A Seeking Heart

Me vs. Kerry

2012-02-04T09:56:00.001-05:00

I must admit that I’ve been a bit overwhelmedlately. I’m not on the verge of a twenty-something-life-crisis per se—well, let’scall a spade a spade—I’m on the verge of a twenty-something-life-crisis.

Correction--I am having an existential life crisis.

I can't describe fully what I'm thinking because its all so murky and foggy in my head, and part of the murkiness is the inability to articulate what I'm feeling. So, instead of describing it, I am going to replay how a typical internal dialogue sounds lately. The character of "Me" will be talking to the character of "Kerry." Which one is which you ask? My question exactly.

Me: I'm having an existential life crisis.

Kerry: What do you mean by crisis?

Me: Like, I have no idea what I am doing with my life. I have no idea what career path I should take. I don't know what anything means anymore. I'm totally lacking clarity.

Kerry: Ha! That's not a crisis--the real crisis is that you think you are having a crisis. The fact that you categorize the inability to give clear meaning to your life as a crisis is really indicative of larger issues you're facing.

Me: Like what?

Kerry: Like your unsated desire for clearcut answers on how to live your life and your all-consuming obsession with future plans. I didn't want to say anything, but you've had a lot of unnecessary freak outs lately.

Me: Oh my god, this is even a worse life crisis than I thought.

Kerry: Which brings to me another issue you have--your use of the word life to clarify crisis is totally superfluous; a crisis can only exist if we say it exists--if we're alive. So you're actually the cause of the crisis. And, while we're on it, maybe we should start examining who the "I" is that you're talking about. When you say "I" who do you mean?

Me: So, the person that I think is "I" is the creator of a crisis that doesn't even exist?

Kerry: Yeah, totally.

Me: Should that make me feel better or worse?

Kerry: I'm not really sure.

And that's about as far as I've gotten . . . .

I'm a nobody who are you?

2012-01-31T23:00:00.003-05:00

As only my sister can attest (compliments of her repeatedly betraying my trust by reading my red diary I hid beneath my bed), I was a morbid child. Though seemingly upbeat in my Lion King dance renditions, my diary shared darker thoughts.

By the age of ten, I had already written three different versions of my obituary, composed a song about our dead rabbit Sam ("Sam oh Sam, I'm dressed in black; Sam oh Sam, when are you coming back?"), and wrote down the name of every person who I heard had died (RIP Mr. Bihr who worked at the corner store.) Shannon may also cite to my morbitity by mentioning the game that I invented called "Hostage," which entailed me capturing her and her friends and then tying their necks to lamps and making them drink "poisonous" drinks replete with toothpaste, ranch dressing, pepper, and milk. (Don't worry, Shannon and I have spent years working through this, and she has since admitted loving the game). But that's beside the point.

At age eleven, I was obsessed with Emily Dickinson, memorizing her poems at night (which was quite a feat considering I couldn't remember--and still can't--all the words to the Pledge of Allegiance). My favorite poem of hers was "I'm a Nobody Who Are You" and I'd scrawl the lines in a Black Meade Composition Notebook, asking rhetorically "are you a nobody a too?" I didn't fully understand the second stanza (what was that whole reference to a frog thing?), but that didn't stop me from loving the poem.

I hadn't thought about that poem for years, but thanks to my existential life crisis which I'll discuss next time, I've begun thinking about it.

I really want to be Somebody.

And this has caused me a lot of anxiety.

In the land of public display of somebodyness, where I constantly read about everyone's accomplishments and chronicle people's self-promotional successes, my increasing desire for validation patheticizes me (verb: to make one feel pathetic).

Of course I seek validation. I mean, hello, I have a blog. Nothing screams a desperate attempt for attention than writing about one's inner most thoughts, posting it on facebook, and then squealing in delight to see a "like." And it's not just that I write because I need it as an outlet (which, I admit, I do). I write because I want people to read my writing, if only to affirm the fact that, why yes, they too had similar thoughts and can affirm that they are just as delusional as me.

I want to be a freaking somebody. I want people to read my blog and like my statuses; I want to be seen and recognized; I want to be a famous writer and then a speaker and then have millions of dollars and then be a philanthropist who gives away my money while still living a perfectly comfortable life in a gray-shingled house on the water that won't be that big but will probably still cost a lot of money with that sunset view and all. I want to be a person that people say is She's a Somebody, She's Good (whatever the heck that means).

But all this trying to be Somebody stuff--God, it's exhausting. And I'm kinda sick of it. How liberating would it be to just be a nobody? To live life without the need for the crowd's response? To screw all that seeking, wanting, its-never-enough-validation stuff. Ah, to be a Nobody . . . to want to be a nobody. How much freer would I feel?

So, Emily Dickinson, there's a pair of us now. But don't tell, they'd banish us you know. . . . (read the fricking poem for clarity on that last line--it's only 2 stanzas for goodness sake!)

Disclaimer.

2012-01-22T18:41:00.000-05:00

Part of writing about myself means that I share some of my innermost thoughts and experiences. In doing so, it is unsurprising that some of the people I hold most dearest appear in my entries--Alex more frequent than most. Because it is in my nature to shun sappiness (thanks mom!) and to exaggerate meaningless details (thanks dad!), Alex can sometimes come across as my slappy roommate whose flaws I broadcast to the world to make my own story better.

He is always a good sport about it, but for clarity sake, let me clear.

I love Alex. I love him so much I want to marry him.

He is my rock when I'm blown around in doubt, my confidante when I'm making tough decisions, my cheerleader when I'm struggling with self-doubt, and my "stop writing and let's enjoy the day outside" inspirer. He is the one who, when I spiral out of control on one of my rants, patiently listens and delicately encourages me to figure out what's "really going on." He is the one who asks me every few weeks, "is there anything else I can do to make you feel more loved?" He never complains, ever, even when I'm in one of my terribly nagging and self-righteous moods. He sees the world in a childish way--full of adventure and opportunity and joy, and this constantly refreshes me. He doesn't judge people, never holds a grudge, and his generosity is beautiful. The way he loves and treats his mom is beautiful. The way he values his family is beautiful. He is, to me, the epitome of beauty.

So, disclaimer: when I am harping on Alex, which I have a tendency to do at times, and undoubtedly will continue to do (bless his heart), my love and adoration for this man never waivers. Just an FYI.

Dear Gretchen Rubin, Happiness is Overrated.

2012-01-16T15:52:00.001-05:00

Photo taken by Kerry Docherty outside Lopuri, Thailand

I stumbled across the book The Happiness Project last year by Gretchen Rubin. In the book, Gretchen chronicles a year in which she focuses on being happy. The book has become a best seller, and even though the premise of the book is a little cheesy (but certainly no less than my book may be), I can't help but love the woman considering she wrote me an email.

Well, back up. First, I wrote her a stalker-ish emailed titled "we're the same, except you're a better version than me" and then shared the parallels of our lives--we both lived in New Haven, we both went to law school (she to Yale), we both were federal law clerks (she for a Supreme Court Justice), we both moved to NYC (she to a bigger apartment), and decided to write a book (she a successful author). I mean, if that's not a soul mate, what is?

So, I wrote her an email asking her to coffee and promising that we would have so much in common that she'd randomly decide to be my mentor and walk me through this strange journey of writing a book. That almost happened.

When I say things "almost happened," I usually mean that I was utterly rejected. Like if I were to tell you that I was almost on the hip hop dance team in college, you'd know that I actually endured a humiliating tryout where i failed to properly do the Harlem Shake and fell on my chin while trying to do the "worm," such that I didn't get a call back.

So, when I say that Gretchen Rubin almost became my mentor, I mean that she kindly wrote me back, telling me that she was working on another book and, at this point in time, saying "no" to all invitations. That being said, she didn't refute my statement that we were the same, and she even told me good luck on my endeavors. I saved the rejection under my "Inspiration" label of gmail.

Gretchen, I can call her by her first name at this point, don't you think?, has now dedicated her life to sharing tips on being happy. Her following is huge in large part because so many people want to be happy. Who doesn't?

Well, maybe me. I mean, of course I want to be happy, but I've become so bombarded by information as to what happiness looks like, that I don't even know what happiness means anymore. It's that feeling of, "sure I want it, but what's 'it' again?"

So, when people tell me they're "happy," I always want to know more. What does it feel like? Like in your body and in your mind? How long does it last? And when you can't feel it anymore, what replaces it? Is it a continuous high, a freeness, a state of euphoria?

And what's the cause of it? What's the source? I know happiness isn't an accumulation of good things in one's life because there are times when I've had a nice apartment, significant other, great friends, and a world of opportunity, and still felt anxious and burdened. I also know that happiness is not merely a lack of suffering, because there have been times when I've been fully immersed in suffered-filled situations and felt happy. Happiness isn't merely the following of one's dreams either because even though I'm writing a book and embarking down a path more aligned with my passions, I don't really feel that different than I did a year ago. Maybe more energized perhaps, but certainly no happier.

Perhaps I've felt happiness before, but as I remember it, it was kind of boring. One of those "oh, well, this is nice." Or maybe I had a burst of "hallelujah, life is good!" before realizing that I had to the dishes before company came over. It felt kinda like how you feel after a good meal, where you sit back in your chair with your top button unbuttoned and you pass on dessert because you don't feel like you need anything else to feel satisfied.

Along those lines, then, maybe we should talk about contentment. "Oh shut up, Kerry," you may be thinking, "now you're getting into semantics--happiness and contentment are virtually the same thing, so move on." And, maybe you're right, and when it coms to semantics, I'm the last person you'd want to talk to considering I use words wrongly (wrongly is a word, right?). But, I still think there's a difference in what we expect happiness and contentment to look like; the words, to me, conjure entirely different feelings.

When I think about happiness, I think about ooey gooey feelings of giddiness, of slight intoxication, of the allure of the unknown, the intimate touch of comfort, or an orgasmic bite of a bacon-ridden meal. My happiness moments stem from something wonderful and external--friends, date nights, music, food, and coconut smelling bubble baths. These moments are amazing, but oh-so-fleeting. Happiness' downfall therefore is its stamina; it just doesn't seem to last that long. And yet, it tries so hard. It's like we're taking Viagara for happiness, begging it to last longer, and then feeling disappointed when it goes limp minutes later.

Contentment, however, is happiness' rebellious sister. The one that says, "yeah I like to feel good, but who cares?" It's that state of being without desire--that, no matter if good or bad happens, she knows she'll still be okay; that "yeah this is fun, but I'd probably be just as content if I was sitting home alone"; that "there's a long line at the grocery and a child is crying, but that's okay because I'm where I'm supposed to be"; that "it'd be nice to be eating out right now, but this bowl of apple cinnamon Kashi oatmeal surely will do." Content moments seem to last longer because they usually don't result from anything but a feeling of fullness. And, because it doesn't feel as amazing as happiness, it tends to be less addictive; there's not as much panic in holding onto it or searching for it to get the next high.

Don't get me wrong, contentment doesn't seem that sexy. But I trust it more. All I know about happiness is that it tricks me to wanting more of something that I can't ever hold on to. So, Gretchen Rubin, I haven't given up on you, but this whole "Happiness Project" has made me question whether a pursuit of happiness will make me happy or just make me feel guilty about the fact that I can't hold happiness long enough. If you write a Contentment Project, then we're talking.

I'm in an Unhealthy Relationship.

2012-01-10T23:11:00.003-05:00

(Giddy over the ice displayed on my ring finger)

As the stresses of planning my upcoming nuptials with Alex start to give me borderline anxiety attacks (whoever says that a wedding is only about the couple getting married is lying), I've been trying to refocus on what a wedding really means. Not only am I reading Elizabeth Gilbert's Committed (thank you, Herbie), but I've been breaking down the elements of what makes a healthy relationship.

Like thoughtfulness, for example. (I know you like smoothies in the morning, so I made you one despite the fact that I always ask you to make me coffee but you don't do it unless I beg you.)

Patience. (It's okay that you left your clothes hangers all over the bed despite my repeated requests to not leave hangers all over the bed, just please try to remember next time k?)

Compassion. (It's really annoying that you're zoning me out right now, but I know that you're stressed, so instead of complaining to you and making you more stressed, I'll zone you out and pretend I'm zen.)

Short-term commitment. (I just got asked to dinner with some friends tonight, but because we already agreed to watch a sports game tonight that I don't really care about it, I'll still watch the game because I value date night.)

Long-term commitment. (I promise that even when I get really sick of you, I'll stick by you).

So, as I started to reflect on what attributes I wanted my relationship to have, the more I thought about, well, me.

This entry is not about the healthiness status of my relationship with Alex: it's about my relationship with myself.

Comparatively, and I'm not sure if it's a good thing or bad thing or anything, my relationship with myself is far less healthy than my relationship with Alex. I'm certainly not thoughtful to myself. I mean, I have a lot of thoughts, but surely that in itself doesn't make me "thoughtful," right? Rarely do I indulge in sweet kind acts for no particular reason but self-love. (Flowers for me? Nah, not worth it). I'm not that patient with myself either. (You did it again you mindless dweeb--you forgot to respond to that email. Get your act together, woman!) I know I lack self-compassion. (You say you want to write a book, but you don't even have a good enough discipline to write on your blog consistently, so surely you make a terrible writer (and person, for that matter.)) I lack short-term commitment. (Dear Workout, I was going to totally spend time with you tonight, but instead I'm getting a gluten-free pizza with bacon, sorry.) And, I certainly lack long term commitment. (Dear God, I know that I've committed to this whole "spiritual practice thing," but it's just not as passionate or fun as it used to be, so I'm not saying that its 'You' per se, but it's just too daunting right now to think of having to meditate for "forever.')

Sigh. I'm in an unhealthy relationship with myself.

When did I start cheating on my well-being with my promiscuous mind? When did I start to think that I wasn't worth flowers and patience and and compassion and commitment? When did I start to falsely believe that I could I have a healthy relationship with others when I couldn't even have a healthy relationship with myself?

Screw the golden rule for a bit. I need to do undo myself the way I do unto the people I love. And, maybe with some TLC to good ole me, I'll realize that I don't need a prince charming to live happily ever after, I just need a healthy relationship with Me.

(Although Al and a castle on the Jersey shore would certainly be a nice bonus.)

The less I want to say

2012-01-05T07:37:00.000-05:00

the more I realize that my thoughts aren't true

the less I want to say.

Monkey Piss

2011-10-12T03:56:00.002-04:00

I've only seen my father flip out twice in his life.

For those of you who don't know my dad, I can only describe him as the kindest man alive. He never loses his temper, never complains, and is quick to calm one down in moments of crisis. His two nicknames, Cabana Boy or Jimbolina, pretty much sum him up.

The first time I saw my dad flip out was when I was in 7th grade. I wrote a poem about a physically abusive and drunk father titled "When Poppa Comes Home" and then chose it as my favorite piece to display for parent's night. He nearly had a panic attack when my classmates' parents read the poem on the wall, slowly turned to look at him with forced smiles, and noted what a creative writer I was.

The second time he flipped out was in regard to an infestation of squirrels that attacked our birdseed feeder. My dad tried everything to prevent the squirrels from jumping on it, moving it from branch to branch, trying different types, and spraying it with squirrel repellant. When we returned home to see multiple chainsaws duct taped to the feeder, we knew that he had officially lost it. The squirrels had broken him.

I can only now relate to my father's squirrel meltdown. The monkeys in Mombasa have been infiltrating Jared and Ilea's apartment. At first, I thought they were cute and would talk to them from the balcony, cooing "hello youcutelittlemonkeycreature." But when they broke into the apartment when I was home alone, I freaked out. Grabbing a wooden banjo from the shelf, I waved it at one of the monkeys. The monkey would hide behind a corner and then pop its head back out until I waved the banjo again. Three minutes went by until I realized that the monkey thought we were playing peek-a-boo. They weren't afraid of me.

A few days later, one of the male monkeys entered the abode. In an attempt to mark my territory, I beat my chest and yelled at it. Jumping into a tree, the monkey then swooped a branch aside, stuck out his head, and thrust its chest forward. I ran away screaming.

Yesterday, however, they officially broke me. After a long day of errands, writing, and torrential downpour, we returned home to make dinner. As we opened the door, Jared yelled, "OH NO THEY DIDN'T!" Ilea and I glanced around the room in shock. We had been robbed. Food was everywhere. Peanuts were strewn around the room, gnawed tomato peels covered the counters, cupboards were opened, and plastic bags filled with cookies were ripped open. Dirty monkey footprints covered the walls, the oven, the windows, and the tile floor. And the monkey piss was everywhere.

We spent the next hour cloroxing the apartment and grumbling how we didn't have any tomatoes for the chili dinner we were supposed to cook.

I don't really have a moral of the story here. I know I usually like to explore how ordinary moments may hold greater meaning in our lives, but the only the only words that come to mind are: (1) shut windows; (2) buy slingshot; (3) fight the monkey piss.

Chronicling the Process . . .

2011-10-07T10:29:00.002-04:00

So, I've been chronicling the book writing process in my journal. I thought I'd share my journey thus far:

3/27/11: At dinner, we talked about the Bradley Cooper movie premised on “if a pill could make you rich and famous, would you take it.” The question “if you could take a pill to be anything, what you be?” was posed. First thing out of my mouth was “author.” I paused, surprised by my answer. Really?! I asked myself. Really. I responded.

4/9/11: I told my mom and dad I had decided to write a book. They weren’t particularly thrilled. My mom asked me if writing a book was distracting me from looking for my next job. I said looking for a job was distracting me from my truest calling. I hadn’t expected full-fledged support necessarily, but it would have been nice. My guess is that they’ll come around. They just want to ensure I'm financially stable, which makes perfect sense.

4/15/11: I'm telling as many people as possible I’m writing a book. The more I say it, the more I start to believe that this will happen. I need to hold me accountable.

4/30/11: Fricking internet, distracts me everytime. Nothing blocks my creativity than looking at my gmail/facebook. So why do I do it?

5/10/11: What I am realizing is that the more I tell people I’m writing a book, the more they tell me that they, secretly, have been writing down their stories too. Who knew I was living amidst such secret authors! Why are people not sharing this beautiful part of them? Is it because of expectation? Such a beautiful thing though for us to share this with each other, in a vulnerable, if not abashedly, admittance that we too want to be a story teller.

5/30/11: I told myself I’d write today and then wasted a ton of time on my computer. Wtf. My mind was telling me to write and I acted like a complete addict and couldn’t give off the internet.

6/3/11: Went to my high school reunion and told my old English teacher that I was writing a book, he wants to invite me back in the fall and have me talk to the high schoolers about this process. Excited. But GULP. I’m doing it!

6/10/11: Happy birthday to me-bought my ticket to Mombasa Kenya for a month in September-October. Writer’s retreat here I come.

6/14/11: I need to be reading more. Need to collect more knowledge from the outside b/c starting to doubt whether I have it inside. But then again, all the answers are inside right?

6/16/11: I meditated this morning and what do you know, the words are flowing like water! It’s 7:32 in the morning, and I know I should go shower and get ready for work, but I simply don’t want to stop writing. Last week I kept having writers block and doubts about the validity of anything I was saying. Now I just want to put it all out there and see what sticks.

6/21/11: I finished the Artist’s Way. But it’s really just the beginning. Can't decide whether to write this morning or clean the apartment (a normal morning debate).

6/27/11: I miss the Artist’s Way. Haven't done my morning pages, and they ground me. I need to buy a journal to start writing down when women say wise things (which is often). Everytime I try to remember their story and try to write it down later, I never say it as well as they said it.

6/29/11: I pulled out all old journals from my bookshelf. All my life thoughts on the past 8 years of my life. Going to read them and feel weird. Scary that most of what I think isn't true.

6/30/11: Roll out of bed and first thing I do is start to write. I cant help myself. Don't feel like going to work, but obviously not an option. Writing a legal opinion translates well into writing a book, right? Although there is an undercurrent between justice and healing and the telling of narratives, I'm just not sure quite how it all comes together.

7/12/11: Went to my first writing group. Everyone says I should blog before writing a book. I stopped blogging to write a book. I’m screwed.

7/19/11: Submitted my first thing to my writing group, what should I give them? Gave them old blog entries to convey my voice. Wasn't particularly thrilled at what I chose.

7/25: Got my first writing sample back with edits. Think English paper w/ tons of red writing on it. But good advice.

8/5/11: Started blogging again. I needed it-helps me reclaim my voice.

8/20/11: Returned home to visit parents at lake house w/ intention of writing. Found out I have an interview at a job in Spanish. So rusty. Freaked out. Took daily Spanish lessons. No book writing.

8/27/11: Submitted an essay for women and power and WON! Good boost for morale.

9/25/11: Began writing "retreat." In Kenya, here I go.

10/1/11: James Pearson tells me about his book--he has a whole plan for what he's going to do when it's finished. Should I have plan on what I'm going to do when I'm done? Not there yet, must keep writing.

10/2/11: Intervention from Christy telling me to stop reading self help books.

10/3/11: Totally changed the narrative of book. 2 weeks left to focus before NYC distractions creep up on me again.

10/5/11: Jared and Ilea sit me down on talk to me about the process of publishing, self-publishing, marketing, branding, etc. I need a permanent life coach. Can't I just hire some one to do all these details? Jared already got a book deal. Maybe it's good luck to be around him.

"I just need to learn to like my face."

2011-10-03T07:47:00.001-04:00

A few nights ago, I pressed up my face against the mirror scanning my face and taking mental notes of its imperfections. No good ever comes from a close up inspection of one's face, which is why I refuse to buy a magnifying mirror despite my mom's continual insistence that I place one on the back of my bathroom cupboard.

Grumbling as I examined my skin, I had a flash back of a conversation from the month before.

I was sitting on a lounge chair overlooking the lake next to my nineteen year old cousin. She was about to enter her sophomore year of college. We talked classes, study abroad options, friends, and, then of course, boys.

"I don't know," she began, "I have a lot of guys who are my friends, but I never believe that any of them really like me, even when they say they do."

She continued " . . . and everyone gets really dressed up when they go out, and so I've started wearing more makeup, but I've started to realize that regardless of whether I wear makeup or not, I just need to learn to like my face."

I laughed at the comment, but then paused as the wisdom soaked in. "I just need to learn how to like my face."

How often do I look in the mirror and say, "Why hello there, Kerry, I like your face."

Women spend a lot of time and energy trying to like our face more. But we think that before we can like it, we must improve it by wearing makeup, getting botox, buying expensive creams, or using a scalpel to reconcoct our features. None of these fixes are ever enough though; it's only a matter of time before we find something else that we think we need to change.

The irony is it's all in vain. (Pun attended). It doesn't really matter. No badly how much we want to, we never, really, look that different. We always just look like us. Regardless of whether my friend dresses up for dinner and has on foundation or shows up with greasy hair piled on head and no makeup, she still looks like her. We can't hide from the our most identifying physical trait.

If we always look pretty much the same, why don't we spend the energy trying to learn to like our face as opposed to trying to change it?

Sometimes I get so fed up by the pressures of beauty that I feel like I'm "sticking it to society" when I wear nothing on my face. Though my sun spots are exposed and my smile lines extend from my eyes to my ears and my skin is pale with a touch of blotchy, it feels freeing to walk in the world in my most natural state. There's a Zen quote that says, "true freedom is being without anxiety about imperfection."

I'm not saying that products or makeup can't help us to feel beautiful, but I am saying that at the end of the day, I just need to learn how to like my face.

The INTERVENTION.

2011-09-30T04:07:00.057-04:00

Question mark, a photo by Marco Bellucci on Flickr.

So, as most of you know, I'm in Mombasa writing a book. If you want to read a description of all that Kenya has to offer, I encourage you to wikipedia it because I've spent ninety percent of my time here holed up in a coffee shop. Five percent of my time is spent clapping at monkeys that have infiltrated Jared and Ilea's apartment in order to dissuade them from jumping on me and ripping off my face like that woman who had to have a face transplant when the chimpanzee attacked her. The other five percent of the time is spent gnawing on leftover Swiss Chocolate and persuading Ilea to give me massages. She wants to a be masseuse so she needs to practice, right?

Anyway, the writing process has been challenging. I just can't figure out which direction I want this book to go. As I write, I keep switching the narrative. Then I get confused and frustrated, take a break, and read facebook for inspiration. (Don't do that, you'll be disappointed and start to wonder why you're friends with people.) Desperately seeking wisdom, I then usually pick up a self-help book and wonder why I don't write as good (ahem, well) as the famous author. That's a typical day here. If I'm feeling really wild, I may run into the Indian Ocean in my bathing suit screaming "don't look at me" as I dive between crowds of Kenyans in black inner tubes.

Yesterday I had one of those days. After one of my "what the hell am I doing moments," I quit writing and checked my gmail. Usually I'm invisible on gchat because I like to have control over who I talk to, but considering I hadn't spoken to anyone in twelve hours save for the few swear words I yelled at the monkeys, I decided to put my status as "busy." (ha!)

Seconds later, I received a gchat from Christy. She's the girl that lived below me my first year in New York City. We didn't see each other that often. One time we ate oatmeal with peanutbutter on her fire escape, and another time we went to a comedy show in a gym, met up with a girl who is a nude model, and then danced in an empty bar before getting a shitty taco from San Loco. Besides these random exchanges, I always liked her. She was honest and whimsical and would hop on a train to the Hudson Valley to find moss to bring home to hang in her kitchen. How can you not like someone who does something like that?

Since moving into new apartments, we hadn't spoken in over a year. After exchanging pleasantries, she asked about the book. "I'd love to hear your insights," I told her upon concluding my spiel. (It's such a spiel at this point it's borderline nauseating.)

"I'm vicious," she warned, before offering any opinions.

"Hit me," I responded.

