Tag Archives: Mindfulness

Driving (Part One)

You learn a lot about people when you’re on the road.  Like myself, for instance.  I had the thought that since I’ve been meditating for years, it should all be smooth sailing (mixed metaphor, I know).  Oh well.

All it takes is for me to be approaching an intersection with an oncoming green, but with the orange “Don’t Walk” light flashing.  I can feel my body tensing up.  Not so long ago, I’d press the gas pedal hard to get through but I finally realized that the constant rhythm of speeding up and slowing down wasn’t what I wanted in life.  So now I lighten my foot and the yellow or green happens.  But the tightness remains.  I figure that I’ve many years of driving still ahead of me, so how cool that I’ll have all these future intersections to practice my mindfulness.

I first attended a retreat at the Insight Meditation Society in 2010.  I wanted to drive.  I wanted to be alone for a couple of days, and experience having no one know exactly where I was on planet Earth at any given moment, until I phoned Jody from my daily destination.  As I set out, already enjoying my aloneness, I felt peaceful.  I wanted the driving to be a preamable to the meditation.

My plan was to take secondary highways all the way from Union, Ontario to Barre, Massachusetts.  Nice two-lane blacktop.  And I left home with one assumption: in Ontario, all the way to Fort Erie, Canadian drivers would happily drive the speed limit with me (80 kilometres per hour, or 50 mph).  But once I’d cross the Niagara River into Buffalo, those darned Americans would tailgate me all the way across New York if I kept to 55 mph (or 90 kph).

It was early morning, not another car on the road.  A bit later, here comes someone from behind.  Coming fast, as a matter of fact.  And voila – there he or she was, stuck to my bumper.  After probably only a few seconds of that, the driver pulled the wheel right and zoomed noisily past me.  By mid-morning, Highway 3 was filling up, and the “car five feet behind my rear bumper” scenario was repeated over and over.  With fewer chances to pass, some drivers would jerk their auto to the centre line, looking for a break in the traffic.  Overall, I let my mindfulness fritter away.  I was shocked that we Canadians were so pushy, so “me, not you”.  That’s not who I am, is it?  After reflection, the answer came: “No, it’s not”.

Once I was off the mandatory section of Buffalo freeway, I found Highway 20 towards Albany and settled into my moderate journey across the state.  Or more accurately, prepared for the onslaught from the rear …  …  …

Guess what?  There was none.  I’d be toodling along at 55, glance into the rearview mirror, and see a driver several car lengths behind, matching my speed.  Oh, the bliss of space.  I got to look around at the world – the farmers’ fields, the cows, the heightening hills and the cutesy towns.  It seemed that half the houses were displaying the Stars and Stripes, and that made me happy.  Through New York and half of Massachusetts, I hardly ever encountered an impatient driver.  So much for stereotypes.  How wrong I was.

Then a week of slowness and silence at the retreat centre.  Sometime, I’ll tell you about it.  Coming back home, nothing on the road fazed me.  That tension at potentially yellowing lights was non-existent.  And out in the country, on a long series of rolling hills, another opportunity arose.  A semi-trailer was having trouble on the upslopes.  Sometimes his speed would drop to 20 mph.  Not only did I not care, it seemed that the four drivers between the truck and me didn’t either.  No darting over the centre line to see what’s ahead.  No bumper games.  Just five of us keeping a respectful distance from the vehicle ahead.  And there was another feeling … love for the human beings in those cars and that truck.  People doing their best, people okay with what the moment was giving them.  At one little town, one of my friends turned off the road, leaving four followers.  I missed that person.  There was a hole.

What if I could bring my mindfulness to all travelling moments?  Why not to all moments, period?  Not just when I’m sitting in a meditation hall, but when I’m living my life.  Sounds cozy.

