Maxwell’s Neighborhood

I feel a little salty about having to make this post. In rereading the rules of the 104p52w Challenge, it is something of a gray area whether the last week in 2009, for the purposes of the challenge, ends this
Sunday at midnight, or tonight when the corks pop. To me, logic dictates that it be the latter, but I know that Jodi and her team of pinstriped legal hit-men would be all over me if I showed even the slightest hint of violating the rules (her numerous transgressions notwithstanding). Because I will be out (inasmuch as a vegetarian nondrinker can “revel”) when I am required to post this, and because the iPhone still doesn’t like Vox, I will be relying on
the handy mobile blogging feature to make this work. Happy New Year everyone! Pie to all!

Happy
New Year!

Thank you and good night. I've complete the challenge. Sweet!

I was walking home from the Metro about a half-hour ago, and had the delightful experience of stepping in a pile of shit in the middle of the sidewalk that some kind dog owner had neglected to clean up.  And that about sums up my miserable day and this miserable year.  I'd wish for a better 2010, but what's the fucking point?

Karen Armstrong wrote Through the Narrow Gate in 1981 as a way to work through and express the difficulties and experiences she had as a nun in the 1960s. Armstrong has a spiritual worldview similar to my own and after reading A Spiral Staircase, I was curious to know more about her. Here are some passages I found interesting.

I knew only too well how much my parents longed for me to go to Oxford. Nobody in my family had ever gone there before and it seemed a paradise to them, a fairytale world intellectual perfection.

“No,” I said slowly. It was no good allowing them to cling to this hope. I felt their disappointment sharply fill the room. “No, I don’t think I want to do that now.”

“But what do you want to do?” my father asked unhappily.

“I want to be a nun.”

In the silence that followed, I sat, trembling slightly, feeling sick and excited. I had dreaded telling my parents, but now, for good or ill, the die was cast. (44)

The courage it takes a person to tell a loved one they are going in a different direction than expected is incredible and scary, especially when it involves religion. Armstrong captured this well in this passage and the ensuing discussion with her shocked parents.

“That’s the start [9 pm] of what we call the Great Silence, which lasts until after Mass the next morning. It’s a daily retreat, really,” she [Mother Albert] explained, “a time when we lovingly prepare to receive Christ in Holy Communion each day.” (81)

The idea of a set time of silence each day is intriguing. Some would say we are silent when we sleep. However, I am thinking about silence while being awake. I often seek silence in what I see to be an increasingly noisy world. This silence is both audible and visual.

She [Mother Katherine] paused and looked straight at me. “They’ve failed in courage somewhere. They’ve let themselves get enslaved by the training, by the letter of the rule and not its spirit. Of course we must be obedient. Of course we have to love God more than anyone else. But we’ve given Him ourselves and He wants us too. As we are, as you are. And the hard thing is to hang on to the inner lights that God sends you. To use your mind and your heart. The training is there to ensure that God always comes first, not our petty selfishness. But God.”

“How do you mean, they’ve failed in courage?”

“By clinging to the rules as to the rail of a swimming pool. Not being willing ever to go out of their depth and trust that God will hold them up. And, Sister, there’s too much of that in the Order. Far too much. The training, the way our superiors have ruled us, make it very difficult indeed for people to stop being afraid like that.” (247)

This idea of tightly clinging to human rules rather than succumbing to spiritual direction is so common in the human psyche. From my experience, rules provide needed structure during spiritual development. However, the line between reasonable structure and thoughtless obedience is fine. I needed spiritual structure at the beginning of my spiritual development. Once I reached a certain level of development, I needed the freedom to branch out and grow. This is where I needed permission (mainly from myself) to let go of the rules and go where God (the generic name I use for the Divine) is guiding me.

I don't think I have to blog today and tomorrow to avoid a regrettable late default on the 104p52w challenge, but I don't want to leave any gaps for Jodi's shenanigans.

Excelsior!

This is not the last post in the 104p52w challenge. Tomorrow I will post the last one in the challenge and then wait for Dabysan to start proclaiming victory and whining about how I need to send him a pie. Of course, he's wrong, but what can you do? If I didn't have to pay a mortgage, I could make it my life's work pointing out to Dabysan all the times he's been wrong and will be wrong. But, you know, I got shit to do.

What that shit is, I'm not sure.

Since it's New Year's Eve Eve I'm feeling a little reflective. 2009 passed in a sort of boring blur, which is a damn shame. I have only myself to blame though. Only boring people get bored, right? My resolution for 2010 is to be less boring. I need to start carpeing that diem.

Viva la 2010!

This quote is often attributed to Gandhi: “Be the change you want to see in the world.”

People often complain about the characteristics of other people. Yet, many of these same people possess the very characteristics they despise in others. This is a lack of mindfulness, which is the inability to see reality.

Many people do not see they are everything they hate in other people. Their lack of mindfulness leads to harsh judgment of other people. However, this judgment is really a judgment of one’s self. Since there is a failure to see reality, a lack of compassion develops, and negative energy is emitted.

Once a person chooses to become mindful, they awaken to see their lack of compassion for another person is cultivated by hatred of their own self. They see how their choices affect others (both negative and positive). Mindful people learn to love both their own strengths and weaknesses. This love nurtures compassion, which shatters judgment.

One chooses to be mindful by letting go.

Let go of your grip on the past.

Let go of your grip on the future.

Let go of your pain.

Let go of your intellect.

Let go of your need to be right.

Let go of your need to express your opinion to others.

Let go of yourself.

Once a person lets go, they gain power to change. However, a person has to desire change and choose it freely. Coercion from outside sources does not work. Letting go is a choice. All one on the outside can do is to offer honest support to change, not justification of a person’s negative choices.

I expected - back when it first came up - to derive no small amount of joy from making birthday mixes for my niece.  And I haven't been disappointed.  But what I didn't expect - at least not right away - is that I would enjoy equally what they had to teach me about music.  I'm officially retired from the cutthroat sport of bad karaoke, but it's possible I just might win KttD X anyway.  After spending almost a week in Ohio with a couple of die-hard Hannah Montana fans, this song has jumped to the top of my short list.

In a manner not unlike the Apostle Paul, I have journeyed to many places in the United States during this decade. Hopefully, I can travel to the southwest during the next decade.

Decade Travels W

Decade Travels SE

Decade Travels NE