You Can Never Speak Up Too Often for the Love of All Thing

You can never speak up too often for the love of all things.
For every living thing or natural place on earth, there is someone
who wants to kill or destroy it;
Therefore, you can never speak up too often for the love of all things.

These families of geese that I watch as I sit beside the pond,
Two pairs, four adults, with their clutches of downy goslings
who are carefully sheltered between the
tall-necked, attendant goose and gander,

There is a hunter who yearns to kill them,
Who feels entitled to his killing of them,
Who would be outraged if you implied he had no right to
gun them down in season.

This pond, set like an opal in the precious ring of earth,
wind sparkling among shaded forests of hemlock and pine,
There is someone waiting to race his motorboat across it,
knifing the soft skin of its silence,
leaking oil into its pearl waters;
develop it, build beaches,
bring in crowds with boomboxes surging across
macadamized parking lots;

Therefore, you can never speak up too often for the love of all things.

By Paul R. Fleischman, M.D. 

Becoming a Boulder Mover!

The story is told of a village in a high valley that had only one road access in and out.  The road was on a steep hilly side of the valley.  At one narrow point in the road, lay a half buried boulder which made passage difficult for both wagon and foot traffic. 

And those that would pass by would curse the boulder for its existence in their comings and goings.   Yet in the hurried busy lives of each, none would do more than give it lip service by complaining of the problems it created for them personally. 

Then early one morning with the rising of the sun, an old man of the village could be seen leaving town, pulling a cart loaded with a shovel, a pick, and other tools.  No one had any idea what he might be doing.  The day passed and as the sun set, the old man returned into town without saying a word to anyone. 

It wasn’t until the next day that word began to spread that the boulder in the road was gone and travel was found to be much easier.  Someone had dug around this large rock and had found a way to push it off to the side of the road.  No easy feat for anyone.  With the hole already filled in, it was hard to even know that a boulder had once occupied that place in the middle of the road.  Everyone appreciated the absence of this obstacle in their lives but with the busy pace of daily living, it was soon forgotten. 

Each day, there are boulders all around us that impede our lives and the lives of those we meet and know.  Boulder Movers selflessly work for the greater good of all and the better good of the one.  And the commitment of such wholesome acts leads to peace within; a most noble goal to have in day to day living.

How does anyone take up the path of a Boulder Mover?  It starts with a right understanding of how to eliminate suffering in our own lives and the lives of those around us.  It is not enough to abstain from committing unwholesome acts that hurt or harm others.  With compassion, we need to see the struggles of others and help when we can.  Right understanding and right thinking leads us to right actions. 

For me it started by recognizing how many Boulder Movers there already are in daily life.  I began to see the kind wordless acts that helped others through their day.  Soon, I realized that many people go to work for more than to just make a buck.  It was their effort at boulder moving for others.  And I was often the beneficiary.  As I picked a pear for my breakfast, I tried to imagine and count how many people it took to make my breakfast possible.  It seems infinite; or at the very least, an expression of the Infinite.

So, when I go to the grocery store and park in a nearby handicap space made possible by some Boulder Mover, I get out and watch for someone who is loading their car and ask if I can return their cart for them.  And as the “bagger” bags our food, I often ask if they have had their “Card Validated”.  Because in my book, they really are special.

I’m OK but You Suck!

Not long ago I was in a used book store looking through the self-help section when I ran across a title that had me laughing out loud.  It was, “I’m OK but You Suck!”.  I think it is a take off from the classic, I’m OK, Your OK.  For me, it speaks to that human weakness of righteous indignation.

Americans like to be righteously indignant.  I like to be righteously indignant.  We go to movies where we can be sympathetic with the hero that has been done wrong and is righteously indignant.  All the Rambo movies start with a guy that is quiet, soft spoken, minding his own business and is wronged.  And then heaven help the town that crosses him because he is coming back to wreck havoc, mayhem and retribution where ever he chooses. 

We have entire TV programs that “review” on-going court cases that point out the outrageous behavior of others and we can then go ballistic in a half dozen directions pointing the blame and holding others at fault in soooo many ways.

I have to be on notice to NOT become attached to such aversions in daily living.  It is easy to get sucked into other people’s misery.  And then I too am miserable.  My peace and happiness then eludes me.

I have been visiting an inmate in prison who is probably in for life.  Of course, there is plenty of drama drama in daily prison life where a pod may house a hundred or more men.  Yet he has found a way to rise above this misery.  When the perception of a wrong is seen or heard, he tells himself or the person he is talking to, “Not My Story.” 

We can have compassion for others travails without getting emotionally caught up.  It is called detached compassion.   This is crucial to be able to purify the mind and end our own suffering and quit spreading the misery to others. 

Now for my “True Confessions” story.  When the Geo Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin story broke, I was incensed.  I read everything I could, which fed my indignation.  I even wrote to the mayor and chief of police.  Looking back, I can see I was miserable and I shared my misery with the people around me.  This negative self feeding closed loop soon spilled into other parts of my life. 

I found I had to see this with greater kindness that soon allowed me to treat my own shortfalls with similar kindness.  I did myself no good thing in choosing to be righteously indignant.  I found I had to develop a balanced mind to make good choices in daily living.  And that meant letting go of judgment.

Bottom line:  I figured out that I am really OK because You really don’t SUCK.