FULL DISCLOSURE

From this distance – across miles and miles of wires and fiber optic cables, beyond the photo and text editing - it's easy for anybody to look good, sound good, delude you into thinking they've got it good, got something that you lack. I have a friend who once explained that he couldn't engage in social media outlets like Facebook too often because seeing the fun and happy times of all of his friends made his own life and times seem a dull and sad drudgery by comparison. Of course, he knew that these people's lives, hearts, and minds weren't necessarily as dazzling or brilliant as those they portrayed; but because he only saw the sweetness his own life soured at the sight of it. He is a friendly if somewhat cynical professional with a career in which his success is only increasing as he helps others and our world, and he enjoys travel and adventures that many would envy. It occurs to me only now that maybe it's not the direct comparison that pains him so much as the recognition of something he's missing in his own life, however vague that impression. Maybe seeing more clearly that others are missing the same pieces would reduce his sense that his life his somehow less palatable while also allowing him to connect with others who have the same problems, and together they could better find that particular spice they've been missing.

I am often honored by people's praise of me. All my life I have been told that I am exceptional, good-hearted, thoughtful and insightful. But I think it's important for you to know that however I may strive to be these things more and more every day, I have not always been so and I don't succeed every day. Just this morning I found myself sunk into some brutal ill-wishing; a consequence, I don't doubt, of some troubled emotions about inequality in our world and what I presume is the endless hunger of avarice which perpetuates that inequality. Moments like these illustrate those places where hurt begins to breed hurt. Strong emotions, untempered by higher reason, easily transform into destructive and regrettable behaviors. This does not make the feelings themselves “negative” or even to be avoided, but our responses to those emotions and the repercussions of that behavior must be well-considered. I do not actually want the annihilation of even that which annihilates. I know that this would only create a vacuum which other destroyers would quickly fill. I would much prefer it if the destructive and avaricious would simply realize that their behaviors fail to bring them the real bliss of which they are capable. I'd love it if they could desire a better life, and then develop a bit more empathy and charity for the sake of their own peace and the world's. But you have to know that knowing better doesn't always stop me from fantasizing about burning shit to the motherfucking ground.

Fortunately, the only thing those thoughts burn is me, and I get better at reducing the duration and damage of that smoldering. That might sound like an admirable goal, but see that better and even less destructive to myself would be not to burn in this way in the first place. I aspire to that kind of equanimity. Without it, even brief forays into judgment and self-righteous thinking will do me more harm than good. While we can imagine folks like Buddhist monks excel in this regard, Dr. Diane C. Evans, who I mentioned in my last post, is a master of this kind of allowing. I point this out because it is important to remember that we don't necessarily have to meditate for ages or engage in ascetic practices to develop that kind of thinking.

I am reminded here, however, of Paul Ekman's “Emotions Revealed: Recognizing Faces and Feelings to Improve Communication and Emotional Life.” In this book he tells us of “automatic appraisal,” which Ekman describes as what happens when “we sense that something important to our welfare is occurring, and a set of physiological changes and emotional behaviors begins to deal with the situation.” My brain's automatic appraisal of the inequality cited above was to call bullshit and respond with fury, for example. As Ekman tells it, we may be able to rewire our responses to our emotions, but perhaps not the function of our automatic appraisal, whatever our training in emotional stability:

“Conceivably, we would have even more choice if we were able to become aware of the automatic appraisal as it is happening, and modify or cancel it at will. Because the automatic appraisers are so fast, I doubt that anyone is able to do that. His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, in my meeting with him, did mention that some yogis are able to stretch time. For them those few milliseconds during which automatic appraisal occurs might be stretched long enough for them to make a conscious choice to modify or cancel the appraising process. But the Dalai Lama was doubtful that this type of appraisal awareness is possible for the vast majority of people, including him.”