 

 

Gosh, if Canadians were like this

Windows

You look out.  I look in
I look out.  You look in

I do a lot of driving and I pass by many buildings.  Sometimes I look at their windows … and wonder.  There are people behind those windows – making breakfast, having meetings, serving customers, sitting on the couch with their precious ones.  Folks who are really just like me, all of us yearning to love and be loved; to do well at something; to gather some creature comforts; and to have an impact, perhaps beyond our lifetimes.  At night, I often peer in at these lives and see those human beings moving around, or maybe sitting still.  And it’s like they’re friends.

At home on Hallowe’en, I turn the light out in our computer room and watch the kids coming up the driveway, all fancied up as storybook princesses or the latest superheroes.  What are your lives like, young ones?  Thank you for coming to my door.

Just as I’m looking, so are you.  What do you see inside that man who’s driving a Honda CRV named Hugo?  Or that scary guy dressed up for his trick-or-treaters?  Do you get a glimpse of what’s within?  I hope so.

I remember a bed and breakfast that Jody and I stayed at, near Bayfield, Ontario.  We were on the second floor of a century home, and I got to sit on the window seat, watching the breeze riffle through the tree outside, and lifting my eyes to the field of grain across the way.  Cozy.  And I was a part of what I beheld.

More recently, I was in an office on the 14th floor of a London skyscaper, gazing out of floor-to-ceiling windows to the sweep of the city below.  Functional conference room furniture.  Far less cozy but still there was a reaching out.

On our home road (Bostwick Road, that is), I love waving to the cars approaching.  Sometimes people wave back, and that contact feels good.  Often though, the oncoming tinted glass masks any trace of humanity.  I don’t wave, and that makes me feel sad.

The Retreat Center at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts was formerly a Christian venue, perhaps a convent.  In the room leading to the meditation hall, there’s a large stained glass window depicting the disciple John, with his arm around Jesus’ shoulder and his head tucked in close to Jesus’ neck.  The look on John’s face is of absolute love.  I’ve lingered many a time before this scene.  There’s no seeing through the glass, but there is a seeing.

Windows all, holding the secrets of our multicoloured lives.  May we continue to look.

May I Suggest

In August, 2010, Jody and I drove to Nova Scotia to drink in the Lunenburg Folk Harbour Festival.  Some of my favourite singer-songwriters were performing: David Francey, James Keelaghan and the Barra MacNeils.  Five days of glorious folk music, with the evening concerts, in a huge white tent, running from 7:00 till midnight.

There were lots of workshops during the day at various venues in town.  We sat down one afternoon in the Lunenburg Opera House to hear groups who harmonized beautifully.

And along came Red Molly, three women based in New York City.  They favoured us (so true) with blissful vocals and a haunting message entitled “May I Suggest”.  Another one of those wide open mouth moments.  The song has stayed with me ever since, and it will continue to do so.

YouTube can help you experience the joy.  A search will yield several performances.  I recommend you listen to “Red Molly In Concert – May I Suggest”, the one indicating “by betsyfollystudios”.  Susan Werner wrote the song.  Would I ever like to sit down for a coffee with her.

See what you think:

May I Suggest

May I suggest
May I suggest to you
May I suggest this is the best part of your life
May I suggest
This time is blessed for you
This time is blessed and shining almost blinding bright
Just turn your head
And you’ll begin to see
The thousand reasons that were just beyond your sight
The reasons why
Why I suggest to you
Why I suggest this is the best part of your life

How about if this very moment is blessed for me, no matter what’s happening or how I’m feeling?  How about if I can access timelessness and untold beauty right now, with no effort?  How about if light of a very subtle kind surrounds me (and you) always?  If all this is just beyond my sight, maybe I just need to turn my head a bit.  Maybe just look up a bit.  I know it’s there.

There is a world
That’s been addressed to you
Addressed to you, intended only for your eyes
A secret world
Like a treasure chest to you
Of private scenes and brilliant dreams that mesmerise
A lover’s trusting smile
A tiny baby’s hands
The million stars that fill the turning sky at night
Oh I suggest
Oh I suggest to you
Oh I suggest this is the best part of your life

I am loved.  So are you.  Something unnameable, I’ll call it Spirit with a capital S, is waiting, ready to open a door that I didn’t know was there.  And when I see what’s inside the room revealed, I’m sure that those smiles and hands and stars will stop me in my tracks.  And close my mouth.  Simply awe.

