Taming the Hydra

Steve asked me this morning why I used the word "gloomy" since I don't seem to be gloomy. The thing is, when I'm with others, or with him, I am happy. It's when I'm alone that I descend into couch-potato lethargy, when it becomes paradoxically difficult to move out of the house and be among others. I told him that's part of why I said it, I wanted to bring it out of hiding and dispel it, keep it from being my secret alone. The other day I was cleaning out and organizing a closet (alone) and inexplicably felt sad. I sat down to meditate, to let come what would come, but nothing arose. Just sad. Nothing apparently triggered it. While sitting there, my homie called and I confessed to her to my sadness and my inability to find the trigger. I simply talked to her about various things, and afterward I realized I felt cheerful again. I am held and made whole by others. Saying these things, I realized I need to break that pattern of sinking deeper into the couch, so I sit in the neighborhood diner where there's not too many people, but I'm not alone. I'm better able to look at the bad news that depresses me.

Rachel over at Terrible Wonderful World eloquently expresses a similar mixture of grief and dismay, though more eloquently. "How do I begin to express the cold fury, the wrenching grief I feel? Day after day after day, we hear about more people being blown to bits in places far away--far away, but where I have family. Yes, I have family over there. We all have family over there. (Brothers and sisters...in the human family.)" Alone on a walk, she ponders the state of things. She says, "Where is my optimism this morning? My faith in human wisdom? My hope for the future? Must be here somewhere...[searching pockets]...though I can't seem to find 'em at the moment. A laugh or two will help... Another thing that helps: remembering last night. The world may be going to hell in a handbasket, but some refuge can be found in the arms of my lover. H., you are a dear, sweet man." This helped me clarify my own confusing inconsistency, it is through being with others, loving others, that I find peace and happiness. Here in the cafe and bar, I am happier to be sharing breathing space with my neighbors, even if I don't know them.

And that leads me into my thoughts on interconnection, and how that could be our salvation in this world bent on a hellish distopian post-oil future. I don't have all my thoughts pulled together, certainly it's not complete, but maybe by putting it out there I and others can give it shape. I visited my other homie and his family last night and gave voice to a piece of that thought. We need to build our communities, our connections, and create our future for ourselves. We need to create our own sustainable neighborhoods, our towns. I mentioned this also to my visitors from Albany the other day. They said they need to bring me into their circle...that they fantasize about building a town that is self-sustaining. I seem to recall reading about a town in California that is doing this very thing. Could it be Davis? I said, "We need to ignore what our government is doing." By that I meant that we not participate in the consumerist imperialist policy of the plutocracy that controls our government and the mainstream media, as best we can. My friend's wife aptly realized it was not a thought that would work well in the Heartland, but we all realized we do have a chance here in Portland and Oregon. We already are building the infrastructures that we will need, not only community groups but the city itself.

I have learned from working with the loose peace network here that it isn't a figurehead, it isn't a single iconic figure that makes things happen, but a bunch of folks working together doing their little pieces of the whole. It takes enough people willing to step to the edge of their comfort zone, and it becomes easier as we forge ties, learn how to deal with the inevitable conflict. It is harder, and lonely, to view the march towards Armageddon alone. While the powers that be march closer to that goal (it sure feels like that, with rumbles of attacking Iran) those of us left behind can continue with this task of building a sustainable future. Of course we can't completely ignore them, we must continue to voice our differences, but we must also quietly go about our business the way we envision it.

Peaked oil, global warming, and perpetual war are heady ingredients for difficult times ahead. Visions of Soylent Green rattle around in my head, with updated science and the anti-science religious movement. We are not helpless though, we can effect a more hopeful transformation. It takes individual changes toward sustainability, and it takes towns and cities that plan development for walking, biking, and local agriculture. It takes caring relationships, people who nurture ties whether business or friendships, while not going back to the 'good ol' boys' days.

So just how does one survive the hydra? Heracles could chop off the heads, but he needed help from another to cauterize the wound and keep new heads from growing. In Buddhism we have the image of a sword that cuts through delusion. Our own karmic hydras can definitely be as vicious and grow new heads, and their blood as poisonous. We can't survive alone, and we must face this monster. In the end, Hercules couldn't kill it completely. He buried the final head alive.

