allow you to be filled full of all the beauty that the cosmos has to offer. Empty yourself to be filled with the wonders of life.
—Rocky Hutchinson
*
#49 – What is a leaf?
Is one of my favorites! In segregation we have paintings that are of different scenes. At first it was cool, then I and others got over it. But since putting this wisdom of Thich Nhat Hanh in perspective you see more than a painting. For it opens my eyes to the time, the painter, the painter’s years of art skills, everything down to what makes paint…paint. There are so many miracles that came together to make these paintings! It’s amazing. Now I try to be mindful of what miracles come into place to make people I meet, foods I eat. Being conscious of what had to come together to create your best friend or your favorite food gives you much more appreciation for how they come to be in your life.
Thank you for giving me a chance, Johnny. I’m really working on myself. My goal is day by day. (Today be less ego-oriented.) Trying to not care who judges me for being me. Because that’s not my problem, I am happy and peaceful. It’s been a sacrifice, but as I’m learning sacrifice is the way to a peaceful life!
Peace Love Happiness
—Jake Green
*
Originally, I had no intention of sharing this, as it was written by inspiration to myself as though it were a summation of what I see as the core of my soul, for lack of better words, and also like a mantra and daily meditation. Here it is:

I am the good man.
I am the good decisions that I make.
I am compassion, I do not fake.
I am kindness, I am love.
I am by choice, not by chance.
I am intent, not happenstance.
I am in servitude of good.
I am alive and I am living.
I am grateful I am.

—Joseph Opyd
*
#6 Concentration
Concentration is an interesting concept in prison—Why should I want to concentrate on my situation being what it is? But as I’ve grown spiritually, I’ve come to realize how useful concentration can be.
There is a lot to complain about in life, but there is also a lot to enjoy! Concentration, or focusing on what I think as I’m thinking it, and what I feel as I’m feeling it, has taught me that my life is richer if I concentrate on the “good” and the “bad”—accepting both for what they are and their role in my life. The passage in the book (#6) talks of the power of concentration in creating happiness at any time. I do think this is important, however the more useful aspect of concentration for me is being able to be fully—(or as close as I can come for now)—aware of the situations that I find myself in, and what ripples I make in that environment. Concentration, or mindfulness, has also helped me embrace the “bad” parts of life. By being mindful of the roots of my reactions and feelings when a “bad” thing happens I have learned to cope, embrace and/or overcome these situations, while gaining a little more skill in mindfulness.
My point is that by being mindful I have learned that there is value in all situations. While I suffer I learn, while I’m happy I learn. Mindfulness is our tool to dig through the layers of our minds and be really truly in the moment, allowing us to remove reaction and embrace each event for what it is truly worth, “good,” or “bad.”
—Cody Dalton
*
I find myself, my soul, my beliefs and my being saturated in belonging—belonging to a love so deep, so real, so unreal. Coming from a life of nothing and going to a life full of love I never knew I could be a part of. A love that I knew was there, there for others, but for me…well, it was only window shopping.
Now I long to be drenched in the core of my soul, always and forever drowning in this love, this love that has pierced my cosmic veil. This love for all, for beauty, for the ones who opened so many doors into and onto the mind, heart and truth that dwells within my being.

#191 Love is Understanding
When we do not understand things we fear them. There was a time for myself, and not too long ago, when I was fearful of myself. Fearful of who I used to be, and fearful of the things I had done. Fearful of what I was capable of. I did not fully understand myself, because I was hiding from myself. When I opened up and allowed someone in, someone who is truly there for me—only then did I have the strength to face myself and understand why I did what I did, who I am, and who I was. Only then did I find the compassion to forgive my demons, and leave them, and forgive myself. Love is understanding not just our own faults, but the faults of others—loving them and loving ourselves.
—Rocky Hutchinson
*
#4 Ambassador of the Cosmos
I love Thich Nhat Hanh’s word “interbeing” and what it suggests to my imagination—the interdependence and interconnectedness of everyone and everything! In this passage he doesn’t use the word, but he describes how when he looks deeply into a piece of bread, he sees the sunshine, the rain and the earth without which there would be no bread. Some people imagine that they are somehow “independent,” but with every breath we take, oxygen revitalizes our blood, and we exhale carbon dioxide which nourishes the trees, which produce oxygen… I’m glad I get to be part of this whole miraculous process that has no beginning or end.
—Johnny Stallings
*
What is it that you really know? Not just what you have been told or what you think or have read or surmise but something that you deeply know. And how is that different from the other kind of knowing where you think it or have heard it? I think starting with what your base understanding is one of the most crucial steps in meditation. Knowing your own inner ground….and what you don’t know. Write it down. And maybe a few months or years from now you can come back to it and see if anything has changed.

