Sunday Sermon [Social Economics]

Hola mi gente,
Another week, another round of interviews. Hope your week goes well.

Economics of Kindness

Tobacco Road, by DuvallGear

Once at a famous business school, a professor gave a remarkable lecture on social economics to his graduate class. Without saying anything, the professor carefully placed a glass jar on his desk. Then, as the students watched, he brought out a bag filled with stones and placed them in the jar until no more would go in.

The professor asked the students, “Is the jar full?”

“Yes,” they replied.

The professor smiled. From beneath the desk, the professor produced a second bag, this one full of gravel. He took the bag and shook the smaller stones into the spaces between the bigger stones.

For the second time the professor asked, “Is the jar full?”

“No,” they answered, now on to his trickery.

Of course, the students were correct for the professor produced a bag of fine sand and managed to coax much of the sand into the spaces between the stones and the gravel in the jar.

Again he asked, “Is the jar full?”

“Knowing you, professor, probably not!” a student seated at the back of the class joked.

Smiling, the professor brought out a small jug of water, which he poured into the jar full of stones, gravel, and sand. When no more water fit into the jar, he put the jug down and looked at his class.

“So what does this teach you?” he asked his students.

“That no matter how busy your schedule,” one of the students answered, “you can always fit something in!” It was, after all, a prestigious business school.

“No!” thundered the professor. “What it shows is that if you want to get the big stones in, you have to put them in first.”

It was a lesson in priorities.

If you want to get to the “precious stones,” you have to make sure you schedule them first, or you will never get around to them.

What are the big stones in your “jar”? What is the most important fit in your life? Will you find space for the precious stone of kindness?

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

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Kindness...

Hola mi Gente,

If you’re impacted by the current big-assed snowstorm, I hope you’re safe and warm.

Today I offer a poem (not mine) on a topic we don’t seem to talk about enough…

* * *

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things, feel the future dissolve in a moment like salt in a weakened broth. What you held in your hand, what you counted and carefully saved, all this must go so you know how desolate the landscape can be between the regions of kindness.

How you ride and ride thinking the bus will never stop, the passengers eating maize and chicken will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness, you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho lies dead by the side of the road. You must see how this could be you, how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow. You must speak to it till your voice catches the thread of all sorrows and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore, only kindness that ties your shoes and sends you out into the day to mail letters and
purchase bread, only kindness that raises its head from the crowd of the world to say it is I you have been looking for, and then goes with you every where like a shadow or a friend.

 -- Naomi Shihab Nye, from The Words Under the Words: Selected Poems

* * *

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

Kindness...

Hola! Everybody...
I work all day to day. Hope you all have a blessed day...

* * *

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things, feel the future dissolve in a moment like salt in a weakened broth. What you held in your hand, what you counted and carefully saved, all this must go so you know how desolate the landscape can be between the regions of kindness.

How you ride and ride thinking the bus will never stop, the passengers eating maize and chicken will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness, you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho lies dead by the side of the road. You must see how this could be you, how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow. You must speak to it till your voice catches the thread of all sorrows and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore, only kindness that ties your shoes and sends you out into the day to mail letters and
purchase bread, only kindness that raises its head from the crowd of the world to say it is I you have been looking for, and then goes with you every where like a shadow or a friend.

 -- Naomi Shihab Nye, from The Words Under the Words: Selected Poems

* * *

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

Time Out

If the only prayer you say in your whole life is "thank you," that would suffice.
-- Meister Eckhart (c.1260-c.1327)

Hola Everybody,
I know I haven't as active lately, but the truth is I'm having problems writing right now. I don't have "my space" -- that space where I can sit in solitude early in the morning to meditate, reflect, and write.

Right now, my whole process is mucked up and though I try, nothing of any substance comes out. I could write blogs about not being able to write, but that would be boring and better left to my personal journal.

Another factor is the fact I've lost over two years worth of writing. Every time I sit down to write, just the thought of that loss depletes all my creative energy.

Eventually, I'll get over it, but right now it's one huge illusion -- that one BIG wave -- and it's kicking my ass.

Perhaps I will be able to adapt to a different morning ritual, perhaps not. I don't know. In the meantime, I won't be posting any new articles -- at least not with the regularity of before.

I would like to take a moment for all the people who have been so kind with their support and words of inspiration. The other day, my ex (upon hearing I had no shoes) met me after work under the pretext of a dinner, bought me three pairs. A dear friend called to offer his spare bedroom for use until I could find my own. And all this while, my sister and brother-in-law have generously offered me their home with no thought of compensation and put up with my moodiness.

Others in my support network, most of who I have been pushing away, have made a concerted effort to rally around me, in the process reminding me I don't have to do all this on my own.

The list of kindnesses and acts selfless love is too long to list here, but it only reinforces my strong belief that life is good no matter what.

I realize that I have an embarrassment of riches.

Millions of things went just right for me today before I even opened my eyes and if I choose to concentrate on the few that haven't gone well, then I am an ingrate.

Life is good...

Love,

Eddie