365 Words Beginning with P

Last night I watched “Transformation: the Life and Legacy of Werner Erhard.” The film included scenes of the est training in San Francisco from the early 1970s and recent interviews with Werner, as well as with former well-known participants, observers and critics.

I “did the training” in early 1972 when Werner was still leading most of it. I also took several graduate seminars, the six-day course and a seminar leaders training program with him, so the film was very much déjà vu – and it brought home to me the enormity of Werner’s impact not only on my life and the lives of hundreds of thousands of others, but on the fabric of our culture today.

Although the training was brutal, in the sense that we were expected to stay in the room, fully alert and attentive to the proceedings for excruciatingly long hours without food or bathroom breaks, I found it riveting. Werner was the sharpest, most observant and articulate person I’d ever met. His (what I would call) dharma talks and his interactions with individual participants took my breath away.

Particularly his interactions with participants who complained or challenged him. His bullshit detector was acute and he’d drill down to the person’s main issue (or “racket”) in a matter of minutes, sometimes seconds. And then he’d bear down one-on-one until suddenly you could see the light bulb come on and an astonished smile creep across the person’s face.

Busted. And everyone in the room could tell that something major had shifted.

For every individual he worked with, fifty or a hundred or three hundred more of us could insert our own version of racket and get a similar shift. Light bulbs popping all over the room.

My sense was that Werner never got into one of these tussles without being totally clear that the other person was capable of moving through it to the other side, where joy and freedom waited. Where someone else saw impasse, he saw possibility.

He wanted us to get out of our thinking mind and into direct experience so we would get that what is is, and what isn’t isn’t. (est in Latin means “it is”). Not until we accept what is (as opposed to what we wished it were or thought it should be) do we have the power of choice about our response.

What is isn’t good or bad, it just is.  It’s a Taoist or Buddhist perspective translated for the westerner.

I’m not always there, but since this shift in perspective I’ve been able to weather life with much greater equanimity, greater tolerance, and greater respect for the unique gifts of others.

It’s not like I’ve achieved Samadhi… but most of the time I experience life with open arms. Again, thank you Werner.

prolific: adj. producing abundant works, results, or offspring

prolix: adj. wordy and tedious

Since I began this blog April 6 of this year, I have created 81 posts. Whether I’ve been prolific or prolix is up to you to decide. I’m having fun and (almost) don’t care what you think.

My purpose in having a blog was/is to practice, practice, practice the art of writing. For years I’d been saying that writing was a priority, but I wasn’t doing it, so mission accomplishing.

Am I saner as a result of such prolific posting? Probably not. But evidently some people are.

Last week Newsweek reported that some mental health experts believe that the confessional blog has therapeutic power, and are incorporating it into their treatment plans.

They say that blogs are a step up from plain old diaries, chiefly because of the built-in audience. We feel someone is listening. Someone who sympathizes. Because of the anonymity, “It’s high intimacy with low vulnerability.”

This blog is definitely a step up from diarying for me. My diary is where I whine or process material not fit for human consumption. In fact, the other day as part of my paring down process I opened a box of old journals and came darned close to tossing out the lot of them. Such drivel.

Why do you blog?

I loved this recent New Yorker cover by the French cartoonist Jean-Jacques Sempé. The woman emerges from her country home with clippers in hand to snip an armload of posies. Someone has been there ahead of her to water and otherwise tend the garden, so all she has to do is cut and arrange the flowers.

Not a bad life.

Once a year I have an ecstatic experience like this - the day after my garden helper and I have hacked back a truckload of overgrown shrubs and he has spread dark compost over the bare patches where weeds once thrived.

This morning was the morning when I was able to emerge from the house, clippers in hand, with no task before me but to snip posies for a big bouquet. Oh happy day.

Tomorrow I’ll be back to hauling hoses, deadheading, weeding, fussing.

I dwell in Possibility -
A fairer House than Prose -
More numerous of Windows -
Superior - for Doors

Of Chambers as the Cedars -
Impregnable of Eye -
And for an Everlasting Roof -
The Gambrels of the Sky -

Of Visitors - the fairest-
For Occupation - This -
The spreading wide my narrow Hands -
To gather Paradise -

Emily Dickinson’s poem opens Benjamin and Rosamund Zander’s book, The Art of Possibility:Transforming Professional and Personal Life. He’s a conductor and she’s a therapist. The book is published by the Harvard Business School Press - indicating this is no ordinary self-help or creativity book.

I read th Art of Possibility when it came out in 2002. LOVED it. Even gave it as gifts to a few people.