What Do I Know?

Closing my eyes,
a silent darkness,
light
at the edges.
My breath moves
up and down,
holding each moment,
inhalation
then release.
The human heart
is quixotic,
malleable,
almost like a berry
in the palm of my hand.
In my ears,
a deeper space
that stretches out,
a disappearing
reverberation.
We touch nothingness.

—Deborah Buchanan, from Layers of Sediment
*
When I invited people who don’t live in prison to be part of our new meditation and mindfulness community, I included Jake Green’s meditations on “What is a Leaf?” Scott Teitsworth was reminded by Jake’s “sweet words” of a passage from a book he edited by his guru, Nitya Chaitanya Yati. (JS)
Even when you do something as simple as sip a cup of coffee or tea, think about what you are doing. Your morning tea begins in some far-off land, where very poor people get up at four o’clock. They crowd onto a battered bus, then walk to the plantation where ripe leaves are waiting to cut into their fingers. Leeches climb on them to drink their blood. All day long they fill their baskets, then they go home to a meager supper. The tea leaves are hauled to huge mills employing hundreds of people, where they are cleaned, dried, and made into the kind of blend you want. Then it is put in tins or boxes, and sent by truck down the mountains and out to the coast. The shipyard is filled with more poor laborers, who load the tea onboard ships. Then across the ocean it comes to your port.The distributors parcel and package it and send it to your local market, where you buy it and take it home. Thus the whole world participates in one cup of tea. If you like sugar with your tea, there is another world of production and distribution behind that spoonful of white grains you tip into the cup. So should you not look into the numinous aspect of just a cup of tea?
If you become sensitive to the numinous aspect of life, gratitude will naturally fill your whole being. Each time you put a morsel of food in your mouth or sip your tea or coffee, you will become so grateful to the corporate life of mankind for giving you so much for so little effort. You will see nothing but the unity underlying the many forms of the world. Great will be your joy to share, to give, to receive. Then you won’t fight. The belligerency comes in where you see only your own personal interests—“my home,” “my family,” or just“my self.” The superficial form of your self interest should be subsumed in the ocean of the general interest, and you should feel the world is your country, your home. That humanity is your family, filled with your brothers and sisters.
The Guru* wants us to really feel this: to stand united, to find peace and become peacemakers. We have to first be peacemakers in our own lives. We bring peace to ourselves. By putting all the peaces together, we make peace with the world.If you fragment it, you lose it. So let us gather all the peaces together in one meaning, in one divine thread of love and compassion and understanding.

—from That Alone: The Core of Wisdom by Nitya Chaitanya Yati pp. 140-141
*Narayana Guru (1856-1928). This book is a long commentary inspired by a philosophical poem by Narayana Guru, Ātmopadeśa Shatakam.
—Scott Teitsworth
*
#7 Why we suffer
Thich Nhat Hanh reminds me that all things change, and I will suffer if I refuse this truth, like a stone in the river trying to stop water’s journey, I will be rolled and all my rough edges worn away. When he speaks of the river, I remember a time we went to a back channel and wandered along in a canoe, and I entered a kind of trance of well-being as the river flowed and sunlight splashed everything alive. When I suffer sometimes, when I wake at night and remember my failures, I go back to the river in my mind, and try to see it for what it is:

Call me the scruffy hermit of willow islands.
Call me the skipping stone eager to squander all
for a few joyful episodes of buoyancy. I could be
counting money? I could be a hero of fame?
Call me one lost to water’s wonders, far gone
down a back channel gaping at water beads
dripping brilliant from the paddle’s blade.

