This Still CAN and DOES Happen!

    This powerful true story was told by Naomi Shihab Nye, Arab American poet, editor, songwriter, & novelist, born to a Palestinian father and an American mother. Her story was posted (more than once) by Joel & Michelle Levey (WisdomAtWork.com), a well-known American Buddhist couple of Jewish heritage. 
    Enjoy:

Gate A-4
by Naomi Shihab Nye

    "Wandering around the Albuquerque Airport Terminal, after learning
my flight had been delayed for four hours, I heard an announcement: 'If anyone in the vicinity of Gate A-4 understands any Arabic, please come to the gate immediately.'

    Well -- one pauses these days. Gate A-4 was my own gate. I went there.

    An older woman in full traditional Palestinian embroidered dress, just like my grandma wore, was crumpled to the floor, wailing loudly. 'Help,' said the flight service person. 'Talk to her. What is her problem? We told her the flight was going to be late and she did this.'

    I stooped to put my arm around the woman and spoke to her haltingly. 'Shu-dow-a, Shu-bid-uck Habibti? Stani schway, Min fadlick, Shu-bit-se-wee?' The minute she heard any words she knew, however poorly used, she stopped crying. She thought the flight had been cancelled entirely. She needed to be in El Paso for major medical treatment the next day. I said, 'No, we're fine, you'll get there, just later, who is picking you up? Let's call him.'

    We called her son and I spoke with him in English. I told him I would stay with his mother till we got on the plane and would ride next to her -- Southwest. She talked to him. Then we called her other sons just for the fun of it. Then we called my dad and he and she spoke for a while in Arabic and found out of course they had ten shared friends. Then I thought just for the heck of it why not call some Palestinian poets I know and let them chat with her? This all took up about two hours.

    She was laughing a lot by then. Telling about her life, patting my knee, answering questions. She had pulled a sack of homemade mamool cookies -- little powdered sugar crumbly mounds stuffed with dates and nuts -- out of her bag -- and was offering them to all the women at the gate.

    To my amazement, not a single woman declined one. It was like a sacrament. The traveler from Argentina, the mom from California, the lovely woman from Laredo -- we were all covered with the same powdered sugar. And smiling. There is no better cookie.

    And then the airline broke out free beverages from huge coolers and two little girls from our flight ran around serving us all apple juice and they were covered with powdered sugar, too. And I noticed my new best friend--by now we were holding hands--had a potted plant poking out of her bag, some medicinal thing, with green furry leaves. Such an old country tradition. Always carry a plant. Always stay rooted to somewhere.

    And I looked around that gate of late and weary ones and I thought, This is the world I want to live in. The shared world. Not a single person in that gate -- once the crying of confusion stopped -- seemed apprehensive about any other person. They took the cookies. I wanted to hug all those other women, too.

    This can still happen anywhere.  Not everything is lost."

 

     A decade or so ago, a young woman in one of my (then in-person) mindfulness classes shared a true story about her young daughter. 
    Once when the little girl was very upset, she had told her to be a big girl, behave etc. The little girl admonished her that that didn't help at all. "When I'm upset, I need you to hug me, tell me you love me, and bring me my teddy bear." 
    So, the next time her daughter became upset, Mom did exactly as requested, and both of them were quickly soothed & happy.

 

    “In love it often feels as if we’re glimpsing the hidden architecture of the world …” 
    Pico Iyer. “Aflame. Learning from Silence.” Riverhead Books, 2025.

    In the above quote, the author might be comfortable exchanging ‘architecture’ with ‘force,' 'energy' or 'lifeblood’. 
    And 'love' is not only romantic, but perhaps even more applicable in the love one feels for everyone & everything, like heat radiating out of one's chest. Loving Kindness Meditation is a superb practice to help gradually melt the protective shield around one's heart. http://www.johnlovas.com/2022/12/deeper-dimensions-of-acceptance.html .
    Gradually, our heart & mind become less-and-less dominated by fear, and more-and-more guided by unconditional love. 
    We MUST take unconditional love seriously and actually practice it. OTHERWISE its opposite - fear, anger, hatred & violence dominate, and the meltdown of civilization begins.

