When Things Fall Apart

Hola everybody,
Here’s a reminder that popped into my head last night as I was sending out resumes, cover letters, ad composing writing samples: I can control the efforts, but not the outcomes. That’s a difficult house rule to accept, but it is true.

I continue to look for employment and it’s been challenging. I keep hearing the dreaded phrase (implied or otherwise) that I’m over-qualified. 

I am trying to start an initiative geared to upgrading my social media presence (especially blog) with the purpose of amplifying the voices of the people we never hear. If you would like to support my writing and activist efforts, you can donate here [LINK]. If you are unable to donate, please consider sharing with your contacts. Thanks.

When Things Fall Apart

When we protect ourselves so we won’t feel pain, that protection becomes like armor, like armor that imprisons the softness of the heart.
 -- Pema Chödrön

I want to say that from the get that it’s OK to feel bad. I mean, I'm going through a very dark period right now and it feels as if my life is falling apart. It seems that I’m losing not just my livelihood, but my identity. I am questioning myself and I am wondering if activism is something I should continue as my life’s passion. I mean, I try to maintain my sense of humor and I put in the effort every-fuckin-day, but there’s a sadness inside me right now and I need to honor that. I need to embrace that.

I think we live in a society that pressures us to feel “positive.” I call it the Happiness Syndrome -- a marketization of modern life that tells us that if you are not happy (as with being poor) there is something wrong with you. But what does happiness or “being positive mean”? Sometimes we break down, man. Life is hard. And we need to embrace those feelings too. 

Pema Chödrön, abestselling author and famous Buddhist nun, was a regular woman who grew up in NJ, taught elementary school, and had two children. Her life fell apart, she says when she discovered that her husband of eight years was having an affair and left her while her children were very young. She wrote a book that has saved what little sanity I can claim, WhenThings Fall Apart. I have also been fortunate enough to have attended one of her workshops in the past. 

All of us have at one time or another had our lives fall apart. A loved one is diagnosed with a terminal illness, we lose our job and in the process, our identities, a relationship ends, we are battling an addiction or someone we love dies. Whatever the event, we did nothing to deserve it. Bad things happen to good people all the time.

The trick is to reframe what is happening to us. To get out of the seduction of the story and get into the gifts and opportunities presenting themselves. I am not saying this is easy. Believe me, this is hard. But it is possible if we can surrender to what is happening.

Here, let use my current predicament as a starting point:

Version One

It seems I cannot get a job commensurate with my experience and education to save my life. I am about to get my phone cut off, I am living in my sister’s house, so technically I’m homeless. I was just fired from a job after less than three months. I have been turned down for other positions for being overqualified and when I apply for a higher position, my lack of a graduate degree is an obstacle (I never finished my graduate studies). No one seems interested in helping fund my initiative, and to add insult to injury, I was turned down for a job as a stock clerk. In addition, I am about to get my phone cut off and lose my property in storage.

That shit right there is deep enough to make one run for the serotonin intake line, right?

Well, here is another story, this story is true:

In his story, the experience being unemployed is a great lesson and a testament to my character. I am incredibly fortunate that I have the presence of mind and convictions to refuse to do work that is demeaning to me and the people I am supposed to be serving. In this story I am not some lightweight, but someone who has been recognized by his peers as an exemplary activist/ advocate. In this story, the universe has manifested an amazing opportunity to prove to myself and everyone around me how strong I am and that I could handle myself with dignity and grace in the face formidable challenges. Is that not a gift?

Admittedly, this version of the story is a hard one to swallow and certainly a hard one to tell. The “woe is I” version is easier and I do not have to stretch myself by having actual compassion for my situation and the people who have not hired me. LOL

But there is a part of me that says, “Wow. What an amazing lesson from the universe to teach you forgiveness and compassion,” when I am tempted to indulge a fit of pity and anger. There’s a part of me that says, “Look at all the amazing things you are doing with your life now. You wouldn’t be doing any of these things if this hadn’t happened to you.”

So in my writing and my actions, rather than pouring out all the self-righteous anger and sadness I am experiencing, I spend more time noting all the lessons. All the things I am learning about myself. All of the old behavioral patterns I am breaking. All of the amazing friends and family I have in my life who are there showing up for me and being there in ways you can’t even imagine. All of the friendships that have been strengthened because I was learning how to ask for help-- something I almost never allow myself.