There is a hope
That’s been expressed in you
The hope of seven generations, maybe more
And this is the faith
That they invest in you
It’s that you’ll do one better than was done before
Inside you know
Inside you understand
Inside you know what’s yours to finally set right
And I suggest
And I suggest to you
And I suggest this is the best part of your life

I think of my grandpa, of sitting at his knee on the cement porch of his farmhouse,  listening to the stories pour out.  Grandpa gave me his heart and soul, though he would never have expressed it that way.  And now to pass it on.  Better?  I don’t know.  How could I possibly add to grandpa waving his hand around at the peak of the tale, looking me right in the eye as he scared me, or moved me, or made me smile?

This is a song
Comes from the west to you
Comes from the west, comes from the slowly setting sun
With a request
With a request of you
To see how very short the endless days will run
And when they’re gone
And when the dark descends
Oh we’d give anything for one more hour of light

There are a few Internet passwords I like.  One is “lasttime”.  Because I never know if tonight will be the final time I’ll say “Good night, Jodiette.  Sweet dreams”, or tomorrow smiling at a stranger, or sitting at the edge of the field watching turkey vultures soar.  Please may I have many more hours of light.  There is much to give.

And I suggest this is the best part of your life

July 14, 2014 at 7:53 pm will do just fine.

 

Christ the Redeemer

It’s a 125-foot statue of Jesus that looks down on the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and its harbour.  If you go to Google Images, you’ll find many stunning photos of this wonder of the world.  For many years, its beauty has held a sacred spot in some nook of my brain, but TV coverage of the World Cup has moved it to front and centre.

Christ the Redeemer draws forth a spirit from me.  Words stop and I just look.  I don’t analyze and I don’t compare.  Having said that, I guess that what I’m about to say is creating words and suggesting an analysis.  But whatever I say will fall short of the silence.  That’s okay.  I’ll just point to something that’s very, very big.

Jesus stands tall.  He’s erect but without strain.  He’s reaching his full height.  I can live an upright life as well, neither swaying to the left nor right, as the world presses me to.  I can be morally true, responding to others in ways that honour their being.

Jesus holds his arms out wide, his fingers gently extended, apparently needing no effort to hold the pose.  Horizontal.  I too can be level in my life, treating all people with the same respect, compassion and love.  No one better and no one worse.

Jesus bows his head, not pushing himself forward.  Instead, “I bow to the divine in you.”  I am not inferior to you, nor superior.  I’m not even “equal”.  You and I are simply waves on the ocean, one no more wet than the other.

Although I’m not sure, I thinks that Jesus’ eyes are closed, so that he can touch a power beyond, and bring it back to us frail residents of planet Earth.  I  close my eyes in meditation, bringing forth something beyond space and time.

Thank you to Heitor da Silva Costa for designing the statue, and to Paul Landowski for sculpting it.  Their work is a gift to all human beings, of any religion or none.

Namaste

It Makes Me Happy

To lie in bed with Jody, holding hands

To go see the cashier, instead of paying at the pump

To watch the hummer at the very top of our blue spruce, surveying their kingdom

To drink big gulps from my shining green Herbal Magic water bottle

To sit curled up in my man chair, reading a cool Buddhist book

To inject Jody with Fragmin without hurting her

To wander down a wooded path in London’s Gibbons Park

To smile at a person who’s sad

To touch my bald head and feel the brain parts inside

To put on my cycling jersey with the snarling clown on it

To whee down the big hill on Fruit Ridge Line astride my bike Ta-pocketa

To sit in front of the Buddha statue on the patio, with a candle lighting his face

