The Middle Way

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

The very purpose of spirituality is self-discipline. Rather than criticizing others, we should evaluate and criticize ourselves. Ask yourself, what am I doing about my anger, my attachment, my pride, my jealousy? These are the things we should check in our day to day lives. -- Dalai Lama 
 

Bullying has been in the news a lot lately. All over the country, every day, you’ll find news reports of its sometimes tragic aftermath and efforts to stop it. We feel outrage and ask why this is happening. We blame the kids, we blame the parents, we blame the schools, we blame TV or violent video games or Facebook or… 

Let’s instead hold up the mirror and take a long look at what our children see, every day. Like reality television shows whose ratings rely on berating contestants or trash talking each other. Or cable “news” channels where it’s standard operating procedure to replace facts with hyberbole at best and untruths and half truths at worst. Or debates with candidates vying for the US Presidency where the debate sponsor encourages a reality TV atmosphere, with predictable results. Where being angry and shouting over those you disagree with and calling them names, denigrating them and everything they stand for, is standard operating procedure. 

Maybe politics has always been a brutal contact sport but the rest of life didn’t used to be. I remember. I remember listening to conservatives like William Buckley, and while as I grew older, I didn’t share many of his political views, I never felt like shouting at my TV when he espoused them. I remember when facts were facts -- not something that had a left or right spin.

Sometimes it seems we’ve lost our ability to talk across these social and political divides. It’s easy to avoid each other or even hearing the same news; modern society provides us with our own echo chambers. There are very few opportunities to leave them and hold real dialogues. 

Every now and then, something breaks through and we see – for a moment – just people with different views, having a real conversation. Like this recent interview with Jon Stewart and Republican Senator Jim DeMint. Like the U.S. House of Representatives coming together to demonstrate respect for a colleague – and each other – when Rep. Gabby Giffords resigned. 

Some would say we respect civility but we reward rudeness. I would agree. And yet, every time I make a choice to read the story with the leering headline, I’m rewarding the kind of behavior I want to see less of. It may be part of our evolutionary conditioning to be drawn more to drama than to discussion – I get that. So does the media: angry people hurling accusations at each other draw eyes. It makes me wonder who profits from this constant “us versus them” state of affairs. 

By actively seeking out angry and tawdry behavior, by supporting diatribe over dialogue with those who believe differently than us -- well. It’s like letting the bullies win.

To Serve and Protect

“I want to save lives and serve my country.”

That’s what my son said at his swearing in ceremony earlier this week when asked why he’d chosen to serve in the Coast Guard.

And I -- who came of age to Bob Dylan’s raging Masters of War, violent protests in the streets and on college campuses, and a deep suspicion of government in the wake of Kent State and Watergate – felt humbled by my son’s conviction of purpose.

On the day he shipped out, we got up before dawn so I could deliver him to the Military Entrance Processing Station by 05:45. I don’t think he got more than an hour or two of sleep and I could see by the set of his jaw and the pallor of his face that he was tired and nervous.

I came back later in the morning and met my son’s traveling companion, the only other Coastie shipping out that day, as well as a newly commissioned Seaman who had graduated a week earlier. He was on hand to answer any questions about what the new recruits could expect over the next eight weeks. Both found this helpful (along with the reminder, “It’s only 8 weeks”).

I also met his recruiter, who fleshed out a few details about the graduation date and advised me to book a room soon; mid-July is high tourist season in trendy Cape May, New Jersey. 

My son’s fiancé -- a first year medical student in the middle of year-end exams -- arrived in time for the formal swearing in. Afterwards, we went to the airport and said our final goodbyes. 

Not a waking hour goes by that I don’t wonder what my son is doing – how he’s managing, whether he’s sleeping OK, how he’s feeling. Previous separations always included the comfort of email, text messages, phone calls and chat to keep us in touch. For the next eight weeks, it will only be letters quaintly sent by US mail.

The times that shaped my son are different than those that shaped me. He’s made a choice I cannot imagine having made for myself, nor would necessarily have chosen for him. And yet I’m proud of his determination to succeed and the sacrifices he’s making to pursue this career he aspires to. 