(image from wikipedia)

Many-Headed Hydra

I'm finding myself in an odd twisted place of gloom and happiness, cynicism and faith, so much to say I've got nothing to say. What can I say that someone hasn't said? I feel the urge to hunker and nest, at least I can keep a happy home for my hard-working sweetie. Where'd that fifties throwback come from? I begin to see why sweet romantic comedies abounded in the forties. When you know the hell of war is tearing people apart daily, you want to remember the sweet half of our human nature. You want the fantasy of a happy ending, the ache of love rather than grief.

I've been hiding out from half-nakedness. I've been shrinking back from the narcissistic flashing of my inner musings. I know what puny efforts they are, and how silly. I've been more comfortable lately offering for others, but that too takes effort to come out my cave. When I feel resistant, I procrastinate. I count on a deadline, because if I don't have one, I don't do it.

Last week another march for peace ignored, another plea for peace treated as so much wishful thinking. People voted so overwhelmingly for Democrats that the votes overcame the black box fixes, yet who have we placed our faith in? People who posture with non-binding resolutions. I don't believe the Democrats really want to end the war. In my gloomier states of mind, I think either our illusionary democracy is held hostage by fear of attacks from within (remember the unsolved mystery of anthrax?) or by the plutocracy that holds the real reins of power. And those powers that be want to be the ones to have the last oil riches of the world. What a convenient piggy bank war is. The oil sits in the sand like cash in a bank while strife above the sand keeps the vault locked. While other countries continue to purge their reserves, those that have the money will not give up the banked oil in Iraq. I'm afraid we will never leave, whatever posturing the Democrats may do. If they meant it, they would stop the funding.

Last week while people marched in Washington, my own little peace group had a discussion about Peak Oil. See info here. There are experts who say we have reached the peak of global oil production. We can look forward to less oil that is more difficult to extract. The closer we come to scarcity it appears to me the more we obsessively consume.

Then there's global warming. Again it seems the more we experience tangible evidence, the more feverish our gluttonous denials. Stephen Colbert handles this so well. And isn't it nice to wrap up in a comfortable warm cocoon, to ride above others, untouchable, unharmable, in this moment? We are inundated with messages that this is good, feed the self, be happy, yet the creation of this monstrous greedy self inevitably brings us more suffering. Consuming the most in the world will not satisfy our need, will never satisfy our need.

So that is the gloomy stuff, bringing me down, making me feel hopeless. Are we doomed? Can we handle the inevitable change coming from the many-headed hydra of global warming, peaked oil, and war? Yet at the same time I am happy, most happy in loving others, connecting with others. Let me be the June Cleaver to my Steve. (Who'da thunk I'd ever say that?). Let me be the host of the tea party. (I had tea and cookies today with Bookmoochers from Albany, Oregon.) Let me be the beloved Sunday School teacher. Let me take this freedom I have learned from Buddhist practice and from daring to love, and give it to the world, because when I do so my love capacity just keeps getting bigger.

Here is where the faith mixes into this tangled mix of dogged activity and stillness in hiding. In Buddhism we don't have faith in something, we have faith that there is a point to all this effort. If we don't get results, we are told not to hang on to that faith. Faith is trust in the spiritual practice, and spiritual practice evolves. Faith evolves. Lately I have come to realize I place my trust in love.

I have not always been so free to love. Fear crippled my capacities. Fear cripples all our capacities. My Buddhist practice and my Zen teacher and my sangha friends helped me uncover and dissolve those hidden rooms fortified by fear. Clearing out the karma was not enough. If I was unmaking my self, I needed to remake my self to live in this physical world of relationships. I needed to meet conditions and learn how the self is made and unmade and remade by it's connections to others. I didn't know love was the key, but I was certainly drawn to it.

Love can be painful yet fortifying. Most of the pain comes from attachment. It is not love that causes trouble, but attachment. I learned it is possible to let go of attachment and continue to love, and that brings a freedom to love even more. There is still a kind of pain, though, in seeing unnecessary suffering, unnecessary cutting off from love. A friend (whom I love) pointed out that putting myself in such an open space can let in some negative stuff. So, maybe I need to allow for downtime, and quiet hidden times. Love tends towards fierce attachment. It takes practice to allow that to arise and fall, and at the same time experience that same love as complete acceptance.

Out of this tangled mix I begin to see the glimmer of an idea. It could be that very many-headed hydra that brings peace finally to this human condition so consistently marked by violence. If we survive the test. It has to do with interconnecting, and will take another post. (Hold me to that, folks.)