All of us are going through something right now. What I have learned is, as awful as these things are when they happen, they are always temporary. They pass in time and happiness and joy find their way to us again. So, just for today I have chosen to not be a passive observer of my “story.” Today I’m choosing to be an example of all the wonderful things that can happen when things fall apart.

As my life falls apart, I am broken open and I am coming together like never before. And as all these things happen, I see that I have a responsibility to be an example of how to reframe the tragedies in our life and create something magnificent out of it. Or I could choose to stay in the resentment.

I only wish that what follows falling apart -- coming together -- happened a little quicker. LOL

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…

The Hunger

Hola Everybody,
So check this out: I need a J-O-B bad, so I applied for a job as a stock clerk. I was turned down -- twice. LOL! Really?

But I’m still here, still looking for work, still trying to upgrade my online presence. You can support my writing by clicking HERE. Any amount helps. If you can’t donate, please consider sharing the link with your contacts. Thanks.

I’m on an introspection trip these days.

The Hunger

The thirst for knowledge is like a piece of ass you know you shouldn't chase; in the end, you chase it just the same.
 -- George Pelecanos

One day when I was very young, my aunt was called to a store. I was caught stealing books and rather than call the police, the owner wanted an adult to come pick me up. I couldn’t have been more than eleven-twelve years-old. I still remember the books. One was a used copy of The Complete Works of Aristotle. Yeah, while my friends were out there stealing hubcaps, I was stealing books. They thought I was weird.

My aunt was so embarrassed, she couldn’t bring herself to look the store manager in the eye. We walked home in silence. The next day, my aunt, who was a washerwoman, reached into her purse with fingers stripped raw by the harsh chemicals of her work and came out with some crumpled bills. She asked me the cost of the books I attempted to steal. When I tried to rationalize the issue, she suggested I be quiet and patiently asked again in a firm voice, “How much did those books cost?”

When I told her, she gave me the money and instructed me to go buy the books. I went back to the same store and paid for the books. The store manager didn’t know what to say, she seemed confused. Eventually, she would come to know me well.

When I returned with the books, my aunt, with tears in her eyes, told me that there was nothing worse than ignorance. She told me if I ever wanted a book, to just ask and she would try to get the money for me. I’ll be honest and say that I continued to steal books here and there. Not a large amount, but books I thought I needed to read. My goal was to read all the great books. 

In case you haven’t noticed, I am a lover of knowledge. Actually, that’s a pretty good definition of philosophy. And please! We all are naïve philosophers in some form or another. Respect for knowledge, truth, and beauty were values instilled in me during my formative years. 

I was either born with this hunger or it was embedded in me at an early age by my parents and reinforced by the other adults during my formative years. Whatever the case, if I were to turn my back on this gift (as if I could), it would be more than a waste, it would be the only true sin.

Books, as with my other teachers, have always taught me to look for the contradictions -- the paradoxes -- because it is there where the truth can be found. I had hard a hard time figuring that one out. How can one find truth, or even anything useful, in things that seemingly have no connection?

But we don’t have to look too closely to see that our existence is full of contradictions. For every negative, there is a positive: night follows day, there is sadness and happiness, rain and sunshine. If you look still closer, you will observe that the web of life itself is made up of the interconnections and relationships between opposing forces. Like the tai chi symbol of yin yang, we all contain the rhythms reverberating from the play of dark and light, male and female, “good” and “bad,” awareness and ignorance.

I think about this web of connections when looking at and attempting to work with my character defects. Growth is optional and for many people and a critical outlook, or even looking within, is something alien -- something to be avoided at all costs. Instead, we are conditioned to consume that we become our material possessions. Even those of us who profess to be introspective truth seekers (or “truth tellers”!) often fall short because we are too busy defending who we are. Too often we rail on about the defects of others while ignoring our own.