To make people laugh

To watch one person enjoying the company of another

To wrap my hands around a mug of hot Dulce de Leche

To watch Bill Murray in The Razor’s Edge for the umpteenth time (It’s not a comedy)

To drive at the speed limit on a two-lane highway, watching the world float by

To sing Annie’s Song to Jody, adding a special Irish Blessing verse

To read Mr. Mercedes, Stephen King’s latest, out loud to my lovely wife

To eat pesto pasta with friends

To sit in a sidewalk cafe on an incredibly steep street in San Francisco, just looking

To rub the tummy of our neighbour’s cat Pretty, listening to her purr

To lie in bed at night, cozy under the blanket, listening to the rain pelt down

To breathe life into Snoopy in You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown

To write

 

 

 

The PW and Me

I worked at the Prince of Wales Hotel for five summers – 1969, 1970, 1974, 1975 and 1976.  The PW is a grand chalet-style hotel, perched on a hill above the northern end of Upper Waterton Lake, with mountains running southward on both sides towards Glacier National Park in Montana.  I had marvelous adventures during the tourist season, hiking many trails with many friends.  The fall of 1974, however, was another kettle of fish.

Johnny, the hotel’s caretaker, had asked me to stay for September and October to close the grand old lady down.  I became a specialist in draining toilets and putting up shutters.  I slept in my room at the middle dorm – the only person there.  After all the summer parties in employees’ rooms, and the general hustle and bustle in the hallways, there was silence.  I didn’t even want to play music.  Spent a lot of evenings under my comforter, looking out the window at Waterton Lake and thinking about life.

Mealtime was another story.  I ate in Johnny’s house – with him, his wife Jean and son Brent … just a wee little lad.  I sat across from Brent and loved pointing behind him (“Look who’s there, Brent!”), and having him turn to see.  Then I’d take his plate of food and put it on my lap.  Looking back, I’m sure that he figured out my ruse pretty quickly, but kept going because the game was fun.  Many years later, back visiting family in Lethbridge, Alberta (near Waterton), Jody and I were walking through a mall when a young man looked funny at me, came right up, and said, “You stole my food!”  It took me a few seconds, but I finally got it.  “Brent!”  Very lovely.

Back in 1974, it was just Johnny and me in the hotel for eight hours a day.  I loved the old place and still do.  It was built in 1927, I believe by the Great Northern Railroad.  Imagine tall rough-hewed beams of dark wood, am immense chandelier way up there and maybe the best view in the world.  Seven stories altogether, with the last two squeezed under the eaves, and a series of interior balconies looking down on the lobby.  Cozy leather sofas were available to both guests and staff, and I spent many an hour listening to the string quartet and watching folks from around the world stroll towards the dining room.

In the fall of 1974, I often leaned over the fourth floor balcony, with no Johnny in sight, opened my mouth, and sang.  The voice was pretty good.  The acoustics were sublime.  And the world stopped.  One of my all-time best memories.

Johnny and I took breaks together, downing a lot of black coffee.  He was such a gentle man, almost always sporting a big grin.  We both loved the place.  The fact that Johnny liked me made such a difference in my life.  I needed someone to like me – preferably a girl, but Johnny would do until the love of my life decided to show up.

I wish you all could have been there in 1974, and felt the spirit of the PW.  Many of you, of course, were in other places, drinking in their essence.  And some of you hadn’t yet made your debut on this fine planet.  I bet that without you ever being there, you already know my dear old hotel.

 

Sanctuary

I went to see my dentist Paolo today, courtesy of three cavities.  His office is in a mall.  The rain was pelting down as I parked but I decided to walk at a normal pace towards the building.  Inside the door, I was soaked and very cold.  Plus several dry people were staring at the water running down my bald head (that’s a story for another time).  Customers carrying their bags passed to the left and right, and the teen clothing store near the dental office was a flurry of colours and music.  I wanted to be in a safe space, far from “the madding crowd”.