—Kim Stafford
*
I look through my study cards. Today’s contemplation is “Observation of the Mind.” Do I have solid mindfulness established, or is my mind more of the scattered quality? To what degree are desire/lust, anger, and confusion present or absent in my mind? This is not about judgement; as humans, we spend so much time with these mental qualities that we might as well use them as meditation tools. This is more like a checklist, is a quality present or absent? The card reminds me: all mental contents arise and pass away. Can I observe that right now? Can I see that my thoughts now are different than my thoughts 10 minutes ago? Bonus points if I can train myself to have some awareness of others, that other people also have rapidly changing mental qualities. “Your True Home” (YTH) speaks about this exercise at item 120, “Mindfulness of the Mind.” Another exercise I can do with my mind, and its contents, is to ask if current thoughts are beneficial to my wellbeing and the wellbeing of those around me, or if they detract from wellbeing. Again, this is not about judgement or criticism, it is about taking inventory of the mind. Flipping through YTH, I find this in item 47.
—Shad Alexander
*
Spaciousness
It is 4:45 am. A small glimmer of light in the eastern sky, but a mass of stars still predominates in the dome above. My favorite time of the day: mornnight. My mind is rested and fresh, still empty.
I have two and a half days of precious spaciousness. My husband is away for a couple days of bike riding while I had planned to go away camping with women friends. My outing was cancelled because of high winds, falling trees and fire danger. David said, “Oh well, I won’t go if you’re going to be here alone.” I said, with a duplicitous smile, “Oh no, you go ahead. You don’t want to disappoint your friends by not showing up. I’ll be fine.”
Don’t get me wrong; I love my husband, but he should know, after 36 years, that I treasure these infrequent, but cherished times of aloneness. And this one is serendipitous spaciousness. I am never lonely being alone. I am filled with empty spaciousness. The house feels bigger. It is breathing and expanding, and I breathe and expand, in tandem, like singing a harmonious duet.
Duet. Round: In my family we played duets on the piano and sang rounds. “Go to Joan Glover and tell her I love her, and by the light of the moon I will come to her.” Repeat one bar after the first has been sung. Etc. And, “Orléans, Beaugency, Notre-Dame de Cléry, Vendôme, Vendôme…” Sung as a round, it sounds like cathedral bells tolling throughout the city. We sang dozens of rounds.
Spaciousness allows my mind to remember things like this. My mind can rest or wander; either way, it awakens refreshed, mindful.
—Jude Russell
*
Reading some passages in Your True Home, I was again impressed with how beautifully Thich Nhat Hanh expresses complex Buddhist concepts in clear, easy to understand language. One of these concepts that touched me this morning was #9: I Have Arrived. So much of our lives are concerned with striving–we want to learn things, we want to get better at things, we want to excel, we want to create. And this striving is wonderful: it has produced our art, science, architecture, literature, airplanes, medicine…our civilization, the civilizations that came before us and those that will come after us. But the most important thing about life–greater than any discovery, creation, or attainment– is the simple fact that we are alive. When we’re in great danger, or facing a serious illness, we often remember that nothing is more important than protecting our precious life. But the practice of meditation is taking time to appreciate this fact without the stimulus of danger. If we open our eyes and ears we can remember how fantastic it is, how precious, how exciting, how beautiful, how crazy it is that we are here. We have arrived. We are not only alive but we can be aware of our life and we can appreciate our life. Meditation practice is taking time to appreciate this amazing fact.
—Howard Thoresen
*
I’ve tried to learn meditation a few different times and I’ve never succeeded. My self-discipline is spotty, my posture’s always off, and I forget the proper hand positions. My body gets uncomfortable and my brain rebels against meditating. My thoughts increase instead of quieting down. Plus, I’m not a very Buddhist-like person, thanks to my intemperate ways. I gave up trying to meditate years ago.
After giving up, though, a funny thing started happening. I noticed that my mind would sometimes quiet down on its own, without much effort from me. When I’m outside I get absorbed by the awesome fullness of life. When I sit in my house and pay attention I feel content with my heartbeat and the peace in my local airspace. When I let my thinking and my judgements be calm the outer and inner worlds do just fine. This balance doesn’t last indefinitely; there are things to do—groceries, e-mails, etc. But I can return pretty easily to what Alan Watts calls “sitting quietly, doing nothing.” I’ll leave the meditating to the pros. I’m simply grateful for the moment, and being part of it, and having people to share it with.