 

"The Divine is not high above us. 
It is in heaven, it is in earth,
it is inside of each of us.”
Morihei Ueshiba Sensei, 
"The Art of Peace"

 

"Active Hope" - Joanna Macy

Skillfully Responding to Aggression

     Fear, anger, & impatience to achieve a goal, which upon deep reflection is usually seen to be self-serving rather than altruistic, seem to cause violence.
     The ego is, according to Buddhist understanding, the very last thing we release before full awakening. The Buddha, Jesus, Gandhi, Mandela, Martin-Luther King Jr. etc all seemed to have been consistently nonviolent, despite severe provocation. 
     A couple of old stories:

     “Once upon a time there was a conquering army going through villages, killing and pillaging as it went. The soldiers caused terror in the hearts of the people in the countryside, and were especially harsh with the monks they found in the monasteries, not only humiliating them but often subjecting them to terrible physical torture.
     There was one particularly harsh army captain who was infamous for his cruelty, and when he arrived in a certain town, he asked his adjutant for a report about the people who lived there. His inferior reported: ‘All the people are very frightened of you and are bowing down to you.’ This gave the captain great pleasure, of course. Then the adjutant continued, ‘In the local monastery all the monks have fled to the mountains in terror. Except for one monk.’
     Hearing this, the captain became furious and rushed to the monastery in search of the monk who dared defy him. When he pushed open the gates, there in the middle of the courtyard stood the monk, watching him without fear. The captain walked up to him and asked in his haughtiest voice, ‘Don’t you know who I am? Why, I could take my sword and run it through your belly without blinking an eye!’
     ‘And don’t you know who I am?’ replied the monk, gently. ‘I could have your sword run through my belly without blinking an eye.’ It is said that the captain, recognizing the greater truth of the moment, sheathed his sword, bowed, and left.”

~

     “A big burly samurai comes to the roshi (Zen priest) and says, ‘Tell me the nature of heaven and hell.’ 
     And the roshi looks him in the face and says; ‘Why should I tell a scruffy, disgusting, miserable slob like you?’ The samurai starts to get purple in the face, his hair starts to stand up, but the roshi won't stop, he keeps saying, ‘A miserable worm like you, do you think I should tell you anything?’ Consumed by rage, the samurai draws his sword, and he's just about to cut off the head of the roshi. Then the roshi says, ‘That's hell.’ 
     The samurai, who is in fact a sensitive person, instantly gets it, that he just created his own hell; he was deep in hell. It was black and hot, filled with hatred, self-protection, anger, and resentment, so much so that he was going to kill this man. Tears fill his eyes and he starts to cry and he puts his palms together and the roshi says, ‘That's heaven’."

     A skillful, evolved person may be able to disarm an aggressor, causing minimal harm, and ultimately even bring about benefit. If indeed "I am that" - how else are we to respond? If your left arm went into a spasm, wouldn't your able right arm treat it kindly?
     Coming from deep inner peace, awareness, silence, stillness, timelessness, patience, equanimity, and compassion, will result in a radically, qualitatively distinct response to aggression than when we were reacting from a fearful self-preservation reflex against "the other".

     An exceptional true story about the wise use of true power: http://www.johnlovas.com/2014/03/power-its-origin-how-to-use-it.html

Thus shall ye look on all this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in the stream,
A flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.
Gautama the Buddha

Look in the Mirror!

     It feels good to belong to a group that professes comforting values (especially when mere membership advertises some version of heaven). But because of our evolutionary history, we have a strong 'negativity bias'. And so behavior, which reflects actual values, can starkly contrast professed values. 
      The more fear, anger, greed & hatred we harbor, the more likely we are to elect a nasty brute who shares our actual values: "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I shall fear no evil, because I'm the meanest son-of-a-bitch in the valley."

     "Every nation gets the government it deserves." Joseph de Maistre 

     "The truth is, going against the internal stream of ignorance is way more rebellious than trying to start some sort of cultural revolution... The inner revolution will not be televised or sold on the Internet. It must take place within one's own mind and heart... Waking up is not a selfish pursuit of happiness, it is a revolutionary stance, from the inside out, for the benefit of all beings in existence." Noah Levine

The Reality of War

     "Of course, war and the large military establishments are the greatest sources of violence in the world. Whether their purpose is defensive or offensive, these vast powerful organizations exist solely to kill human beings. We should think carefully about the reality of war. Most of us have been conditioned to regard military combat as exciting and glamorous - an opportunity for men to prove their competence and courage. Since armies are legal, we feel that war is acceptable; in general, nobody feels that war is criminal or that accepting it is a criminal attitude. In fact, we have been brainwashed. War is neither glamorous nor attractive. It is monstrous. Its very nature is one of tragedy and suffering.