Things quickly spiraled out of control from there. I can't rehash exactly what happened, but it went something like:

"don't use the word power-it's a buzzword"

"don't use 'in-enoughness' it's too hard to pronounce"

"don't be Elizabeth Gilbert, the self indulgent white woman book type who could afford to go explore the world for reasons not discussed" (Side note, I loved Eat, Pray, Love. Other side note, she was able to travel because she received an advancement on her book.)

"don't take yourself too seriously because your personal journey is probably deluded." She stopped to breathe. "What books are you reading?" she asked.

"Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdoms by Christiane Northup and Return to Love by Marianne Williamson."

"Ok, cut that out right now," she responded. "Stop reading other people's ideas about how to live life and start grounding in reality. Go buy an economics or a pottery book."

"Can I read Thoreau?" I asked meekly.

"No, but Kerouac will do. Ok, I gotta get back to work. Good luck, keep me posted!"

I closed gchat and sat on my yoga mat in an empty room in silence. Ilea and Jared are still moving into their place, so the minimalism engulfed me.

I closed my eyes for a moment. My face felt like it had been slapped with a five pound wet fish.

But I felt . . . free.

She was right. She was one hundred percent right. Somewhere down the line, amidst my piles of self-help books and podcasts and journals, I had begun believing that in order to write something people would want to hear I had to be Elizabeth Gilbert or Marianne Williamson or Eckhart Tolle.

I'm not them.

I have not had a life-altering experience that made me understand the universe. I don't believe that I have any profound answers to share. I am a twenty-something year old ridden with self-doubt. I've spent my whole life asking questions and now I don't even trust the questions I'm asking. Screw the answers, how do I figure out what questions to ask? What is it I even want in this life? Is it peace, power, passion? Or, as Christy phrased it, are the questions more like "how do I accept who I am? How do I live a life that inspires me?"

I have a hundred pages of wrong answers, now I need to start figuring out the right questions.

Why Do We Think Relationships Make Us Happy?

2011-09-29T09:36:00.000-04:00

A few months ago, I went to see my dearly beloved Krishna Das for a weekend retreat. Because I had dragged Alex to two Krishna concerts, wherein I forced him to sit cross-legged and chant for five hours while angry yogis stampeded the stage, I let him off the hook this time. Despite giving him a "get out of Krishna Das free," I couldn't help but wish he was there, disappointed that my dream day (chanting) and his dream day (surfing) didn't align.

Seven hours into Saturday, Krishna started talking about relationships. He recalled a story by an Indian guru who stated, "I don't understand why westerners believe that relationships make us happy." The class erupted in protest. "What do you mean?" people retorted, "of course relationships make us happier!"

Krishna didn't back down, responding "certainly close connections with others are important for our well-being, but relationships themselves don't make us happy."

For a very long time, I expected my significant other to be my work-out buddy, my spiritual adviser, my best friend, my chef, my cleaning man, my intellectual guru, my masseuse, my therapist, my support system, my travel partner, my dance partner, my editor, my go-to person to call during the day when I'm bored, my vintage shopping buddy, my florist, and my lets-sip-wine-and-talk-about-feelings-companion. In other words, I expected my partner to fulfill my every need.

So, despite meeting many of my so-called criteria, whenever Alex failed to conform to my relationship needs, we'd have to have a "talk." Alex never complained about these discussions, but they certainly weren't fun for him. At times, he'd listen intently to my concerns and agree to work on it. Other times, he'd gently remind, "Ker, you need to let me be me."

"You can be you!" I'd exclaim, while secretly thinking, "but only if it aligns with my expectations of who I want you to be."

I deepened into my love with Alex when I realized that he couldn't fulfill me.

People are not made to fulfill us; they're made to shed light on how we can fulfill ourselves. This is why we value true friends, spiritual advisers, therapists, and partners. Not because they fulfill us, but because when we're with them, we remember that we are worthy of love.

At the end of the day, Alex cannot make me pursue my own dreams, give me the discipline or creativity to write a book, make me feel connected to God, or convince me that I am powerful. Whatever he offers will never be enough to fulfill my deepest desires.

This realization has been a relief for both of us. I have (er-am trying) to relinquish my expectations of what he needs to provide to me, and in letting go, I see him for who he truly is--a life-long and perfectly flawed companion who can help to remind me that it is my spiritual journey, not my relationship, that ultimately completes me.

Writing a Shitty First Draft.

2011-09-27T05:51:00.002-04:00

Before arriving in Kenya, I had a few day layover in Zurich to visit my friends Talley and Zach. We ate bratwurst, walked around the quaint European city, and railroaded to the Alps. Highlight of the trip was the mechanical luge down the mountain, where I giggled and screamed and got whiplash as I flung around each bend before slamming on the brakes in fear. Who needs to hike down a mountain when you can luge?

Other highlight of the trip was Tal's cooking. For those of you who love delicious food, beautiful photography, and design, check out Tal's blog housetohaus.blogspot.com. Tal's design skills also helped me redesign my totally amateur and technologically stunted blog into a website that better encompasses Kerry-ness. Thanks Tal!

To wake up in the land of the Sound of Music and fall asleep in hot and tropical Mombasa is a strange feeling. Plane travel, you amaze me. After arriving in Kenya on Sunday night and reuniting with my friends Jared and Ilea, I settled into their apartment overlooking the Indian Ocean. I have no phone, the internet is spotty, and the sound of waves, birds, and tree hopping monkeys creates a nice writing ambiance. Add a nice strong cup of African coffee (with a spoonful of powdered hazelnut creamer--total coffee taboo I know, but who I am kidding, it just makes the coffee taste so good!) and I'm ready to write.

So . . . writing. . .

I've got over a hundred pages of borderline incomprehensible notes and ideas. I also have some beautiful stories from women who have shared their thoughts on womanhood and power. Combining the two is going to be an interesting task. But for now, I'm just focused on writing a shitty first draft. That seems to be a great first goal.

As I write, I can't help but think that this book-writing journey is similar to the mechanical luge I rode down last weekend. If I want to move forward with writing, I need to take my hands off the brake and just let go and enjoy the ride (despite the fear and whiplash). So back to my shitty, but ever growing, draft.

Connection

2011-09-26T09:33:00.000-04:00

A week ago, I attended Donna Karan's Women's Inspiration Enterprise conference (WIE), and it could not have come at a more relevant time. I had just finished clerking for a judge and was journeying into the unchartered territory of writing a book before switching legal fields. I was confronting a crossroad in my life and hoped that I would leave the conference inspired.

WIE was broad in topic, ranging from social entrepreneurship, fashion, beauty, human rights, hunger, media, and spirituality. However, there seemed to be a recurrent theme pulsating through each panel, and that was the power of connection. Life coaches Ann Mehr and Jerry Colona reminded us to connect with our breath prior to thinking and doing. Kris Carr encouraged us to have a sacred relationship with ourselves first and foremost. Dr. Jill Biden, Baroness Amos, and Iman encouraged us to connect to the need in Somalia. Documentary filmmaker Abby Disney and former President of Rock the Vote Jehmu Green spoke about connecting to the unheard, whether it be women in combat or undocumented workers in America. Elizabeth Lesser, the founder of Omega, spoke about connecting to other women or, as she referred to it, having “womances.” Donna Karan noted the importance of connecting business and philanthropy. And Deepak Chopra ended the conference by reiterating the need for a “collective consciousness for transformation.”

As women, we spend our lives connecting our paradoxes: yin and yang, ego and spirit; individualism and community; intuition and risk-taking; and patience and ambition. Ultimately, at this point in my journey, I’m experimenting with how to make these connections. And my first mission is currently connecting with my own power. The speakers at WIE reminded me that power is not about our accomplishments, but the ability to overcome difficult circumstances. Many of the women shared stories about their failures, their crazy schedules, or their desire to quit at certain points (or in Kelly Cutrone’s case, “every two weeks). Through mentorship, faith, determination, and ambition, their strength allowed them to transcend these difficulties.

I left WIE feeling not only inspired, but empowered. We all have the tools we need to succeed, we just need to connect to them.

When Our Bodies Talk

2011-09-14T10:30:00.001-04:00

The end of August was an unsettling time for me. My clerkship, a job I adored, was nearing its end; Alex and I were moving back into the apartment we had subletted to friends; I was exploring the unchartered territory of book writing, figuring out my budgets sans federal income and benefits, and rearranging my travel plans. Despite the fact that we were in between apartments, I was almost jobless, and I had no idea as to how the next four months would unfold, I felt surprisingly calm.

At least I thought I did.

Two days before my job ended, the air mattress Alex and I had been sleeping on popped. (I blame Alex.) After moving to the couch, I fell asleep, woke up that morning as usual, and went to work. Half way through the day, I started feeling itchy. I knew I should have moisturized this morning, I grumbled, as I finished writing my last court order.

As I typed, my eye caught a glimpse of something blotchy, and when I looked down, huge welts spanned across my forearm. "I'm breaking into hives" I shrieked, running into my co-clerks room and scrunching up my collared shirt to point to the random bumps across my arm.

"What's happening to me?" I lamented about my yet-to-be-diagnosed ailment. Though they had been conditioned over the year to never take me too seriously, my co-clerks agreed it was probably an allergic reaction. But they were lawyers, so what did they know?

I gchatted my sister-in-love (not yet by-law) Julia and told her the news. "I think it may be from sleeping on your couch with that wool blanket," I stated, placing full blame on her.

"Hmm . . . " she considered, "I dunno . . . perhaps it could be stress?"

"No, it's not stress," I scoffed, "I don't feel stressed at all!"

Despite the fact she's a psychotherapist in training, I rebuked Julia's suggestion, and took a close up photo of my skin to show to my friend Hannah, who's in medical school. Besides being the only person in the world with more "conditions" than me, she knew her diseases well. "Hives," she texted back.

"Am I allergic to something in my environment?" I texted.

"Prob. But could be something much more serious." she responded. "C u at dinner." (After a few glasses of wine that night, Hannie proved useless in her diagnosis.)

A few days later, I went home to Canada, where, as I shared previously, my week of relaxation dissipated into job interviews and Spanish tutoring. The hives didn't stop. I would be fine for half of the day, gently feel an itch on my neck, and notice welts breaking out of my skin.

"What's wrong with me?" I asked my mom in an attempt to receive sympathy (and perhaps a new sweater).

"You're fine," my mom responded matter-of-factly. "It's just stress related."

"But I don't feel stress!" I bemoaned, puffy faced, welted up, and engulfed by three Spanish books, research papers for my job interview, and my journals.

I didn't think I was lying to myself. I really didn't feel that stressed. I was sleeping well (granted I was dreaming in Spanish), eating healthy, laying off the coffee (which I recently observed gives me heart palpitations), and going for jogs. Could it be that my mind didn't think I was stressed, but my body was telling me otherwise? Does my body have a separate voice from my mind?

This had to be the case. Over the past few months, I've heard countless stories about people whose bodies communicated to them more effectively than their minds.

Megan survived a terrible plane crash six years ago, and her father tragically died in the crash. She couldn't remember anything about the incident itself, but a few months after the fact, she accidentally bumped her knee. The bump triggered countless flashbacks about the crash, and she suddenly had an image of her knee bashing into the seat in front of her. Her knee had held the trauma of the accident, not her mind.

Katherine had been praying for a prestigious job opportunity with a well-known politician. The day after she received it, she became physically ill and remained in bed all weekend. After further reflection, she realized that although she thought she had wanted this job, the prospect of working in the position caused her extreme anxiety. Her body was telling her something before her mind could register it. She declined the job offer and weeks later found a job she adores.

Six months ago, Anna was studying for her SAT's. Extremely bright and dedicated, she took countless practice SAT's and performed really well on all of them. When it came time to take the test itself, however, she never scored nearly as high as she did on her practice tests. She had classic performance anxiety. After being disappointed once again after a test, her mom asked me if I had any recommendations for her. I certainly had no insights to offer in terms of vocab or math problems, but I recommended that Anna try some mindfulness techniques. Soon after, Anna spent a five minutes every few days doing body scans to observe how her body was unconsciously hold stress. Once she acknowledged her mind was holding stress, she effectively dealt with it, and a few months later her test scores skyrocketed.

Countless studies also show that after physical or sexual abuse, survivors have an increased tendency to suffer from unexplained stomach pains. Like Megan's story, their bodies may hold unresolved trauma in the gut.

All of these stories evidence that our bodies communicate to us even when our minds don't listen.

As much as I wanted to believe that my hives were a product of allergies (itself indicative of the fact that I didn't want to admit stress), I have no doubt that the hives were stress-induced in large part because once I admitted to myself that I was stressed, the hives started to subside (with a healthy remedy of baths, yoga, and remembering to breathe). It was if my body was screaming to me in the only way it knew how: "listen to me woman; calm yourself down!" And, only after my mind acknowledged what my body was communicating did I start to feel better.

I can't escape my issues through mental repression. Undoubtedly, my body will hold the tension until I am ready to deal with it, and only after I align my body with my mind will healing occur.

Being Me Wherever I May Be.

2011-09-11T15:13:00.003-04:00

Last week, my younger cousin Molly and I sat across the table from each other at a Thai restaurant. After recapping our week, I questioned her about my book and my blog. "Be honest," I began, "do you have any critiques on my writing?"

I knew she would truthfully respond. Molly is family, and my family has never refrained from letting me know when I'm doing something wrong, being annoying, or acting stupid. Molly also has the gift of conveying exactly what she's thinking, even if it makes the other person slightly uncomfortable. I value this trait because I have a hard time speaking my mind if I know it may cause conflict.

"Actually, yes, I do have some ideas on your blog," Molly started, gazing up at the ceiling as she slowly chewed her pad thai. "I really like it when you share your own thought processes and describe your whole train of thought."

"Mmmhmm...continue," I pressed.

She shoved another forkful of pad thai in her mouth. "No offense, but I don't like it when you do a lot of analysis on the situation and start to quote other philosophers. I don't believe that you actually know what you're talking about when you analyze, so just sharing your own thoughts is better."

"Hmm . . . ok, that makes sense?" I responded, lingering on the phrase "you have no idea what you're talking about," but ultimately agreeing with the comment. I took out my most faithful companion, my notebook, and jotted down "no idea what I'm talking about."

"And definitely lay off the descriptive sentences about scenery. They bore me."

"Interesting," I stated, which is my go-to word when I have no idea how else to respond. "This is hard though because I'm receiving conflicting messages from people," I countered. "Someone just read some of my work and told me that I needed way more analysis and more sensory imagery."

Molly looked at me for a few moments, just blinking. "Yeah, I mean, it's totally up to you what you want to do. I'm just saying what I think."

"Yeah, I know," I mumbled. I mindlessly played with my food, which I do when I'm nervous, and mentally weighed which writing style I should pursue.

I know it's up to me. I have received countless suggestions to "just be me" when I write, but that's the hard part, figuring out what my truest voice sounds like. I think I know what it sounds like, but just when I get in to a groove, I start to question it.

I'm not saying this is bad per se. I think it's healthy to be open to our own malleability and explore different styles. That being said, on a larger scale, I'm still figuring out not only how to write like me, but how to be me wherever I am.

It sounds like an easy concept, but it can be hard being myself--my most authentic self--in every social situation. I often find myself catering my discussions to whom I'm talking. For example, I'll talk politics with my friends from college, but rarely religion; I'll talk religion with my religious friends , but never politics; I'll talk about my interest in certain legal issues with other lawyers, but won't talk about my book writing; I'll express my discomfort at a racist or homophobic comment to some, and completely ignore such comments to avoid confrontation with others; I'll put on my happy-go-lucky side in a social situation, when really I'm feeling quiet and introverted.

While this could be considered, in some form, emotional intelligence or social etiquette, when I choose my conversations based on the comfort level of others, I'm actually catering myself to who other people are. I'm creating a social construct of self and choosing whether to share my "public" or "private" persona depending on who I'm with.

Back to Molly. A few months ago, we were sitting around a party and someone shared an inappropriate joke. I pretended I didn't catch the punch line and avoided eye contact with the joke-teller. Molly, on the other hand, nicely, but firmly, asked, "I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what's funny about that." It was awkward, I'm not going to lie. But Molly did it in such a way where she was honoring herself and her beliefs and not shying away from speaking her mind, though it shifted the mood of the environment. I really respected her for that. She said what she meant.

I'm currently practicing this new thing called "only saying what I mean." For example, if I run into an acquaintance on the street and I know that we won't get together, I don't say "let's get together sometime and catch up." If someone asks me how I am, and I'm feeling tired, I don't respond, "I feel great!" If someone asks me where I want to eat, and I have an opinion on it, I tell them where I want to eat. If someone asks me for advice and I know it could be hard to hear, I'm trying to just share what I really think.

I am slowly learning that I can't successfully be my truest self if I'm constantly catering my opinions, thoughts, advice, or vocabulary to other people. As Shakespeare said (sorry Mol-I'm quoting someone), "to thine own self be true." One of the reasons I write is because it clears away all my facades and personas that I may put up during the day and sheds light on my deeper, more authentic Self. I'm trying to own my own voice, regardless of what others may prefer. It's part of my practice of being me wherever I may be.

The Pain of Expectations

2011-09-06T12:30:00.000-04:00

Last Monday, I flew home to my lake house in Canada for a week of relaxation. On the plane, I sat in the window seat, staring out the window and envisioning a week of early morning risings, hours of writing, long beach walks, and family time. In an attempt to create a more disciplined writing schedule, I set a goal to write six blog entries and another ten pages in my book.

After picking me up at the airport, my mom and I returned home, and I breathed a huge sigh of relief upon seeing the water. I put my suitcase upstairs, caught up with my parents, and then opened my email.

Emails, unfortunately, have become mood dictators in my life. When I see bold unread messages from friends, my heart quickly flutters in excitement. When I see bold unread spam, I get annoyed at having to go through the ten second routine of unsubscribing. When I see bold unread messages from the organizations to whom I have applied for jobs, my stomach quickly churns.

Now normally when I open my email, I don't receive anything specifically new and exciting. But this particular Gmail occurrence was Christmas in a box. I found out that I had won an essay-writing competition and was chosen to attend Donna Karan's WIE Symposium, a conference relating to Women and Power--the very topic of my book. I also received two job interviews, both for organizations for whom I'd love to work. One of them scheduled a phone interview for that week, and the other scheduled an in person interview for the next. After being informed that part of the latter interview would be in Spanish, and realizing that I hadn't practiced my Spanish in five years (panic!), I googled "emergency Spanish tutor Buffalo, New York," and immediately scheduled five consecutive days of one-on-one Spanish refreshment classes.

Just like that, after reading those emails in the first hour of being home, my week of writing dissipated into job preparations, tutorial sessions, and driving back and forth to the city. While the actual act of speaking Spanish to an old Chilean man was not particularly stressful, nor was preparing for my phone interview, nor was submitting my bio to the conference, mentally I was stressed. In light of the conference and job prospects, I was not only was considering postponing my flight to Kenya, but canceling it in replace of a Costa Rican Spanish immersion. My "just take time out of your schedule to dedicate to writing" plan was now in question and my visual expectations of how the next few months would unfold was turned upside down.

What I really found amusing (translate: sickening) was that wonderful opportunities were causing me stress . . . because they were unexpected. They say the only thing that is certain in life is change. So why am I surprised when my plans don't go as scheduled? Why do I get flustered when the unexpected happens? These past few weeks I've been reflecting on the unexpected, and I've thought about how it's not the unexpected that causes me stress, but rather the fact that I had expectations to begin with.

Not all my expectations are big. I may have 25 small, seemingly trivial expectations in a given day. I expect I will accomplish certain things on my to do list; I expect that my subway train will timely appear; I expect that people will act in a civilized matter (so not always the case); I expect that my computer will turn on when I want it to; I expect that I'll get through the day safely, and so on.
By placing these unnecessary expectations on my day, I set myself up to feel frustrated when these things don't go as planned.

Not only do I place expectations on my day, but I place them on my relationships, be it with friends, family, or strangers. Unconsciously, I always have an expectation as to how someone should react, and when they don't, I feel hurt. If I smile at someone in line and she scoffs back at me, I'm taken aback. If a friend doesn't call me back when I planned, I feel hurt. When a family member doesn't support me in the way I want to be supported, I feel saddened.

Alex and I had a long talk a few nights ago about this topic and he artfully said, "we set ourselves up to feel frustrated when we expect the people around us to act like we would act." Meaning, we place the expectations of what we would do on other people. If Alex responds to a situation in a way different than I would respond to a situation, and I think that I respond to the situation better, I get frustrated with him. This is not only unfair, but causes pain to both of us. Instead of figuring out how he failed my expectations, I need to reassess what my expectations are, why I even have them, and how these expectations lead to disappointment. This entry easily segues into the difference between conditional and unconditional love, but that's a topic I'll explore later.

How can I stop having expectations altogether? I'm not entirely sure, but I'm working on it. Phillip Moffitt wrote an article about The Tyranny of Expectations, wherein he discerned the difference between falling prey to expectations and opening to unknown possibilities. Perhaps, slowly, I can start to loosen my expectations as I go, reminding myself that the unexpected is more sure than the expected and finding excitement in the possibilities of a constantly changing and unpredictable life.

The Comparison Condition

2011-08-19T11:42:00.000-04:00

It was one of those days when all I wanted to do was curl up in a chair and not think. I didn't want to do anything but engage in a mindless activity, whether it was watching TV, perusing through facebook, or picking up a trashy magazine.

So I mind-numbingly picked up my computer. Within ten minutes, I began to feel "ill."

It had started innocently enough. I read the Huffington Post and NY Times, checked my gmail, read a few blogs, and then stared at my computer hoping that a cool website would pop into my head. When it didn't, I logged into facebook (despite the small voice that begged, "don'tdoit").

Ten minutes into reading people's status messages, I began feeling what I can only describe as "weird." I read about someone's yoga class and felt ashamed at my constantly deprived yoga practice. I read about someone's trip to Argentina and felt antsy to travel. I read about someone's job success and felt inadequate in my own job hunt. I read about someone's gourmet home-cooked meal, and felt guilty about the fact that I've barely cooked all summer (I've helped people chop vegetables, does that count?). I read about someone meeting the President of Rwanda (yes, that's you Elizabeth), and was inspired, but then wondered what the heck I was doing sitting at my desk job. The next thing you know, I had contracted the "comparison condition."

My family will be the first one to tell you that I have a tendency to self-diagnose myself with illnesses. Speech dyslexia? Check. Perpetual Morning Hands? Check. Thin Skin Condition that results in me breaking out into a heat rash every time I take a shower? Check. Fatty Forehead Syndrome? Check. (No, but really, if you press my forehead hard, your fingerprint will remain embedded in my forehead for a good five minutes. Ask my siblings).

And now, I can add Comparison Condition to my list. This condition is defined as follows:

Comparison Condition: mild virus caught through social media exposure or direct contract with another person who has certain qualities or opportunities that I don't have.

Symptoms: initial curiosity or inspiration turned into dull pangs of anxiety (often felt in the gut), inadequacy, frustration. Shortness of breath. Deep sighs. Longer blinks. Slumped shoulders.

The at-home remedy? This is what I'm experimenting with. I'm currently trying the good ole Stop. Drop.and Roll. Stop what I'm doing (close magazine, turn off computer) and stop the downward spiral of thoughts. Drop the comparisons (replace comparative thoughts with affirmations). Roll onward (focus on breath and keep moving).

The irony about most of my "mindless" activities is that they are anything but mindless. Are they entertaining? Certainly. Do they require little effort? Of course. But what happens during and after I engage in these type activities is that I become emotionally drained--I start to compare myself to people and convince myself that I am not complete as I am. I then expend energy thinking (falsely) that I need to be more like "them" to be happy or at peace or successful, as opposed to learning how to utilize my own unique gifts and purpose. If I constantly spend energy and time thinking about what everyone else is doing, I will have nothing left to spend on myself. And when I do spend energy on myself, what type of energy do I want to surround myself with? What if I replaced unkind words with affirmations? What if I replaced thoughts of inadequacy with thoughts of power? What would happen? Perhaps my immune system would be better at warding off the comparison condition, maybe that's what.

Stopping to Sit.

2011-08-15T17:42:00.000-04:00

After sitting at my desk for eight hours, I decided to end my day with a long walk in Prospect Park. I hadn't yet explored the depths of the park and was eager to get lost amidst a land of green. As I entered through the main gate, I found myself behind an older woman who was, quite literally, dragging her pet poodle behind. The poodle, a middle-sized black ball of puff, would take three steps and sit down in the grass. "Muffy!" the woman yelped, snapping the lease forward, "come on, let's go." Muffy would then get up, prance a few steps, take a look around, and sit back down.

As this cycle continued, I couldn't help but smile, although I was unsure of who I felt more bad for--the woman who obviously wanted to take a walk but couldn't leave behind her uncooperative pet, or the dog, obviously bothered by the owner's walking agenda, who just wanted to sit and relax in the park.

After a few more moments of watching the owner drag Muffy against her will, I quickened my pace and wandered through the unknown terrain. As I walked, my mind fluttered with the thousand thoughts that swirled in my mind--what I had to finish up in my last week of work, what cover letters I needed to edit, what outfit I should wear to an upcoming wedding, and which friends I needed to call back. Every once in a while, images of grassy knolls and kites and ponds would interrupt the thoughts, and remind me to breathe. (I have a tendency to forget to exhale when I'm lost in thought). Between a fluctuation of being present and being totally zoned out, my eye suddenly caught glimpse of a man under a tree on a hill. He sat quietly beside his tipped-over bike with his legs crossed, hands gently clasped in his lap, and his two thumbs touching. His eyes were closed; his lips slightly parted. He was undoubtedly meditating. A faint breeze gently ballooned his loose fitting tee-shirt as it passed. That looks so wonderful, I thought to myself as I walked by. I should do that some time--just sit in the park and meditate.