—Bill Faricy
*
78 The Wounded Child
I was planning on writing about another part of the book, but I read this, this morning, and it kind of hit me like I needed to write about this instead.
I guess a good question is: what is the child inside of us? I suppose it is part of us, the child that is, just because we grow into adulthood we don’t necessarily leave that child behind—he or she comes with us. I believe children are more susceptible, at a young age, especially to trauma. I think a traumatic experience as a child can have more of an effect than experiencing that same trauma at an older age.
I sometimes struggle with a lack of self worth, and have some insecurities. I am sure most people do, and maybe being in prison just heightens them. For instance, sometimes I struggle to even call my family. I will convince myself that they don’t want to hear from me and they have better things to do than talking to me.
I have recently reconnected with a girlfriend from my past. Talking to her has been great, but when she says, “I love you,” in my mind I say that doesn’t make sense. I have made so many mistakes. Am I worthy of Love? I feel I have worked very hard these last fourteen years to become a better human being. I try to be kind and compassionate to others. Is that enough? I don’t have much else. What if I screw up again? I think maybe that is the child inside of me that is scared.
I think in these moments of insecurity if we are able to recognize the source, and why we are feeling this way, we can begin to heal them. I realize I have done some amazing things with my time in prison. I have met some amazing people along the way that have taught me so much about life and its true meaning. I am not angry anymore and have become a very patient, understanding person. Maybe sometimes too patient—it may take me a couple days to answer someone’s question sometimes. I want to make sure I understand what they are asking before I answer though. Geez! I do truly believe that all humans are worthy of being loved, so I guess that includes myself. Dang it! I know the best thing I can do for myself is continue to live a healthy clean life, love others, and surround myself with like-minded people—and when she answers my call, enjoy it for all it’s worth in the here and now. My hope is that someday I will be a successful productive member of society, and when that child inside comes calling I can reassure him that we have the tools to live a healthy life, and everything is going to be okay.
—Aaron Gilbert
*
Your True Home: It is in the now, the breath, the fully aware moment. I can’t add to or take away from it. And, if I hold on to it, I get stuck because new “now” moments have begun piling up behind this one. If I touch it, let it go—not holding on to anything—then I can flow from one now to the next, feeling everything. I see a connection to Kristen’s topic of “Contentment.” When I can be content with life as it is, instead of wasting energy with how it was, I have one less roadblock to the “now” moment.” When I can allow my guard down, for myself at least (if not for others), I can enter that moment to begin the experience as it is. Then I can breathe and allow each “now” moment to come and go as they wish.
In spite of all this “now” mindfulness, “in the moment” talk is that I can’t, (won’t or don’t), just let go of ego, barriers, worries past and present, judgements, etc. Well, not for as long as I think, or tell myself I should. I tell myself that I “want” to do this. I attend the Zen practice sessions so I can practice being more skilled at this—sometimes I even succeed at something, which leads me back to all that I judge. (Thanks, Jake.) I “need” to let go. Once in a while, I do somehow, more by happy accident than skillful action, manage to set everything down, breathe, and contentedly exist. The more often I struggle with this, the more often I manage to stumble into aware, conscious breathing, where thoughts come and go without my bidding, or following another white rabbit. Someday, I want to arrive at my True Home.
Even this work is plagued by ego, self-aware judgement, criticism, worry about the opinions of others—that I don’t somehow measure up to some arbitrary standard. (All of this is more in my head than in reality.) It all comes from awareness that I am no expert, guru, or skilled practitioner of mindfulness, but find myself at the beginning. Always At The Beginning!!—just like everyone else: breathing, just breathing, being gentle and kind when I see I have followed another wild hare off into some dark forest and away from my thoughtful breath.
—Michel Deforge
*
This is one of my favorite guided meditations from Thich Nhat Hanh.
It begins with his signature meditation on being aware of our most basic source of life.
Take three deep breaths then breathing normally, gently, follow someone saying to you the following, or say to yourself:

“Breathing in I am aware that I am breathing in. Breathing out I am aware of breathing out.”
In, out. . . . . in, out . . . .
In, out. . . . . in, out . . . .
In, out. . . . . in, out . . . .

Breathing in, I see myself as a flower.
Breathing out, I feel fresh.
Flower/Fresh (say this to yourself, for three in and out breaths)

Breathing in, I see myself as a mountain.
Breathing out, I feel solid.
Mountain/Solid

Breathing in, I see myself as a mountain lake.
Breathing out, I reflect things as they are.
Water/Reflecting

Breathing in, I see myself as the sky or space.
Breathing out, I feel free.
Space/Free.

Some of my reflections on this practice.
On being a flower:
When I sit and see myself as a plum blossom, I feel delicate and careful, I want to be aware of the subtle fragrance and the fresh air. I feel still and listen for the insects and the breeze in the tree.
Later, when I want to thank someone, like my yoga teacher or a friend that brings a gift, I remember feeling like a flower, and I will put my palms together and offer a “flower bud” of thanks.
On being a mountain:
Moving from feeling like something delicate to feeling solid as a mountain, grounds me and I feel a strength, and a knowing that makes me feel more steady than any fleeting emotions.
On being a mountain lake:
The water is still, we can reflect what is aroud us, like trees on the shore that are inverted but without distortion. Such a sense of calm.
On being the sky :
The feeling of spaciousness fills me with each breath. Beyond judgement, I feel space in and out, and appreciate the space we need to give one another to be fully human and unique.
This simple meditation moves us through an expansive experience with just four images that are familiar to us all, because we are alive on this planet.
There is a song that goes along with this meditation, that can help tune us up. I will find a copy with the music and send it next time if you all are interested.
I hope you will find some peace, be well.
A plum blossom to you, Katie
(I wish I could send you some plums that are growing now on the plum tree)
—Katie Radditz
*
Our dialogue begins. Thank you. We’re off to a good start!
Today, on September 15th, I’m mailing this to just under a dozen people living in prison and emailing it to just under two dozen people who aren’t. It’s a conversation. Feel free to write and email me in response to something somebody shared. That will be the basis of the next letter, which will go out on October 15th. Also, between now and then, please send me your ruminations on passages from Your True Home or other poems or texts. Or just your thoughts. Or a poem.
May all people be happy.
May we live in peace and love.

—Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 9/10/20
2020-09-10 - 2020-09-16
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

September 10, 2020

The Paradise of Books

Cervantes says that Don Quixote stayed up day and night reading books until he fried his brain and went completely mad. The hero of Salman Rushdie’s latest novel, Quichotte, has watched so much television that he can’t tell what’s real from what’s not.
Since June 7th, I have been hosting a Zoom gathering on Sunday afternoons at 3 pm, Bibliophiles Unanimous!

(https://openroadpdx.com/event/bibliophiles-unanimous/).

We’ve been having a lot of fun with it. It’s not like a “regular book club,” where each month everyone agrees to read the same book and then talk about it. I think the impetus for that kind of book group is that we all hunger for more connection with each other, especially a shared cultural framework that is not limited to Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad. It’s why, when we’ve just read a book or seen a movie, we say to all our friends and to anyone who will listen: You must read this book! (Or see this movie!)

Our weekly Zoom gathering is a meandering dialogue. Topics have ranged from poetry, to books with pictures, to oddball books, to books that changed the way you see and experience the world.

Our house is filled with books. The bookshelves are filled to overflowing. I’m sitting in a nest of books. I think of many of the books and their authors as my friends. Even though I’m just sitting here, I can easily imagine myself to be walking along the open road with Walt Whitman by my side. On my life journey, he has taught me so many things! Like this one: “I am not contained between my hat and boots.” And: “All truths wait in all things.” And: “Seeing, hearing, feeling are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.” It’s good to know these things.

Things I read are constantly changing my inner landscape. Want to see the world in a new way? Try this:

In the Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge, it is written that animals are divided into:

those that belong to the Emperor,
embalmed ones,
those that are trained,
suckling pigs,
mermaids,
fabulous ones,
stray dogs,
those included in the present classification,
those that tremble as if they were mad,
innumerable ones,
those drawn with a very fine camelhair brush,
others,
those that have just broken a flower vase,
those that from a long way off look like flies.

—from Other Inquisitions, by Jorge Luis Borges
*

As a young man, Jack Kerouac’s books On the Road and The Dharma Bums gave me permission to explore the big world, follow my heart’s desire, and live a life relatively free of societal constraints.

And then there were books that furthered my exploration of the nature and meaning of my human existence. The Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda, inspired me to become a vegetarian, and to begin meditating in quest of samādhi—“the peace which passeth understanding.” J. Krishnamurti spoke of “freedom from the known,” and other radical ideas. The I Ching, Tao Te Ching, and the poems of Han Shan were a window into the ancient Chinese ways of seeing and being. More recently, I’ve added the Hsin Hsin Ming of Seng Ts’an to that list. Shunryu Suzuki’s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind taught many hippies of my generation about Zen meditation. I’ve learned about Haiku, Zen and Japanese Culture from R. H. Blyth. My favorite books by him are Zen in English Literature and Oriental Classics and Volume 1 of his four-volume series, Haiku, titled Eastern Culture.

I learned about Advaita Vedanta from the Bhagavad Gita, Talks With Ramana Maharshi, the Vivekachudāmani of Shankara and The Philosophy of the Upanishads by Paul Deussen. Aldous Huxley’s Perennial Philosophy shows how the world’s religions express the same fundamental truths. Joseph Campbell’s vast knowledge of world mythology also illuminates how “Elementary Ideas” are given different costumes or masks in different cultures. (I enjoy listening to talks he gave more than reading his books—they bring out his lively mind and engaging personality better.)

