Sunday, June 15, 2014

The low tide of Chivalry

What transpires in the human search for the Holy Grail of the soul? I believe a journey ensues to follow the path of Chivalry. Chivalry respects women. It protects women from harassment. It never accosts women. It doesn’t hit women despite felt provocation. Chivalry defends women from men who abuse them.


I read social media complaints about the way men treat women. I’ve noticed black eyes on wives and heard the rants of despotic husbands in next door apartments. I’ve called the police. I’ve intervened to protect women from maltreatment. I hope a decent portion of other men have done so as well.

Still, I fulminate against the feeling in some women that being a man equals being a jerk. The vast majority of my men friends over the years have treated women with decent respect. I have to ask. How could women love so many men if most men are jerks? Most men must not be jerks. I surmise that a large enough minority of jerk men spoils the atmosphere between the genders. But they didn’t come from my circles. In my younger years in respect to women I was more interested in getting laid than anything else. I’ve hurt the feelings of a few women in my past by jumping from one bed to another. In my older years I’ve simmered down considerably, as age will bring about. But no matter how elderly I get, I am a man enamored of beautiful women. I thank attractive women out in public who welcome my smiles and appreciative glances.


So what does the Holy Grail have to do with Chivalry? The cup from which Christ and the apostles drank at the Last Supper represents in its originality the Holy Grail. It represents the way to eternal life and timeless beauty. It represents a beauty which doesn’t exist on earth, yet perfection and beauty that men long for in the depths of their being. I suspect I glimpsed a precognition of the Holy Grail when once I beheld a sky so redolent of nature’s beauty that I stood for long moments transfixed. It’s beauty representing every virtue. It’s solemnity representing every desire within to be good. And it deeply hurts because we realize we can never fully attain these virtues. We can only try and sometimes succeed but far too often fail.


In the Middle Ages, people celebrated in song and poetry the idealisms of Chivalry. The ideals imbued society. They were meant to order behavior and instill willingness for right conduct. These ideals for nobility, honor, justice and love may have had some influence, but moral behavior in reality was very seldom practiced. “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century” by Barbara Tuchman reveals extraordinarily barbaric details about the age when Chivalry reigned as high ideal.

In our own time, Chivalry loses influence the more time passes. My 90 year old aunt told me that in the 1950s she would walk unafraid at night on Market Street in downtown San Francisco. Let me explain. A central value of Chivalry is to act with courtesy towards all high or low. I wonder. How much of the downward spiral---the school shootings---the general fear women have of men---the abuse of the elderly---how much of these trends started with the devaluation of courtesy?

I offer a tip. Don’t only give a homeless man or woman a dollar. Linger and chat. Don’t reply to an insult with insult. Be courteous because courtesy will build the foundation of a long lost sense of Chivalry.

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Don't fear defending your boundaries.

How do you react to the idea of sweeping only your side of the street? If I have discarded paper cups, cigarette butts and tossed candy wrappers littering what’s within my boundaries, my side of the street, I’ll sweep it up. Or not. But it’s not the responsibility of someone else to barge into my territory and try to clean up my garbage. Besides, that would be an impossible venture. No one can change another person. If everybody doesn’t know that, everybody should.

Bridge spanning the borders of U.S.A. and Canada.

People with rapid speech retort defend their boundaries well. If someone flings a subtle insult, they fire back with a witty remark that disarms the verbal assailant. It’s like the ramparts which defend their boundaries have sharp, accurate and verbally loaded crossbows.

Boundaries erect borders between states and people. They exist to define lines of difference. They exist to separate. Boundaries cannot fully separate sometimes because circumstances disallow. Despite all efforts to contain illegal immigration, widespread impoverishment in Mexico guarantees movement across the United States border. In the waning decades of the Roman Empire, barbarian tribes peacefully settled within Roman boundaries because the legions lacked vitality to stop it.