My thoughts stray often to him, warmly enveloping him in love and well wishes. And I’m looking forward to reuniting with the young Seaman who will greet me on the other side of these eight long weeks. 

Why Won't They Listen?

Why don't people believe climate scientists that anthropomorphic global warming is real and a growing threat?

This question puzzling scientists comes as no surprise to social scientists. NPR's All Things Considered ran a recent story highlighting research that shows a belief in climate change hinges on a person's world view. From NPR's story:

"To social scientist and lawyer Don Braman, it's not surprising that two people can disagree so strongly over science. Braman is on the faculty at George Washington University and part of The Cultural Cognition Project, a group of scholars who study how cultural values shape public perceptions and policy beliefs.

" 'People tend to conform their factual beliefs to ones that are consistent with their cultural outlook, their world view,' Braman says."

The Cultural Cognition group ran a series of experiments among people whose cultural beliefs were labeled individualistic -- those who embrace new technology, authority and free enterprise -- and communitarian -- those who are suspicious of authority or of commerce and industry. In a series of experiments, both groups formed vastly different opinions when presented with the same scientific facts.

"It doesn't matter whether you show them negative or positive information, they reject the information that is contrary to what they would like to believe, and they glom onto the positive information," Braman says.

It turns out that the messenger is also important. You don't send Al Gore to talk to climate skeptics; they won't be able to hear him with any sense of objectivity. To persuade the climate change discussion, scientists need to focus more on influencing the influencers in the skeptics' camp.

The broader implications go beyond climate science. Anyone watching the Health Care summit (as I did for 6 hours) could plainly see that the people sitting around the table were not convincing anyone to change their beliefs. Implacable, strained expressions -- all.

No one is immune to this. We all shape the world we live in by our particular belief systems. We are all resistant to changing our beliefs, even when confronted with evidence that's in direct conflict with them. Some of the most painful moments I've lived through came when I could no longer block a particular truth from penetrating my protective shield.

My own spiritual belief system involves constantly checking in to see whether what I am doing, saying or thinking is real or an illusion. It means I'm always striving to be open to change a long-held belief by paying careful attention to where I'm getting my information.

And it's likely to keep me busy for the rest of my life.

Snowed In

I have never outgrown my love of snow. I feel the same wonder and delight today that I did as a child, watching it fall and muffle the sounds of a noisy world.

I know few share my love of snow, especially in a winter that's already seen more than usual. Here's something for those who do.

 

Shoveling Snow With Buddha
Billy Collins

In the usual iconography of the temple or the local Wok
you would never see him doing such a thing,
tossing the dry snow over a mountain
of his bare, round shoulder,
his hair tied in a knot,
a model of concentration.

Sitting is more his speed, if that is the word
for what he does, or does not do.

Even the season is wrong for him.
In all his manifestations, is it not warm or slightly humid?
Is this not implied by his serene expression,
that smile so wide it wraps itself around the waist of the universe?

But here we are, working our way down the driveway,
one shovelful at a time.
We toss the light powder into the clear air.
We feel the cold mist on our faces.
And with every heave we disappear
and become lost to each other
in these sudden clouds of our own making,
these fountain-bursts of snow.

This is so much better than a sermon in church,
I say out loud, but Buddha keeps on shoveling.
This is the true religion, the religion of snow,
and sunlight and winter geese barking in the sky,
I say, but he is too busy to hear me.

He has thrown himself into shoveling snow
as if it were the purpose of existence,
as if the sign of a perfect life were a clear driveway
you could back the car down easily
and drive off into the vanities of the world
with a broken heater fan and a song on the radio.

All morning long we work side by side,
me with my commentary
and he inside his generous pocket of silence,
until the hour is nearly noon
and the snow is piled high all around us;
then, I hear him speak.

After this, he asks,
can we go inside and play cards?

Certainly, I reply, and I will heat some milk
and bring cups of hot chocolate to the table
while you shuffle the deck.
and our boots stand dripping by the door.

Aaah, says the Buddha, lifting his eyes
and leaning for a moment on his shovel
before he drives the thin blade again
deep into the glittering white snow.

And Now, A Word From Our Sponsors...