     War is like a fire in the human community, one whose fuel is living beings. I find this analogy especially appropriate and useful. Modern warfare is waged primarily with different forms of fire, but we are so conditioned to see it as thrilling that we talk about this or that marvelous weapon as a remarkable piece of technology without remembering that, if it is actually used, it will burn living people. War also strongly resembles a fire in the way it spreads. If one area gets weak, the commanding officer sends in reinforcements. This is throwing live people onto a fire. But because we have been brainwashed to think this way, we do not consider the suffering of individual soldiers. No soldiers want to be wounded or die. None of his loved ones wants any harm to come to him. If one soldier is killed, or maimed for life, at least another five or ten people - his relatives and friends - suffer as well. We should all be horrified by the extent of this tragedy, but we are too confused.

     Frankly as a child, I too was attracted to the military. Their uniform looked so smart and beautiful. But that is exactly how the seduction begins. Children start playing games that will one day lead them in trouble. There are plenty of exciting games to play and costumes to wear other than those based on the killing of human beings. Again, if we as adults were not so fascinated by war, we would clearly see that to allow our children to become habituated to war games is extremely unfortunate. Some former soldiers have told me that when they shot their first person they felt uncomfortable but as they continued to kill it began to feel quite normal. In time, we can get used to anything.

     It is not only during times of war that military establishments are destructive. By their very design, they are the single greatest violators of human rights, and it is the soldiers themselves who suffer most consistently from their abuse. After the officer in charge has given beautiful explanations about the importance of the army, its discipline and the need to conquer the enemy, the rights of the great mass of soldiers are almost entirely taken away. They are then compelled to forfeit their individual will, and, in the end, to sacrifice their lives. Moreover, once an army has become a powerful force, there is every risk that it will destroy the happiness of its own country.

     There are people with destructive intentions in every society, and the temptation to gain command over an organization capable of fulfilling their desires can become overwhelming. But no matter how malevolent or evil are the many murderous dictators who can currently oppress their nations and cause international problems, it is obvious that they cannot harm others or destroy countless human lives if they don't have a military organization accepted and condoned by society. As long as there are powerful armies there will always be danger of dictatorship. If we really believe dictatorship to be a despicable and destructive form of government, then we must recognize that the existence of a powerful military establishment is one of its main causes.

     Militarism is also very expensive. Pursuing peace through military strength places a tremendously wasteful burden on society. Governments spend vast sums on increasingly intricate weapons when, in fact, nobody really wants to use them. Not only money but also valuable energy and human intelligence are squandered, while all that increases is fear.

     I want to make it clear, however, that although I am deeply opposed to war, I am not advocating appeasement. It is often necessary to take a strong stand to counter unjust aggression. For instance, it is plain to all of us that the Second World War was entirely justified. It "saved civilization" from the tyranny of Nazi Germany, as Winston Churchill so aptly put it. In my view, the Korean War was also just, since it gave South Korea the chance of gradually developing democracy. But we can only judge whether or not a conflict was vindicated on moral grounds with hindsight. For example, we can now see that during the Cold War, the principle of nuclear deterrence had a certain value. Nevertheless, it is very difficult to assess all such matters with any degree of accuracy. War is violence and violence is unpredictable. Therefore, it is better to avoid it if possible, and never to presume that we know beforehand whether the outcome of a particular war will be beneficial or not.

     For instance, in the case of the Cold War, though deterrence may have helped promote stability, it did not create genuine peace. The last forty years in Europe have seen merely the absence of war, which has not been real peace but a facsimile founded fear. At best, building arms to maintain peace serves only as a temporary measure. As long as adversaries do not trust each other, any number of factors can upset the balance of power. Lasting peace can only assuredly be secured on the basis of genuine trust."

       Dalai Lama       http://www.dalailama.com/messages/world-peace/the-reality-of-war  

The Refinement of Mind

     The step-wise process of refining the mind is comparable to refining gold - removing the grossest impurities first, then progressively more subtle impurities, until only pure gold remains.

