You Are Enough

"You've heard it said that you can't please everyone," I said. Well, I'm here to tell you that you can't please anyone but yourself if that."

"Are you talking to me," asked the woman about to sit at the table next to ours.

"He's practicing for the little speech he's giving later today," said Lupe in response to the question.

"Oh," said the woman and sat down at the table apparently deciding that I was no real threat.

Now you're probably wondering what's going to happen next because you know as well as I that this Lupe, mature beyond her years full to the brim with particle physics and differential equations, is about as stable as a hot quark.

And you'd be right to wonder. With a manner that's usually reserved for BFFs, she leaned over to the woman and said, "You alone are enough. You have nothing to prove to anybody."

The woman, let's call her Solveigh because she had the look of someone who regularly spends weeks without seeing the sun.

"Excuse me?" said Solveigh. 

"Maya Angelou," said Lupe.

Solveigh turned her eyes to mine as though asking for assistance.

"Sorry," I said. "I'm a stranger here myself."

Solveigh turned to look at Lupe again. Now I was confused. I would think that once would be enough but apparently she's one of the devotees of Rumi and willing to give everyone the benefit of the doubt.

"If you look to others for validation, then you already have one foot on the banana skin," said Lupe and I'm sure she meant it to be an explanation.

Solveigh stood, picked up her latte, and headed for the door. Lupe watched her walk away.

"Too bad," I said. "I sensed that she has an interesting story to tell."

Lupe didn't reply.

"Don't you agree?" I asked.

"Well," said the godneice in a deeply thoughtful way, "you know what they say. You can measure the location or the momentum, but you can't measure both."

"Is this about quantum physics?" I asked.

"Isn't everything?" she said.

"Very true," I said. "Life comes hard and fast, especially when you're not paying attention."

National Coffee Day

So apparently September 29th is National Coffee Day, a day that means a lot to me as so many of the treasures in my life are directly related to and, in many cases, due to the consumption of infusions of that little, dark, bean. The infusions that I call Jah's Sweet Mercy because that's what it is, of course.

Not only has my life been blessed with the gifts redolent in a steaming cup of bohea, but many of the great men and women of history fueled their success on the shoulders of coffee. I'm certain of it. Probably,

I mean to say people like Catherine the Great couldn't have accomplished so much in so little time without the help of caffeine (and you shouldn't believe half those stories). 

I'm sure that I remember reading somewhere that Napoleon spoke highly of the beverage while exiled on that little island and for my part, I find it incredible that Alexander was able to get out of Macedonia without the stuff.

So you can readily understand that when I learned this morning that I had missed the celebration, I decided to celebrate by imbibing an extra cup or two, which is the only decent thing to do, so if you haven't already, do the right thing and stop by your favorite caffeine slinger's stand and enjoy a cup of bean.

Go Bean Traders!

This post was first published on October 1, 2012! I know! I've updated it on Sep 27, 2023! I know! Who'da thunk? I've added this postscript because this year September 29 will be the date of the Full Super Moon, the third one this year if my reckoning is correct. Just more reason to drink a cup of the steaming. Enjoy!

George Takei Believes in Me

Life comes hard and fast and if we aren't prepared, we can be overwhelmed by it. But it doesn't have to be that way. Fierce living keeps me free of the tyranny of emotional overload and I'm convinced that it will work for anyone. 

Sharing my personal life with the general public is not a little scary. Still, this morning I feel much better about it because I've been reading George Takei's blog. That's right. George Takei navigated the Starship Enterprise to destinations where no one had been before. And he didn't stop there.

Mr. Takei continues to chart new paths. George believes in the power of people to change the world. I'm convinced he believes that I can reach my goals if I just set a course and don't waver.

Several years ago I met a man who understood the pain and hopelessness that filled my life at the time. He suggested a different way of living, one that had completely transformed his life. I told him that I was afraid to try. Afraid that I would fail and be left hopeless. 

"You don't have to believe that it will work for you," said this man who I would later recognize as one of the winners in the game of life, "you only need to believe that I believe it works for me."

He explained that his life had changed so dramatically and all for the better because he followed a specific set of guidelines. If I followed those same guidelines, he said, then I would experience the same results that transformed his life. 

I followed his suggestions because I believed in him and it worked! Today I am free of the limitations of yesterday and I'd like to be an instrument of healing for others who suffer emotionally the way I have.

The most curious thing about the path I'm on is that when I do my best to help others, I reap the same benefits. It's a way of life that only works if you share it with others.

That's why I share the events of my life with others--to help them and to help me. It's sometimes funny and it's sometimes embarrassing. It's always a little scary for me, but hey! I believe in George Takei and he believes that I can do this so I keep doing it.