I guess I’m not done yet with this topic of the Corporate States of America.

As we move corporate political donations from behind the (thin) curtain that maintained an appearance of fair play (if not the reality), what might we look forward to? Brand placements in political ads – “Vote No on Issue 1, brought to you by Buy N Large” (nods to WALL-E and my son)? How about in the chambers of Congress?  Whole state delegations could compete for sponsorship dollars! Imagine Congressional seats decked out with decals, a la NASCAR (thanks, Stan!). And why stop at the Halls of Congress? There’s a whole White House to conquer!

Yep – we’ll finally get this country running like a well-oiled machine. Of course, not everyone is up to the task of being a worthy denizen, but I’m sure our corporate-led government will find ways to maximize profits through strategic outsourcing, “rightsizing” and other corporate efficiency programs. Imagine – an entire nation in transition! Generous outplacement and philanthropic programs will handle the deserving hard cases; religious and other not-for-profit organizations can manage the rest.

<irony off>

We’re at another moment in U.S. history where greed and righteous indignation are tearing us apart. We have tone-deaf bankers who can’t understand why million dollar bonuses are morally and ethically wrong; legislators and political parties who can think no further than the next election cycle; and strident media voices stirring up populist anger to accept no negotiation or compromise on any issue. Differences of opinion become chasms no one is willing or able to bridge. And now the highest court in the land has ruled it’s acceptable to give the largest “haves” in our country the unlimited ability to buy the power they seek.

What price victory? In the words of one of our country’s original sponsors:

"Much indeed to be regretted, party disputes are now carried to such a length, and truth is so enveloped in mist and false representation, that it is extremely difficult to know through what channel to seek it. This difficulty to one who is of no party, and whose sole wish is to pursue with undeviating steps a path which would lead this country to respectability, wealth, and happiness, is exceedingly to be lamented. But such, for wise purposes, it is presumed, is the turbulence of human passions in party disputes, when victory more than truth is the palm contended for." -- George Washington, in a letter to Timothy Pickering, July 27, 1795

The Best That Money Can Buy

Coming on the heels of dire warnings that a 41st Republican Senator would most certainly derail health care reform, the Supreme Court -- acting against 100 years of precedent –- ruled that the government cannot ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections.

As I posited on Facebook, “does anyone else wonder, with yesterday's Supreme Court ruling granting corporations First Amendment Rights, whether we've officially ceded the US government to corporate interests?”

It’s impossible to predict how this will play out but no one doubts it will create major political consequences.  Almost certainly, we’ll be in for a slug fest of attack ads from outside interest groups at a level far beyond what we’ve seen before.

I’m having trouble understanding how ordinary citizens benefit from this ruling. While I can’t see many companies rushing to directly finance campaign ads because of public relations concerns, I can see a steep increase in activity by industry groups, funded by these very companies.  And it’s not at all unrealistic to envision a future where lobbyists essentially hold legislators hostage by giving them a glimpse of what they have in store for them should they vote against the corporate interest.

I don’t believe corporations are evil. I worked for one for most of my adult life. That said, what’s in the best interest of the corporation is not always what’s in the best interest of the people. Money has, does and always will talk –- but until yesterday’s ruling, there was at least a semblance of government of, by and for the people.  

Are we approaching a time when citizens must band together and incorporate in order to be heard and have influence with their elected representatives?

"Everything will be okay in the end.  If it's not okay, it's not the end." -- Unknown

Reading those words this morning was the equivalent of stopping and taking a deep breath. And reminding myself that the media and blogosphere feed on all the “ain’t it awful” drama. I can choose to get caught up in their chatter or -- pay attention to other things going on in the world around me.

I think I’m going to spend some time on those other things.

A Poignant Lesson on Attachment and Loss

This past Monday, I left my bracelet in the locker at my gym. Taking it off in the first place was a hard habit to get into; I never remove it except when I must -- my few hospital stays, airport security checkpoints and now, when I swim.

But that day I left it behind when I gathered my things. I realized it was missing about an hour after I got home, and rushed back to retrieve it. It was gone: whoever found it did not turn it in, nor has it shown up in the days since.