Boundaries allocate areas of responsibility for individuals and nations. It’s not anyone’s prerogative to enter another’s personal border unless invited. But what if you’re driving a hundred miles an hour? I don’t care whether it’s your job to drive or not, I’ll tell you slow down. It’s not my job to paint your house or mow your lawn, but maybe it’s your job to help maintain community property values. Maybe it’s not. I think clear and distinct boundaries however fortify the chances for accord between people and nations. When an entity violates a definite boundary alarms signal. A response ensues. When an alarmed client questions an expert on how to do his job, more than likely he’s excessively worried.

Historical events often germinate into confusion and disagreement between nations over boundaries. Ecuador and Peru, with roots of conflict dating to early 16th century Inca history, fought two 20th century wars over boundary disputes. Undefined areas of demarcation and desire for valuable natural resources contributed to the outbreak of hostilities.


Some people violate personal boundaries as a matter of course. Maybe someone repeatedly steps on your toes. Maybe he deliberately bumps into you time and again. And maybe he’s bigger and stronger. A kid in grammar school was treating me like this. I eventually challenged him to fight. We fought in a green field with spectators watching. I hurt him as best I could, but he slugged until the fight in me was exhausted. I had defended my boundary with complete abandon, gained my opponent’s respect, and the maltreatment ceased.

Nazi Germany plunged Europe into war by sending its armies across the boundaries of numerous nations, beginning with Poland in 1939. Germany had an alliance with Japan. When Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, the United States declared war on Germany. I know it is obvious, but no less worth repeating. Respecting national and personal boundaries fosters peace between people and nations.

Thursday, June 5, 2014

Escort the days with a Plan of Action.

You’re no longer employed. You’ve retired and most of the day’s hours belong to you. You don’t want your senior years to bore. You don’t want to atrophy. You want a vital, energetic life.

A Plan of Action organizes your day and allocates those hours into categories of tasks.


Without a Plan of Action, the hours don’t utilize time in any direction. Without goals to strive for in the senior years, motivation and vigor lose reasons to exist. Time as it were sits still. It’s not occupied.

Goals contain the aspirations of the heart. In retirement years, goals enliven. They spur on.

A Plan of Action lists the tasks that work towards attaining the goals.

It builds a structure that holds the day in place. It also charts how well you’re doing with following your Plan of Action.


My Plan is printed on 8.5 x 11 in letter size office paper. The Task column on the far left spells out eight activities from top to bottom. The row of days extends out to the right. Each activity or task has its days marked, and I’ve chosen to perform those activities on those days. It’s in black and white. I sheath the Plan into clear plastic and pin it over my desk.

TASK GOAL

Write Food Plan: To attain and maintain a healthy body weight.
Morning Prayer: To draw spiritual sustenance to live a better life.
12 Step Work: To enable me to be clean, sober and abstinent.
Study Spanish: To become a fluent Spanish speaker.
12 Step meetings: To enable me to be clean and abstinent.
Brain Exercise:                To build up memory and other mental attributes.
Blog work: To practice my writing skills.
Gym: To keep physically fit.

After I’ve completed a task, I put a black dot in the slot for that day and task. At the end of the day, I see a picture of how much effort I’ve put into the achievement of my goals. At the end of the week, I see by looking at how many black dots on the Plan of Action, how well I did on doing my allocated tasks. If I’m slipping on doing tasks, I can see that because I’m monitoring.


I find I go through phases. Some periods of time I’m energetic and willing to tackle my tasks with enthusiasm. It doesn’t take much effort or discipline. Other periods of time, my energy slows. I’m less willing to work my Plan of Action. It’s all kind of like a sailboat. When the wind blows, the sails catch the wind and move the boat forward effortlessly. But when the winds die, the sailboat must switch to an engine to move the boat forward. The engine is like personal strength and discipline necessary to progress when one feels in the doldrums. An engine is like when you need to stretch yourself.

The chart of a Plan of Action informs and guides on the journey towards goals.

Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Progress is the most important project.

If we're making progress, the stage of progress doesn’t matter. When we start to make progress, that’s what matters. What matters is continuing to progress, because if we don’t do that, we tread water. We merely stay afloat; but if all we can honestly manage is to stay afloat, that’s better than drowning.

An indicator of progress consists of expanding willingness and ability to feel the uncomfortable. Nobody likes to feel nervous, edgy or afraid. But when we do, in principle, it's better to feel those because they’re authentic feelings. I want to face life. I want to progress. Do you want to learn to better tolerate feelings you'd rather not have ? Do you want to better absorb and feel who you are in the moment; then learn what lessons your feelings teach you about yourself ? I do.

Tools for making progress in a garden

It’s uplifting when an aspect that troubles you in relation to others fades. That’s progress. The aspect may not have entirely disappeared. You may find yourself now caring less about what people think of you. You catch yourself more often. You notice when you’re playing politics and not being authentic. You realize with greater perceptivity when you accede and let someone dictate the operation of your affairs. By opening yourself to how mistaken behavior or habits generate anxious feelings, you can chart a plan of action to change the behavior. The key is to feel the feelings so you grasp what you’re dealing with. And then take action.

Flowers of progress in a garden.

Progress in a particular regard is especially valuable. It promotes calm. It holds the hand of faith and walks with surety of foot. It grows awareness that we are not alone but part of a whole. It’s the birthing of intuition that whispers or cajoles. It’s energy tending to support the humble and humble the proud. The closer to this spiritual source, the more progress is made on manifesting its peace to those around us.

I’m not an expert on spirituality. I don’t have an M.A. in psychology or social science. I do know about the hole. The hole is a deep, empty loneliness that seeks to eradicate its tribulations by smothering feelings. The hole may choose different ways. Each wipes away authentic but hurting feelings. Each way replaces discomfort with temporary gratification.

Instead of nourishing human growth, these ways feed the urge to compulsively eat or drink. We feed a craving for narcotics or sex. We feed an addiction to gamble. The diseases expand but don’t fill the hole. The loneliness hides inside unacknowledged. Consequences like mortgage defaults, broken relationships, morbid obesity and imprisonment follow in the train of these abuses.

The answer is spiritual. The remedy to the cry of agony inside the hole of one’s being is to embark on a spiritual journey. With authentic desire and rigorous honesty, one can have impediments to growth in life removed. From whatever stage, one can progress towards contentment.

Friday, May 9, 2014

Patience is the companion of wisdom

Let me see if I can look at what ways patience is the companion of wisdom.  And let me see if I can say something about wisdom itself.  I think wisdom comes when we see reality the way it is.  I think it comes from having learned through experience.  It comes from having made mistakes perhaps, but mistakes from which have been drawn lessons, mistakes that have taught lessons in wisdom.

Mistake-making demonstrates a person is active, human, and willing to take chances that can lead to mistakes. These mistakes can become seeds of wisdom. When we turn towards God, or a Higher Power, to me this is a fundamental step on the road to wisdom.  It means we start to live not just for ourselves but for others too. We become ambassadors of good on earth. To me turning towards your understanding of God is a critical first step on the road of wisdom itself. This is where patience arrives as the companion of wisdom.

Patience is the ingredient in the soil of that which grows in character and virtue. It allows for change in its own time. It doesn't pull or try to force growth but instead helps growth by nourishing understanding, which is absorbed through prayer and in relationship with God.

Patience reminds us that time is needed to change defects into qualities that foster continued growth.  That deep and lasting change does not take place in a rush. Patience walks with wisdom and with wisdom helps us to learn that finding and doing the will of God is the greatest treasure offered by life.  And along the way, wisdom and patience teach the less significant ways that accommodate us on the road to greater love of God.

How writers contend with blogging.

Blogging instructs…teaching the way of words. It acts like an engine moving the search for new subjects about which to write. It adds to knowledge and understanding of the world.  It harnesses energy to create unique posts.