Of course, it didn't occur to me right away that I could do exactly what he was doing. Unfortunately, I have an uncanning ability to convince myself that I should do something in the future, while ignoring the fact that I could just do it now. So, it took me thirty more minutes of walking before it dawned on me that I could sit down in the park and meditate.

Since moving to New York City, I desperately crave moments of stillness. My walks to and from work are often filled with daydreams of finding nooks of quiet, be it on the East River, or a park bench, or a hole-in-the-wall coffee shop. It's so rare, however, that I listen to this craving and just sit. Getting to my next meeting on time is more of a priority than carving out time to sit. At times, it is much too hard to resist inertia. Most days, I am both Muffy and the owner--a part of me begs to sit down and be still, and the other part ignores this desire and drags me along.

Suddenly sick of being dragged, I attempted to find the perfect place to sit (no shade, no remnants of dog crap, no crying children, no underage kids with flasks, and no random wet spots), and finally settled into a shady spot under a tree. After doing ten push ups (I was still "supposed to be" working out, afterall), I laid in the grass in savasana, took a deep breath, and stared at the clouds. I hadn't done that in a long time, and let me tell you, it is wonderfully freeing to watch billows of clouds move across a soon-to-be-dusk sky.

(Image from Rosier/Daily News)

Once my hunger for stillness subsided, I got up (with a slight feeling of vertigo compliments of low blood pressure) and slowly looked around, eyes awakened to the diversity of colors, ears opened to the subtle sounds of a lone cricket, touch sensitized to the subtle breeze, and breath deepened. I walked slowly, so as not to disrupt the quiet with my footsteps, and cherished the peace before reaching the nightly noise of the Brooklyn streets. Ten minutes later, I neared the entrance. And wouldn't you know, who did I see on my way out . . . but Muffy and her owner. And this time, Muffy was pulling the owner along, and I couldn't help but feel victorious.

Inenoughness

2011-08-06T11:05:00.000-04:00

So about this book. Over six months ago, I shared my "DSquaredS" (aka Deepest Darkest Secret), which was that I didn't really believe in myself. Soon after, I started doing the Artist's Way by Julia Cameron, a book that encourages us to "unleash our creativity" through a twelve week dedication to morning pages (the process of writing three pages each morning) and affirmations (positive statements about ourselves).

At the end of each chapter, the Artist's Way poses a few questions. One of these questions asked, "if you could be anything, what would you be?" I immediately wrote down author. Then I paused. "Author?" I asked myself incredulously, "that's strange." But the more I thought about it, the more I realized how often I feel called to write. From a young age, I kept a journal under my bed, filled with poems about my dead bunny, daily concerns, or aspiring careers. (Like most nine year olds, I wanted to be a marine biologist or zoologist. This is strange considering I don't even like animals that much.) I would spend hours planning and writing about what my funeral would be like when I died. (I've always had a small obsession with death). I would write down every positive and negative quality that each of my friends and family had and would try to figure out how I could deal with their negative traits. (My sister Shannon always reminds me of this entry, which now reminds me of one her negative traits: she is a snoop).

Writing has always been an outlet to me, which is why I felt drawn to blogging two years ago. The Artist's Way, however, triggered something even deeper in me--and that was to write a book. But on what?

As I completed my daily affirmations, I noticed how hard it was for me to write positive comments about myself, particularly comments that encompassed notions of my own power. The idea of power has always been something I struggled with--internally debating whether it was something I innately had or something I wanted to avoid. In my morning pages, I started to explore what it means to "powerful," not just relationally, but spiritually. Part of power is the belief that we are complete as we are.

Most of my life, I have struggled with the feeling of "Inenoughness"--that is, the feeling that I am not enough as I am. I always had to be smarter, faster, more athletic, stronger, thinner, happier, more spiritual, etc. A constant dialogue played inside my head, whispering that I needed to be "more of this" and "more of that." I didn't know it at the time, but I was constantly being unkind to myself.

Through writing and reflection, I discovered that my inherent power was missing—which was the first step in getting it back. Some people are lucky to have a profound epiphany where they wake up and are enlightened, i.e., Eckart Tolle's experience in The Power of Now. But for me, re-harnessing my power is a slow journey of small and unremarkable conscious decisions. My power is not always as accessible as I'd like, but now that I realize that I have it, I can't ever return to the state of believing that it doesn't exist.

So, my book is on Women and Power. I will explore how we define power, when we have felt/feel powerless, and what tools we can utilize to overcome our feelings of inenoughness. This book cannot be written by me alone. It will also be written by other women who have shared their stories, insights, and fears. I don’t have all the answers, but I think all of us together, including you who reads this now, have most of them. Through our stories, we can share the collective journey of power and completeness.

If you or anyone you know would like to share your thoughts on this, please email me and kerrydocherty@gmail.com. Any comments or questions will inspire me.

The Vulnerability of Exposure

2011-07-25T20:14:00.000-04:00

I haven't written a blog in a very long time. It's been so long that the mere act of writing a blog entry is strange to me. It makes me uncomfortable and vulnerable. Did I always feel this vulnerable sharing?

(I know this picture is random-but how else better to capture vulnerability than through a picture of an exposed limb washed ashore on the beach? Note: this is why I'm choosing to be a writer and not a photographer).

I took a break from the blog because a few months ago, I decided to write a book. (I'll talk about that next time). Actually, I think I decided to write a book when I was 5 years old and started chronicling my normal, if not mundane, existence, but it's just been recently that I decided I was going to "take the plunge" and put my feelings into more than just my battered journal. Since then, I've been drowning in my own thoughts, gasping for breaths of clarity and cohesiveness. I certainly don't have trouble sitting down to write, it's just that when I write it results in page after page of garbled gook--full of random sentences and quotes and paragraphs of questions and wronged word choices and rhymes. It's been a scary and wonderful and frustrating process so far. Part of this process, however, needs to be the reincorporation of my blog.

I need to share my writing because it makes me feel exposed and feeling exposed makes me vulnerable and vulnerability makes me reflect on why I feel vulnerable and reflection allows me to speak in my truest voice.

So, I'm back to blogging; undoubtedly sharing some of my incomplete chapters and my confused reflections. Here's to vulnerability. And doll's limbs on abandoned beaches.

Bad Poetry.

2011-03-21T22:32:00.000-04:00

I just read a blurb on bad poetry.
I've succumbed to all the "do nots."
Too much alliteration and adverbs alike
Too many cliches and mixed metaphor.

So what can I do,
but keep writing in hopes
of a poem that is salvageable?

You are a Better Poet Than Me.

2011-03-21T21:28:00.000-04:00

You are a better poet than me
you know.

Living life sated with sadness and beauty,
you have feasted on the fleshes of fruit
and spit out splintering rinds.

Your palate moist with lingering tastes,
you have sipped the sweetness of love
and burned your lips on its biting heat.

You too have touched the tenderness of sorrow
and splashed in puddles of tears
and soaked up an afternoon sun,
and wandered, wondering your place in this world.

You, my poet friend,
alive and awake,
share sensualities,
brainstorm brilliant ideas,
paint artful images
with words.

You are a better poet than me.

I wait for you to write.

I Forgot to Look Up.

2011-03-10T07:58:00.000-05:00

(Image by Brett Townshend)

There are days that I don't see the leaves on the trees

Days that I don't notice the softness of the breeze

Days that I forget to look up to the sky

The details of being present passing me by.

Pushing Productivity and The Art of Doing Nothing

2011-02-11T09:54:00.000-05:00

In the past few months, I've had a few different incidents with myself that made me realize my unhealthy tendency to push productivity.

The first was last week when, not feeling so well, I chose a night to just relax. After reading every possible news source online, and then feeling slightly nauseated by the glow of my computer screen, I turned off my computer and sat on my couch. I don't have a TV, I didn't feel like talking to anyone, and I didn't feel like reading the stack of books that had accumulated on my bookshelf. I had nothing to do. While this should have added to my desired state of relaxation, it had the opposite effect.

In the space of nothing to do, I frantically struggled to find something "productive" to accomplish, even categorizing productivity as emailing someone or enhancing my spiritual knowledge through reading. But I didn't want to do any of it, and instead of embracing this feeling, I felt guilty and frightened by my realization that I was having a hard time just "being."

The story ends with me regressing into a twelve year old child and calling my mother to vent that "I was bored." When my mom recommended I meditate, I whined "I already did that today" (in the three minutes that it took for my coffeemaker to make coffee). She then recommended, "I just sit and relax." (whatever that means). Obviously unconcerned by my state of doing nothing, I hung up frustrated and started staring at my bookshelf.

The second incident was over holiday break. I had an hour to spare as I waited for my sister to come out of a yoga class. While I sat in the car with a book, my thoughts kept wandering to all of the other things I could be doing. Realizing that my inherent to-do lister self was peeking out its head, I decided that I would force myself to just sit for that hour. Before three minutes had passed, I had already whipped out my iphone. The next forty five minutes were laughable as I ran through the cycle of checking my phone, saying "no" to myself, putting the iphone down, sitting in silence, and then checking my phone again. This persisted for the next fifty minutes.

Someone once told me that when we take out our iphone in an off-moment, whether it be as we wait for somebody or in a lull of a conversation, we should ask ourselves, "What am I escaping from right now?" More often than not, when I ask myself this question, I realize that I'm escaping from the present moment, yearning for distraction amidst the quietness of simply being here.

We have become so information hungry and such productivity pushers, that we have lost the art of doing nothing. Jon Kabat-Zinn, author of "Wherever You Go, There you Are" reminds us that the "the joy of non-doing is that nothing else needs to happen for this moment to be complete." He then recalls Thoreau, who stated (free of guilt, I'm sure), "it was morning, and lo, now it is evening, and nothing memorable is accomplished."

On days I struggle with the discomfort of non-doing, I can't help but think of an elderly man on his porch who sits for hours at a time as he watches the neighbors walk by or a group of women in a small village of Africa who sit outside their huts and stare out into the world. Do these people have a secret to share? As they sit in silence and gaze at the world without pushing for productivity, what have they found?

If I constantly pursue information and multi-tasking, I will continue to have a harder time quieting my mind and appreciating the art of doing nothing. At this point, I need to practice carving out time to do nothing particularly productive, and then practice feeling completely at ease with these moments. And hopefully, soon enough, when someone asks me what I did on a given night, I can learn to say "I didn't do anything" with a smile and an appreciation for those moments of non-doing.

PS: There is a website "Do nothing for two minutes" http://www.donothingfor2minutes.com/ that encourages us to just sit for two minutes and listen to the sound of the waves. If you press your keyboard at any time during those two minutes, the clock restarts. It's a great way to experiment with the act of "non-doing."

Taking Off Our Masks

2011-01-20T09:03:00.000-05:00

"Who am I?" Zoolander asks, staring into a puddle. His reflection looks back at him, "I don't know," it murmurs.

When I first meet people, it's interesting the information that I initially share in order to inform them about who I am. Because it is in people's habits to ask about a person's particular profession, I usually share that I am a lawyer. When they ask where I work, I tell them, and then usually state my future goals. Then they usually ask where I went to law school, and when I respond Pepperdine, I offer a brief caveat that I am neither particularly religiously dogmatic nor conservative, and then I partly justify my decision to go there based on the fact that I grew up in Buffalo and needed some sun. I then note that it was great going to school in California considering my two siblings lived there. Then I tell people that it's ironic that three kids from Buffalo ended up in Southern California. I always tell people that I'm from Buffalo, because once I do so they instantly feel bad for me. And when you feel bad for someone, you can't help but like them more. (People never feel threatened by people in Buffalo, so it's a good way to let people take their guards down.)

In sum, within five minutes of meeting me, you will know where I went to school, what I do, what I want to do in the future, how many siblings I have, where I live, and where I grew up. Because I often choose to define myself through the parameters of family dynamics (one of my first blogs was on this topic), it makes sense that I offer up information about my siblings and where I was raised.

None of this information about me is particularly interesting. What is interesting is that I have a spiel upon introducing myself that reflects how I choose to present myself. In other words, I have carefully selected my masks that I put on for the world.

And this is what intrigues me--the process of self-identification. What do I choose to share about myself? How do I define myself? Or, even more interestingly, how do I want others to define me?

Social media is another psychological experiment in self-identification because through Facebook, we are able to create a honed and comprehensive image of Self. We can create an image so that when people go to our page, they can learn about who we want them to believe we are. Facebook encourages us to categorize our life into easily accessible tidbits, such that people, just by looking at our page, can get a good idea of "who we are."

So, by looking at any given page, we believe we "see" people by what they haven chosen to post. Does someone see their partnership as the most defining part of who they are and create a page dedicated to that idea? Does someone define themselves by religion and thereby proffer religious quotes? Does someone see themselves as an advocate for a cause and thereby provide relevant information on it? Does someone see themselves as an artist and thereby share their work? Does someone see themselves as anti-mainstream and thereby share information challenging mainstream perceptions? Does someone see themselves as a person of service and therefore post information on serving? Does someone see themselves as as an upcoming politician and thereby share commentary on politics? Does someone define themselves as an emotional beings and thereby share reflections on current states of feeling? Does someone see themselves as a spiritual seeker and thereby share a quest for meaning through a blog posting?

The identities we choose are neither good or bad. But, they are just that--identities that we have chosen. Masks that we choose to wear such that we feel safe when we present ourselves to the world. That's ultimately why we wear masks--they make us safe and easily definable and recognizable to the people we encounter. And often we wear these masks, so that we can fulfill our innermost desire to be heard. Social networking, for example, allows us to share who we are so that we can feel validated when someone reaffirms who we want to be; we have an outlet in the world to let our voice, or more expansively, our identity to be recognized.

The masks we choose, whether we view them as positive or negative, are still masks, and only encourage us to cling to the Ego, which thrives on the belief of a permanent and confined Self. These attachments, however, are not who we are in our most simple and pure state. And I know this because if I took away all of my attachments and identities and associations, I would still be...well, me. If I was not a lawyer, and no longer in a relationship with Alex, and no longer had my siblings or my parents, and no longer lived in New York City, and changed my career goals, and changed my spiritual belief, and was a thousand miles away on an island completely isolated from everything and everyone. . . .I would still be Me.

So then who is Me? Am I just a combination of attachments whose sum is "Kerry?" I don't think so, for the same reasons described in the paragraph above. I think it's too reductionist to think that what we choose to attach to or the masks we choose to put on ends up being the Self. That's the "default" answer. And I certainly can't ask others who I am considering they too reinforce notions of Identity.

Murathan Mungan, a contemporary Turkish poet, writes, "Identity is a concept of our age that should be used very carefully. All types of identities, ethnic, national, religious, sexual or whatever else, can become your prison after a while. The identity that you stand up for can enslave you and close you to the rest of the world."

Most religions warn against clinging to worldly attachments and identity-defining behavior as well.

In the Bible for example, Matthew, discourages us from wearing these masks as well, demanding that we not present our faith (mask) and actions (mask) for all to see, and telling us that we are neither the clothes we wear (mask) or the food we eat (mask). Jesus' Self transcended all masks--who he was, was ambiguous. He was both man and God, Jew and Christian, mortal and immortal. He was both a part of the world, but not of the world. Similarly ambiguous, when Buddha was asked whether he was man or god, he merely responded, "I am awake." A Zen proverb, notes "no self, no problem."

So if we were to unpeel all of our layers--such that we took off the clothing of labels and beliefs and actions and self-validated categories of being? Who would we be? What would we be?

Would we find that we are essentially nothing? Would we find that there is no "me?" Would we find, as Krishna Das found, that "there is no me, only we." Would we find something temporary, fluid, vast, and undefineable? And what would that mean to us? How would that change our lives to be nothing but naked, vulnerable, and free?

At this point, I can only ask questions, because I am still very far away from having the answers. But if our identity is actually the disassembly of all of our accumulated parts, then I guess my identity is really the process of the deconstruction of the Self itself. (Whatever that means).

Row Row Your Boat.

2011-01-08T10:21:00.000-05:00

Sharon Salzberg once analogized life to rowing in a row boat. We put down our head and row. We row to get to the place we want to be. Row against the current. Row despite our pain. Row until our muscles hurt. And when we finally look up we realize that despite our rowing, we are in the same place. We have forgotten to untie the boat from the dock.

We often cannot let go of the things we need to in order to get to where we want to be. Despite our best efforts, we can't shake ourselves free from things that hold us back, whether it be fear, expectation, attachment to others, or lack of confidence. I'm trying to notice what this "rope" is that can unsuspectingly hold me back from pursuing the changes in my life that I want to pursue.

But what if we go one step forward and just jump off the boat altogether? What if we don't confine ourselves to being on a boat at all, and instead, imagine ourselves as the water on which the boat float? What if we saw ourselves as vast, flexible, malleable, uncontainable bodies? How would our life be different if we thought ourselves, not as body, but as an ocean--taking comfort in the sound of the waves that our breath makes-- crashing to shore on the inhale and rolling out to sea on the exhale. Our moods mere tides that pass through the day. Our ability to spread out expansively due to the vastness of our mind. To flow with the storms that life may bring. To seek the stillness of the ocean's morning's calm. To hold people up through the supportive buoyancy of our nature. This is my desire for this year--to embody oceanic traits.

POWER

2010-12-25T09:08:00.000-05:00

Last Sunday at Middle Church, my pastor Jacqui Lewis preached the typical Christmas story. Halfway through the sermon, however, she paused, looked up, and asked the congregants, "should I stop here? Because you already know this story though don't you?"

"Mmmhhmm, we know it," people murmured.

Jacqui continued, "But the story does not end with the birth of a baby boy in a stable. The story continues. . . because this baby made a difference. This baby was a healer. But Jesus did not try and make a difference on his own, he appointed disciples and gave them jobs. He wielded influence, and he gave orders. He looked at his disciples, pointed at them, and ordered, 'YOU, heal the sick, and YOU feed the hungry, and YOU help the poor.' What he demanded of his followers is that they TOO be healers. He annointed them as such." She ended the sermon with a similar demand, "now YOU go out into this world and be HEALERS as well."

It was quite the demand, but as we shuffled out of the church into the cold, there was a shift in spirit. People felt EMPOWERED.

POWER. The word makes me shutter. It makes me think of greed, politicians, manipulation, and deception. More often than not, I view it as a corrupting force that elicits terrible actions in good people. The word holds connotations that surely are more negative than good, most likely because we have seen what happens when people take a drink from it. But it doesn't have to be as such, and it is time we re-evaluate what it means to be powerful.

Caroline Myss explains in her book "Invisible Acts of Power: Personal Choices that Create Miracles" that every action we do and every word we think is an act of power. She writes, "every action is an exchange of power between two people, no matter if that action is altruistic or acquisitive."

If power exists in the most simple exchanges--any interaction between two people--then regardless of whether I believe I hold power, I exercise it. Of course, I don't always use my power for good. When I snap at my siblings or am impatient in line or say a comment to a close one that I know will cause pain, I am influencing the world around me. I can just as easily bring negativity to a situation with one snide comment or instantly hurt someone's feelings with a twist of the mouth.

But it's Christmas, so I don't want to take about how power can cause suffering. I'd rather talk about how our power can alleviate suffering. How a smile at a person on the street can validate a human's existence, how a kind word of encouragement can help one's self-esteem, how a piece of food can ease one's hunger. But, we don't need to remember "to do lists of kind acts," we just need to remember that the nice things we do are powerful, and, once we remember that, we can remember that we have the power to be healers.

I'm not saying this to encourage grandiose feelings of self, I'm saying this so that we can start to believe our selves are full of grandeur. You and me, friend and reader, are healers. We have this power. And, fortunately or unfortunately, it exists whether we believe it or not or whether we align our actions to this belief. Instinctively and innately, we are gifted with a set of tools that can bring people relief--physically, emotionally, and spiritually. And, intuitively, we know when we should do an act of healing, we just need to start listening to this intuition.

So, if this is true (as I believe it is), that we all have the power to heal, then how do we use these powers? This is what I'm still trying to figure out, debating between enlisting myself into a Buddhist monastery, starting my own non-profit, or moving to a random village in a developing nation and beginning my life anew (aka trying to accomplish "BIG" things) OR inching along down my path and challenging myself to be a healer in the smallest, most mundane, interactions during the day. The latter is certainly more boring, but at the end of the day, all we have is the small interactions--my most lofty goals are compiled of only small acts and interactions. And in these small actions, the subtlety of beauty and healing exists. So, in my journey towards something "bigger" (or maybe nothing big at all), my true test of power is in my daily encounters.

Perhaps quoting Mother Theresa's statement that "we cannot do great things -- only small things with great love," would be a cliche. But, I'm willing to be cliche, to shine light on a statement that holds great meaning. Aiming to do great things is a commendable goal, but aiming to be great when doing the small things is the true test. And, as healers, we must not see even the small things as small, because within the small rests the expansive opportunity to touch another in kindness.

I, for one, cannot flippantly throw aside Mother Theresa's wisdom as a cliche because my struggle against my own power is alive each and every day. There are times when I see myself as healer in the smallest of moments and there are times when I see myself as a helpless and frustrated bystander. This fluctuation has subsisted in me for as long as I can remember. There are days when I wake up and I am ready to fight the current and there are days when I'd much prefer to merely float down the river. But the days I choose to float is only is when I wake up under the false pretense that I am powerless.

So, today, on the birth of a baby boy who became one of the world's most famous Healers, I am going to awaken my own healing powers as well, wielding my power to alleviate suffering even in the smallest of acts, starting with . . . unloading the fricking dishwasher.

The Awkward Compliment.

2010-12-15T08:21:00.000-05:00

Last week, on my way home from a place I can't remember, I was sitting on the subway staring at people (as usual). Suddenly, an older sixty-something man boarded my subway car and sat down across from me. Though there was hardly any one else on the subway car, he obliviously sat right next to the only other person on his side of the bench. Their coats basically touching, I couldn't help but smile when the other man, looking annoyed, started to scoot away. The older man, completely unaware, smiled to himself while staring upwards at an advertisement for a personal injury lawyer.

Watching this oblivious older man smile to himself made me smile. And as my eyes scanned downwards, I couldn't help but notice that this was the cutest man I had ever seen. He had white hair that was pushed back immaculately behind his ears and clear framed glasses. He wore a white pressed collared shirt buttoned up to his neck with a plaid bow tie. In a loose fitting coat, he had draped a silk scarf around his shoulders. His pants were slightly too short, which allowed me to get a glimpse of the deep purple socks he was wearing. And his shoes...the typical black, rubber-soled, old man shoes. His hands lay folded in his lap.

Watching him smile to himself in this adorable outfit while sitting too close to the man next to him melted my heart. And, in a not-so subtle attempt to capture this moment, I whipped out my i-phone to take a picture. The other man, fully aware of what I was doing, and very confused as to why I was taking a picture, got up and moved to a different section of the subway car. Whoops. I pretended like I was then writing a text message, to "throw the old man off,"even though there is no service in the tunnels. I didn't even need to pretend, the older man was completely unaware. I took four more pictures, including one of his socks.

We both got off and 2nd and 2nd. As he walked in front of me, I was torn between making small talk, paying him a compliment, or saying nothing. My internal struggle lasted the length of the subway tunnel, until we both approached the stairs to exit. "Say it, Ker" I ordered myself. "This is so awkward," I muttered, knowing what I was about to do.

"Excuse me, sir," I blurted. The old man turned to look at me. "I just wanted to say . . . that, well, I saw you on the subway . . . and you are the cutest dressed man I have ever seen."

After my blurtation, I realized that perhaps there were more eloquent and mature compliments of which I could have shared, but regardless . . . this is what came out.

The old man inhaled deeply and then he exhaled with an energetic, "Oh my gosh! Well THANK YOU! THANK YOU!" He started beaming and a borderline giggle slipped through his lips.

"Well, I can't WAIT to get home to tell everyone what you said tonight. Thank you for sharing that with me young lady."

"You're welcome," I said, and then fled the scene of the compliment. Because after all, compliments to random strangers are awkward, but full conversations with people in the subway are even more awkward.

"Have a wonderful holiday," I yelled over my shoulder as I waved goodbye.

"You bet!" he called after me, waving frenetically.

Alone up on the street, I smiled. Smiled at the sight of the smiling man--the "cutest dressed man I've ever see-- and smiled at how ridiculously long it took me to say something. But then the bittersweetness set in . . . why was I so scared to give a compliment to a stranger? How often am I walking on the street and walk past people of any age and think, "that person is beautiful," or "that child is precious," or "that woman has a wonderful smile," or see a person visibly upset and think "I wish that person peace." And how often do I ever utter those thoughts to the people themselves? Never. Really never.

What is it about society that makes us so fearful to engage with someone we don't know? What makes it even harder to look someone in the eye and to pay them a personal compliment? Why are the most loving sayings the hardest to utter, even to those that we know and love? I'm not really sure, but I'm going to try to speak my positive thoughts to people more often. Because it matters to people, and even when it doesn't, it somehow matters to me to share that with them. And though it is likely that a few people will think I'm crazy as I blurt ineloquent compliment, it's a risk that I'm willing to take to fight this trend of "say nothing."

You should do it too . . . I dare you.

Undecided.

2010-12-06T08:37:00.000-05:00

I am undecided about most things, I think
what i will eat for dinner
or wear to work today

and beyond this trivial,
I am undecided about the career I shall pursue
or the faith I shall practice

But You.
I am decided about You.
I am decided that I will love You
for a very long time.
even always.
and each day, regardless of my indecisiveness
I will take comfort in the permanence of my decision
to keep this Love alive.

Escape.