There’s a story behind this bracelet, and a story behind that story. The story is this: it belonged to my grandmother, who bought it from a Native American on the side of a dirt road somewhere in New Mexico or Arizona in the 1940’s. She and her husband had moved to Colorado after the war and explored much of the American southwest and Mexico by car, camping by roadsides. The bracelet is sand-cast silver and has the signature of its maker – a small bird – on the inside.

Like me, my grandmother always wore it.  It’s one of my earliest memories of her. She gave it to me during a last, long visit I made to see her – another in a series of solace-seeking trips for some trouble or another I was going through. The bracelet had begun bruising her thinning skin and she felt it was time to pass it on. Among all her granddaughters, she chose me: the one she always felt was most like her.

The story behind the story is that of my grandmother. Born at the end of the 19^th century, she lived a fascinating life. From her early days of privilege to the cash-strapped years of her teens, she had a fierce intelligence and independence.  Before her marriage in 1918, she was a dancer in Greenwich Village and acted in plays written for her by a doting playwright. She was also a member of the Socialist Club, best known today from Warren Beatty’s film, Reds, about one of its more famous members, John Reed.

Her marriage ended abruptly in 1929 when the car she was driving collided with a train at a crossing in Nyack, New York, on a foggy April night. My grandfather and another couple were killed; my grandmother spent 3 months recuperating in the hospital. She never walked properly again.

She remarried in the 1940’s and moved to Colorado. Max was Swiss and had also lived in South Africa before moving to the U.S., and he and my grandmother took many trips together. Often their transportation was as exotic as the trips themselves – tramp steamers and cargo planes, a reflection of Max’s thriftiness. I always loved to visit them; their home was filled with African masks, Peruvian pottery, Indian cloth and Chinese paper paintings, and smelled of spices and faraway places.

Now I’ve lost the most visible connection to the grandmother I admired and adored. It’s a visible, visceral loss and I feel tears pricking my eyelids every time I think about it.

The bracelet may yet turn up. Whether it does or doesn’t, I’ve been thinking a lot about the Buddhist concept of attachment.

It’s a complex concept that’s often misinterpreted, but the explanation in this article does a reasonable job of summarizing: “Attachments are sim­ple beliefs … that have become solidified as ‘truth’ in our minds. They also partake of the energy of desire, which is based on the underlying belief that without some par­ticular person or thing, we can never be free from suffering.”

My attachment comes in equating this bracelet to my grandmother, and feeling like I’ve lost a part of myself in losing it. It comes in giving up the warm fantasy of passing it on to my own granddaughter someday, along with the stories that accompany it – my grandmother’s and my own.

In the end, it's just a thing, not a substitute for my life memories of my grandmother. I'll always carry those with me. Or so I remind myself as I once again unconsciously reach over to adjust the bracelet that's no longer around my wrist.

“Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night….”

I had lunch last week with some former colleagues, all of whom -- like me -- accepted early retirement packages our company offered to qualified employees.

Even without that incentive, it had become common practice for people to leave our company by age 55 because of the generous retirement benefits, including health insurance. In fact, as one of my lunch companions told me, the system had evolved over time to implicitly encourage this trend. The buyouts simply accelerated that process.

Some of us skipped out joyfully; some of us looked around and realized that -- ready or not -- it was time to go; some of us left kicking and screaming.

The common thread?  Whether it was seeking full-time or part-time re-employment; consulting, or working on contract; starting our own companies or buying a franchise:  many of us weren’t ready (or able) to stop working.

The latest exodus of early corporate retirees joins a flood of 50+ adults losing their jobs due to the punishing recession. Any way you look at it, there’s an amazing number of highly skilled, hard working people looking for ways to continue being productive.

And yet connecting people in this age group with opportunities is difficult.

This isn’t a piece about how to do an effective job search for the over 50 crowd.  AARP has some good advice; so does Workforce50. I’m more interested in exploring the opportunities for lifelong employment.

Case in point: in July, my former employer contacted me about taking over part of my old job -- the part I never had time for as an employee and felt constantly guilty about, as a result.  To borrow from the jargon I worked so hard to banish from company communications, it was a “win-win” proposition: the company would cede handling of an important (but not strategic) aspect of its work to someone with the knowledge, skills and interest to competently manage the work. And may I add, with enthusiasm!