So when we see people like Diane or badass monks remaining chill as fuck in the face of bullshit and chaos, it probably isn't a benefit of personality or character that keeps them cool, but rather a choice they make in each new moment to remain unflappable and in control. This is the same choice that we can make in each moment in response to our emotions, and it is empowering. You'll see memes and hear talk of not giving other people the power to control your emotions, but they don't tell you how to prevent them from doing so. It may be that you can't prevent it, only your response to it, and then you simply have to choose to chill the fuck out.

Now, since emotions are a physical thing, you can get physical to change your emotions. A few deep breaths may be all it takes to return control of yourself to you. Smiling too has been proven to alleviate emotions. Ekman notes that this has to be a genuine smile, for your brain senses your muscles and knows the difference between a fake smile and a real one. For a real smile, remember a pleasing experience: a good snuggle, your most recent orgasm, warm times with friends, that hilarious thing that happened on the lake, a song that brings you joy. If you can learn to love exercise (and here's a tip: start by telling yourself that you love to exercise), this will go a long way towards improving your general well-being. After more than a year of frequent and regular exercise, I believe I can now vouch for the truth of this. Exercise is truly empowering, a habit of self-love that reveals the capacity we have for changing who we are in clear, undeniable and physical terms.

I had originally meant to provide a kind of full disclosure regarding my being as much an asshole as anybody, a desire not to delude you into thinking, as my friend does of others, that my life is somehow perfect. You must remember that nobody is as they appear on social media. They are not even as they appear when they are standing before you, no matter what they can tell you about themselves, and no matter what you can discover about them. We are all much deeper and more complex than we may seem, and we have a lot of nasty stuff going on most of us don't want to share. But I shared some of my nasty because you see by doing so, we can look for ways to push through and into the better people we were born to be. When we reveal what's missing in our lives – in my case, equanimity – we can start to search for what we need together.

The other day I met a man sitting on a grassy knoll at the edge of a strip mall parking lot with a sign asking for help. We spoke a while. He showed me his pint of Fireball, and I remembered how it tastes like cinnamon candy, the Red Hots I loved as a kid, and that's probably why so many of us drank it as teens. I thought about how it probably kept him warm. He sang me songs. Cars passed, a woman in one stopped, smiled, blessed him and handed him a five. He told about how he just couldn't relate to many people, felt like he was on another level. When he asked me how to deal with that, I felt a little silly to tell him that it's important to stay humble. If he thinks he's got something better than others have, giving that gift is the best thing he can do with it. I told him he should sing more, if that's what he loves to do. When I had to go, in a hurry towards an appointment by the time we were done, I drove past him on my way out of the shopping center. I thought we'd just wave and say good day, but he surprised me when he apologized. “I'm sorry if I disappointed you,” he said.

“What?” I asked him, baffled.

“With my drinking, and all.”

“Nah, man! You're all good. You do you. We all do what we gotta do to take care of ourselves, man. It's all good,” I told him. 

I hope he knows I was sincere. I had a good time being there with him.

Again: we are all much deeper and more complex than we may seem, and we have a lot of nasty stuff going on that most of us don't want to share. But you have to know it's all good. You have to know that if we can check our emotional responses and our judgments, towards others and ourselves, we can create a space in which the most reasonable and effective solution is love. We can lift each other up. You can't heal the darkest parts of yourself, though, without opening yourself up to let the light in, or even just to clearly see what's really going on in there. People worry about putting their baggage onto others, others with problems of their own. But for fuck's sake, good friends, we can't even see our own assholes without flexibility and the help of a mirror. Would you be so foolish to think that you can resolve all of your own problems? To believe that because others have problems too, we should all just clam up, smother them and let them fester beneath the surface, and out of view of even ourselves? I hope not. We are in this together.

See beyond the surface. Pause and consider your thoughts and emotions, whether they are helping you to create the life and world that you want. Seek and give help. Know that you can heal so much with the unconditional love that is always in you.

Much love to you on your journey.