I walked into Paolo’s office, took off my dripping cycling jacket, and sat down on a leather love seat.  Cozy.  I looked at the magazine rack and spotted a Sports Illustrated featuring the San Antonio Spurs and their run to the NBA championship.  I hunkered down on the couch and started to read.  Even better, the receptionist came up to me to say that my appointment would be delayed for 20 minutes or so.  So I got to read the whole article, which focused on the Spurs’ inspired passing and team play.  Yummy.

Once I got into the examination room, I started shaking – it was a lot colder than the waiting area.  Bonnie, my hygienist, brought me a blanket and covered me collarbone to ankle.  Oh, cozy some more.  After Paolo injected the freezing agent, Bonnie and I talked as we waited for my mouth and tongue to go numb.  She used to be a swimmer at school, and mentioned one race where she had to do the breast stroke for two laps of the pool, and thought her lungs were going to burst.  She did it though.  I saw a bit of sadness there.  I talked about my storied football career – just one year, in Grade 9, when I was on the third string of the bantam team.  I never got into a game.  I also told Bonnie how I love cycling, and how I’m just getting back to it after stopping everything when Jody got sick.  This was fun, two new friends chatting about life – until my mouth became inoperative.

I was safe, and felt that way throughout the two hours, with the possible exception of Paolo using his grinder on me.  That didn’t hurt – just lots of pressure and a burnt smell.  Melissa was the person responsible for inserting the white fillings, and she and Bonnie often had their gloved fingers in my mouth at the same time.  That felt good, as did their friendly talk.  Sometimes I looked up at the overhead TV.  A woman named Katie was hosting a show.  Her next segment was on mindfulness, a subject dear to my heart.  My eyes opened wide when I saw that one of her guests was Sharon Salzberg.  She’s one of the co-founders of the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, where I’ve attended three meditation retreats.  So I had another friend while in the dental chair.  Nice.

Part way through Melissa’s work, with those ever present fingers touching me, I shut my eyes and meditated.  So quiet.  Mall, what mall?

After the whole show was wrapped up, I said goodbye to Bonnie at the reception desk.  She’s on vacation next week … thinks she’ll go for a swim.  Think I’ll go for a ride.  Twin smiles.

Complete

Last night, Jody was sitting up on her side of the bed, and I was in a chair beside her.  Right in front of me was the tiny wooden table that holds her Kleenex, water bottle and a bowl for meds.  I looked at the light brown hand towel that covers the table, and especially at the tag hanging from it, the one with washing instructions.  My forehead wrinkled, and inside I said “No”.  I wanted the towel to be pure towel.  I wanted the essence of towel to be all I saw.  I knew that the towel didn’t need the adornment of “Machine wash in cold water.  Tumble dry low.  Remove promptly.”  It was a diminishment of towelness.

I feel the same way about meatloaf.  Don’t want the heavy gravy.  I need to sense the beef itself, and the spices the chef used.  Sometimes I get strange looks from people, implying that I’m not dressing up my food appropriately.  “So boring, Bruce.”  Oh well … it just feels like a different drummer, wanting to taste all the subtleties.  No better and no worse than anybody else.

The beauty of the blue spruce tree in our backyard is just so “balanced”, symmetrical.  And the light turquoise tips blend naturally with the brownish needles closer to the trunk.  It is enough.  At Christmas, our neighbour festoons his spruce tree on the front lawn with strings of multi-coloured lights.  In that context, I see this too as “sufficient unto the day”, with its own beauty.  But some folks add blinking lights to their display … and that draws forth another “No” from me.

I’ve always enjoyed watching movies in theatres.  I went to Expo 67 in Montreal as a teenager, and one day was watching a film outdoors with hundreds of others.  Suddenly something happened that I had never experienced before – instead of one image on the screen, there were now two!  A collective gasp filled the space.  I enjoyed the novelty, and actually was shocked by it, but the fact that I needed my eyes to go back and forth to see both movies started feeling like … no.  In 2014, many advertisements have pictures flashing by every second, assaulting my sense of now.  I don’t like it.