I know! George Takei believes in me! Life is good!

Controlled Spontaneity

When this old world is getting me down and people are just too much to deal with, I go for a walk along the path in Brunswick Forest--the path that surrounds the lake. That's what I did this morning. It's what I do every morning if it isn't pouring.

It's quiet and peaceful there. Azaleas and forsythia are blooming in the open spaces underneath the trees. Geese and ducks are guarding their nesting places in the shallows along the shores. Time slows down there and I can easily find a moment to hide in--a moment outside of time. The moment that Einstein missed in his equations.

The voices of crows, visions of egrets in flight, the warmth of morning sunshine on my skin, these and more fill my senses, heaped up, pressed down, and overflowing.

I learned in the zendo at the Zen Center in West Houston that any action coming out of a mindful state of consciousness was governed by controlled spontaneity. Like poetry, jazz, or kung fu, it's not something that you plan and rehearse; it's simply something you do.

Wynton Marsalis said that in jazz music, every moment is in crisis and you must bring all you have to bear on that crisis in the moment. Just like the poet, martial artist, and musician, there is no past or future, everything is right there in that moment. Life happens right now!

I was there in that moment as I walked the mindful path. But unlike the accomplished musician, my mood disorder sometimes allows bits of the other to slip into the moment. For me, it was noise from a nearby construction site, the whine of gasoline-powered leaf blowers, and the roar of 18-wheelers on the highway. Not a little anxiety was pressed down into my chest and ignored in my futile attempt to remain mindful.

When I crossed the street in the middle of the pedestrian walkway, the guy in the loud sports car approached me, in the middle of the walkway, at an uncomfortably high speed. 

"Off with his head!" screamed Amy from the emotion-control center of my brain. But I had the benefit of a mindful meditative walk on my side and I remained calm. 

Just like the poet, the martial artist, and the jazz musician, everything was in that moment. My action, resulting from the Zen state of mind, was one of controlled spontaneity. Fierce qigong! The finger happens!

It may seem a small matter to you; hardly worth writing a blog post about. But to me, it's a big deal and important for me to document it. Each time I read this post (and I do re-read them often) I'll be reminded that sometimes I am able to stay in control--sort of. I wonder what would have happened if the guy in the sports car had stopped.

But he didn't, did he? And that makes all the difference.

Defining Moments

"Ms. Wonder", I said. "Have you ever gotten your knickers in a wad?"

And I'll bet you can guess why I asked the question. It's because, as you are certainly aware by now, that she seems to never be rattled by any circumstance. Concerned, might be the word to describe her most excited reaction. Slightly worried on rare occasions, but never, never does she jump the rails.

She didn't answer right away but seemed to be searching the data banks for salient memories. 

"I suppose I did when I was a small girl", she said.

"Did you wear knickers when you were small?" I said.

"You're silly," she said. "You didn't literally mean knickers when you asked the question and you know it," she said. "I do remember being upset that I never got anything to go in my cereal other than bananas. That's why I never eat them today. I prefer peaches and blueberries."

"I wore knickers as a child," I said.

"When you were a baby you mean? she said.

"I also wore short pants and sandals," I said.

"So?" she said.

"I didn't like them," I said, and when I say I didn't like them, I mean that I hated them."

"Why?" she said.

"Because big boys didn't wear shorts. Shorts were for girls, was my opinion."

"Why didn't you like sandals?"

"Because pebbles got in them, underneath the arch of my foot, and that hurt. Added to the physical pain was the embarrassment of sitting down and inserting a finger between foot and sandal to extricate the pebble. The word is extricate, isn't it.

"The word is extricate," she said, "but I wonder why you use it. Why not withdraw, free, clear, wriggle out? But never mind that now. Why was it embarrassing to remove the pebble?"

"Because it drew attention to the shorts and knobby knees," I said.

"Yes, well I feel your pain but if that's the biggest problem you had, then life in Shady Grove must have been pretty gentle on the mind," she said.

"Ah," I said, "you may think so but you haven't heard about the socks that didn't fit properly. And if that doesn't change your mind about my childhood, then wait until I tell you about being forced to eat pine needles on the school playground."

"I've heard that one," she said. "And it's disgusting. Any why is it called a monkey's paw anyway?"

The last remark got past me. I assume it was meant to be a diversionary tactic and so decided to give it a miss. I include it here only because it may have some meaning for you. If you recognize it, please leave a comment below and clue me in.

I forged ahead with the theme, the nucleus, the heart of the matter as I saw it. 

"That pine needle moment was the single most defining moment in my young life," I said.

"Fierce Qigong," she said.

"Rem acu tetigisti," I said.

"Yes," she said, "a pine needle."