Getting to “yes” required a lengthy co-employment evaluation to ensure I wasn’t a threat to the company’s retirement plan.  But what if retired employees were considered a strategic asset rather than a potential threat?  What might that look like?

• People could retire but still be part of an accessible database when the company needed their expertise. In fact, there’s been a move to tap into retired talent. For example, Your Encore “was created to tap into our country’s under-utilized asset: the growing number of retired and veteran scientists.” But while companies participating in the program encourage their retirees to register, you’re unlikely to find much on offer unless you’ve worked in a technical field.
  
  There are also a number of job listing sites catering to the 50+ crowd. In Canada, Retired Worker promises to connect employers “with the skills, knowledge and experience of Baby Boomers.” WiserWorker and Retirement Jobs appear to do the same for a U.S. audience. All these options, though, are simply job search sites; they don’t screen people and match their skills with employer needs.
  
  
• Employment status could be on a continuum, from full-time with benefits to intermittent with none, and variations in-between.  In other words, you would never truly leave the company – you would just move from one state to another, with diminishing levels of company support as your situation changed or you aged. 
  
  I found some examples of companies who are actually doing this. According to this article on BNet, “Monsanto brings back retirees as temporary workers or part-timers to fill gaps and reduce costs…Monsanto estimates that it saves 12-15 percent by using retirees instead of traditional temps.”  The article also lists “the customer service center of a major national bank [that] keeps track of employees who are about to retire from other parts of the organization and then proactively recruits them, offering part-time, flexible hours…cutting down on recruiting costs.”  

 As it happens, while I was working on this post, someone called to ask for my help with a project linking retired workers with nonprofit jobs. In the course of our conversation, she pointed me to Civic Ventures, “a think tank on boomers, work, and social purpose.”  Of the many available resources on the site, the one I spent the most time on, and ended up registering with, was Encore Careers. It offers advice, articles and communities where you can connect with other “second life” searchers.

Baby Boomers are entering their retirement years to the strains of Dylan Thomas’s “Do not go gentle into that good night.” Through sheer numbers, we’ve been a force of social change our entire lives. We’ll continue to shape and redefine what it means to be retired, just as we have with every other milestone we’ve encountered. It’s too early to know what that means, but the view from here is that we’ll continue finding meaningful ways of contributing, for profit or not, until well into the traditional golden years.

A Conversation on Climate Change

It started off simply. An email from my conservative brother, distraught about cap and trade legislation that had passed the U.S. House. Just another in a long-running policy debate between him and his liberal older sister.

I admitted the legislation was flawed but not final: the Senate had yet to weigh in. And I asked him this question: “Given that this is an even more dire issue for the future of our children and grandchildren than any other, what ideas do you support for curbing greenhouse gases and creating a more sustainable society?”

That’s when for me, the conversation became surreal. Because it turns out my brother – like many other US citizens, mostly of a conservative bent -- doesn’t believe in global warming.

And so began a conversation that ultimately included my friend, Bob Grumbine – a real, live climate scientist I dragged in to counter what I believed to be bad science. I could turn this post into a play-by-play description of that conversation, but that’s not fair to my brother or my friend. Especially when my biggest insight was about my own ignorance.

So I write this as a thank you to my brother, who started the conversation. And to Bob, for clearly explaining the science behind the issues my brother raised, then pointing me to other knowledgeable resources.

Did the data sway my brother? I don’t know. One of Bob’s comments haunts me: “If you can't examine the science without letting fears about your wallet dictate whether you accept the science, you're really not going to understand the science.”  We seem incapable of moving beyond ideology when it comes to the science of climate change.  And general ignorance of science is a big part of the issue.

That would be me. I tuned out all things science long ago, certainly by the time I took high school chemistry. “We’re words people,” my father used to say. As if the ability to communicate effectively doesn’t apply to science or math. But I absorbed this because truthfully, science and math didn’t come as naturally – or interest me – the way language and history did.