Perhaps I have a towel, tree, light and film idiosyncrasy.  I don’t mind.

Listen Fall See Act

Since the 1980s, I’ve collected quotations – about 6000 of them so far.  Every single one resonates inside all there is of me.  If the words don’t sing, I pass them by.  I’ve never kept track of who says what.  I just liked what the person had to say.  I suppose if I ever published all these cool thoughts, someone would get mad because I wouldn’t have listed the authors.  Oh well.

Way back when, I came across LFSA, as I’ve abbreviated the term.  I hoped that by making it short, like “this”, I’d let the wonder of it all percolate through my innermost spaces.  But it hasn’t happened.  And that makes me sad.  I’ve too often let the affairs of my world take me away from what’s important.  I’m writing about LFSA today, in hopes that it takes hold, and holds me tenderly for the rest of my days.

It’s a sequence, those four words.  What would happen if I let them flow, one after another?

Listen

Meandering through the events that come my way, it’s possible for me to stop and listen, not to sounds necessarily, but to something big that wraps itself around all the people, all the things, all the moments.  I “hear” that something when I’m quiet.  No picture comes to mind.  But there’s a stirring where my heart is.  The air seems to vibrate.  I have no desire to move, or move away from what’s here.

It’s not a quick thing, this sequence.  When I am present, it takes its time.  To listen is to float on my back in the embrace of the ocean.  I could look up at the sky all day.

Fall

I can feel a mixed metaphor coming.  From the mirrored surface of the sea … I am falling.  Not underwater.  The “no parachute, but then again no ground” kind of falling.  No fear to be found, just the gentlest of breezes coming up to say hi.  I’ve never skydived, but I’ve fallen, even if infrequently.  Nowhere to go.  Nothing to do.  Just watch whatever’s touching me deepen and deepen some more.  Closing my eyes.  Like those trust exercises in the encounter groups of the 60s.  Letting go and knowing that the group will catch you.  They will.

See

And then the inner eyes open without plan or effort.  The whole world is animated -from the Latin “anima”, meaning “breath”.  To breathe life into the moment.  But actually, that seems too active a phrase.  Maybe for the moment to be breathed into.  However I say it, the seeing reveals a beauty and grace that can’t be described.  The mouth opens, the heart quivers, and all that is beheld shines like the sun.  The moments linger together.

Act

Seeing like this, there is only one way to act … with love.  Anything else would be ridiculous.  No options, no doubt, no problem.  Love them all.  Light the world.

***

Thank you.  I needed that.

 

 

Extra

Improving myself

Hurrying

Creeping forward at a red light

Groaning

Thinking about standing up Jean Deeth when we were 18

Preferring one life experience to another

Labelling someone

Worrying about what people think of me

Pushing someone or something away

Calculating what my next move should be

Harming any living being

Comparing me to you

Trying

Weighing myself every second day

Rehearsing what I want to say

Slamming myself for being terrified during a case conference about a child

Planning my day, my retirement, my life

Being jealous of other men for their good looks

Analyzing why I did something

Saying “I’m sorry” for doing something that really doesn’t hurt the other person

Craving chocolate, popularity, anything that will make me “better”

Hovering around someone

Reading tabloid articles

Explaining why I feel this way

Continuing to go down a tunnel with no cheese

Laughing at someone

Having to be right

Disagreeing

Having an opinion

Escaping from anything

Making sure that the toilet paper falls down the front of the roll, not behind it

Protecting myself

Checking whether I turned off the lights

Hating

Pretending to be someone I’m not

Trying to impress someone

Ruining someone else’s fun

Interrupting someone

Gossiping

Skipping steps to get the job done faster

Memorizing anything

Pleasing people

Complaining about politicians

Resisting

Preaching to anyone about anything

Changing what someone else thinks

Rescuing people when they can handle it themselves

Separating beings who love each other

Moaning about “poor me”

Diminishing the well-being of others

Wasting the moments

Making sure that my blog posts are “long enough”, whatever that means