For now, I’ll mention just a few books that gave me a better understanding of the world in which we live. Woman and Nature by Susan Griffin woke me up to the centuries of oppression of women by men, and gave me a sense of the importance of listening to women’s voices and helping to co-create a more just world. Magical Child and Evolution’s End by Joseph Chilton Pearce, and For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty In Childrearing and the Roots of Violence by Alice Miller gave me unforgettable lessons in how our systematic physical, emotional and psychological abuse of children thwarts human potential and sows seeds for every kind of violence—from suicide to genocide. In my view, the one thing that the world needs most is more lovingkindness.
*

Some poems came my way this week. Josh Barnes sent me this sonnet:

Sonnet #1

Each snowdrift piles higher than the last,
The ground’s surface has long frozen over;
A frigid picture—Nature’s wild past
That beckons the heart—taunting, Come closer;
But as times change the beauty is melted,
Leaving a dreadful Silence in its stead,
For the ones that would’ve truly felt it
Are lying inside their graves, long dead;
But beauty shed need not mean beauty lost,
And life has many a surprise in store,
Like rivers that spring from ‘neath the frost,
Then freely flow from the glaciers to pour;
Endless the stream of life in its beauty,
The circle of life doing its duty.

—Joshua Barnes
*

Doug Marx shared some poems from his “Sheltering In Place” series. He prefaced his reading by saying that the poems are not his voice, but the voice of a persona. He said it’s as if these poems are being dictated to him. Here’s one:

Sheltering in Place #12

The crows are freaking out about the mask.
We’re not speaking.

Now they squawk
and flee me when they see me coming up the walk
in my orange and yellow
tie-dye pandemic disguise.

I can’t blame them.
They can’t see what I’m hiding from
and neither can I.
They don’t know the real me anymore
and neither do I.

I don’t ask why, I just don’t want to die.

How explain four million
nine hundred and eighteen thousand
four hundred and twenty
down,

or one hundred and sixty thousand
two hundred and ninety
gone.

Their world isn’t falling apart right now.
The spider webs are still holding.

Flashbacks of the old life come at me
like phantom reds and blues
in the mind of a man five months blind.

Some humans freak out about the mask too
and would as soon kill you as wear one.

I can’t explain anything to them either.
The death look in their eyes terrifies me.

When I see one coming I squawk
and cross the street.

Welcome to the masquerade.
You are on your own.

—Doug Marx
*

Dear Readers:

Please send me your poems and short writings, or poems and short writings you love, and which have inspired you, that were written by somebody else.
We’ll end this issue with a poem that Nick Eldredge wrote. It hangs on his wall as a reminder…

¡Gracias!

Juanito

YARD SALE
sat & sun 9 to 4
everything I know
must go
slightly used certainties
preowned philosophies
refurbished realities
bargains galore

peace, love, happiness & understanding 9/3/20
2020-09-03 - 2020-09-09
After The Winter’s Tale at Two Rivers prison in 2014: Ashley Lucas and Jeffrey Sanders.
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

September 3, 2020

Interview with Ashley Lucas

Johnny Stallings. Your book Prison Theatre and the Global Crisis of Incarceration comes out today, published by Methuen Drama. Can you tell our readers what it’s about and how you came to write it?

Ashley Lucas. I traveled to ten different countries to see as much theatre inside prisons as I could. When I started, I thought the book might be more focused on how theatre in prisons gets made, which is certainly something the book discusses, but I realized when I really started talking to incarcerated people about their work that what I most wanted to know was why theatre matters to them. The vast majority of people I met in my research had little to no relationship to theatre prior to their incarceration, yet somehow once they started doing theatre inside the walls, it became deeply important to them. I wanted to find out what that was about. Most of these folks didn’t see themselves as training to become professional theatre makers after their release from prison. They told me stories that revealed that they were using the theatre to accomplish other things besides the staging of plays. They were building communities, developing professional skills, creating social change, and maintaining hope as a way to survive the harsh world of the prison. The book endeavors to make the people that I met feel alive and present to readers who likely will never get to meet the extraordinary folks I encountered in prisons.