2010-12-01T08:05:00.000-05:00

I just returned home from a glorious week in Costa Rica celebrating the marriage of two de facto family members. After a week with no internet, tv, phone, hot water, subways or crowds of people, the thought of heading back to New York City was slightly daunting. Though it's Christmas in NYC, which is always my favorite time of year in the City, the thought of endless supplies of people with large shopping bags and rain-soaked umbrellas made me cringe.

In an effort to dwell on my misery upon my return, I listened to Ray Lamantagne's sing his lyrics: "Just gotta get out of New York City, need a place where I can feel free, Gotta get out of NYC, NYC is killing me."

I wasn't even back yet, and NYC was already killing me, Sing it Ray.

I listened to the song approximately 26 times on repeat until I felt satisfactorily miserable. (There's something slightly sick about listening to music that you know will make you sad, but on long travel days, I love to tap into that subtle sadness that I would ordinarily shake off. It's fun to conduct an individual psychological study on how music can affect my mood or bring back particular memories.) Once I was content with how much I dreaded my return, I switched back to my chanting beats to reharness some positive energy.

Ultimately, I think my dread for the bustle of the City was the result of a delusional paradigm. I view vacations, and even weekends, as an Escape. And as such, these days away provide me an opportunity to escape from the routines of life, to avoid the distractions on the internet, and to spend time exploring my own creativity--a time where I can be fully be present, free from distractions, and connect with family and friends who are physically present without worrying about those friends and family who may await my interaction through technological means. By disconnecting from constant communication, I am able to reconnect with those around me, and, most importantly, reconnect with myself. While this, in theory, sounds healthy (that is removing yourself from places to reconnect), the delusion permeates this idea in two different ways: (1) that I must physically remove myself from my normal geographic location to reconnect, and (2) what I view as an escape should actually be my everyday reality.

I need to shift how I view "escape." Perhaps, instead of escaping elsewhere I merely need to return inward--to return to my innermost quiet still place. A return to simplicity and presence and authentic interaction. After all, that's why we like vacations. And I can create this return right here in the comforts of my apartment in the heart of New York City. This a slightly unfortunate realization because it means that I am responsible for creating my own relaxation and vacation-esque calm. It also means I shouldn't wait for vacations or weekends to recenter.

I guess for now, I'll be content on knowing that I have free roundtrip ticket to a place of calm within myself that I can access twenty-four hours a day. And the more I can escape to this place, the more it can become an everyday reality. Now, if I only could access some Costa Rican sun during these personal vacations inward.

What I dont like in you...

2010-11-17T21:00:00.000-05:00

What I don't like in you,

is the thing that I don't like in me.

And once I can forgive that part of myself,

I can learn how to forgive that part in you.

Flowers from my hands

2010-10-28T08:55:00.000-04:00

Would you believe it if I told you
that this morning, I awoke,
with flowers sprouting from my hand?

The sweetness of their fragrance made me woozy

The weight of bouquets
upset my balance,
and the moisture from the nectar
dripped down my arm

Confused and high on honey-suckle
I stumbled out the door,
smearing pollen against the wall,
waves of yellow streaks against concrete

Out the front door I ran, panicked,
as red and purple petals
feathered to the street,
trails of color filling out my footprints

i paused at the sight
of a child, wide-eyed and curious,
who stared at me, then
pulled out two stems of tulips

and then another child,
in stripes and smiles,
grabbed my hand and uprooted
a daffodil,
which he held like a yellow balloon

thrusting my hands forward
and bowing to my knees, I waited
as person by person plucked
petunias from my palms

And when all my flowers
had been given away,
I stood up.

Looking at my hands in wonder
of only flesh and veins
I slowly ventured home, alone.
Laughing at my day-dream.

Walking silently down the street,
a gust of wind chilled my core
for warmth, I rubbed my hands together,
and gasped

as soil slipped through my fingertips
sprinkling seeds into
the cracks of the sidewalk.

Stop Should-ing on Myself

2010-10-11T22:24:00.000-04:00

Considering I was in school for 22 out of the 27 years of my life, the fall always seems like the start of a "new year." A time of year when I want to go to the store to buy freshly sharpened pencils and new notebooks and highlighters. And a time of year when I want to set goals for myself academically and athletically.

Although I am taking one class this year, I'm not enrolled in school. Yet I still feel that itch to start fresh and set new goals. So instead of waiting till New Years Eve, I'm making my new years resolution now. And one of my resolutions is to take a lot of my usual yearly-to-dos off my list.

Unlike some people who have bounds of energy and/or time, I realized (a long time ago) that I cannot "do it all." And I'm finally learning that this is ok. I can't cook all the time (or often), train for a marathon (or even a half), have a full time job, make weekly visits with my closest friends in and outside of the city, make new friends, spend quality time with Alex, have a disciplined writing schedule, spend quiet time with God, go to all of the hip places in New York City, take up painting, attend weekly meditations, volunteer, complete my homework, and research techniques for healing trauma victims.

My first reaction at not being able to "do it all" was slightly depressing. I felt guilty taking life goals off my list considering that there are people in my life who appear that they can do everything and still function. And if you are one of those people, well, good for you. (Show-offs.) But this isn't me. It's not when I'm doing everything that I live up to to my true potential. My true potential only blossoms when I'm taking care of myself, and taking care of myself often entails a lot of letting go.

So my new years resolution includes crossing things off the list so that I can focus on the things that pertain to my simplest and deepest desires. This year, I'm freeing myself from my pressures to be a good cook (or just "a cook"), to be in great cardiovascular shape, to find the trendy NYC spots, to take an artistic class, to go vegan (or just vegetarian), and so on. I won't bore you with what I'm giving up...but there's a lot. As my mom often reminded her children, "stop should-ing on yourself." In sum, I'm letting go of what I think I "should be" doing.

And let me tell you, there is freedom in giving stuff up.

the arrived season.

2010-10-02T08:58:00.000-04:00

I knew that autumn arrived today
the morning came too soon
and I awoke to the coolness of the tip of my nose

Tossing a knitted blanket aside
I slither out of bed, slowly exposing
inch by inch of me, my eyes still closed till
my toes shivered at the touch of the varnished wood floor

Rummaging through dresser drawers,
I find an old cashmere sweater,
and slip it over the bareness of my goosebumped skin
drafts of air tickle my hairs through its holes

smelling faint hints of burnt logs
I tiptoe through the stilled chilled room
the sight of light through windows awes me
its softness kisses dirty buildings gold

draping back the now yellow-lit sheers
I open the balcony door
accosted by the crispness of its coming
it dissipates the humidity of summer
still stuck to my lungs.

I breathe deeply my first breath
of the arrived season.

A Haiku: The Dichomoty of Walks

2010-09-27T08:09:00.000-04:00

Strolling down the street
thoughts tangled, memories passed
feet force me forward

Already Here.

2010-09-14T08:40:00.000-04:00

I always feel like I need to
     take one more step
           to get There.

Refusing to acknowledge that There
        has long become
Here.

The irony, sigh.

In my frequent footsteps forward
the opportunities of the present passed.

I drink it up fast.

2010-09-09T23:02:00.000-04:00

When I taste poetry
I drink it up fast
with a big thick straw
you know the kind, swirled red and white stripes
and when my slurping of syllables subsides
I look into the cup
sucked dry
and think
i must have been thirsty.

Articulating Annoyance.

2010-08-31T23:45:00.000-04:00

I'm used to listening to discussions on all different types of emotions and feelings--fear, sadness, anger, joy, hope, etc. But there's one feeling out there that just doesn't get the street credit it deserves despite its flagrant frequency, and that is . . . ANNOYANCE.

People don't really talk about this feeling, probably because the mere thought of talking about it makes them even more annoyed. In fact, because I am in a state of annoyance, I don't want to talk about it either. BUT, because I don't have a television and it's 10:30 PM on a Tuesday night and I don't feel like reading, I decided I am going to at least try and articulate my annoyance.

To begin, there's no real reason why I'm annoyed right now. It's completely unjustified, which makes it even more annoying because then I can't really blame the mood on anyone (which is always the easier route when you want to avoid taking control of your own moods). I actually didn't even know I was annoyed until I caught myself in the middle of a negative stream of thought, and then realized that I had been clenching my jaw for the past hour (a sure sign of an irritable state).

How to describe this mood? It's is like the yellow light in a traffic signal. Annoyance is not per se a bad mood (red light), but it's certainly not a go-ahead for positive and happy thoughts (green light). It's more like a "proceed with caution because anything you do right now may really piss me off."

There are approximately ten main things that really annoy me (I offer the caveat that I'm completely aware of my own hyprocripsy in naming some of the following):

1) rudeness (including condescending tones, "better than you" mentalities, or pathetic attempts to validate the constructs of hierarchy)

2) inappropriately loud voices (please stop screaming, thanks.)

3) homophobic, racist, or generally bigoted remarks (you'd be surprised at how many people don't mind hearing unprovoked mean-spirited comments about a person's immutable characteristics)

4) the act of checking one's cell-phone in the middle of a conversation (a sure sign that the person, despite pretending to listen, would rather be doing something else. also may be categorized as rude (see [1])

5) chewing popcorn in the movie theater (my family hates watching movies with me because I give them the death stare when they sit next to me and shove heaps of popcorn in their faces. One time my sister was chewing popcorn (very loudly I might add) in a movie and, because I found it completely distracting to hear her buttery fingers attempting to grab handfuls of popcorn during a quiet and sad part, I made her get up and sit in another part of the theater. I'm sure you will judge me because of this)

6) judgment (i'd prefer one not to judge the essence of another based on a differing belief (i.e. chewing in movies is annoying) or practices)

7) noise in the morning (excessive talking, mindless tv, loud radio, my mom clearing her throat = sure recipe for annoyance)

8) the sound of my dad eating cereal ( cant explain it, but trust me, it's annoying)

9) endless banter (it gets old after 5 minutes, if you'd like a real conversation, you can find me later)

10) people who have little spatial awareness (like when you try to pass them on the street and they unknowingly weave across the width of the sidewalk so you cant get around of them)

11) (i know i only said i had 10, but i thought of another) - when Alex takes out his contacts in random parts of the apartment and flings them, leaving little dry contact remnants that feel like shards of glass when you step on them) (they don't disintegrate...trust me)

anyways. . .

I think the main conclusion to draw from my annoyance is the fact that when I feel it, for whatever reason, I feel it. It's not worth fighting or trying to convince myself that it doesn't exist; I just can accept that when, for a moment of time, I feel annoyed, that's ok. And hopefully the mere observance of this feeling will be a step in furtherance of separating myself from it. Then, like these moods always do, the annoyance will simply pass.

Shuffling Shit.

2010-08-26T09:01:00.000-04:00

Last week, I moved stuff out of my small studio and transported it to my new apartment. It took five hours. Granted, I refused to use the more efficient "pack up your stuff in boxes" and chose the "chinese water torture" method of moving by slowly bringing down heaps of clothes and individual baskets one by one; regardless, the move took much longer than I (and my friendly helper) expected. It also reminded me how much I hate stuff.

As a child, my mom was surprisingly calm and even-tempered considering the personalities of her three children (her calmness probably foreshadowed her eventual decision to run off to India to become a yoga teacher). But the one thing that would knock her off her rocker (in a not-so-positive way) was. . . the BASEMENT. Just saying the word brings me chills, flashbacks of a shrieking mother threatening to throw out everything that was shoved down there. It was like when she went down into the depths of the house, Hades took her over and made her into a person that my siblings and I could only refer to as "evil mom." She would walk down the steps after an inspirational Oprah show and simply go ballastic.

The basement also made her a liar. In fact, it was the only time my mother ever lied. "I promise you," she would begin in a scarily whispered voice, "that if you help me and spend one day...ONE DAY...going through the stuff in the basement, you will NEVER have to do it again." We heard that freaking lie a good twenty-five times. Other times, she would make no promises and just bark orders, beckoning us to emerge from the comforts of our room by repeatedly yelling our name from the basement until we could stand it no longer and finally succumbed to her screams. "Kerrrrrryyyyyy" she would yell from two floors down, "I need you for just a couple minutes (lie) in the BASEMEEEEENT!" As we got older, she would return from her yoga room after meditating and sneak into the basement. Instead of yelling, she would just sigh and state "Shuffling shit...I'm so sick of shuffling shit." (a sure sign of a step closer to enlightenment)

But now, her crazed moments seem to make more sense after I too have slowly started to accumulate STUFF. And it makes me CRAZY. I have become my mother. I despise shuffling shit. (I already feel badly for my children, who will one day have to deal with a clothespin with a bucket for a toy...no Barbie Dreamhouses for them...)

When I lived in Santa Monica, I became friends with a man who essentially was a walking monk, Raymond. He spent his days walking up and down the streets, with nothing but a plastic bag which he held in alternated hands. I used to find him on various corners and we'd sit and talk. Unbeknownest to him, the years of walking awakened him into a modern day prophet. On one particular day, he said, "I think...we lose God a lot. We lose sight of him. It's like, picture a piece of paper. Then picture a small black dot on that paper. When there's nothing else on the paper but the dot, you can always see the dot. But when you start to add things to the paper, when you start to fill that paper with stuff, it's hard to find the dot. And then one day, maybe you can't see the dot anymore. Life is that piece of paper, and God is the dot."

Raymond's analogy deeply resonated with me. He, a man who had nothing, had freedom. He had the ability to see God all day because he was completely liberated from the distraction of stuff. He always had his eye on the dot.

Raymond's words echo those of Jesus who directed his followers to leave everything behind to follow Him; and echoed the teachings of Buddha who stressed that attachment to stuff, amongst other things, resulted in suffering. It the freedom from wordly "goods" that helps the Mother Theresas of the world and the Jesuit priests and the Buddhist monks remain focused. Stuff doesn't only clutter our homes, it clutters our souls and weighs them down, and distracts our eyes from remaining focused on a Greater Truth.

And while I'm not yet to ready to completely rid myself of some baskets full of trivialities, I'm forcing myself to give away some of my excess, if only to get better a glimpse of that dot.

Word Calculator.

2010-08-17T19:00:00.000-04:00

Sometimes when I type on my iPhone
I feel like I'm using a calculator
The words mere numbers in a mathematical equation
But the keys can't convey feeling
So the sum of the parts don't have the meaning
Of the wholeness of a spoken word.

Deepest Darkest Secret

2010-08-10T07:25:00.000-04:00

In college, my friends and I made up the game "D Squared S" also known as "Deepest Darkest Secrets." We would sit around late at night telling each other our innermost thoughts and feelings. Despite the intimacy of the game, the secrets often involved new found crushes or worries about social circumstances. But regardless, we loved to play the game, shrieking at each others' personal gossip or listening to one's concerns.

Recently, there has been something deep and quiet that has arisen in the trenches of my heart. It has sat there so quietly that for a very long time I didn't even know it was there. And every once in a while, I'll think to myself, "can this be? is this true?" But only recently did I finally admit to myself that indeed this secret is how I truly feel. And it was so shocking and surprising and seemingly out of character that it took me a while to register.

My D Squared S is:

I don't believe in myself.

That is a stark and scary statement to hear myself say aloud and I still want to pretend that it's probably not true. However I cannot let it remain cloaked and entrenched in other thoughts, remaining unrecognizable in my consciousness. I have recognized it as what it is. And while I may be confident that I am competent in my daily tasks or profession, and I may be optimistic in my future goals, my deepest darkest fear is that I will not lead the life of purpose of which I think I am capable. I do not trust myself to do what I think I should do.

A few weeks ago, at a Faherty Family Barbeque, I stood in the kitchen washing off scallops while my eventual family members, Jack and Michael, prepped the meat. The men had just suffered the loss of their dad and father-in-law, respectively. Despite the upbeat tone of the night, a heaviness weighed in the air that allowed for a deepness of discussion. As we seasoned and chopped, Michael suddenly asked, "What is your biggest fear?" While my normal response usually would have been squirrels and turbulence, after a second (and the reality of the funeral the day before), I responded "the death of someone I loved." And then I paused, realizing that my statement was not entirely true. Fearing the death of another, while rational, is entirely outside my control. And the things that I truly fear the most are not what I cannot control, but that which I can, but do not. So, I changed my answer and it was the first time I outwardly admitted my secret to others:

Failure.

I am not talking about the failure to attain physical wealth or prestige or fame. I am not talking about the failure of relationships. I am talking about failing my true self, failing my spirit--that is, the failure to pursue the journey that my soul has dictated I must pursue. Of course, I am still figuring out what I am "supposed to do," but the signs have pointed to a particular road and it's just up to me to follow the signs and listen to directions. But so often, though I see the signs up ahead, I subconsciously (or consciously) choose to take a side-trip, distracted by social fun or self-absorption or security or internet distractions. So my biggest fear is that I'll stray from that "yellow brick road" and wake up one day in complete comfort, removed from the realities of the poor and the hungry and the struggling, and think, "what about all those who are suffering that I have left behind?" "What about the people whose paths I refused to cross because it was inconvenient?" "What about the dreams that I had in my youth that I let deaden because of proclaimed impracticalities?" And if I have to ask those questions one day and I cannot honestly say that I pursued my heart's desires, the tears will fall...because I have failed.

And this is my fear. Instead of convincing myself otherwise, I'm trying to embrace this fear and convert it to a motivator as opposed to an inhibitor. I try to carry the fear along with me so when I start to go astray it can poke its head up, but before it can whisper "I told you so," I'm going to U-turn back to my path. I'm going to let the shadow of a girl who doesn't believe in herself follow me around as I go, knowing that a shadow has no power to dictate the direction of a woman walking in the sun. And then perhaps one day, in my older age, I will share secrets with my daughter at bedtime, and tell that my deepest darkest secret was that "I once believed that I couldn't do it, but I did."

We're the SAME.

2010-07-31T21:12:00.000-04:00

Many of you may have heard me shriek "we're the SAAAAME" when a tiny commonality arises. (we're both the middle child? we're both reading the same book? we both love the same singer? Then..."we're the SAME!") The expression began as a joke between me and my friend Bri during law school. As our friendship began to bud, we began to realize that despite our physical, familial, religious, and political differences, we both loved baths, long walks, our feelings, calamari, and red wine. "Ohmygoodness, we're the SAAAAME!" Bri shrieked, elongating her vowels to add 4 more syllables to the word and throwing her dainty upward-facing palms on her hips. And such was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Soon we were sharing the expression left and right, without discern and without regard of our audience. Most people didn't get the saying (which obviously made perfect sense), but we kept saying it regardless, and it became deeply entrenched into my daily language. My family was NOT amused. "Um...I hate it when you say that because we're NOT the same" my sister responded one day. "But we kinda are." I smirked." No, we're not." "Maybe a LITTLE bit?" "No." My brother didn't get the expression either, rolling his eyes every time I shrieked it in his ear. Even my mom gave me the "look" when I said it (although she was forever won over when I wrote her a poem for Mother's Day called "Why We're the SAME.") My dad was the only one who didn't seem to mind, in large part because he always agreed, that, indeed, we were the same (sucker).

Soon enough, the saying flowed so freely from my lips that I began to lose control of its usage. On the third day of my clerkship, I wore a red shirt, as did my co-clerk. "Look at you matching," my Judge joked. "It's because we're the SAAME!" I shrieked, throwing my upward palms on my hips. Silence. Really awkward silence. "I mean...not really..it's this saying that...well, nevermind, anyways, back to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure..."

Despite my excessive and inappropriate timing of the phrase, perhaps the irony behind it all is . . . we really are all the same. Deep down, fundamentally the same. And this sameness arises from our one true basic desire: to be loved. At the end of the day, that's really all any one of us wants. The only thing that differs is how that desire manifests.

The Enneagram, an ancient personality test, believes that there are only 9 personality types in this world (ranging from 1-9), and the differences of personality depend on how each number manifests this desire to be loved. 1's seek love through perfection; 2's seek love by providing for others; 3's seek love through achievement; 4's seek love through expression; 5's seek love through their intellectual capabilities; 6's seek love through loyalty; 7's seek love by being fun; 8's seek love by being in control; and 9's seek love by maintaining the peace. (My number is a 9, which brings up all sorts of interesting issues which I'll psychoanalyze in another blog entry, but if you're interested in finding out your "number" you can go to www.enneagraminstitute.com.)

So even though I may be one number and you may be another, and our personalities may drive each other crazy, there is freedom in realizing that our differences actually stem from our same deepest desire for approval and love. We're both just acting in the most best way we know how to achieve it. And this realization can break through the barriers of personality and behavior, allowing us to connect--vulnerable heart to vulnerable heart.

And so, if fundamentally our hearts beat to this same beat for love, maybe I won't be retiring the phrase, if, indeed, we really are the SAME.

My Sleeping Diva

2010-07-21T08:18:00.000-04:00

You lie there on the pillow

Eyes closed

Elbow extended

Palm propped upward against your face

Faint smile on your lips

As if you are posing while you dream

I will call you my sleeping diva.

For the Man on the Street

2010-06-13T16:19:00.000-04:00

Last week, after finishing my blog entry on the strength of expressing sadness, I closed my computer and got ready for the day. Feeling energetically drained from the occurrences of the weeks prior, I was hyper-aware of my own emotional delicacy. In other words, I was feeling particularly self-absorbed.

As I left my apartment building in a fog, I grabbed my phone to call my mom, hoping to distract myself from my own feelings. She answered, but told me she would call me back. Ugh, I thought to myself, knowing I was now forced to be more present on my walk than I wanted. A block later, as I was about to cross the street, I caught something out of the corner of my eye. On the other side of the street, there was a man, face up, his upper body on the side walk and his legs extended into the street. Oh my God, I thought, as I quickly walked to see what was going on. Even before I could get a glimpse of him, an older Latino man threw his phone at me. "Talk to them, tell them this problem." "Ummm.." I stammered into the phone, looking down at the man for the first time and instantly having a pit form in my stomach.

--Oh God, ok, there's a man, I think he fell, his face is bloody, he is bleeding from the mouth.

--How old is he? the 911 responder asked

-45 to 50, I think.

--Is he conscious?

--Not really, I don't know, I mean he's not speaking, but he's moving his arms.

--Is he homeless? What else can you tell me about him?

--No, I don't think so. No, he's not. He, I don't know what happened, I just walked up, but I think he fell, and i think he hit his head. He's kind of shaking a little. I don't...know.

--Ok, we're sending someone.

When the 911 responder hung up, the Latino man thanked me, took his phone, and started to walk away. "Wait!" I cried after him desparetely. "No worry," he said, "ambulance will come." Then he walked away. I looked down at the man on the street. His glasses were by his side, broken. He was shaking, slightly, and for the first time he looked up at me and whispered, "please." Oh God, I thought to myself, I am not equipped to deal with this.

"It's ok, you'll be ok," I responded in a panic, "the ambulance is coming." I stood over him, torn between looking him in the eye and looking frantically around the street for the hopefully soon to be coming ambulance. Part of me wanted to touch him, but the other part shied away from such an act of intimacy with a stranger, even one that was struggling. People continued to walk by, some looking down at him inquisitively, others kept walking, looking straight ahead. A man stopped over him, "did you call the ambulance?" he asked me. "Yeah, yeah...they're coming.." I assured him.

The man then started to squirm and tried to lift his head off the ground, but quickly let it drop back onto the concrete, his head making a sick thud as it landed. It was only then that I knelt down beside him, and put my scarf under his head. The man stared straight into me, his blue eyes pleading. "Please...please..please.." he whispered again.

And then he grabbed my hand.

I took a deep breath and held his hand. It was warm. He squeezed mine. I squeezed back. A crowd was now starting to form. "This man..he is dying," someone stated knowingly. "Where is the ambulance?" another asked. I picked up the phone and called 911 again. "I'm on 7 and A, we're still waiting for the ambulance. He's not doing well. I don't know what's going on, but he needs help." "They're on their way," they stated.

15 minutes later, the ambulance arrived. I let go of the man's hand and stood over him with the rest of the crowd and watched as the ambulance put him on the stretcher. When the medics asked him his name, he could not respond. When the man was in the back, a medic picked up his broken glasses and, before we could ask any questions, jumped in the ambulance and drove off. The crowd dispersed. I stayed on the corner for a moment, trying to register everything that just happened. "I guess I'll head to work?" I asked myself, and burst into tears. Only, unlike the hour before, my tears were no longer for myself or my personal burdens. These tears were for the man on the street, whose name I did not know, whose prognosis I did not know, and whose life expectancy I did not know. These unknowns will forever remain. I would like to think, one day, I'll see him in the neighborhood walking around, and can smile at him when he passes. But perhaps, my only connection with him will forever be confined to the corner of 7th and Avenue A.

Sometimes, amidst the self-absorption of our own lives, our lives are slammed into the life of another. And in that moment, we must make a decision to use the collision to connect with that person or keep on walking. And if we choose to engage, the connection may be as subtle as a smile or a nod or as intimate as the warmth of a touch. And whether that act is enough or not will most likely remain forever indeterminable. But regardless of whether the warmth of my hand was enough for the man on the corner of 7th and Avenue A, I know that the warmth of his hand was enough for me. At least enough for me to remember the strength of the human connection and the power of the human touch. So, to the man on the street, thank you for awakening my heart. May you be healthy and well, wherever you are.

How do you really feel?

2010-06-09T11:30:00.000-04:00

One thing I notice about myself is my inability to sit with pain. When I feel it, physically or emotionally, I want to rid myself of it. I justify distracting myself from pain, by arguing that for the benefit of my emotional health, it should pass quickly and quietly. Not only do I struggle with allowing myself to sit with pain, but I struggle with honestly sharing my pain with those outside of my family.