     "... in the case of a practitioner devoted to practice, there may be such gross impurities as unskillful conduct in deeds, words, and thoughts. Such conduct the follower of the way gives up, puts away, lets go, and relinquishes.
     When one has abandoned these there may still remain such impurities of a moderate degree as lustful, angry, and violent thoughts. Such thoughts the follower of the way gives up, puts away, lets go, and relinquishes.
     When one has abandoned these, there may still remain grasping to special states of meditation.
     Thus concentration is not yet properly calm or refined; it has not attained to full tranquillity, nor has it achieved mental unification. But there comes a time when the practitioner's mind gains firmness within, settles down, becomes unified and concentrated. With such a concentration the practitioner is able to direct the mind to states of higher insight.
     Having completed this initial purification, a follower of the way devoted to practice should from time to time direct attention to three qualities of mind ... concentration, energetic effort, and equanimity. If one gives regular attention to these, then one's mind will become pliant, workable, lucid, and not unwieldy, and it will be well concentrated upon overcoming all fetters and attachments."
       adapted from the Anguttara Nikaya, translated by Nyanaponika Thera 
       Jack Kornfield, Gil Fronsdal eds. “Teachings of the Buddha.” Shambhala, Boston, 2007.
 

Lightening Up

"The ultimate weakness of violence
is that it is a descending spiral,
begetting the very thing that it seeks to destroy ...
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."

Martin Luther King Jr

WisdomAtWork.com

 

Being Swept away by Tribal Hatred is Easy - Only Evolved Human Beings can Live Wisely

     "The religion of blood and war is face to face with that of peace.”                Winston S. Churchill


     "It's far easier to fight for principles than to live up to them..."                       Adlai E. Stevenson


     “The nation that will insist on drawing a broad line of demarcation between the fighting man and the thinking man is liable to find its fighting done by fools and its thinking done by cowards.”         Thucydides
 
 
     “Dad, how do soldiers killing each other solve the world's problems?”               Bill Watterson


     “Older men declare war. But it is youth that must fight and die.”                          Herbert Hoover


     “Whenever you are confronted with an opponent, conquer him with love.”         Mahatma Gandhi


     "That man is best who sees the truth himself. Good too is he who listens to wise counsel. But who is neither wise himself nor willing to ponder wisdom is not worth a straw."         Hesiod 
 

                                 “War is over ... IF you want it.”                 John Lennon


        Our Choice: http://mindfulnessforeveryone.blogspot.ca/2013/08/381-each-moment-new-beginning.html

Power, its Origin, & How to Use it

     An exceptional true story about authentic power:

     “The train clanked and rattled through the suburbs of Tokyo on a drowsy spring afternoon. Our car was comparatively empty – a few housewives with their kids in tow; some old folks going shopping. I gazed absently at the drab houses and dusty hedgerows.
     At one station the doors opened, and suddenly the afternoon quiet was shattered by a man bellowing violent, incomprehensible curses. The man staggered into the car. He wore laborer’s clothing, and he was big, drunk, and dirty. Screaming, he swung at a woman holding a baby. The blow sent her spinning into the laps of an elderly couple. It was a miracle that the baby was unharmed. 
     Terrified, the couple jumped up and scrambled toward the other end of the car. The laborer aimed a kick at the retreating back of the old woman but missed as she scuttled to safety. This so enraged the drunk that he grabbed the metal pole in the center of the car and tried to wrench it out of its stanchion. I could see that one of his hands was cut and bleeding. The train lurched ahead, the passengers frozen with fear. I stood up. 
     I was young then, some twenty years ago, and in pretty good shape. I had been putting in a solid eight hours of aikido training every day for the past three years. I liked to throw and grapple. I thought I was tough. Trouble was, my martial arts skill was untested in actual combat. As students of aikido, we were not allowed to fight. 
     ‘Aikido,’ my teacher had said again and again, ‘is the art of reconciliation. Whoever has the mind to fight has broken his connection to the universe. If you try to dominate people, you are already defeated. We study how to resolve conflict, not how to start it.’ 
     I listened to his words. I tried hard. I even went so far as to cross the street to avoid the chimpara, the pinball punks who lounged around the train stations. My forebearance exalted me. I felt both tough and holy. In my heart, however, I wanted an absolutely legitimate opportunity whereby I might save the innocent by destroying the guilty. 
     This is it! I said to myself as I got to my feet. People are in danger. If I don’t do something fast, somebody will probably get hurt. 
     Seeing me stand up, the drunk recognized a chance to focus his rage. ‘Aha!’ he roared. ‘A foreigner! You need a lesson in Japanese manners!’ 
     I held on lightly to the commuter strap overhead and gave him a slow look of disgust and dismissal. I planned to take this turkey apart, but he had to make the first move. I wanted him mad, so I pursed my lips and blew him an insolent kiss. 
     ‘All right!’ he hollered. ‘You’re gonna get a lesson.’ He gathered himself for a rush at me. 
     A split second before he could move, somebody shouted, ‘Hey!’ It was earsplitting. I remember the strangely joyous, lilting quality of it – as though you and a friend had been searching diligently for something and he had suddenly stumbled upon it. ‘Hey!’ 
     I wheeled to my left; the drunk spun to his right. We both stared down at a little old Japanese. He must have been well into his seventies, this tiny gentleman, sitting there immaculate in his kimono. He took no notice of me, but beamed delightedly at the laborer, as though he had a most important, most welcome secret to share. 
     ‘C’mere,’ the old man said in an easy vernacular, beckoning to the drunk. ‘C’mere and talk with me.’ He waved his hand lightly. 
     The big man followed, as if on a string. He planted his feet belligerently in front of the old gentleman, and roared above the clacking wheels. ‘Why the hell should I talk to you?’ The drunk now had his back to me. If his elbow moved so much as a millimeter, I’d drop him in his socks. 
     The old man continued to beam at the laborer. ‘What’cha been drinkin’?’ he asked, his eyes sparkling with interest. ‘I’ve been drinking sake,’ the laborer bellowed back, ‘and it’s none of your business!’ Flecks of spittle spattered the old man. 
     ‘Oh, that’s wonderful,’ the old man said, ‘absolutely wonderful! You see, I love sake too. Every night me and my wife (she’s 76, you know), we warm up a little bottle of sake and take it out into the garden, and we sit on an old wooden bench. We watch the sun go down, and we look to see how our persimmon tree is doing. My great-grandfather planted that tree, and we worry about whether it will recover from those ice storms we had last winter. Our tree has done better than I expected, though, especially when you consider the poor quality of the soil. It is gratifying to watch when we take our sake and go out to enjoy the evening – even when it rains!’ He looked up at the laborer, eyes twinkling. 
     As he struggled to follow the old man’s conversation, the drunk’s face began to soften. His fists slowly unclenched. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I love persimmons too….’ His voice trailed off. 
     ‘Yes,’ said the old man, smiling, ‘and I’m sure you have a wonderful wife.’ 
     ‘No,’ replied the laborer. ‘My wife died.’ Very gently, swaying with the motion of the train, the big man began to sob. ‘I don’t got no wife, I don’t got no home, I don’t got no job. I’m so ashamed of myself.’ Tears rolled down his cheeks; a spasm of despair rippled through his body. 
     Now it was my turn. Standing there in my well-scrubbed youthful innocence, my make-this-world-safe-for-democracy righteousness, I suddenly felt dirtier than he was. 
     Then the train arrived at my stop. As the doors opened, I heard the old man cluck sympathetically. ‘My, my,’ he said, ‘that is a difficult predicament, indeed. Sit down here and tell me about it.’ 
     I turned my head for one last look. The laborer was sprawled on the seat, his head in the old man’s lap. The old man was softly stroking the filthy, matted hair. 
     As the train pulled away, I sat down on a bench. What I had wanted to do with muscle had been accomplished with kind words. I had just seen aikido tried in combat, and the essence of it was love. I would have to practice the art with an entirely different spirit. It would be a long time before I could speak about the resolution of conflict.” 

     Dobson T. “A soft answer.” From: Nelson RF ed. “The overlook martial arts reader. Classic writings on philosophy and technique.” The Overlook Press, Woodstock NY, 1989. 
     More about the author: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Dobson

 

Persimmon   gardening.ktsa.com

Returning Home

     “Who we are and what we do to one another is shaped most deeply by how we know the other. Knowing in isolation or illusory objectivity creates distance from the other and this makes violence easier to imagine and justify. On the other hand, understanding or heartfulness builds connections and closes the distance between the self and other. Understanding serves as the centerpoint, the axis, of an education that turns the tide of radical disconnection. Character involves the development of wholeness, a self undivided, which includes the integration of the knowing heart.”

       Hart T. "From information to transformation. Education for the evolution of consciousness." Peter Lang Publishing, NY, 2009. 

Photo: David A. Lovas