The process of how I came to write the book is multifaceted. On a very practical level, back in 2013, Methuen Drama invited me to write a book about theatre in prisons around the world, but in a certain sense I had begun this journey long before that invitation arrived to mark the official start of my research. My father spent twenty years in Texas prisons, and in a sense I grew up in prison visiting rooms. I started acting in community theatre productions when I was in middle school, just a few years before my father’s incarceration began. In that sense, both theatre making and visiting prisons have been major cultural practices that shaped my life from adolescence. Nearly a decade into my father’s incarceration, I was in graduate school working on my Ph.D. in theatre and ethnic studies when I decided to write an interview-based play about people who have family members in prisons. When I started performing my play Doin’ Time: Through the Visiting Glass as a one-woman show, I started getting invited into prisons to share it with incarcerated audiences. People began introducing me to other folks who made theatre in prisons, and that was how I came to realize that theatre was actually happening inside these facilities. My work as a scholar shifted to follow my artistic practice, and I began to research prison theatre companies. That led me to a job at the University of Michigan, which recruited me to teach theatre and also become the Director of the Prison Creative Arts Project (PCAP). (I’m now the Former Director and continue to teach in the program, while the fabulous Nora Krinitsky serves as the current Director.) My work as a playwright/performer, administrator of a prison arts program, teacher of students who facilitate theatre workshops in prisons, and scholar who studies such programs informs how and why I wrote this book. Fundamentally, my experiences as the daughter of someone who served two decades in prison shapes my approach to writing this book more than anything else.

Johnny. Before asking my next questions, I want to mention that the Prison Creative Arts Project is the largest prison arts organization on Planet Earth. So, my next questions… After seven years of travel and work on the book, are you excited that it’s coming out today? Who do you hope will read it? What do you hope the book will do to them?

Ashley. I am so grateful that I was able to finish all of my research travels as planned before the advent of the global pandemic. It would have made me so sad to miss out on meeting any of the extraordinary theatre companies and artists I had the honor to meet in my journeys. I am both excited and a little overwhelmed that the book is finally coming out. At the PCAP we’re just starting new correspondence programming in lieu of the work we have always done in prisons in person. It’s very sad not to be able to be physically present with all of the people we care about inside prisons, but the fact that we are being allowed to start this new correspondence programming gives us the ability to send books into prisons for the first time in PCAP’s thirty-year history. We’re sending all participants in our theatre workshops a copy of my book, and I pray that the men and women who receive it will find it both a consolation and an inspiration in this terribly difficult time. It’s always really tough to be in prison, but the pandemic adds layers of pain, fear, and physical torment that are not always part of an incarcerated person’s daily life. Good books have helped me through the hardest moments of my life (and are helping me now). I pray that my book can be a layer of support for people on both sides of prison walls who really need it right now. I think Prison Theatre has the potential to do this for folks because it’s full of stories of people who have used their artistic talents as mechanisms for survival in very trying circumstances.

Johnny. I get the impression from your book that you are also making a case to prison administrators and the general public that theatre in prison is more than just a way for prison residents to while away the time. It has value. You’ve already said that prison theatre helps to build community, develop professional skills, create social change, and maintain hope. Let’s talk about love. In your travels, in 2014, you visited Open Hearts Open Minds’ production of Shakespeare’s Winter’s Tale at Two Rivers prison in Umatilla, Oregon, and you write about that experience in your book. What happened in the Visiting Room where the play was performed?

Ashley. Yes, I hope that the book has many audiences. I hope that prison administrators with open hearts who truly wish for the world to be a safer place rather than a more punitive one will read the book and see how much theatre programming can do to improve the lives of everyone inside the prison—the incarcerated folks and the staff—and the lives of those connected to them in the outside world (ie. their families and the general public coming to see the plays).

I am so happy that you brought up love! I find that people are terrified to talk about the concept of love in connection with prisons. There seems to be an automatic assumption that the only kind of love that can happen in prisons is sexual, romantic, or aggressive, and of course, the truth is that because people in prison are complex human beings, just like the rest of us, all forms of love and affection exist inside prisons. We love our friends, our mentors, the people who become our chosen families. A prison that recognizes the humanity of the people inside it and actually wants them to be empathetic and driven to make positive contributions to the lives of others should actually cultivate a broad range of opportunities for safe and loving relationships among people, in much the same ways that a good school, religious congregation, or community organization would. The theatre is an extraordinary vehicle for emotional openness, vulnerability, and love. If we can’t enable one another to be vulnerable in safe ways, then we are cultivating a culture of isolation and aggression. Since the vast majority of people in prison will live again in freedom some day, we need to invest in their emotional wellbeing and stability. People cannot be well if they do not feel that they are loved, admired, and appreciated for their unique gifts and abilities.