It is not unheard of that my closest friends will ask me a question, I'll answer, and right after they'll say, "ok, but how to you REALLY feel?" This usually results in a melting of inhibitions and an answer embodied with a deeper and more emotional response. But it takes slightly more of an effort to bring these responses to the surface. Why am I quick to share my joys, but slower to share my sorrows?

If there is an epidemic in this country, it is not the suffering itself, but the sickness of "desperate attempts to avoid suffering." We have become a society that despises pain. If it is physical, we numb it with medicine. If it is mental, we distract it with noise, internet, or tv. If it is emotional, we view it as weakness and therefore repress it in addiction, avoidance, or silence.

When people are going through a hard time and don't cry, we view them as "strong." When people are struggling and look on the bright side, we say "they have so much faith." But is rare that we look in the face of a crying person and say, "this act of crying is a true sign of courage- to feel sadness in the face of another."

Sharon Salzberg, a renowned Buddhist, noticed that as a society, we rarely are capable of expressing our feelings of pain with others. We often don't respond to "how are you?" with an answer of "I'm sad; I'm hurt; I'm suffering; I'm lonely; I am discouraged." Though these sentiments may later express themselves through further prying, often these feeling remain unnamed.

Salzberg noticed that our society has really only come to accept one word as a socially suitable means of expressing any type of suffering: "stressed." If we feel inadequate at work, if a close friend has ill-health, if our family is going through some struggles, if we do not have time to do that which we love--we tell the world, without hesitation, that "we're stressed." And those who listen can share that they too feel stressed. For whatever reason this word is easier to share. Perhaps, we view "being stressed" as more circumstantial, stemming from external sources, and it is therefore easier to admit since it avoids any commentary on an internal state. Perhaps, it's easier to share because it broadly means "I have a lot on my plate," but it is not specific in that no one has to know the true root of our suffering. But regardless for the reasons of its acceptability, it has become the universal word for pain.

Anger too is much more of an acceptable emotion. And not only are we not scared to share it, but we often find it empowering. Even though anger is merely a different manifestation of pain, we embrace. Our expression of anger hides personal suffering by blaming the pain on the act of another, and, therefore, we are not viewed as weak. When we witness acts or words of anger, rarely do we look at the person with a sense of compassion and think, "here, is a person of true suffering." Rather we think, "I wonder (what someone else did) to make this person angry; I wonder what occurrence (outside the person's control) made this person angry?" Similar to stress, the expression of anger frees the person experiencing it from having to delve into his/her true feelings of hurt and pain with others and with themselves.

How can we be better embrace our feelings of sadness? How can we learn to experience it, instead of fighting it? How can we learn to invite it in when it arises as opposed to trying to distract ourselves from it? Perhaps the mere acknowledgment of the pain is where it must start. Perhaps, when it seeps in, we must say, "hello there sadness, here you are." Perhaps we must sit with it and observe how it feels; not trying to fight it, but trying to engage in it-hand in hand. And perhaps when people ask how we are and we feel it, we can have the strength to look people in the eye and share, "right now, I am sad. But that is ok." And perhaps in doing so, this will be a true act of strength. And then, sadness will no longer be a weakness.

Two-word prayer.

2010-06-03T07:33:00.000-04:00

there are days when my prayers only get as far as

a deep sigh that exhales "dear God..."

but, sometimes, that seems to be enough

Celebrate the Sad.

2010-05-24T21:19:00.000-04:00

It was an ordinary day when the ordinariness changed
suddenly what was normal became rearranged
and instead of fighting the routine of life
it was for life that that he began to fight

he told them the news and they all began to weep
the reality of the fleetingness in their hearts began to seep
how long will it be? how many months? how many weeks?
but no one knows the response to these questions that they seek
it was God who held the answers, of life's secrets He does keep

how quickly his body changed, when the uninvited guest came to town
invading the body, turning strength upside down
when did the illness come, when did it arrive?
they asked how can we kill it to keep him alive?
but when the talk of cancer began to subside
of intense emotion no one could deny
and each person's heart began to open wide

one tried to take control, another just asked why
one offered a healing touch, others bent their heads to cry
one gazed softly at the ground, one tear fell from the eye
one asked if this was it, did this mean he'd have to die

though pain had existed in relationships past
there is beauty in talks of death, of a reality it casts
light on what matters and how love thrives
forgiving the trespasses and letting bitterness die

so of the messiness of life, the children began to sweep
pushing shallowness aside, the conversations turned deep
they began to share their gratitude, they began to share their thanks
they laughed at the rollercoaster of money in the banks
they reminisced about the good ole times, and of those they had many
of millionaires they'd be if for each smile they got a penny
they barbequed, they watched sports, they gently sipped their beers
or chugged them, either way, good times were always near

he watched them proudly as they grew, playing football in the dirt
sitting in the stands with a baseball hat and a Hawaiian shirt
always rooting from the sidelines for a victorious win
rooting loudly for Jack, Chris, or the twins

and with these memories the flaws that used to cause disdain
became an inside joke, only laughter did remain
because its not worth holding tight to the things in the past
its much better to let the wrongs seep out from clenched grasps
and in the process of letting go, they slowly start to see
the heaviness of that weight, it is now that they are free

so for now, in the present, we will sit and share stories
and wait till tomorrow to express any worries
because this moment is all we have and this is always true
but its only when we see death that we know what we should do

we should drop the trivial to-do's and the meaningless chores
gather with our family and try to love much more
monitor our words so only kindness reigns
express our deepest thanks, gratitude engrained
laugh at each other, occasionally give a roast
then flatter in another breath, raise your glass to toast

celebrate togetherness, celebrate tonight
cry tears of pain and joy, find peace then take the fight
find solace that whatever happens, of joyous company awaits
either family here or family at the pearly gates
the beauty in this battle is that no one has to lose
though the outcome he plays a part, the outcome he cannot choose
the resolution will be determined, through the spirit God moves

so though we do not know the cards that He is dealing
and of endless thoughts and fears is the mind reeling
the beauty is that this pain allows a time of healing
filling up holes with the hearts glue-like sealing
allowing love t0 be the subsisting feeling
gazing to the heavens-the now reachable ceiling
remaining in a time of prayer, continually kneeling

thanking God for the time we all spent together
sighing in thanks that love lasts forever
and there's no such thing as absence when memories remain
never subsiding, they saturate us like falling rain

so we celebrate it all, breathing it all in
gathering round, clutching tight to our kin
knowing that this time is truly a gift
to mend all separateness, no more is there rift
laughing through the tears, crying through the laughs
these moments shall be endless, forever they will last
let us cram it all in, so our cups overflow
drown in love now, for the reasons we know
get high on the present, drunk on this life
continue to battle, fight the fight
and bask in the glory of God's shining light.

A Hate Letter

2010-05-05T21:13:00.000-04:00

Dear Violence,

I hate you.

I hate how you slowly seep into our lives as a game, convincing us that killing can be fun and that there can be winners when we play you.

I hate how you infiltrate our lives in tv shows, movies, and video games such that we become so familiar with you, we think you're normal. I hate how when I watched actual footage of US soldiers killing two innocent journalists in Iraq, my mind could barely distinguish fact from fiction. I hate that the first time I watched the clip, I felt nothing but numb.

I hate how our country of freedom is founded on you. I hate how we generated land by the genocide of Native Americans. I hate how we proclaimed that "all men are created equal" in the Declaration of Independence, but lines later referred to Native Americans as "inhabitants of our Frontiers, merciless Indian Savages." I hate how you justified our enslavement of Africans. I hate how you have convinced us to deny immigrants, claiming that the DNA of America is white, when three hundred years ago America was only indigenous Indian and Mexican.

I hate how you use the sexual organs of men to rape women, penetrating them so deeply that the only thing more torn than their vaginas is their sense of dignity. I hate how you tell women to commit acts of violence on themselves, encouraging us to starve our bodies for beauty, subjugating ourselves to sexual objects, and shaming us to insert silicon and botox into our flesh.

I hate how you pretend to be funny; tell us to laugh at drunken debaucles that lead to fights and screaming, and evade responsibility for the aggression by blaming alcohol. I hate you how hide beneath the guise of racist and homophobic jokes, allowing laughter to subdue indignation.

I hate how you blind us with beauty, such that we think minerals mined by war criminals and clothing made through slave labor are beautiful.

I hate how you cloak yourself in principles like "freedom" and "democracy," and shove the death of innocent masses into the graves of a few terrorists. I hate how you pretend that the violence is contained to a bullet, denying that the death of any human undoubtedly fosters and perpetuates more hatred and violence.

I hate how you create a hierarchy of righteousness, labeling torture against our enemies as necessary, and the torture of others elsewhere as human rights violations; calling the poor who steal as criminals, and the rich who eradicate homes and pension funds as businessmen; calling those who defend their families in the inner cities as gang members and those who defend their country as soldiers.

I hate how you have convinced people that despite everything that our religions preach against, you are moral and for a greater good.

I hate how you manipulate us into believing that through violence we can achieve peace, despite basic logic showing that hate cannot breed love and falsities cannot breed truth.

I hate you so much I will refuse to use you to fight you. I hate you so much that I refuse to hate you. Instead I will deny your power by believing that the assumed powerlessness in nonviolence is power itself. I will strip away your aggression until you are cold and vulnerable, and re-dress you with the warmth of the human spirit. I will slowly starve you out of my life by refusing to feed your lies and then force feed you with love. I will tear down your walls of barbed wire and build bridges across the canyons of separation. Although I will not be active in violence, nor I will be passive in peace.

Assholes at the Krishna Concerts

2010-05-03T21:48:00.001-04:00

I love chanting. For the past eight years, my main music preference has been that of Krishna Das, a Jew from Long Island who traveled to India to become a Hindu and was forced out of his ashram because his guru decided he needed to share his music with the world. He is, to sum him up, the Bruce Springsteen of chanting.

I've been to three of his concerts, two of which included some of the holiest moments of my life. Intermittent in the holiness, however, are reminders about the unholiness of people--aka there are always assholes at the Krishna concerts.

At my first concert in San Francisco, I was sitting alone in a church pew, squeezed between strangers. (My friends claimed to have other "commitments" that night..you know who you are, ahem Carolyn, Crem, and Per). Despite not knowing anyone, I felt connected to everyone. In fact, I spent the first song completely entranced by the people around me; all of us sitting quietly at first, many with their eyes closed, singing in unison, opening up our hearts, and chanting words in sanskrit that we didn't quite understand, but that we knew were holy hymns.

In front of me sat a large bald man sporting a leather jacket, aggressive jewelry, a couple tattoos, and a goutee. He was really feeling the music. I found the juxtaposition of his physical stature but his quiet chanting beautiful. As he chanted, he slowly lifted up one of his fingers, obviously expressing the "power of one,"and rhythmically pumping his finger to the beat of the "hare krishnas." He had a soft whimsical smile...UNTIL...

the couple next to me started whispering sweet nothings into each other's ears, undoubtedly feeling the love of this "power of one." Suddenly, Mr. "Whimsically Smiling Hells Angel" turned around and barked at the couple, "SHUT THE HELL UP!"

It was awkward. Really awkward. The couple paused in shock. I paused in shock. And then the man turned around, smiled, and started his "one" chant again. Umm..... COMO??!! I felt weird. And distracted. And annoyed. What the HECK?! How DARE HE?!

And then, there was my most recent concert a few weeks ago. I dragged my partner in crime, Alex, to Webster Hall in the East Village. When we arrived, there was a line around the block of people clutching yoga mats and meditation pillows. Everyone was smiling. When we finally got inside, we anxiously searched for a spot to sit down, finding a small place in the back. People were frantically trying to save seats. "You can't save seats!" a 40 year old woman-turned-kindergartner yelled. "Stop pushing me!" another meditator-turned-screamer yelled. Smothered between angry yellers who would soon-to-be-enlightened chanters, six foot one Alex awkwardly sat cross-legged, his knees scrunched to his chest. "Move OVER!" someone yelled out. "SHUT UP, we can't move ANYWHERE" another person yelled. "YOU Shut up!" another person yelled back. Alex looked over at me with a panicked look that expressed claustrophobia and bewilderment. "Hare krishna?" I responded. "I.....think I'm gonna stand," he whispered fearfully. "Good idea," I feverishly agreed as we jumped out of the mob scene, gasping for breath.

Rudeness amidst godliness is not unusual. My mom witnessed it when she was in an ashram in India, noting how yogis would hoard fresh fruit for themselves even if it meant depriving those further back in line. My siblings and I experienced it every Sunday after church when we would inexplicably fight during the 7 minute ride home. I see it every time I walk out of church and watch 300 congregants walk over a homeless person as they rave about the Word of God and the power of loving our neighbors.

It's as if the universe wants to ensure that the second we start to feel like we're righteous and holy, we are reminded of our flawed humanity....so as to say, "oh yeah? you think you're disciplined in your faith? deal with this asshole!" or "you feel full of God's love? try sharing it with this guy."

These recognized moments of un-enlightenment always seem like buzz kills. But perhaps it is these moments, not the obvious moments of peaceful holiness, that are the true gifts for our faith. They are moments that allow us to practice godliness as opposed to just observing God. They are moments that allow us to practice our faith, as opposed to just reciting our faith. They are moments that remind us that our religiousness is not just a belief, but rather a discipline that must be practiced to be perfected. They are moments that force us to stop patting ourselves on our backs for being "good" and lead us to kick our asses into being better. Perhaps then the holiest experiences are when we stop the chanting and simply send love to the assholes.

Noise-filled Thoughts

2010-04-26T21:11:00.000-04:00

My mind is swirling of thoughts

The shoulds, the shouldn’ts the have-to's, the oughts

Unbridled emotions swirl around

Arrogances, annoyances, burdens abound

The clammer inside continues to rise

I can’t hear the external, I’m completely inside

Engulfed by past images or futures I want

The words I wish I hadn’t uttered continue to haunt

Fireworks of stimulated synapses exploding everywhere

Words burst into each other and evaporate into air

And suddenly from the depths of my noisy despair

A hear a Voice that Sternly Blares:

LISTEN.

All is quiet.

I hear my own breath.

I return

Sadness is the Stillness.

2010-04-25T21:21:00.000-04:00

Sadness is the stillness.
The quiet holding of a breath
that exhales with a long sigh
a gasp of air before she wept

she begins to blink her eye
but she holds the blink too long
and as her chin begins to quiver
you can tell that something's wrong

and just before she knows it,
you see the sliver of tear, the rest
desperately begging not to be released
so as not to let the sadness manifest

but still they seep through-quiet
tears blossoming from a downward crescent eye
rolling through the crevasses of her mouth
despite attempted blinks to keep them inside

and despite the subtle motions of her face
and the tiptoes of her tears
the delicacy of sadness breaks
and the gasps and sobs begin to near

trying to maintain her composure
she squeezes shut her heart
clenches her fist and clamps shut the eyes
of a witnessed break-down she will not be a part

and slowly she contains herself
and of a mustered smile she tries to make
her eyes get wide and bright
but you knows this attempt at composure is fake

so for now she will pretend to be ok
and wait till the comforts of her room
to break open her sadness
and freely wallow in her gloom

see sadness craves the stillness
it likes to be alone
hidden in the shadows
where melancholy's sown.

The Box Conspiracy.

2010-04-12T21:26:00.000-04:00

I tend to gravitate towards small contained areas that completely enclose me, otherwise known as boxes, squares, or rectangles. As a child, when my mom could not find me in the house, she would open the closet and there I would be nestled against three walls sleeping soundly. My favorite room in the world is in my cottage in Canada, a narrow rectangular room that barely fits a single bed and dresser. There is something about small confined spaces that makes me feel safe. This is probably why I love my studio in NYC. It is small...like really small, but there's something about it that brings me relief when I walk in it. There are no surprises. I can walk in, peer around from my stairwell, through my doorway, and ensure that no stranger lurks in an unseen place.

Unfortunately, my tendency towards straight geometrical patterns is what I most dislike about my self. Because not only do I physically find myself confined by small places, but I find myself living many days in a box. I think the same thoughts, I walk the same route to work, I eat the same food. I have the same weekly meetings and get-togethers. I'm living my days just like they're displayed on my calendar--in little tiny boxes, but with a different number for a different day.

And besides the squareness of my days, I am forced to spend most of my days staring into the damned glowing box of a computer screen. The Onion recently just had an article that headlined "90% of Waking Hours Staring at Rectangles." This is probably not completely statistically accurate, but it's not too much of an exaggeration either. This is frightening.

Stupid Squares and Rectangles! They rule our lives! We even force the vastness of the mind's creativity into them. Like now, in this moment, I'm trying to capture my intangible thoughts on life and fit them into the "posting box" of this website that falls within my rectangular computer screen. And when I paint, I find myself painting on a square canvas. And when I take a picture, it prints out onto rectangle paper and I try to preserve the memory in a rectangle frame. And when I write, whether it be poetry or a legal opinion, I print it out on the rectangular paper. Even the world's best novels are contained to little boxes full of print.

Is no one else bothered by this?! Is there some type of conspiracy out there to confine our lives to boxes? Is it not ironic to anyone else that the limitless nature of creativity is often expressed on the limited nature of a square? How can these limits not, at least on some subconscious level, affect us?

Regardless of whether the conspiracy exists, my constant daily struggle is to accept the confines of physically small places, but to seek vast spaces. Though we are already inherently contained by the limits of our bodies, the joy in the metaphysical is that our hearts and minds transcend their physical organs. Our thoughts, expressions, and creativity are free and spacious. They only become contained when we decide to place artificial limits on them. I want to fight to free my mind from these limits (even if it feels less safe). I'm pretty sure my deep cravings for the ocean reflect this desire. I take comfort in the ocean not only because it is beautiful, but because it is vast. Because when I look at it, I do not see limits. I do not see boxes or squares or confinement. I see endless motion and expansiveness. It is a vast space of unboxable life. And this is how I want to live--oceanically.

I don't want to be put in a coffin when I die (do you hear this, family?) I went to cremated and spread into Lake Erie. It will be my last (and surely my most successful attempt) to be free from the confines of a physical box.

Ode to Musicians

2010-04-02T12:11:00.000-04:00

Over the past month I have witnessed random people creating music in the most ordinary moments. Last week, on my way to to the Maui airport (yea for vacations :)), an older Hawaain man quietly began singing "Tiny Bubbles" from the back of the bus. All of the chatter immediately ceased. As we sat there listening, no one turned around to say anything to him, but there seemed to be a quiet understanding that we took joy from his song.

And then there was the flute player in Pacific Palisades Park sitting on a bench in the rose garden practicing "Chariots of Fire."

And then there was the elder Asian woman dancing and singing to herself in a language not understood by me by the East River on a spring morning.

And then there was the musician playing Van Morrison "Crazy Day" in the subway tunnel during rush hour in the lower east side.

And then there is the recorder player Mickey who greets people emerging from the subway on their evening commute everyday.

The beauty of music is that it often finds us, sneaking into our awareness in the most unsuspecting moments. Providing us an opportunity to stop our thoughts and listen. Allowing us to witness strangers gifting their talents to other strangers. Letting us enjoy something that we did not have to create.

Music allows people to stand alone in a random part of the city and share a part of themselves with the passing world without seeming crazy or annoying. The public sharing of any other passion is looked upon with disdain. People who talk to themselves on the street are considered schizophrenic. People who share their faith are preachers. People who hold up signs are in-your-face protesters. People who make art on the street are graffiti-ers. People who hand out leaflets on their cause are annoying fundraisers.

But people who make music....are musicians. People will stop and listen to musicians. People will tap their feet to a stranger's beat. People will be moved to drop money in a hat when they pass by out of a pure appreciation of a sound. People will look up and smile in the acknowledgment that you too are listening. People will feel their memory or emotions awaken to a recognized song. Because of this, musicians have a rare freedom to uninvitedly reveal their talents and soul to the world and still be embraced.

I want to be a musician. I think a lot of us do. And though we may not have the lyrical or musical capabilities of producing pleasing auditory compositions, we have something within us that we yearn to share to the world. We want to share it although it will make us vulnerable. We want to voice our inner most passions, but fear such an act would deem us crazy. Or worst, no one would listen. We want to create something that people may, if only for a moment, pause and appreciate. We want the opportunity to show the world that we can create something beautiful.

Perhaps the myth is that only singers and songwriters and instrumentalists are musicians. Perhaps we walk through life resigned to listen to others' music, without realizing that we too can create it. Perhaps music is not merely notes or sounds, but the courage to vulnerably share an inner voice to strangers passing by. Perhaps the creation of music means quieting the yelling of the mind's opinions and allowing the voice of the heart to emerge. Perhaps the melody we create will find a listener. And then perhaps the true beauty of music lies not in what is created, but what is shared.

Footprints of a Stranger

2010-03-03T08:31:00.000-05:00

When I sit on the subway, I stare at those around me, wondering what they are thinking. It's the ultimate poker game: people's faces are blank as they look into the spaces between the faces. I always lose this game, staring at people until they awkwardly look up at me, at which point I pretend I have something in my eye and start staring at someone else.

A few months ago, while waiting for the 4,5 subway in Brooklyn, I was staring particularly unscrupulously at a tall older man with perfectly coiled dreds down to his waist. When he looked over I quickly diverted my eyes. What an intriguingly beautiful man, I thought to myself, subconsciously imprinting his picture into my memory. We both got on the subway, and a few stops later, I got off.

Three months later, in a subway stop in an entirely different part of town, I was changing from the A line to the L line. As I worked my way through the masses of people in underground tunnels, I kept my eyes focused on those walking in the opposite direction. Suddenly, I stopped. The guy from the subway, the intriguing stranger from the 4,5 Line, walked right past me. I gasped. "I KNOW YOU!" I wanted to yell after him, reminding him of our moment of diverted eye contact. He kept walking eyes straight ahead with no glimpse of recognition and then he was gone.

The recognition of a stranger's face really affected me. How often do we walk by the same people over and over again, unaware that we are sharing unrecognized familiar moments with each other? How many people do we walk past daily not knowing that we know them?

This incident reminded me of another experience I had the year before. I was at a James Finley meditation in Santa Monica and after 20 minutes of sitting, the group of around 40 or so, got up, pushed back our chairs, and prepared for walking meditation. Right before we started, I slipped off my shoes, wanting to be barefoot. As we began to walk in a circle, head down, amidst darkness, I did not know who was behind me or ahead of me. But the slow rhythm of my walk was guided by the pace of the person in front of me.

Two laps into the meditation, I suddenly realized that I could feel the the warmth left behind from the stranger's step: the physical manifestation of a life in action. And as I felt the warmth from the ground, my heart warmed. I could not help but feel connected to this stranger. I was sharing with him an intimate moment that he did not know we were sharing--but I was physically and symbolically sharing in his walk of life. In 27 years of walking behind people and in front of people, I have never considered that our footprints leave behind a momentary heat of life and, whether or not we recognize it, we daily feel the warmth of a stranger passing. We are constantly unconsciously connected to the footprints of a stranger.

Poem of Peace

2010-02-08T21:34:00.000-05:00

My close friends and family will tell you that the only presents I usually give them for their birthdays, holidays or special occasions are poems. And the poems always, always rhyme. Since I was six, I utilized poems to convey my ideas (i.e. "my mother wasn't funny when she gave away my pet bunny; my father's the best dad because he never gets mad.") Twenty years later, I'm still doing it. I'm actually surprised that it took me this long to write an entry in rhyme, but regardless, here it is...

A Poem of Peace.

In the subtlest of moments, life changes before my eyes
Often in these moments I take me by surprise
As I unclothe the preconceptions and take off the disguise
I am left stranded, naked, seeing the stark truth behind my lies.

I tell myself lies sometimes, in order to feel free
Pretending that as a human, I lack accountability
And so I am left in a world in which I make believe
Though my eyes are open...I still claim not to see
So this poem is a poem in pursuit of honesty
Of the truths that remain, that stem from my heart
I still have much to learn, but this shall suffice as a start.

Though I believe in peace, a life of peace had I swore
In reality, most of our lives are driven by war
War between races, Based on the color of faces
war of territorial gains, the claiming of spaces
war between politics and polarized wings
the destruction of common goals, of which divisiveness brings

War between ourselves-torn with societal mainstreams
Trying to figure out where to fit our own dreams
Torn between our natural image from which we were given
And a barbie doll image to which we're subconsciously driven

Blaming others that the harm we see is another's fault
Not seeing our role in things, our own actions an assault
Denying that the jewelry we wear and keep in our vaults
Have not come from pain, of these thoughts we halt
We tell ourselves pretty things come from a mine field
But deny that it is enslaved children who painstakingly yield
Minerals and diamonds in order to survive
And we hang them from our necks, so our own wealth thrives

And I pretend to make believe that my clothes come from a store
And not from a factory where physical labor leaves muscles and hearts sore
And I pretend that when Jesus said "if you have two coats, give one away"
He really meant you can save charity for a different, more convenient day

And I see us paying for exploitation
Justifying destruction for new creation
Perhaps this all my imagination
a make-believe of truth or a miseducation
But we're all a part of the proliferation
of a culture which seeks the domination
of indigenous species and all others we come across
democracy is a gift, but there is a line we have crossed

One voice, one vote; this is what I believe
not corporations electing Presidents because their motive is greed.
We're founded on freedom and principals of democracy
But when we engage in human rights violations, we engage in hypocripsy
Letting the world be run by a profit-ridden corporatacracy

Comparatively speaking, in this country we are safe.
But we always feel so threatened, perpetual fear we instigate
But there are places where people suffer much worse fates
In Congo where girls are subject to gang rape
Fistulas ripped, vaginas torn
Children abandoned, a population forlorn

Earthquakes in Haiti, people buried alive
North and South Korea, families suffering divide
Starvation in Zimbabwe, religious clashes in Nigeria
And health care for all here is causing hysteria?