If you look deeper, there is an essential unhappiness, a bitterness, driving this attitude. We all know at least one overly critical insensitive who tramples over people’s feelings under the guise of “truth” or “self-expression.” This kind of shit often backfires. It’s a bitch: when you deny life, it has a funny fuckin’ way of sneaking in through the back door. The baggage you carry will manifest itself through whatever form you consciously or unconsciously choose to express it.

In any case, many of us live our lives shuffling back and forth between two identities that seem to conflict: the rational and the emotional. My rational self, for example, tells me I really shouldn’t act out on an impulse, while my emotional self urges me to say “fuck it.” we all experience these two conflicting identities, and, though many people deny this, it’s how our mind/ brain is wired.

The rational self says “I should,” and the emotional self says, “Even though I know I should, I can’t.” Today, I have a better grasp of this paradox, these conflicting urges within me, but I’m still working on it. It’s a process, not a race. It’s also about practice and not perfection. I have found that I’m a deeply flawed man. So flawed that, by necessity, I need to have a process in place that keeps me moving, at the very least, in a good orderly direction. My path is more of a zig-zag than a straight line, but that too is OK.

The point being is that I (we?) have to find a way to balance these two natures. Some of us take the rational approach which often has the effect of leading to a denial of the emotional self. I see this all the time: people will say things like, “It doesn’t bother me,” as if reason can be used to stifle feelings. However, shit always comes up, somehow. Ultimately, denial is not a good coping mechanism no matter how logically you want to dress it up. Others take the opposite tact, and indulge their emotions. This is just the flip side of the denial coin.

I am at a point in my life where I am comfortable with who I am and how I embody my expressed values. I am comfortable with expressing my anger and confronting actions or behaviors that I find offensive. Is it always nice? No. Life isn’t nice. It is wrought difficulties and it is often within the crucible of conflict and turmoil that true growth happens. Avoiding conflict is like sticking your head in the sand. Conflict is an unavoidable and oftentimes invaluable fact of life.

This makes for many challenges and contradictions, but for one to live relatively happy, we need to find a way toward integration because that is the direction of all life: all life seeks to integrate fully somehow, it does this as surely as there is gravity and the sun sets and rises. Understanding how this all works can help many achieve some integration, some measure of comfortability and acceptance amidst the chaos and mass of contradictions that we all possess within.

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…

Working for a Living

Hola mi Gente,

I've been wanting very much to post some version of this for quite some time. Thank you all, but especially to my sister and her husband for being here for me… 

* * *

Work to Do

In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.

-- Albert Camus

I've been meaning to send out a formal note of appreciation for all of my supporters of my campaign (here), but I was waiting for some good news before I did that.

First, the support you all showed me went a long way in boosting my morale at a time where I was really struggling. Secondly, I was able to pay off my storage and cellphone fees, and your donations will help me rent a room, so that I will no longer be technically homeless. This is huge for me, obviously. Finally, yesterday I was offered a position at a criminal justice reform organization. It’s for less than I was making before (much less) and not exactly where I saw myself heading, but it’s a J-O-B! So, I’m happy about that. I am hoping that improving my situation from the advantage of being employed will yield better results.

For me, it’s been a long and challenging “winter.” At the same time, the past eight months also has allowed me the space to become more introspective, to reserve energy, and to look within. Sometimes the seasons mirror the emotions we grapple with: we suddenly see or sense conflicting emotions within ourselves. The cold of winter presses in on us and we may feel tested by its sharp bite.

Yet, when we think we cannot bear a moment longer, we find a force within, an inner reassurance that comes like a summer breeze and says we do what we must. Perhaps it comes in a moment of despair, and then the realization we have made it this far -- that we are strong. In our deepest sadness about the loss of a love, we may find a more meaningful relationship with something more powerful -- with ourselves, for example, or a “Higher Power.” Or, as in my case, the strength can come from the support when it is most needed, sometimes from so many people, many of whom we have never met.

What I have learned is that the winters of our lives may tempt us to curse the cold and darkness. Similarly, the conflicts in our lives may tempt us to struggle with them. One side may be very clear and obvious while the other is vague and hidden. When we are open, these extremes become equal teachers for us. As we think about the seasons and our feelings today, what opposites do we find? Whatever the answers (or, more importantly, the questions), perhaps today we can remember that we have an invincible summer at the deepest part of the winter in our lives.

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…