I hope that the chapter I wrote in Prison Theatre about the Open Hearts Open Minds production of Winter’s Tale helps readers to feel in some measure the magic of that production. The acting, costumes, music, and sets were all absolutely beautiful, but the incredible joy and love that that performance brought to everyone in the room really altered the world of the prison. The visiting room where the performance was held was full of families and children. I was blessed to sit by a woman named Sharon Lemm whose son Joseph Opyd was in the cast. She had been at Two Rivers prison for the Open Hearts Open Minds production the year before, and when she realized that a number of men in the cast had no families there to support them—indeed some no longer had contact with their families at all—she promptly adopted the entire theatre troupe and became known as Momma Sharon. Her extraordinary spirit exemplifies something larger that was happening at Two Rivers that day. All kinds of human connections were forming. Families were mixing with one another to celebrate the cast. The prison staff were engaged and even proud of the work they’d seen the incarcerated men do. Audience members like me who were until that day strangers to almost everybody in the room were welcomed with open arms—literally, there were people hugging all over that prison visiting room! It was such a glorious evening, a celebration of life in spite of the prison in which we found one another. That play helped break down all kinds of barriers that divide people and helped us all to see what we shared in our common humanity.

Johnny. One thing that keeps people away from theatre is money. Not charging admission means that more family members, and even small children, come to see the plays. By making the play free it is a pure gift from actors to audience. What we discovered is that, in the case of our prison productions, the gift was reciprocal. It means so much to the actors that family and strangers have traveled a long way, and come inside a prison(!), to see them, and to appreciate them with thunderous applause. For the volunteers with Open Hearts Open Minds programs, volunteering in prison is not some kind of noble act of charity. It’s a profound reciprocal giving. Have you noticed something similar in your work supervising college students who go into prisons in Michigan?

Ashley. Yes, absolutely! Many people I meet want to talk about what a great thing our program is doing for folks in prisons, but in truth the most demonstrable growth I can see, as someone whose worked with the program for years, is in the college students. Most of them have never set foot in a prison prior to joining PCAP and don’t believe they have any connection to the carceral system. Then they spend a semester collaborating with incarcerated people and come to love and respect those folks in a way that reshapes their entire world view. The experience of meaningful and prolonged interaction with people who live in very different circumstances than you do expands your understanding of how things like state power, structural inequality, racism, and social justice work. My students and the currently and formerly incarcerated folks with whom we work also come to see the arts as active forces that can help us to build coalitions, address problems, and create opportunities. Fundamentally, my students are not going into prisons to teach or to provide social services. Our mission is to equalize power dynamics as much as the prisons will allow us to do so and approach one another as collaborators with a shared stake in the community and artistic outcomes of our projects. In this way, we all learn and grow together. My students will often tell me that going to prison is the best part of their week, and none of them like prisons. Being in community with other people who take you and your artistic gifts seriously is an incredible joy, a great blessing—one that can be harder to find in the outside world where our presence in a classroom or other public space is often taken for granted. People in prison treasure their time with people from the free world, and they remind us of what a gift it is to be truly present with others.

Johnny. Thank you so much, Ashley, for taking the time to share with our readers. Congratulations on completing this vast project! It’s going to make the world a kinder place. How can people order your book?

Ashley. Thank you, Johnny! I’m so grateful that this book project enabled me to get to know you better and to meet the extraordinary folks at Open Hearts Open Minds. I hope very much to return to visit you and the incarcerated folks with whom you work.

My book is available from all major booksellers, and I encourage you to support local and independent bookstores when ordering. My favorite independent bookstore is Literarity Book Shop in my hometown of El Paso, Texas: https://www.facebook.com/LiterarityBooks/. My friend Bill Clark who owns it has my book in stock and ships anywhere in the United States. You can reach him through the store’s Facebook page or by emailing him directly to order: bclark@literarity.com. Local bookstores sustain our communities, and they need our support!
You can also order directly from the publisher’s website: https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/prison-theatre-and-the-global-crisis-of-incarceration-9781472508416/.

Note to our readers: Ashley will be doing a virtual book tour, which includes being the special guest of The Open Road’s Bibliophiles Unanimous! Zoom gathering on Sunday, September 20th, at 3 pm, Pacific Time. Here’s the link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82169567543

I hope you’ll join us!

And to clarify a couple of points… I’m no longer doing theatre inside Oregon prisons. Open Hearts Open Minds is moving forward under the leadership of the amazing Carla Grant as Executive Director. To learn more about what they’re doing, here’s a link to their website: www.openheartsopenminds.net.

I do have a lot of prison pen pals, and The Open Road (openroadpdx.org) has a Prison Education Project and a Meditation & Mindfulness Project for people who live in prison and for those who don’t. This “peace, love, happiness & understanding” journal is mailed every week to 33 friends inside prison walls and emailed to 130 friends on the outside.

peace & love

—Johnny