I understand the need to preserve a certain status quo
But of the current state of things, is this the way we should go?
If being a nationalist
Means preserving self- interest
And becoming isolationist
Then to my spirituality and God will I seek guidance to step
Obeying the laws, but questioning the people we elect

And though I may be defined as poitically liberal
And my values declared impractical and much too cerebral
An idealist who lives too much in imagination-
To others I seem to engage in conservative conversation
Pursuing a moderate way and supporting religious vocations

However I am labeled, I seek to fight evil
That perpetuates extreme disparity and leaves others as unequal
Although I don't suffer from discrimination because my color is white
I know racism exists and minorities still fight
To overcome stereotypes and be seen in the same light
Frustrated by conceptions that white often means right
To say racism is over ignores a greater plight

And though I am straight, of the mainstream sexual orientation
I have seen loved ones cry tears based on gay discrimination.
And they say words don't matter, if you don't mean what you say
But I have seen sadness as a consequence of a joking "fag" or "so gay"
Sometimes intentions seem pure, we justify principals with beliefs
But if beliefs cause pain and suffering, perhaps we're missing a piece
Because while love can cause sadness and love can cause pain
Love doesn't treat the essence of one's being with disdain

And other lies that we believe, I begin to see...
I've come to realize that money is certainly not free
It may come at the sacrifice of who we may want to be
Hiding our dreams for financial security
Saving money for things that we don't even need

And our relationship with the environment, of this I have learned much
At times it seems that everything that we touch
the grass, water, forests, begin to destruct
We indeed have broken mother earth's trust
Like vampires, of her resources, we perpetually suck
it is rare that we stop at enough...
we always want more
turning mother nature into our whore

We treat animals and trees as objects for our use
Taking as much as we can, turning our eyes at abuse
Forgetting that like a time bomb about to blow a fuse
if we don't change our ways, it is us who will lose

But regardless of differences or what we each believe
from deep within our sorrows we all seek to be happy
If I can fill myself with love, pushing aside hate
Hoping that with openness, judgment will dissipate
And with judgments aside, in my heart there is more space,
I can better relate to others, of new beginnings I can create

Let us appreciate the difference, to acknowledge other sects
But still embrace diversity, ensuring no neglect
Believing what we may, but not owning notions of correct
We can build a community of differences based on universal respect

If we can demonize the injustice, and not the person
then we can start to live by love's assertions
of a religion based on kindness, there will be no desertion

So, to sum it up, in my quest to self-actualize
I yearn for a union of all of the divides
of self and God
of self and other
let other be brother
let me become we
thy become my
all unify.

I try find to find peace in the "i don't knows"
Hoping that as I listen, my heart will grow
And observing the cycle of reaping what i sow
life will unfold in equilibrium, balance will flow

A new earth filled with simplicity
This is a dream I pursue actively.
Through lies, I hope I continue to see
And if God asks, "a fighter for peace who will it be?"
I will bow my head and fall to me knees
Here I am, I am waiting... God, please send me.

"I'm ok."

2010-02-04T21:18:00.000-05:00

This morning, after my dentist appointment, I rushed down the block towards the subway station hoping to make it to work before 10 a.m. It was cold. Really cold. As my list of things to do swirled in my head, my eye suddenly caught a blanket shaking at the corner of 59th and Lexington. Except, it wasn't a blanket shaking. There was an older woman whose body was curled in the fetal position on the concrete, wrapped in a thin blanket. Though her body remained tightly wound, her head stretched upward seeking the generosity of strangers, her eyes gazed a few feet ahead of her at the passing of feet. She was shaking. Profusely. I watched a stranger drop their gloves at her feet. Her head remained dropped, but she lifted her eyes in appreciation. "Oh my goodness," I said as I approached her, "you must be freezing! Please take my hat." I outstretched the hat towards her, but she was too cold to reach out to it, so I dropped it in her lap. She nodded her head. "Thank you," she whispered.

And then, I kept walking. Because that's what you do, right? Carry on with your life? Move on to the next obligation? I walked down the subway steps on 59th and waited for the 6 train. Something whispered inside of me, "that's all?" I stared straight ahead waiting for the screeching of an approaching subway train. "She was freezing, Ker," the voice whispered. "Go back." I didn't listen. The subway came and I got on. The train conductor called out, "train traffic up ahead. We're going to be delayed for a moment."

"Go Back." it whispered. I stared ahead, glazing over blank faces and trying to avoid looking at the train door which remained open. Two minutes we waited. The train started moving again.

I'm not listening, I thought to myself. I should go back...I'm not listening to...wherever the voice was coming from, be it my heart, or my conscience, or my guilt, or the universe. Regardless where it came from, I wasn't listening.

Oh well. Too late, my rationality chimed in as the subway jerked to the next stop.

We got to 51st street. The doors opened. It's not too late, I thought...8 blocks away...I could walk back to her in 8 minutes. She's probably gone though. Someone else is surely helping her. Gotta make it to work on time. "Watch the closing doors," the conductor yelled out. The doors didn't close. The conductor yelled out again, "doors closing!" The doors remained open. "Go." it whispered. The doors started to close, I grabbed my bags and dashed through the open door. Back to 59th Street I headed. I counted the blocks as I frantically walked. Definitely going to be late to work. I passed the stores I had just past, watched people sipping their coffees and rushing to work. My bags bumped against passerbys. I grabbed a hot tea to give, just in case. Finally, I reached the corner again. She was still there. Someone had taken off their jacket and wrapped it on her. Two people had already left hot coffee by her side.

I kneeled next to her. The hat I dropped by her side had fallen off. "Your hat fell off," I said. This time I put on her head. "Can I take you somewhere to get warm. Are you freezing?" She didn't recognize me from before, probably because I hadn't looked her in the eye and probably because she likewise avoided eye contact. "I'm not too cold," she replied, still shaking and looking down. "People are layering me up with clothes. My legs are in pain. I'm just gonna stay here." I paused. "Ok. that's ok...ok." I mumbled, wondering what else to do. I stared at her, finally asking, "But..are YOU ok?" She finally gazed up at me. "You know," she said, "all morning I sit here and people drop things at my feet, but not any one ever ask me if I'm ok."

She paused. And gazed back towards the concrete. Someone dropped some change in her cup.

"But I'm ok." she finally said. "I spend the nights in the shelter, sometimes at a friends' house. I'm ok. Thank you for asking ma'am."

"Ok." I replied, knowing that while she was surviving, she was barely ok. "Ok. I'm glad you're ok." I said, nodding one too many times.

We exchanged a few more words and then I crossed the street to get back on the 59th Street Subway. I started crying as I walked away. Crying because she was suffering and I had walked by her and it took me 9 blocks to turn around. Crying because I was someone who had thrown something at her feet. Crying at the justifications we tell ourselves to pretend we're not responsible. Crying at the hundreds of people who walked by her each day, pretending not to see. Crying at the kindness of those who gave her their clothes. Crying at the thought that no asked her if she was ok. Crying for the millions of other people who only want people to care enough to ask the three simple words of "are you ok?" Crying at the mere thought of the magnitude of suffering in this world. Crying at how it was only after I looked in her in the eye that my heart awakened to her need.

When I exited the subway in Brooklyn and approached the court house, I looked at the clock and tears brimmed my eyes once again. After all of my concern with timing, I was only twelve minutes late. I breathed a sigh of relief, "I'm ok on time," I thought. And then I paused, feeling the heaviness of the unspoken story encompassed in a shivering woman's words of "I'm ok." My heart hurt. But on to the next obligation.

Are you a Dreamer? Do you Dream?

2010-01-28T22:52:00.001-05:00

There came a point in my life a few years ago in which I realized I didn't really dream anymore. Though I had dreams when I fell asleep at night, I no longer daydreamed about adventures I could take; of a person that I could become; of romances that could whisk me off my feet; of a career that aligned with my heart. At some point, I simply accepted that I was on a path, it was pretty straight, and as long as I didn't veer too far off the trodden yellow brick road, I would never become lost. I became the ultimate pragmaticist, focused on financial security and safety and comfort. Always stating, "this a means to an end," but without asking, "but is this what I want?" By avoiding my heart, I felt in control, but I also felt stagnant. I had lost an internal flame that once burned creativity and passion into the depths of my spirit. At some point, I forgot that there existed a "road less traveled." As Paulo Coehlo noticed, "there comes a time when our personal calling is so deeply buried in our soul as to be invisible. But it's still there." My dreams were buried. I had forgotten that I could shape my current reality into whatever I wanted, and I couldn't remember what I wanted anymore.

But as slowly as my dreams subsided, one day they creeped back in. I was in Northern Nigeria having experiences so foreign I was almost certain I was not actually experiencing them. I shadowed a seventy-year old woman hiking through the bush, investigating religious conflict, traveling where she felt called, interviewing those in conflict, hugging those in need. This woman, Caroline Cox, epitomized a life driven by a heightened sense of purpose, of living the life she believed she should live. And because of this, her heart was free.

And so, half-way through law school, my world of possibility expanded. It was if, after being repressed for so long, the kinetic energy of these pent up dreams burst into the infinite leaving me chasing parts of them in Uganda, and Rwanda, and the streets of LA, and New York City, and Armenia, and Thailand. But the dreams had been stifled for so long, I couldn't quite ascertain the road to reach them. I couldn't even quite verbalize what my dreams were...and this made me sad. The girl who used to rest in imagination, now rested in imitation, mirroring the lives of those around me, wondering if I should want what they wanted.

Realizing that I had the power to dream again, scared me too. Because if I wanted to achieve my dreams, I needed to make choices. This is scary. This means I have control.

Although I am not entirely in control of my circumstances, I cannot be held hostage by them. I know that at the end of the day, if I don't attain my dreams, it is not because of societal pressures, or familial expectations, or closed opportunities...it is because I was too scared to pursue (and even sacrifice) what I believed I was called to do.

A couple weeks ago my book club (yes I belong to a book club and, no, I do not watch Oprah... yet) read the Alchemist. I had read it years ago, but it's one of those books you should keep by your bedside and pick up every so often to remind you of a life that "could be." As we sat around discussing the book, we went in a circle and each vocalized our inner aspirations. The question of "who do you WANT to be? what do you WANT to do?" invoked much more conversation than "who are you now; what do you do?" A lot of us hadn't asked ourselves about our dreams in a while; some of our dreams were simple; some were complex and far-fetched. But, regardless of what they were, the mere thought of them awakened a childish hope that anything could be possible.

My dreams as a child consisted of fantasies and castles and sugarplum fairies and prince of charmings. Now, depending on my mood, they are subject to change. The vagabond in me dreams of a life of travel and wander. The hippy in me dreams of living in a commune with my friends. The hero in me dreams of exploiting the rich and using their money to provide necessities to those in poverty across the globe. The materialist in me dreams of vacations on isolated islands. But most days, my dreams align with what I now believe to be my personal calling: to develop a self-therapeutic, voluntary, and step intensive program, similar to Alcoholics Anonymous, for post-traumatic stress that communities, who have no access to individualized therapy, can implement and take ownership in. I'm not sure quite the path this will lead me on, but I'm hoping as I go, the road will become more clear.

Whatever my dream may be on a given day, the simple act of dreaming blasts open the heavy bars of pragmaticism, of financial security, of parental desires, and of societal expectations. It allows me take off running to visions of foreign places, of love, of my heart's desires. It allows me to "see the world in terms of what I would like to see happen, not what actually does." (Coehlo). Though the pursuit of my personal calling will undoubtedly be filled with struggle and sacrifice, the reality of the path towards the dream makes the journey beautiful. And even though I feel that the road is long, I know that right beyond the "now" is a realm of possibility that awaits to be seized by a dreamer.

Death, Man's Best Friend

2010-01-12T07:53:00.001-05:00

It was the summer after I graduated from college. I was having the time of my life living with my college roommate Hannah in Martha's Vineyard, going to the beach during the day, and waitressing in the evening. Each night I'd sink into my bed slightly sunburned and with a couple hundred of dollars in cash in my pockets. It was wonderful. Except for the fact that I was convinced I was going to die.

Hannah and I had plans to travel to Thailand for three months at the end of August; she was going to be interning at a hospital in Lopburi and I was going to be working in a home for sexually abused girls. It was surely going to be transformational...it was too bad that I believed I was never going to get there.

I don't really remember how "the" epiphany happened. I think I was lying in bed one night staring at the ceiling when I decided, "I'm going to die soon." And just like that, I became obsessed with death.

Soon after my realization, on one of our daily walks, I confided in Hannah. She looked at me incredulously, "Ker, you are NOT going to die." "But, I really think I am," I responded blankly. "Come ON," she started and listed off all the reasons why I was not going to die. I blocked out everything she said because she was convinced she was going to get bit by a rabid dog or contract malaria, dengue fever, and/or the bird flu in Thailand, so I couldn't trust her rationalities.

I talked to my mom about it. "Hmmmm...." she said. "Maybe you are going to..." "You think?!" I exclaimed, slightly relieved that even though I may be about to die at least I wasn't crazy in my belief." "Maybe...but I think you should see a therapist. We'll make an appointment with Dr. Goffman when you get back home in August." "Dr. Goffman ?" I asked, not recognizing the name. "Yeah...you know him, he's the marital therapist who got divorced from your old math tutor...the one with the long pink nails and all the cats who always said 'Shaloooom' when you and Cate arrived for your sessions?" He certainly would not be helpful.

So prior to my trip to the therapist and my trip to Thailand I was forced to sit with my death obsession for the next few months. It consumed a lot of my thoughts. My previous distinctions of life from death soon became blurred. Every time I talked on the phone, I thought that this could be my last conversation. It got annoying because even when I didn't want to talk someone, I convinced myself the conversation was worthwhile, because, afterall , I was going to die soon and this may be my last phone connection with the person before I passed away. My obsession with death was never fear-ridden or particularly sad; it was simply a firm belief that crept into my thoughts and made me appreciate, if not cling to, those fleeting moments that would have undoubtedly remained unobserved had death not been on my mind.

My nostalgia for a life that would soon fade permeated every activity. When I took walks on the beach I would stare longingly at women playing with their children in the sand. It must be nice, I sighed to myself, to live long enough to have children. When I ate my ice cream sandwiches, I'd savor each taste...I'm really going to miss these suckers I thought to myself as I licked my fingers. At night, I'd draft my obituary. I pictured my funeral. I got annoyed by the prospect of being buried, not cremated. I planned where my ashes would be spread (on the lake by my cottage in Canada) and the songs that would play as they spread through the air (enya maybe? no maybe snatum kaur.) I cried at how hard it would be for my parents to lose a child. I took joy in finally figuring out what death would be like.

When I returned home to Buffalo, I met with Dr. Goffman. He looked at me and smiled smarmingly: "well, Kerry...you leave for Thailand in a week and you're still alive, so that's good news!" "Yeah...I'm pretty sure at this point I'll die in a plane crash." I responded matter-of-factly. "You know," he started to drone, "that the statistics of dying in a plane crash..." blah blah blah. I stopped listening. I had already diagnosed the cause of my death obsession: the thought of myself living in Thailand, at this point, was so unimaginable that my brain couldn't register it, and therefore, I had convinced myself that because I couldn't imagine myself there...I would surely die before getting there. Knowing why I thought of death so much, however, didn't make the thoughts go away.

When Hannah and I met at the airport in LA a week later, I was slurping down a venti frappuccino in one hand (with whip cream of course) and eating a Wolfgang Puck pizza in the other. "This could be my last meal!" I exclaimed. 24 hours of travel later (and no sleep...thanks to my ridiculous consumption of caffeine), we landed safely in Thailand. I WAS STILL ALIVE!

Soon after my arrival, my thoughts of death dissolved into the tastes of my new life in Thailand. At the last leg of the trip, as I lay on my mat alone in an abandoned two story building in a Buddhist monastery (that's a whole another saga -see blog entry on "joy" in January 2009), I realized I kinda missed death. It's ever present presence had helped me see the delicacy of life and because of this I saw beauty more vividly. And it certainly helped me be a better person each day guilting me into treating each interaction, even if trivial, as precious.

And so, I got to thinking. Even though I don't particularly like pets (don't judge me), maybe our relationship with death is a lot like our relationship with a dog. It grabs our attention, forces us to walk with it hand-in-hand, and often causes us to stop in our tracks as we wait for it to catch up. Sometimes it barks at us and instills fear, other times it lies at our feet, patiently waiting until we acknowledge it. Sometimes its dirty and we don't want to touch it, but other times the thought of it seems gentle and sweet. Sometimes we get mad at it and push it away, begrudgingly knowing that no matter how much we ignore, it will undoubtedly be waiting at our door for us when we come home. Sometimes it forces us to change our schedule, but even when it is a burden, the appreciation of its existence brings us a greater joy. Perhaps then, it is not dogs who are man's best friend. It is death.

Taking Cover Under Shitty Umbrellas

2010-01-10T17:33:00.000-05:00

The bane of my existence in NYC is umbrellas. Cheap umbrellas. The kind you buy for $5 on the side of the street because you don't want to spend any of your disposable income (what little I have) on a nice one. No fail, about 4 blocks into buying the umbrella one of three things happen: (1) a gust of wind flips the umbrella inside out; (2) one of the spokes of the umbrella rips through the cheap plastic and creates a dagger-like knife which sticks out, and leads you to become obsessed with monitoring it for fear it will puncture a young child on its mother's breast as you walk by; or (3) your umbrella hits another umbrella and you blame the collision on the other person and decide that you hate people.

At this point, it would appear obvious that nothing good comes from buying a cheap umbrella and it is certainly NOT the means to stay dry. And yet, I seem to make a vain attempt to use them every time it rains. The only thing that brings me comfort in all of this is that the other 8 million people in New York seemingly have the same pattern...united we stand under shitty umbrellas.

When I told one of my friends that my next entry was about shitty umbrellas, she paused and said..."do not even try to tell me you think there is symbolism behind this." I shook my head seriously, "I utterly believe there is MAJOR symbolism behind this pattern."

I think my unwillingness to buy a functioning umbrella is indicative of greater unwillingness (i.e., stubborness) to seek refuge in places that will actually provide me with a place of shelter and protection. This is nonsensical, you say. Why would you have such a pattern?

I offer two reasons: (1) I'm an optimist; (2) I'm an idiot. I think, ideally, that a shitty umbrella will keep me dry. Despite experience upon experience, I convince myself that maybe it's not that windy out today, so my umbrella won't flip; maybe these built in daggers won't puncture through the fabric; maybe the streets won't be as crowded because people are staying inside. And so I grab the umbrella with the false hope that...this time I'll stay dry.

The second reason is that, well, I'm an idiot (or insane). They say insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. (See above paragraph).

So regardless of whether I am the former or the latter, I still tend to seek refuge under that which I know will not sufficiently provide protection. More examples:

I seek refuge in wine and sweets when I am emotionally drained. I seek refuge in coffee (with hazelnut creamer please) when I am intellectually stagnant at work. I seek refuge in the internet when I want to attain mindlessness after a stressful day. I seek refuge in my sister and my mom when I want to vent my frustrations (sorry guys.)

While these refuges are not are "shitty' per se, they aren't self-sustainable. They may provide me a temporary reprieve from the storm, but ultimately when their comforts wear off (as they always do), I am left on my own to figure out the next place to which to run. The irony about this all is that I already know exactly the place which will provide me comfort--a place of silence; a place of prayer; a place of meditation.

The Bhavagad Gita stresses, "control the thought, word, and deed; ever absorbed in yoga of meditation, and take refuge in detachment."

The Bible states, "[t]rust in Him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him: God is a a refuge." (Psalms 62:8)

Buddha encouraged, "be a lamp unto yourself, be a refuge to yourself...betake no external refuge, but hold fast the Truth as your lamp, and in doing so, you will reach the topmost height."

Ok, so I know the answer (that's usually the easy part), but then why do I avoid the places of true comfort and peace? I mean...I'd rather read about taking refuge in meditation and silence and prayer for an hour, then actually sitting in prayer and meditation and silence for an hour. Just like I'd rather THINK about buying a functioning durable umbrella then actually buying one.

Whatever my resistance may be, I can, for now, take refuge in the acknowledgment that when I am ready for it, I know where a true refuge exists. And hopefully the fact that I just received an umbrella for Christmas is foreshadowing...

Embracing My Own Shadow

2009-12-31T17:53:00.000-05:00

Grace. I have heard the word a lot lately. I have always struggled to understand this concept. Though I have read the word in countless religious texts, heard it spoken in churches and temples, and said it myself countless times, I still can't wrap my head quite around it. Maybe, like most spiritual concepts, it is not something that translates into vernacular articulations, but is something that we feel in the inner-depths of ourselves. Perhaps, it is something that brings us peace in the acknowledgement that though we are imperfect, unconditional love exists.

At the crossroads of last year's dusk and this year's dawn, I seek to embrace grace. My News Years Resolution therefore consists of writing down the traits I want to accept in myself, as opposed to writing down all those I want to change. No more cliched last-for-a-month self-expectations that will, like last year, unsuprisingly cease upon the realization that not only do I lack self-discipline, but that I am never good enough. Instead, I am starting the new year by acknowledging that OF COURSE I am not good enough and starting from there.

I must admit, it was much more easy for me to acknowledge what I already am than trying to figure out who I want to be. In order to practice radical acceptance, I first needed to identify those traits that I needed to accept. For example, this year, I'd like to accept that I am not a details person. Accept that I always end up being my own worst enemy. Accept that I am not a revolutionary. Accept that while I am organized, I am not super clean. Accept that after college sports, I have retired from all competitive activities. Accept that I don't have all (if not most) of the answers. Accept that the stupidest things drive me crazy like someone chewing popcorn next to me in the movie. Accept that I don't like pets. Accept that while I adore community, I'd rather spend most nights home alone. Accept that my eyes squint when I smile and my right eye squints more than my left. Accept that I like going shopping. Accept that I become an ashen-pale gray color in the winter. Accept that my annoying bangs are too short and my muscles are undefined. Accept that I never have the latest styles and prefer to dress in black and brown. Accept that I am a list-maker. Accept that I am hypocritical and judgmental (especially of myself). Accept that my hypoglycemia makes me cranky when I don't eat every few hours. Accept my tendency to diagnose myself with "conditions" like hypoglycemia even when there is no medical evidence in support of it. Accept that the performer in me likes to receive attention. Accept that every emotion I experience-anger, sadness or joy-results in tears. Accept that I don't like bars, despite still being in the prime of social youth. Accept my uncomfortableness with conflict and brutal honesty. Accept my love of comfort. Accept my poor short-term memory and inability to communicate ideas on the spot. Accept that my optimism can convey a sense of naivete. Accept my sadistic joy in pranking people and torturing my siblings. Accept that I am neither enlightened or dogmatically religious. Accept my unhealthy tendency to protect my sister. Accept my inability to speak my mind when I know it will hurt someone. Accept the fact that I am broken and flawed and searching. Accept the fact that I am not only human, but lacking in humanity. Accept the fact that this is okay.

My resolution this year is to find resolution in my imperfections, knowing that while they do not define me, they are a part of me, and so I must come to terms with them. Through grace, I seek to accept them knowing that while I should aim to transcend my humanity, I also must accept my own humaness as reality.

In accepting and acknowledging my naggingly persistent flaws, and not repressing them, I hope to create space from them. By being mindful of them, I hope to observe them before they take action, thus allowing them to be mere tendencies as opposed to patterns of behaviors. But, even when these flaws creep to the surface (as they always do), I hope to learn "to embrace my own shadow" and find "gratitude for the grace within my paradoxes and imperfections." (Richard Rohr). Here's to a year of radical acceptance...

Inarticulation.

2009-12-29T22:45:00.000-05:00

I watched others read poetry last night

their hearts articulating visions

and painting emotions

through the canvas of space

My desire to make music

too

is stifled by the confines of words

because when I write

and look back at the sentences

I think

that's not quite what I meant.

Role-Playing

2009-12-26T22:26:00.000-05:00

I know I wrote this blog entry a year ago...but it still holds truth to date. Oh Family Holidays at Home... :)

From 12/17/08:
I'm heading back home today. I use the word "back" both literally and figuratively. I am literally flying home today, as in traveling. But I am also heading "back" in the sense that I am going to regress. You see, I have noticed that every time my family is together, we regress into our childhood roles. When we're not home, we're mature, grown ass people. I'm in law school doing real law school things, my brother is in business school learning about accounting, and my sister is in college engaging in philosophical discussions about social constructs. And then we get home and every day is 1989.

Scene from 1989: I'm staring into the camera, doing a choreographed dance to a "A Tisket a Tasket." And I'm really good at it... I even adlib some "doo dah doo dahs" as I shimmy my shoulders and whip my chicken legs around. My brother proceeds to run across the screen, making weird noises and holding some type of concocted gadget. He's a ghostbuster, obviously, and he's fighting the bad guys. He throws a pillow in my face and yells "you got slliiiiiimeeeedd!" "BREN-DDANN," I shriek and elbow him in the stomach. Pause. I turn back to the camera with a sickeningly sweet smile and continue dancing. My mom laughs at me (not with me) and then scans the room with her camera, wondering aloud, "where's Shannon?" And sure enough, the camera scans to little Shannon, alone in the corner, rocking away on a plastic pony, talking to herself or one of her imaginary friends, it's too tough to tell. Soon after, the camera zooms in on my dad, and he makes a goofy face, which is kinda funny, but no one really laughs (it's better not to encourage him), and the scene ends.

Not much has changed almost 20 years later. I still seek validation from my parents and try to entertain them with my trivial accomplishments (look mom! I have a blog!). Brendan spends the day playing Xbox and seeking to live vicariously through a character in a video game (He's 27, but that's ok). My dad putzes around the house making horribly corny jokes that are almost funny. Shannon is in her room, doing her own thing, and giving two shits about the scenes unfolding around her. And my mom walks in and out of each room, all up in every one's business, making comments that she thinks are funny, and laughing at us.