Every post challenges the blogger to improve. Each post complains about the scratchy barnacles that slow the boat ride of reading. An ornery writer scrapes them off the hull of the content. The precise word to allocate definite meaning often hides in subterranean shadow. Does the writer compromise with the substitute word that’s merely good enough? Sometimes yes and sometimes no, but more and more I intuit the surest motivation to blog breathes in finding the elusive word that perfectly fits.

A writer wrestles with passion to create posts that reflect honesty and interest the reader. He shapes and molds sentences. She integrates a concept into the general architecture of meaning. Bloggers experiment if the generosity of abundant time allows. Is that word too worn from repeated use? Is that paragraph better suited elsewhere? The work of blogging mandates discipline. It practices the skill of writing with every post.  

I started my first blog three years ago, called it Ecuador Experiment, and published weekly posts until early last year. I wrote those posts with an ardor and gusto meant to entertain and inform people curious about moving to Ecuador---and living in the old colonial city of Cuenca, where I resided three months.  I wrote off topic posts for Ecuador Experiment--- but focused on delivering content mostly about Ecuador.

Me Speaking takes a different direction. I write on a variety of topics. No specific theme corrals these posts into a single category, and that’s because I value the freedom of uncertainty encapsulated in this approach to blogging. Wind blows where it will.  Ideas for a post sometimes spark to mind from uncharted regions. Other times they derive from long held interest in a historical subject or current international issue.

Although popular posts do boost the writer’s dopamines, they don’t necessarily reflect quality. Nor does an unpopular post necessarily reflect its quality.
Bloggers who base their motivation to write solely on page views will probably find the steam to continue eventually waning. If the work of writing itself engenders motivation, however, the blogger fuels the blog from the spirit of writing itself.

The Cigar Tree

When I was a kid, I liked my bikes’ looped, u-turn handle bar that set up or down.
I liked the bike’s thin tires and wire spokes. I liked getting two playing cards and clothes pins, then attaching the cards to each tire. The spokes slapped against the cards and my bike sounded like it had an engine!


I liked the shifter---I shifted the gears to select between ten speeds--- to pedal easier up a hill or go faster on flat ground. Actually---Sacramento just had flat ground; and I loved riding my bike.
Rolling over the streets, I felt I was a cowboy; riding my bike elevated me. It extended my range. I rode it to a grassy field one summer day where girls from school played baseball with us. I rode it to William Land Park to fish in the pond; but the pond was closed. I stood, blocked by a chain link fence on a sky blue day---so decided to climb over. I poked the fishing pole through the fence and pitched, but as it went through the hook penetrated my index finger and instead of climbing the fence, I went to a doctor.

I liked to ride with friends on my bike. One time, a group of us were pedaling fast, parallel to Curtis Park going north, our destination the Cigar Tree. Tottering tombstones visible by the Cigar Tree emanated foreboding in that place.  We zoomed in, dropped our bikes and scrambled up the tree. We were grabbing cigars as fast as possible.

These cigars grew about six inches and were thicker than cigarettes. They were withered and dry, and many dangled from the tree. We knew the Cigar Tree was in “other” kids’ territory---we didn’t know them, but raiding their tree was taking a risk, and the risk challenged. A band of yelling kids on foot suddenly attacked and we fled on our bikes fast--- furiously!  We rode ten blocks, past the tennis courts in Curtis Park, gradually feeling calmer the more distance we put between ourselves and our pursuers---until we stopped in a grove of redwood trees.

We climbed up thick, low branches which gradually thinned the higher we climbed. Careful to plant feet firm, we grabbed branch after branch, pulling ourselves aloft higher and higher until we found perches--- until we were so high we could see the distant white dome of the State Capitol.

Hidden in the Redwoods ---we lit our cigars and smoked and watched the smoke billow and ascend. We gazed at the Capitol and felt like kings.