So it’s hypocritical of me to point to the ignorance of the doubters when I’m just as ignorant about the science supporting climate change. It doesn’t help that the scientists who know the most write about it in ways that make it inaccessible to the average non-scientist.

There’s increasing discussion among scientists, themselves, about the need for communicating effectively with the general public. Michael Tobis, who blogs at Only In It For The Gold, says, “ I believe that increased alienation between experts and the public during the past generation, notably in America but also elsewhere, is the single greatest threat humanity faces.”  And Randy Olson, scientist, filmmaker and author of Don’t Be Such a Scientist, asks, “How bad is the situation with scientists and their communication skills? Well, I think it’s at a crisis stage.”

I began reading Tobis’s blog at Bob’s suggestion. While I admit I’m completely lost reading some of his posts on climate change science, I appreciate his passion, which often comes across in humorous and irreverent ways. And I felt like he was talking directly to me when he said:

“I believe that the present topic is the keystone issue of the survival of civilization. I believe that the increased alienation between experts and the public during the past generation, notably in America but also elsewhere, is the single greatest threat humanity faces. It subsumes not just climate, but also food security, energy security, health, war and peace, and ultimately the preservation of any human accomplishment worth preserving. If we accept that humanity freely chooses its destiny, we had damned well better improve our competence. “[Italics mine.]

Tobis also pointed me to science teacher Greg Craven, whose YouTube videos led him to write a book, What’s the Worst That Could Happen?  Although Craven clearly comes out in support of the science behind global warming, his book doesn’t try to talk nonbelievers to his side. Instead, he provides a way to do your own risk analysis, offering the supporting arguments for both sides.

I’m still not as knowledgeable as I’d like about the science of climate change. Thanks to Bob and others, though, I can at least explain why we should be concerned by a CO2 level of 385 parts per million (ppm), rising about 2 ppm/year, and why these increases cannot be attributed to normal warming trends.

It’s a start.

When Procrastination meets Mindlessness

It's not yet noon and I've been having one of those mornings that defines having a bad day.

Because I was intending to take my son's car to the shop for service following my morning swim, I grabbed his key and what I thought was a house key on my way out the door this morning.  I didn't take my mobile phone, thinking I wouldn't need it. 

I noticed when I got to the gym that in my rush to get out the door, I'd not picked up a house key but my son's extra car key.  This would not have been a problem had the outside device for my garage's remote control been working.  It wasn't because I hadn't bothered to get it fixed.

I called my neighbor (who keeps an extra key for when I'm out of town) from a lifeguard's phone on the chance she was still home.  No dice.  Maybe I'd left a front window unlocked so I could break into the house through one of the windows facing my front porch?  Nope.

Next, I made the 40 minute round trip drive to my mother's house since I knew she had a key to my place.  Except when I got home, I found out she'd given me the wrong one. 

I finally remembered there was a ladder under the deck that I could use to enter an open window one side of the house.  Finally, success!  

Wait -- there's more. 

As I was walking back up the drive after putting the ladder away, I saw my son's car rolling down the driveway towards me. I couldn't stop it before it ran into the back yard and (thankfully) came to a stop just shy of the shed, whose low stone wall had stopped it before it could cause any damage. 

I had to stop and just breathe for a couple of minutes after that. Sometimes, that's all you can do.

Even before the car came rolling down the driveway, I knew that my inattentiveness in combination with a tendency to put off dealing with things as they arise had combined to create a perfect storm of unpleasantness.  At other times in my life, such a series of events would have put me in a funk for the whole day.

Instead, I took this for the lesson in mindfulness I obviously needed. Mindfulness can be described as full-minded awareness, paying conscious and purposeful attention to what you're doing from moment to moment. 

It's easy to go into automatic pilot and unconsciously go through daily routines.  Maybe you're tired or stressed out from work or personal issues, and you just aren't really "there."

Recognizing I was having a problem with being fully present, I made myself slow down and consciously consider what I was doing next, and next and next.  I got the car delivered to the shop without further incident, and back home safe and sound. I called the company that installed my garage door opener, where they told me I likely just needed a new battery for the outside fixture and talked me through how to install it.

And I have an extra house key I'll put in my son's car, just in case something like this happens again.