Part of us can't help it. We are who we are! But then there are times when we're being OTHER than who our family THINKS we are, and our family still responds as if we're the same. For example, just recently, when my parents came to L.A. for Thansgiving, I turned to my mom, gave her a big hug, and genuinely told her how much I loved having them here. My mom looked at me and responded, "Ohhhhh, you suck up." I'm sorry....WHAT??!! "Mom!" I exclaimed, "I'm not seeking validation, I'm simply expressing my love!" To which my mom laughed.

Here's another example. I come home from exams. And I'm feeling pretty good about myself and slightly knowledgeable about the law. We're at the dinner table having a conversation about politics. Somehow the law comes up. I think to myself, this is the perfect opportunity to contribute a small piece of the plethora of knowledge I have accumulated this semester. So, I chime in something about civil liberties and tell my family a story about a prolonged detention of an American citizen in Iraq. It sounds like a pretty good law school story--legal jargon, political relevancy, and exemplary of a civil rights impact litigation case. The only problem is my speech dyslexia kicks in and I add, "You can read the guy's biopsy online." Pause. "Biopsy?" my family responds in confusion. I stare blankly. "Yeah." I respond, "biopsy." "You mean 'biography'!?" they shriek and laugh hysterically. "Oh Kerry..." they say patronizingly, shake their heads, and smirk in that "you're such an idiot, I can't believe you're in law school" type of manner. And suddenly, any small bit of pride I had in my law school education has disintegrated. And I've returned to the characterure of myself from 1989.

What's so interesting about this regression is that it is actually more symbolic than I would like to believe. It doesn't just happen with family, but it happens to each of us, every day of our lives. Each day we wake up and we regress into the role we played the day before. We wake up believing that we are a certain way. Because we have told ourselves so. Because our family sees us as so. Because our friends see us as so. Because society tells us we should be so. And somewhere along the line, we started to believe that we are fixed characters. And so we start playing the part. And suddenly, we are not just playing a character, but we ARE that character.

And then we label ourselves based on these traits: I am Kerry, I am a girl, I am 25, I am straight, I am a law student, I interned here, I will be working there. And then, we begin to tell others how they should perceive us: "Oh, I'm fun, but I don't do fun things," "I'm a morning person," "I don't like watching tv," "I always do this, but never do that," "I believe in this, but not that." And the next thing we know, we've created a nice little image for ourselves. And two things can happen, we cling to the constructed roles we've created or try to free ourselves from them.

But if we're not these roles, then who are we? That's what I'm trying to figure out. I'm trying to let Kerry just be Kerry, but struggling to free myself from the confines of constructed roles. I'm trying to learn how to work outside myself, but still remain connected to my inner-being. I'm trying to be just here, in the now, but find myself creating a persona for later.

When Buddha was asked, "What are you? Are you a God or a man." He responded simply, "I am awake." And I think at the start of each day, that's all we can ask ourselves to be. Awake. Nothing else, no one else, but awake.

Dancing in front of the Mirror

2009-12-13T09:48:00.004-05:00

When I was little, I would spends hours dancing in my room, choreographing moves to "A Tisket, A Tasket" and "Have you ever seen a Lassie?" In first grade, I completed my first (and last) dance recital--a tap dance to "Deep in the Heart of Texas." (My dad taped over the recital with a Bills Game-one that he actually attended, but a game he wanted to re-watch when he came home....this a different blog entry.)

In elementary school, I would boss my friends around, barking out the proper moves to "I saw the Sign" or any one of the Disney Showtunes. In high school, the trend continued-- in two of the talent shows my friends and I choreograped dances to "You Don't Own Me" and Jackson's 5, "I want you back." Though most people in the talent show strummed their guitars or read poetry, we found joy (and talent?) in lipsynching and jumping off chairs.

The first week of college, I naively tried out for the hip-hop team. For purposes of not reliving that humiliating 5 hours, I will simply state that trying to mimic Julia Stiles' dance moves from Save the Last Dance during the individualized dance portion of the tryout will simply not cut it, particularly when everyone else in the tryout can (1) breakdance; (2) Harlem shake; or (3) perform the full rendition to Michael Jackson's Thriller. Needless to say...I didn't get a call back.

Despite this setback, my friends and I, even in college, loved to make up dances. Prior to going out at night, I'd spend time in my room, bee-bopping around, getting ready, and practicing "new moves" in front of the mirror (and by "new moves" I mean the latest moves I saw someone cooler than me perform). My friends and I mastered the Jump Rope dance, mimicked Destiny's Child music video, and encouraged dance offs at every party.

And then one day, the music stopped. Not literally, of course, but at some point in my life, I stopped dancing in front of the mirror. I would dance at parties, at family reunions, and at weddings, but I no longer came home at the end of the day, changed into sweats, blasted some tunes, and shook my bootie to the newest jams. What happened?

I am not sure if we have a "maturity" nerve in our body or if it's a voice in our head that society has implanted, but at some subtle point in the past few years, I think when the thought of dancing in my room crossed my mind, I heard a whisper, "too old for that." The sad part is that I listened. It wasn't until this summer that something small re-awakened inside of me. After taking the Bar, I went to see Shanti, an Indian reflexologist and a healer, to help fix my study aches and pains. When I sat down in his chair, he looked me straight in the eye, leaned in, and said, "you have music your soul." I quickly admitted, "Ohh...well, I am a horrrible singer." (My sister and brother will admit I ruin every song on the radio due to my improvisations). Shanti smiled and responded, "I didn't say you a were good singer, no, I didn't. But you have music in your soul."

I don't think Shanti told me this because he knew I listened to the music; Shanti told me this because he could see I wasn't listening to it. We all have music in our soul, it is just a matter of whether we dance to it. As I get older, I cease to tap into my endless supply of internal rhythms. While it occasionally bursts out when I am driving alone in the car or attending a concert, the rhythms usually remain repressed until an "appropriate time."

Last night,the time was "appropriate." My mom and I went to see Fela, a broadway play that chronicles the Nigerian revolutionary, singer, and pioneer of Afrobeat. It. was. amazing. The drum beat penetrated the soul, the lights and colors made me dizzy, the dancing was disciplined chaos. Throughout the play, I kept thinking, "I'm going to buy this cd...and, without shame, dance in front of the mirror."

And so today, for the first time in a while, I am going to dance to the music in my soul.

Oh yeah? Prove it.

2009-12-02T23:43:00.001-05:00

I could tell you a lot about myself that you probably didn't know. But the problem is that some of the stuff I tell myself is not always true, so when I'm telling others about it, it's probably not true either. I like to think that I'm pretty socially conscious: conscious about the environment, human rights, civil liberties, poverty. However, one thing I have learned in life is that just because you think something, doesn't mean its true. So even though I like to convince myself that "I care," my actions usually expose a greater truth. (As Maya Angelou once said, "You don't tell people who you are, you show them.")

The other night, for example, right after I made a snide comment to one of my friends who doesn't recycle, I indulged in a bubble bath. And as I lay fully immersed in the lavender scented oil, I came to a shocking and humiliating realization.....I don't really care that much about the environment. And as I came to this epiphany, my bubble of self-righteousness burst and I found myself drowning in a bath hypocripsy.

Now, WAIT, before you judge me, let me clarify. I am EXTREMELY CONCERNED about the environment and climate change. The thought of natural disasters, soiled water supplies, and deforestation makes me anxious, angry, and overwhelmed. But as far as actually caring, as much as I have convinced myself that I do, evidence proves otherwise. (As a lawyer, evidence is a necessary component of determining the legitimacy of the argument).

Evidence that I DON'T CARE: I sometimes buy bottle water, I rarely carpool (when I was in law school, I often drove separately to campus even though half of all Pepperdine students drive through Santa Monica each week), I eat meat (often the non-free range, non-organic kind), I buy fruit that was grown half way around the world, I use way too much water, I leave lights on, I haven't changed all of my light bulbs to florescent bulbs, I take planes when I could take trains, I take cars when I could take bikes, I take buses when I could walk, and so on.

Evidence that I CARE: I have a Sigg, I unplug my toaster when I'm done, and I recycle (but who I am kidding...recycling simply isn't enough these days).

Conclusion: I don't really care....at least enough to change my ways. Why does this happen? I think my main problem is that I have confused having "an opinion" or "a belief in something" as translating into "caring." And so, somewhere in there, I have convinced myself that if, mentally and emotionally, "I care" I can justify (or ignore) my non-caring actions. Having a belief is easy. Acting on that belief is not. And actually caring about acting on that belief is a whole another issue.

I've struggled with reconciling belief and action for a while now. One of the most profound epiphanies of my life (and humiliating realizations) was in my senior year of college. I had just shared my life story (my "bio") with 15 newly met people whose only duty that night was to listen to my story and ask me questions. And after I finished my life story, cried tears of pain, and shared my proudest moments, I sat vulnerably as I awaited questions. My new friend Chatan raised his hand and simply asked, "ok yeah, we heard your story, but what do you CARE about?" Dumbfounded, mind-reeling, and annoyed that someone would even ask such a question, I defensively thought to myself "I care about a lot of things." Chatan continued, "I mean, are you the type of person who reads the newspaper, thinks 'that's sad,' puts it down, and moves on? Or do you ever care about something enough to DO something?"

Woah.

And as I sat in silence, defensive, vulnerable, and ashamed, I realized that up until that point in my life, I had never asked myself, "what do I truly care about?" And I certainly never took the time to ask: "do I believe that I care...or do I care enough to DO?"

While this entry does not explore how it is that people, in general, come to care enough to act (this will be saved for a later date), I know that in order to hold myself accountable, I constantly have to bully myself, demanding, "oh yeah, Ker? Prove it." I care about the homeless? Then don't walk by them, head down on the street. I care about world hunger? Feed the hungry as opposed to talking about it over large entrees and wine. I care about how the government allocates its resources? Assess how I choose to spend my own resources. I care about the voiceless? Speak on their behalf. I care about the lonely? Sit with them and be in their presence. I care about God? Listen to Him. I care about peace? Stop judging those with different priorities.

And so, though I don't always care enough to act, I do care enough to want to act. And hopefully the bully inside of me motivates me to do good, aggressively taunting "oh yeah? prove it."

Today I lost myself.

2009-09-29T21:25:00.000-04:00

Today I lost myself. Momentarily, of course. But moments are sneaky because they blur into the day and the day blurs into time, time forgets to tell us it is passing, and then these moments no longer seem so innocent.

It wasn't until I got Home today that I remembered to remember me.

It (the "losing me") began with the walk to the subway as I hurriedly crossed streets to a blinking of the red hand. I walked unnoticed and unnoticingly walked.

And then I sat on the subway, reading ads for learning English and plastic surgery.

And I stared at others as they vacantedly sipped their cheap coffee, getting lost in their thoughts that probably didn't exist.

And I sat at my desk, engulfed in suspected terror plots and the reasonableness of class action attorney fees.

And I walked out of the court house, thinking about the past and planning for the future.

And I checked my phone for no other reason than habit. And then 30 seconds later, I checked it again. No "new" news in the world that I was currently not checked into.

And then when I was near home, I felt a chill in the air, and I thought, "I am cold." And suddenly I remembered that I was feeling. Which led me to remember that "I am." Which reminded me that I was me. And it felt good to return to a state of remembering. To catch that moment before it fled. To truly breathe. To accompany myself back Home.

The Old New Me

2009-09-18T10:16:00.001-04:00

I haven't written in a while for no other reason than I just didn't feel like it. But I just moved to New York City last week and the freshness of my surroundings has encouraged me to begin blogging again. It feels good to write and I enjoy the struggle to articulate my muddled pile of thoughts.

I had been anticipating this move to New York for months. In August, as I indulged in family time at my beach house, I started meticulously making lists of everything I wanted to complete, explore, and become when I moved. I wanted to start up my yoga practice again. I wanted to avoid TV and read books from the library. I wanted to join a community group and volunteer. I wanted to support local farmers and only buy from local markets. I wanted to find socially conscious people who I could discuss my dreams and frustrations with. The list, rightly named "The Next Chapter," quickly became longer and longer with my internal desires. And I LOVED this list. I carried it around with me from room to room at my house, adding character traits and habits that "the new me, in the next chapter" would acquire. Having the list was great because it meant that I didn't need to start on being "the new me," until I actually moved. Sure there was a yoga studio down the road from me in Canada, and a weekly farmers market, and people I could connect with, and places to volunteer...but I wasn't "there" in New York City yet, so while I was "here" still in Canada, I could still be the "old" me...unmotivated, undisciplined, and unable to meet my own desired standard of living. But "here" was comfortable, so I felt entitled to enjoy it for as long as I could.

So, now that there has become here, I am thirstily drinking what the city has to offer before I start my job next week. However, I must admit, most of motivation to explore stems from fear. And I am my biggest fear. I know my own tendencies too well. As a lover of routine and simplicity, I know I will quickly become trapped in a daily ritual. Of course nothing is wrong with ritual, but, unfortunately, my rituals tend to become unbreakable patterns of permanency anchored in self-absorption. And this leads me to awake each day feeling trapped by the weight of the world.

But now, I have the opportunity to choose my rituals before they start. And this is liberating!
The only problem with my new found liberation is that I have already confined it with artificial time constraints. I am only liberated until my routine begins, at which point, I am once again encircled in schedules and new old habits and routines. I quickly forget that each day is in of itself an opportunity to liberate myself from "the old me." I forget to believe that the end of each day is a death and the beginning of the next, a rebirth. I fail to realize the essence of who I am--one who is impermanent, malleable, fluid. Instead, I continue to hold onto fixed views of myself, clinging to these characteristics because they help define me to the world and offer a comfort in my own predictability. Such that I wake up each day without a feeling of surprise, with the expectation of sameness, with the entitlement of routine. And it makes me feel safe. But despite this safety, deep down, I am already planning for the future, for when the "next chapter" can begin, so that I can recreate myself, remold myself into a better version of me. And though I clothe myself each day with my traits from the day before and wrap myself in the heavy cloak of "Kerryness," I yearn to put on a different wardrobe or even no wardrobe at all. I yearn to be free of myself.

And to do this, to free myself, I need to stop defining "the next chapter" as a set point in the future. I need to go to bed each night knowing that tomorrow is already a new chapter. And I need to wake up knowing I am free to be the person I want to be today, knowing that my inadequacies and predictabilities and stagnancies of yesterday have died in the night, knowing that whether I decide to be the "old" me today or the "new me" today, I have a choice in the matter. Because on this morning, I am reborn.

Ceaseless Craving, Invincible Sustenance

2009-03-06T19:59:00.000-05:00

The other night, right before I went to bed, I was craving something sweet. Not wanting to deprive myself of a bedtime snack (heaven forbid), I grabbed a chocolate chip cookie. And as I stuffed it into my mouth en route to my bedroom, I paused. Though my mouth was still crammed with cookie, I was convinced I needed another one. I NEEDED it. Still chewing, I immediately turned around, walked back to the kitchen, and proceeded to shove another one in my face. I breathed a sigh of relief. This was exactly what I needed, I thought to myself, as I crawled into bed with crumbs on my face.

Thirty minutes later, I found myself staring at the ceiling, waiting for the sugar high to wear off, and wondering why I had convinced myself that I actually needed two cookies right before going to bed. I couldn't help it, I thought to myself, I was craaaving them. But was I? Yeah, I'm pretty sure I was. The problem is though I'm always craving something. I crave morsels of chocolate at every meal (read: a large large piece of chocolate), I crave wine, I crave fresh air, I crave dinners out, I crave leisure, I crave coffee with hazlenut creamer, I crave a beer with my burger...and the list goes on. The utterly ridiculous thing about these cravings is that I always find a way to satiate them. It would never occur to me not to! If I want a f-ing cookie, I'm gonna buy a f-ing cookie. And if I want a glass of wine, I'm going to pour one. And if I want leisure, I embark on fun. And if I want a burger, I'm going to get a burger (medium rare, please) despite the fact that I claimed a month ago to be a vegetarian. (This is why I'm NOT a vegetarian...because five days into it, I have these pregnancy type cravings for raw meat and ten minutes later I find myself gnawing on chicken wings, thinking sheepishly "I couldn't help it.... my body was craaaavvingggg it") Ummm...??!!

I rarely do NOT act on cravings and this scares me. It scares me, firstly, because when it comes to my food desires, I know there are so many hungry people in this world who cannot simply eat what they want, when they want. Secondly, this scares me because even though I do not have an addiction (or at least one that I'm not in denial about), I could see how easily satisfying cravings could lead to one. Thirdly, this scares me because I think on principle, deprivation can lead to growth, and I should practice the act of deprivation more. And lastly, this scares me because as the cravings ceaselessly continue, I ceaselessly satisfy them, but I still ceaselessly seek for more satisfaction. To it put it simply, no matter what needs I may satisfy, I still don't feel "filled."

Don't get me wrong. If I'm craving cookies, and I wash a row of Oreos down my throat with a glass of milk, I will be FULL. But I won't be FILLED, and I certainly won't be FULFILLED. The irony is, however, that being "filled" is really all I want at the end of the day; I don't want cookies before I go to sleep each night, I actually just want peace. But, instead of doing a five-minute meditation (which my heart craves), I find myself eating cookies (which my stomach craves).

I'm not Freud, so I won't try to psychoanalyze what my cravings really might mean from a psychological standpoint (although I'm sure Freud could offer some ver-y interesting commentary). I will, however, analyze my cravings from a more spiritual perspective.

Our cravings stem from something inside of us which tells us that we need something outside of us to feel "satisfied." This is the utter lie of the world--that we are not "complete" as we are; we need something OTHER than ourselves to fill us, whether that be a relationship, a friendship, a job, a house, a certain lifestyle. But the fact is that we are already completely whole. We are born in Union with God. But as we process life and start to form our identity, we start to identify ourselves based on the world around us. We start to believe we are what we do and what we have, and we therefore start to feel that we are separate from that Union. And once we believe we are separate, our needs start to change. We start to crave the knowing of things as opposed to the knowing of our inner-being. We crave noise as opposed to silence. We crave motion as opposed to stillness. And we therefore crave the very things that take us away from our Union with God. As one Sufi master noted, "the inner truth of desire is that it is a restive motion in the a heart in search of God." And as we plow forward, desperately grabbing in vain at bubbles of guaranteed "fulfillment" that pop upon touch, we start to feel defeated. Because despite the fact we have satisfied our cravings, we do not feel filled, and we do not feel whole. We believe that we are separate from God.

As James Finley so simply (and paradoxically) stated: "We are not God, but we are not OTHER than God." And once we comprehend that we are not OTHER than God, we begin the journey back Home. We can begin to feel whole again because we realize that we need to look no further than ourselves (into our soul, our inner-being, our Buddha nature) to find everything we need. Jesus assured the Truth of this in eight words: "Behold, The Kingdom of God is WITHIN You."

And with recognition of this Union and the knowledge that the kingdom of God is within, I think we can start to flip-flop our cravings. Our craving for things, stemming from the separation from God, can lead to a craving of God, which will result in the separation of all things. Nuri, a Sufi teacher, stated it much more eloquently: "Union with God is separation from all else, and separation from all else is union with Him."

And in this Union, the oneness with the divine, we will stop believing that the externalities can satisfy our soul. And though our ceaseless cravings may subsist, we will have the awareness that God is inside us, offering "invincible sustenance" (as James Finley calls it) which is all we really need to feel "full."

Fricking Opinions

2009-01-29T22:04:00.000-05:00

It's really easy for me to like people. Quite often, I'll meet someone and immediately feel some sort of connection. Sometimes I even go as far as picturing the two of us laughing together over a cup of coffee while divulging our thoughts on improving the world. (I'm exaggerating...kind of). This whole fantasy goes quite well until they actually open their mouth. And then I'm like "ahhh crap...this isn't going to work."

You must have had this type of experience. You're on a date. He's cute. He's charming. He makes you laugh. He's intelligent. You stare dreamily into his eyes. And then he says something like "Bill O'Reilly truly is the source of all wisdom." And at that moment the turn table stops. Silence. And you find yourself slightly cocking your head to the side and thinking "ehhhhh." And at that moment, the sparks are gone.

Opinions. Fricking opinions! They ruin it EVERY time. It's so easy to get along until the Vegetarian discusses meat with the friend who is a Carnivore, the uber-conservative realizes her friend's hero is Michael Moore, the housewife starts discussing family values with the working mom, the pro-lifer starts talking about abortion with the pro-choicer, and so on. And then, a perfectly lovely conversation quickly turns heated. And very often both sides stare back at each other with complete disapproval, thinking "I can't believe you ACTUALLY believe that."

I have one friend who vows not to date Republicans. Shocked by her claim, I asked her, "but, if you meet a guy at the bar and he asks you out, how the heck do you know what political party he belongs to?!" "Oh that's simple," she responded. "I just make sure on the first date the conversation turns to abortion, gay marriage, and his economic theories." Now, THAT makes for an "interesting" first date (one that I'm glad to say I won't have to go on).

And while my friend may appear slightly adamant in her dating preferences, we all kind of do the same thing. We have certain opinions, about certain things, which make us fit into certain labels, and then we go around convinced that "like attracts like." We basically go through life with motion sensors that beep more quickly when we're approaching a like-thinker. It's like "oh, you like the ocean?" (beep)," "and doing yoga?" (beep beep)," and you're an Obama supporter (beep beep beep), "and you're a card carrying member of the ACLU?" (beepbeepbeep beep)," and "and you think there's nothing better than sitting on the ocean, after yoga, and talking about Obama and civil rights issues" (beepebeepbeepebeep..JACKPOT). We all claim to like diversity, but at the end of the day, don't we just want to be surrounded by a group of people with common ideas?

Of course we do! Based on some nurture and some nature, we cling to certain opinions for safety and, in some regards, survival. If we are raised in an environment where those who surround us believe the same thing and then we look for cues to support that opinion, chances are we too will have that opinion. We then continue to pursue environments where others share the same opinions--communities of like minded people offer a safe haven to share opinions and ideas free of intense conflict. Communities also validate our opinions, which thereby strengthen these opinions and reinforce the truth of what we believe. Thus, our opinions are, in many regards, our truths that help us navigate through life as fluidly as possible.

So this is all pretty obvious. Nothing deep going on here at all. But the question turns back to the role of opinions. If we are not our opinions, what are we? And if we can't detach from our opinions (because it is inherent to mankind to have them), then how do we deal with them?

I know we are more than our opinions because I have friends who I disagree with on almost every political and religious realm possible and I still love them to death. If they were their opinions, we certainly wouldn't be friends. But there is something within their "inner-being" (if you will) that attracts me to them. And this inner-being (also called their Christ-like consciousness, Buddha nature, soul or whatever you want to call it) transcends their constructed thoughts on the world.

So once I became cognizant to the fact that we are not necessarily what we think (and the fact that just because we think something doesn't mean it's true), it was easier for me to separate people from their opinions. But that was only half the battle. Even though I knew people weren't their opinions, their opinions still drove me crazy! "Now whaaaat!?" I would bemoan (ahem whine) to myself, "It'd be so much easier if I didn't like these people because then I wouldn't have to listen to them talk. But now I actually adore these people, but can't stand it when they open their mouths!"

So where does this leave me? (I switched to the present tense because I'm still working on this as we speak.) It leaves me with a choice: only surround myself who think exactly the same way as me or have some friends who hold different views on certain issues. Once I decided on the latter, I knew I needed tools to deal with our different opinions. And through people wiser than me (ahem Buddha and other gurus) I found the answer...detachment!!

Now this may sound brutally blunt, but this is the best way of summing this point up--the best way to free yourself from the burden of other people's opinions is simply "not to give a shit what other people think." It simply is what it fricking is. They have those opinions because of COURSE they have those opinions because their own environment and experiences LED them to have those opinions. And it actually doesn't matter what they think, because they are entitled to those thoughts, and at the end of the day, it doesn't really affect me at all. That is not to say that there shouldn't be dialogue or discussions or debates about certain issues, because I think our opinions should not necessarily be definite; these conversations offer opportunities for self-exploration. But, if I can't change people's opinions, then the only thing I can change is how I react to them. I can let myself get frustrated and upset and angry and emotional OR I can simply "let go." Deep breaths. Mindful awareness of our constructed differences. And move on.

This is like soooo easier said then done. But I'm working on it. I really am. But, until I can free myself from the web of attachment of other people's opinions, the most I can do is take deep breaths, shake my fist and wail, "fricking opinions, they ruin it every time!"

The World is a Metaphor for itself?

2009-01-22T23:40:00.000-05:00

We are really good at convincing ourselves that things are exactly as they appear and accepting the way the world works.

And if things are exactly as they appear to be, then we should stop looking for answers because we already have them: Things are what they are; life is life; death is death. Get over it.

But if the world is beyond what it appears to be, then that means there is something more. And if there is something more, then that means we need to find it. And if we need to find it, where do we do look?

Now as someone who likes to search for answers, I'm really good at buying books, listening to lectures, discussing issues, asking questions to the older and wiser, etc. But what if the answers to the world weren't found in books or songs or letters? What if the answers weren't "hiding" anywhere? What if the answers to the world ...were found in the world itself? What if God provided all the answers to "why" the world worked the way it worked in the workings of the world itself (say that ten times fast--maybe I should quit blogging and start writing tongue twisters?) This would be GENIUS!

Shit, I totally lost you. Too many "what ifs" and not enough examples. Bear with me. This is something I've tried to put into words for a while, but failed every time. Partially because it's so obvious and simple that it is hard to explain and partially because I'm still an idiot 65% of the time.

