Impending Doom or Opportunity?

My computer is on its last legs and while it is in the shop quietly deciding its own fate, I use this time to learn patience, yet again. Hey, maybe some wisdom would be great, as well. Pretty please? With sugar on top, if you don't mind. I will continue to analyze my faults, hopefully to access my compassionate heart buried deep underneath. I have noticed that when things are good and you are feeling ok, deep down, you know it will end suddenly. So, one has the tendency while things are fine to not even enjoy them with this threat of the never ending question, "What is next?"

This probably comes to most people like it does for me, after you have a some personal history of failings(we all do - like a breakup, job loss, etc) or some kind of surprise drama like my near death. Or it might come to you, when your upcoming death rears its ugly head like some police sobriety test while you are drunkenly cruising through life. But in all seriousness, if you don't work on yourself when things are good or even just satisfactory you'll find that you are suddenly injured or even on your deathbed and you no longer have any time or patience left. Yes, life goes by this damn fast. We really do have no idea what is next. You can save, dream of some far off place to relax and plan ahead for retirement and it will never put a dent into the clear understanding that things change and often do so with no logic or reason. Out of the blue.

I think I have come to an understanding that those little discontentments I have about life, all the way to the supreme life changing event of my brain injury are a result of my ripening karma. Whether from this life or not really doesn't matter. What does matter ...is I now have the time to invest on developing my compassionate heart while things are fine. This will insure a future of more positive karma and might even result in a peaceful passing. So, you say you don't believe in karma? OK, fine then, but at least once you have probably experienced someone in your life – that their entire being or character is positive and loving and it rubbed off on you, the day you encountered them. I want to be that person, and one can't just wake up and be that.... even if you won the damn lottery. It takes a clear and thorough understanding of the way life really is.

This means working on putting to bed delusions and dissatisfactions based on ignorance. Delusions like anger(yes, even in most subtle forms), jealousy, pride, ego, laziness and others. If I truly want wisdom I have to look at my faults that are fear based, like my death, of course. And how I deal with others. Like today when given a compliment, instead of saying thanks... I try to whittle down my value. You know, people who say, "Not me, I hardly did anything." This is not a wise person, who does not show respect for himself when he downplays a compassionate thank you. You cannot offer wisdom and be truly happy without some real work. What you say, how you act and your body language says a whole lot  about what is in your mind. A calm mind is a product of wisdom and compassion built out of meditation. I can see the kind of compassionate person I want to be,  and I am finally aware of the personal work involved...with or without my computer. But the clearer I get, the more superficial my things appear to me.

Losing Heart

As a fan of RadioLab on Podcast, I proposed to them the idea of something that I have encountered. With the advent of personal computers, we are losing or ability to see someone’s intent or their soul(ie Heart). With my disability I get a wide range of responses to hearing my voice in person for the first time. I have no great visible signs, clear eyes, and clear face (meaning not red). Yet younger people, like those under 35, cannot see my intent, even when it as simple as ordering tea when at a café counter. Instead of trying to help me they actually “fight me” by assuming I am drunk, stupid, or insane. (see also June 28) I am generalizing, of course, but I use this to my advantage to find out who has a good heart. Those with a good heart almost immediately try to figure out how to understand and help me.
Now this idea goes as far as when people date, if they don’t read each other’s intent they are doomed trying to find a worthwhile relationship. They trip, fall, and get up like most yet find they fall in the same hole. I have been trying to answer people’s questions online, even meeting a few people to help, but it seems if they don’t have these skills already, then there is not much I can do.

Driving...watch out

Drove home at sunset and watched the colors unfold over the Forty-five minute drive. It was dimensional with high wispy light golden clouds above, long horizontal light purple clouds in the middle, and deep orange clouds that hid the remnants of the sun. I thought about how I have changed, but mostly how people’s perception of me changed. Now, I am talking mostly about new people I meet, not old friends. Few people go as far to find out who I am now, and who I have been in the past to get a full-rounded version. They get either a fixed idea as a disabled person, sometimes pathetic or sometimes compassionate. With my speech disability, I came to the idea that if a person’s heart was good and their own issues were on the back burner then we could quickly become friends or at least acquainted. Some people use my speech or lack of it as a jumping off point, to use me as a sounding board. So, I realized that I have to become more patient, just for my own sake. Along with this is the old adage, “Why am I here?” Now there was no quick way to figure this all out, I spent many a day crying, getting angry, sleeping(with any brain injury) and occasionally laughing. The laughter at myself helped to give me a clue as to how I should approach life. I had to set goals everyday, sometimes way beyond I could possibly go.