But here's what I'm thinking...we have largely convinced ourselves that the workings of the world is simply the world and not something OTHER than the world. We think that the sun is just the sun, a rock is a rock, the ocean is an ocean. But what if we entertained the theory that everything is symbolic? What if the workings of the world were an exact metaphor for how God planned for our life to be? What if the world itself told us the answers to why we can't see God, why our bodies are the way they are, why there is suffering, why the soul is buried deep? Would things make more sense? Would we stop being so confused?

For example, if someone asked you "why can't you stare at the sun?" you would probably respond, "I don't know...it's too bright?!" (and then you'd laugh to yourself and mumble under your breath, "dumbass.") But if someone asked you "why can't we see God?" you would probably spend the next three days engaging in philosophical discussions, whipping out CS Lewis, seeking Jewish mystics, and using a lot of hand motions to try and convey a still unsatisfactory answer. A simple "because He's too bright?" probably wouldn't work, because we don't think of the sun as symbolizing God. But should we? Do we make things too complicated?

To better explain this, I'm going to you give some examples. My friend James Pearson (jamestravels.com) ignited this whole thought process, so I'll share with you his own example.

He wrote: "The moon tries to shine its light on us every night, but is shaded by the earth herself. We fear the darkness, but we block the light. It is the nature of our world."

My other friend, Mitchell Moses, made a similar type of observation: "Funny how fitting it is that our body is made up of 60 -70% water. Maybe a hint from God on how our lives should look - Refreshing, Radiant, and Fluid. Water flows effortlessly from one form to another, but never loses the essence that defines it. " This is the nature of each individual.

And diamonds and gems, which lie deep below the surface, are only available to those who dig to find them. Beneath the superficiality of the grass, beneath the messiness of dirt, and beneath the seemingly impenetrable rock lies the most valuable and precious stones. It is the nature of our souls.

And the rain, the source of growth for almost all living things, is accompanied by dark, heavy clouds. At times, they completely shield the sun to those looking up. And the rain sometimes sprinkles and sometimes storms, but it always ceases when the winds from the west dissipate the darkness. And then, though the earth is damp and heavy from the water, true growth occurs and new life begins. It is the nature of suffering.

And the sun, the source of light and the source of life, is the only thing at which we cannot directly stare. We can feel it, but cannot see it. We perceive its rays, but are blinded by its core. And yet, in the early morning, as the new day approaches, and in the evening, when dark meets light, its brightness is subdued by the softness of colors, and in those moments we catch a glimpse, though our eyes burn after. It is the nature of God.

I could go on, blurb by blurb, to dissect the symbolism of nature's nature. About the ocean. About the tides. About mountains. But I'll leave it at these five examples for now because what may strike me as symbolism may strike you as silliness. Regardless, here's to searching for answers in symbolism.

Why I listen to my bladder more than my heart.

2009-01-13T11:14:00.000-05:00

I have two persistent fears in life: severe turbulence and squirrels. Irrational, I know. But regardless, there you have it. In order to calm my fear of squirrels, I usually cross the street when I see one lingering on the sidewalk. (I am always about 90% sure that the squirrel is probably rabid.) In order to calm my fear of turbulence, I like to sit by the window. This ensures that I am able to see if the wings are still attached to the plane (not that it matters or changes the circumstances of anything, but go with it).

The need for the window seat, however, results in a certain situation: two people sit between you and the aisle. And this is especially a problem when, like me, you are obsessed with hydration and just chugged two gallons of water prior to boarding the plane.

The scene usually goes like this. Chug water. Board plane. Sit by window. Two strangers sit beside me. We smile at each other. Take off. Window staring. Ten minutes later, the urge arises. Already!? I ask myself. I don't want the strangers to think I was irresponsible in not making a pit stop before I boarded the plane, so I decide I'll wait a few minutes. A few minutes later, my bladder calls again. I look at the strangers. They're asleep. Frick! I cross my legs, put on Enya, and stare out the window. Try and distract myself. I can't distract myself, all I can think about is that I need to pee. Like bad. Deep breathing. I sneakily unbutton my top jean button. It helps for like a minute. We hit a big bump and the plane jerks to the left. The strangers wake up and look out the window. Now's my chance! I unbuckle my seatbelt to make my move and then the buckle seatbelt sign comes up with that cheerfully annoying "BING" sound. Nooooo!! I shriek to myself, as I sit back down. The flight attendant warns of turbulence. Deep breath. Turbulence plus bladder equals bad. You get the idea....

The last time I found myself in this situation (aka yesterday), I started thinking about the anatomy of the bladder. When our bladder calls we listen; if we don't, we explode. We stop what we're doing and we make the pit stop. Doesn't matter where it is. Doesn't matter if it's inconvenient to stop. Doesn't matter if we don't want to. We do it, nonetheless. And this obvious realization made me think how incredibly unfortunate that humans are wired to listen to our bladders more than our hearts.

You know that horribly cheesy techno song that is played in seedy clubs: "Listen to Your Heart, when it's calling for you...i don't know where you're going and I don't know whyyyyy, listen to your heart...before you say goodbyeeeee"? If you don't, it's better that way. But the point of the song is to "listen to your heart when it's calling your name." And this horrible song has some wisdom. Too often our hearts feel compelled to do something, whether it's in a relationship or in a career choice or in volunteering, but we still ignore it....because we can. Unlike our bladder, our hearts won't explode if we don't listen to it.

For example, homelessness truly breaks my heart. And my heart constantly encourages me (with sharp pangs of burden) to drag my ass downtown to the Union Rescue Mission and start volunteering. Deep down, my heart tells me "you need to go." Now if this were my bladder, of COURSE I would go. I would jump in my car and drive downtown to Skid Row, disregarding the fact it is "inconvenient," disregarding the fact that it is "out of the way," and disregarding the fact that "I don't have any time." I would go...because I HAD TO GO. But because these signals stem from my heart, I somehow justify ignoring these signs because I can.

This pisses me off (no pun intended). Are humans still so animalistic that the priorities of our bladder outweigh the desires of our heart? And if this is the case, why is our heart, our most vital and powerful organ, the easiest one to ignore? Why couldn't we have been created with some sort of contraption that FORCED us to follow our heart? It would have been so much better for our own emotional health and for the rest of humanity.

Apparently, that would have been too easy. We as humans are left to battle with our own hearts. And because of this, when we don't listen to it, we are the only one to blame. If I don't go down to the Union Rescue Mission, it is my fault. If I don't pursue a career that my heart calls me to pursue, it is my fault. If I don't stay in or leave a relationship based on my heart's subtle signals, it is my fault. And although our hearts will not explode if we do not follow these callings, worse things result, like BURDEN. And burden is the worst...slowly accumulating weight as we try to navigate through life. I think I've unfortunately mastered some feelings of burdenment at this point in my life and I must admit the weight of burden pangs much more than the desires to urinate.

And so, another New Year's Resolution is for me to truly listen to my heart throughout the course of the year. To act on it's desires. To listen to it's callings. And through it all, of course, to still listen to my bladder.

The Joy in the ABC's.

2009-01-02T12:03:00.001-05:00

So, it's the New Year. Didn't that already happen like a year ago? Weird. Anyways, like most of my New Year's Eves, this new years was overwhelmingly and pleasantly uneventful. Over a glass of wine with a dear friend (and in typical new years fashion), we toasted to our new years resolution. We pledged to "do this more and that more and this more," all in hopes of having a new year filled with "joy." And in this quest of joy, I was reminded of an event three years ago, when I found joy in the most unusual package....

Three and a half years ago, prior to starting law school, I traveled to Thailand with my friend Hannah to work in an orphanage. It was an amazing experience, but two months into it, I was incredibly burdened. I had learned that almost all of the girls (age 5-18) had been sexually abused at least once and it was hard to reconcile the fact that while these girls needed a home, intense therapy, and schooling, all I could offer was my presence (which would soon be gone).

Before returning home, I had the opportunity to stay in a Buddhist monastery for a five days. Feeling particularly weighed down and hoping to gain some insight on happiness, peace, and divinity, I eagerly jumped at the chance. Hannah, who had seen the monastery before, quickly opted out, which was fine by me as it was the perfect chance to have some quiet time and reflect on the months past.

I didn't blame Hannah for choosing not to come. The monastery was not quite like the ones you may typically envision. There weren't 50 foot gold Buddha's anywhere, the conditions weren't pristine and white, there were no flower gardens, no views of the valleys, and no clear lake filled with orange carps. Instead, the monastery lay on the outskirts of town, where roosters ran rampant, mangled trees shaded a murky pond filled with over-sized gray catfish, and tin shacks offered a place for the monks to sleep. The temple itself was...let's say....understated . I, lucky or unlucky, was not placed in a shack, but rather placed in an empty room (minus a mat on the floor also known as "my bed") on the second floor of two story empty building. Next to the room was a "bathroom" which consisted of a hole, a bucket, and a faucet. My room had one window, which faced the duck farm next door. Perfect, I thought, as I tried to subdue my fears of the bird flu virus, which had just started to trickle its way through Southeast Asia.

While it wasn't quite what I had expected (but is it ever?) I was excited to converse with the monks about Buddhism. The only problem was that I quickly found out...no one spoke English. Like at all. The only information that was somehow conveyed to me consisted of the chanting schedule: 4:30 am and 6:30 pm. I quickly made my usual "to do" list and tried to calm the panic I felt when all I had written was "chant." This was going to be a veryyyy looooong five days.

At 4:00 am the next morning, the roosters "politely "summoned me to awake, so I stumbled down to the temple to begin the one hour Sanskrit chanting fest. I had no idea what I was chanting, but I'm pretty sure it was holy. After chanting, the monks started walking in a straight line in silence into town for their daily ritual of "begging" for food. I, not knowing what else to do, brought up the rear. We walked for miles, into town, around town, through the market. And one by one, people in town waited patiently for the monks to arrive so they could place a bag of homemade food into the large silver bowls the monks carried. Upon inquisitive glances of locals, I just smiled and waved--I can only imagine how ridiculous I looked, a white girl with blond hair, wearing a mock nun outfit, ho-humming around behind a line of robed Thai monks.

By the time we returned to the monastery, we had accumulated enough food for a feast. Which was important because we were only to eat one meal a day (although we could continue to drink (non-alcoholic beverages of course)). This would not be good for my low blood sugar, I thought, already feeling myself get hungry the second we finished our meal. Trying to distract myself from future hunger pangs, my thoughts drifted to my disappointment that the monks would not be able to translate their knowledge into tangible words. I felt like the Little Matchgirl, standing in the cold outside and salivating upon staring into a window where a happy family is about to sit down for a warm turkey dinner. I could see the wisdom in the monks eyes, my brain salivating at the taste of such knowledge, yet I couldn't quuuuuiiiiite grasp it. This is a sick joke, I thought to myself and whipped out a book on Buddhism (I had thankfully brought), while grumbling that I could have fricking been reading this Buddhist book on a Thai beach somewhere and instead I'm reading it in a crappy farm monastery.

The next morning at 4:20, I dressed for chanting and basically slept-walked into the temple. No one was there. Typical, I thought, to myself, obviously no one communicated to me that there wasn't chanting this morning. After crawling back to bed, ahem laying on the mat on the floor, I was awakened an hour later by an eager nun. She frantically motioned "let's go." Confused, I jumped up and soon found myself being crammed into a van with 10 other monks. Two hours later, still having no idea where I was going, we arrived at a temple in Bangkok. Apparently there was a huge Buddhist festival going on (I still to this day have no idea what this celebration was supposed to be). I spent the next 8 hours walking around the grounds of a massive temple being a bewildered spectator. Monks were everywhere, eating, laughing, praying, chanting, reading, and meditating. I sat under a tree and hoped that through simple osmosis I would feel wiser and enlightened. Instead, I felt confused and dumb.

When we were ready to leave, ten tired monks and I got back into the van. Halfway through our ride home, we stopped at a Thai 7-11 and all got out. The head monk got a large cherry flavored slurpee and walked around the shop. Suddenly, I heard giggling. I turned around to see the head monk, in his robes, trying on cheap yellow sun glasses and doing a little dance which consisted of moving his arms in a robotic fashion. Completely caught off guard, I burst into giggles too. And then, once we were all back in the van, the head monk turned around to me, smiled, and said "English?" I smiled back. "Yes," I said. He pointed to himself and said "English." I looked at him curiously. And the monk, the wise and enlightened man that he was, started singing joyfully "the ABC's." Soon the other monks joined in and clapping their hands to each letter they sang together the Sesame Street Version of the ABC's. And, at that moment, I did what any other person could do at the sight of a van full of Thai monks singing the ABC's... I joined in. And once the ABC's were finished, we sang "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." And once that was finished, I taught them "Mary Had a Little Lamb."

And halfway through "Mary Had a Little Lamb," it hit me. THIS is exactly what I so desperately sought. It didn't come in the form of words or doctrine or a teaching or a lesson from a wise man. It came in the moment of an innocent surrendering. And it...was....joy. It was joy at being where I was (in a van in Thailand), with who I was with (strange monk men), when I was there (at that moment) and feeling peace. And I realized that THIS was the fundamental teaching of Buddhism: being present and letting go and finding joy in the ABC's.

Needless to say, the next four days in the monastery were transformative. And while I often need to remind myself that joy is in the simplicity of life's moments, I am so grateful for that wonderful, albeit utterly surreal, experience. And so, my friends, Happy New Years and here's to a year filled with the joy in singing the ABC's.

Enough.

2008-12-24T10:01:00.000-05:00

Whenever I come home, I always have a list of "life activities" which I hope to complete in my time away from school. Movies, books, phone calls, walks, yoga, meditations, eating patterns, and so on. And then halfway through my vacation, I realize I have not done enough. I haven't read enough, I haven't done yoga enough, I haven't meditated enough, I haven't been vegetarian enough (I'm a struggling carnivore). But most importantly, I am burdened by the realization that I certainly haven't given enough.

And this got me thinking. What is enough?

I think "enough" falls into three categories: (1) Having enough; (2) Being enough; (3) doing enough.

(1) Having enough: The plight of humans is the fact that we have convinced ourselves that we never have enough. The problem stems from the fact that we quantify "enough" to such extremes that it becomes an intangible destination. We never feel satiated by our current state of being. And this pertains not only to money and things, but to status, trend, and success. We don't have enough clothes, we don't get good enough grades, we aren't making enough money, our project isn't successful enough, we aren't understood enough, we aren't spiritual enough. Law school in particular encourages such thinking: get good enough grades, so you get a good enough summer job, so you can get a good enough job, so you can get a good enough partner position, so you can have a good enough lifestyle. One problem is that even if we attain what we initially sought, we tend to move the rung of success out of our reach, and convince ourselves, once again, that what we have now, is not enough. The other problem is that we tend to not even want that which we seek, and if that's the case, then we certainly never feel as "it" (whatever that may be) is "enough."

(2): Being enough: The greatest lie society tells us is that what we have is who we are. If you get good grades, you're smart. If you have a high paying job, you're ambitious,. If you have lots of things, you're successful. If you have Bibles lying around, you're faithful. If you wear nice clothes, you're attractive. Sometimes I get so irked by these lies (particularly when I feel myself believing them), that I want to run away to destination unknown, free myself from externalities, and just be me--free of labels and objects and judgments (especially the ones I put on myself). But while we do not have the capabilities to run away from it all, we do have the luxury of going inward, in silence, tuning ourselves into the frequency of God, and listening. The fear is, of course, that in the quiet and nakedness of ourselves, we may not be enough. But I truly believe that such a fear is unwarranted. We are, in our simplest form and our most vulnerable state, enough.

(3)Doing Enough: There is a scene from Schindler's List which resonated in me so deeply, that I think about it often. It is the scene at the end of the movie where Schindler is about to leave his home and factory, which had employed and hid over 1100 Jews during World War II. As he walks to his car, hundreds of Jews congregate around him to express their gratitude. And as he stands before them, a man holds up Schindler's gold wedding band and returns it to him. And Schindler takes his ring, looks at it for a minute, holds it up, and choking back sobs states, "I could have got more....I could have got more." And the man responds, "there are 1100 people who are alive because of you." But Schindler shakes his head and responds, "I didn't do enough." And he looks at his car and cries, "Ten people, ten people I could have saved with this car." And he looks at his pen and says "2 people. I could have saved two people with this pen." And eventually he collapses into a man's arm, sobbing, "one more person, I could have got one more person."

This scene makes me cry every time I watch in. And it makes me look around my room, my home, my life, and look at things, worthless things, that would only have value if their monetary worth was exchanged for an act of giving. That candle on my dresser is a cup of coffee for a homeless man. That sweater on my shelf, a meal for someone who is hungry. That decorative bowl on my table, a pair of gloves for someone who is cold. And so on. It's even harder for me to reconcile the wealth that surrounds me when I return to my parent's home. The newly upholstered couch...a Thanksgiving dinner for ten.

And if Schindler, a businessman who saved 1100 Jewish people during the Holocaust, is looking around saying "I haven't done enough," then surely I have not done enough. Whose life have I saved? Who have I helped? While I may not be living in the midst of the Holocaust, we are all living in the midst of a genocide in Darfur, famine in Zimbabwe, utter rape and destruction in the Congo, and violence and poverty in our own cities. At what point will I be so profoundly moved by the emergency of human need that I start giving away what I have? And not only do I want to start giving away unnecessary things, but I need to start giving away more of myself. And in giving myself away, I hope to truly find myself, and in finding myself, I hope to know God. I personally believe that our faith is not ultimately what we profess, but what we do. And I personally believe that without acts of love and grace and charity, I cannot know Him.

We already have, in our most minimalist state, eough. We are in our purest form enough. But what we do should never be enough, because once we convince ourselves otherwise, we
compromise ourselves, each other, and most importantly, God.

Role-Playing

2008-12-15T02:15:00.000-05:00

I'm heading back home today. I use the word "back" both literally and figuratively. I am literally flying home today, as in traveling. But I am also heading "back" in the sense that I am going to regress. You see, I have noticed that every time my family is together, we regress into our childhood roles. When we're not home, we're mature, grown ass people. I'm in law school doing real law school things, my brother is in business school learning about accounting, and my sister is in college engaging in philosophical discussions about social constructs. And then we get home and every day is 1989.

Scene from 1989: I'm staring into the camera, doing a choreographed dance to a "A Tisket a Tasket." And I'm really good at it... I even adlib some "doo dah doo dahs" as I shimmy my shoulders and whip my chicken legs around. My brother proceeds to run across the screen, making weird noises and holding some type of concocted gadget. He's a ghostbuster, obviously, and he's fighting the bad guys. He throws a pillow in my face and yells "you got slliiiiiimeeeedd!" "BREN-DDANN," I shriek and elbow him in the stomach. Pause. I turn back to the camera with a sickeningly sweet smile and continue dancing. My mom laughs at me (not with me) and then scans the room with her camera, wondering aloud, "where's Shannon?" And sure enough, the camera scans to little Shannon, alone in the corner, rocking away on a plastic pony, talking to herself or one of her imaginary friends, it's too tough to tell. Soon after, the camera zooms in on my dad, and he makes a goofy face, which is kinda funny, but no one really laughs (it's better not to encourage him), and the scene ends.

Not much has changed almost 20 years later. I still seek validation from my parents and try to entertain them with my trivial accomplishments (look mom! I have a blog!). Brendan spends the day playing Xbox and seeking to live vicariously through a character in a video game (He's 27, but that's ok). My dad putzes around the house making horribly corny jokes that are almost funny. Shannon is in her room, doing her own thing, and giving two shits about the scenes unfolding around her. And my mom walks in and out of each room, all up in every one's business, making comments that she thinks are funny, and laughing at us.

Part of us can't help it. We are who we are! But then there are times when we're being OTHER than who our family THINKS we are, and our family still responds as if we're the same. For example, just recently, when my parents came to L.A. for Thansgiving, I turned to my mom, gave her a big hug, and genuinely told her how much I loved having them here. My mom looked at me and responded, "Ohhhhh, you suck up." I'm sorry....WHAT??!! "Mom!" I exclaimed, "I'm not seeking validation, I'm simply expressing my love!" To which my mom laughed.

Here's another example. I come home from exams. And I'm feeling pretty good about myself and slightly knowledgeable about the law. We're at the dinner table having a conversation about politics. Somehow the law comes up. I think to myself, this is the perfect opportunity to contribute a small piece of the plethora of knowledge I have accumulated this semester. So, I chime in something about civil liberties and tell my family a story about a prolonged detention of an American citizen in Iraq. It sounds like a pretty good law school story--legal jargon, political relevancy, and exemplary of a civil rights impact litigation case. The only problem is my speech dyslexia kicks in and I add, "You can read the guy's biopsy online." Pause. "Biopsy?" my family responds in confusion. I stare blankly. "Yeah." I respond, "biopsy." "You mean 'biography'!?" they shriek and laugh hysterically. "Oh Kerry..." they say patronizingly, shake their heads, and smirk in that "you're such an idiot, I can't believe you're in law school" type of manner. And suddenly, any small bit of pride I had in my law school education has disintegrated. And I've returned to the characterure of myself from 1989.

What's so interesting about this regression is that it is actually more symbolic than I would like to believe. It doesn't just happen with family, but it happens to each of us, every day of our lives. Each day we wake up and we regress into the role we played the day before. We wake up believing that we are a certain way. Because we have told ourselves so. Because our family sees us as so. Because our friends see us as so. Because society tells us we should be so. And somewhere along the line, we started to believe that we are fixed characters. And so we start playing the part. And suddenly, we are not just playing a character, but we ARE that character.

And then we label ourselves based on these traits: I am Kerry, I am a girl, I am 25, I am straight, I am a law student, I interned here, I will be working there. And then, we begin to tell others how they should perceive us: "Oh, I'm fun, but I don't do fun things," "I'm a morning person," "I don't like watching tv," "I always do this, but never do that," "I believe in this, but not that." And the next thing we know, we've created a nice little image for ourselves. And two things can happen, we cling to the constructed roles we've created or try to free ourselves from them.

But if we're not these roles, then who are we? That's what I'm trying to figure out. I'm trying to let Kerry just be Kerry, but struggling to free myself from the confines of constructed roles. I'm trying to learn how to work outside myself, but still remain connected to my inner-being. I'm trying to be just here, in the now, but find myself creating a persona for later.

When Buddha was asked, "What are you? Are you a God or a man." He responded simply, "I am awake." And I think at the start of each day, that's all we can ask ourselves to be. Awake. Nothing else, no one else, but awake.

Hi, It's me Kerry.

2008-12-14T01:23:00.000-05:00

I must admit...I'm a virgin blogger. I didn't even hear the word "blog" until about a year ago, and when I heard about them, I thought they were pokemon cards or something. But as I learned more about them, and even read some, I decided that not only do I enjoy blogs, but that I would like to have my own. (I have ownership issues, but we'll discuss that at a later date). And why do I want one? Well, I certainly do not think I have much to offer you. But it feels good to write, and it's freeing to share, and it's humbling for me to feel vulnerable. So, I guess, in all honesty, this blog was created for selfish reasons. Sorry :)

So, here I go. Since I started law school, my thought processes have become severely limited. I realized one day that it had been a very long time since I last pondered. Like really pondered. Or daydreamed, for that matter. And even when I tried to ponder, I found myself dissecting my thoughts in a legalistic formula--issue, rule, analysis, conclusion. Even my thoughts on God, which were once fluid and deep, started to fit into this formula:

Issue: Who and what is God?
Rule: God is _____
Analysis: Here, in Holy Book X, verse Y, God says Z. Because God is (insert rule), Z is true. While other people may argue A, those people will probably lose, b/c the judge will find, based on precedent, that God is (insert rule), and thus Z is true.

This is a perfectly sound and satisfactory argument. A winning argument, nonetheless. And although I should be proud of such legal analysis, there is only one problem... although I may understand the law, I don't feeeeell the law. And although the law is a means to an end, it is not the end itself. And, although I value the significance in rules and procedures, I kinda don't give a shit (excuse my language), because I really only want to focus on the substantive part.

Besides my dislike for rule statements, I also don't really like words. I have never been articulate, in fact I claim the contrary. I have this weird habit of making up words and then convincing myself that the words exist. Take, for example, the word "disdainment" (n. meaning disdain). I don't know why I thought "disdain" was an insufficient noun and thus added "ment" to it, but I did. I also mispronounce words wrong...a lot. I diagnosed myself with "speech dyslexia" a view years ago, which was a good idea. Because once you tell people you have a "condition," they do not think you're as stupid.

In all seriousness though, I do struggle with words, particularly their meaning. They bog me down and, unfortunately, for a very long time they hindered my faith. I spent so much time analyzing and interpreting words, that I forgot to see the story the words told. And I realize, that this happens to so many of us--we become obsessed with words. We quote religious text, we regurgitate verses, we sing hymns, and with each word, we hope to get closer to the truth. And these words can be beautiful, and comforting, and they can bring peace. But we also must note, that these words can be swords, and can bring harm.

Father Richard Rohr observed, "Christians have become obsessed with the words that Jesus spoke, as opposed to the life that Jesus lived." And this is true of all religions. We read spiritual books and texts, desperately hoping that these words will be sufficient to make us faithful. We spend so much time reading and preaching, that we forget about doing. We preach of the poor, while we step over the homeless. We preach of justice, while we seek injustice. We preach of nonjudgement, while we judge our friends. We preach of peace, while we engage in war. And despite the fact that our actions falter, we still choose to focus on getting the words "right." And I am the first to admit, that this is me.

And so, in honor of disliking words, I have decided to write a blog!! (haha believe me, I know how hypocritical and ironic this is!) But I hope that through the emptiness of my words, I can explore a language that has no words, and that is Love. And through Love, I hope to explore God.

Thanks for listening.