Then yesterday the video of Ben Zander’s talk at the TED conference (3/200 was finally uploaded to the TED site so non-attendees could watch it. I was so moved and inspired that I hauled the book off the shelf and have been re-reading it.

First. You. Must. Watch. The Video of his talk. The subject is ostensibly about getting everyone to recognize that they love classical music. And he achieves that goal with his Chopin demo.

But more than that his talk is about possibility - and how the vision of possibility can transform your life. His own transformation came in the 80’s when he realized that the conductor doesn’t make a sound. For his power, he depends on his ability to make other people powerful. It’s like chiseling away the marble to reveal the statue of David within.

My job was to awaken possibility in other people. How do you know you’re doing it? You look at their eyes. If their eyes are shining, you know you’re doing it. If they’re not shining, ask yourself, who am I being that their eyes are not shining?? As a parent you can ask yourself the same question if your children’s eyes arent’ shining.

When you can see possibility and believe in it passionately, you can move mountains:

The mark of a leader is that he not doubt for one moment the capacity of the people he’s leading to realize whatever he’s dreaming. Imagine if Martin Luther King had said, “I have a dream…. but on second thought, I’m not sure if they’re up to it…”

Lucky for me, the Art of Possibility is littered (alitered?) with a plethora of plummy p-words: perfect, perception, perspective, peril, prejudice, pattern, posture, profits, population, pain…. (for starters), so I shall be touching on some of their pointers in the coming couple of weeks.

Second. Read. The. Book. Let’s talk about it.

Permanent: fixed and changeless; lasting; not expected to change in status, condition or place
Permanence: the condition of quality of being permanent

I spent much of the weekend in the garden, dealing with my plants (wanted and unwanted). Last week I hired Joe to deal with the plethora of my unwanted plants (otherwise known as weeds), and the garden looked fabulous. The rhodies, iris and peonies were at their peak, and the roses coming on.

But now the rhody bushes are covered with dead florets and look like hell. Ditto the iris and peonies. I want everything to STOP! Why won’t the rhodies just STAY in perfect bloom? Ditto the iris and peonies.

If there is one thing plants teach it’s impermanence. A plant is at its peak only for a couple of weeks. Cut a flower to bring inside and maybe it lasts a few days.

A few years ago I took an Ikebana (Japanese flower arranging) class at the Shambhala Meditation Center in Portland. The teacher had brought all sorts of plant materials as well as just enough low vases and kenzan (the spiky base that hold stems in place) for each of us. I have had a fair amount of ikebana training so the lesson wasn’t particularly new for me, but some of the materials were novel (those flat sweet little peaches, for example).

We all fixed and fussed on our own arrangements for maybe an hour. Mine turned out the most beautiful, the most interesting, the most wonderful (etc etc etc) arrangement I had ever created (at least I thought so). It totally tickled me, particularly how I’d used the peach and picked up its subtle colors in the other plant materials I used.

The teacher walked us from arrangement to arrangement tweaking here and there and discussing what worked in each one. We were inspired by each other’s creations.

Then she said, “OK, take them apart. We’re going to do another arrangement and you’ll need to re-use that vase.”

WHAT !?!?! My chef ‘ouevre? The pinnacle of my ikebana career? Destroyed after only one hour??

I know that plants are ephemeral, but to KILL an arrangement after only one hour was unthinkable! And I didn’t even bring a camera to capture it on film for my continuing pleasure.

Buddhist teachings stress that all is impermanent, that attachment is suffering.  I got it.

Today I went to the Portland Japanese Garden, ostensibly to see the ikebana show that is an annual adjunct of the Rose Festival (demonstrating how to incorporate roses into this traditional flower arranging art).

The arrangements were interesting but couldn’t hold a candle to the garden itself, which was arrayed in every shade of green imaginable, a perfectly framed view in every direction no matter where you stood. Here’s one shot to give you a sense of the lush beauty:

What really entranced me, however, were the paths… each one different, each one meandering off to another place, each one so irregular that you have to mind your step.

The paths don’t just take you from here to there; they are metaphoric - designed to make you think about your own life’s journey.  Life’s twists and turns, dead ends, new vistas.

You are supposed to sloooww down. Look up. Look down.

Look around you.

Some of the paths have random rocks inserted in them, others have end tiles from roof caps, still others ask you to stop and simply appreciate the design at your feet.

I loved this detail. It’s an abstract work of art in stone and moss.

It’s been a week since I pulled a pec doing too many pushups. (In yoga a sun salute involves half of the pushup - from plank to cobra position, so it’s more like a slow drop down…).

The doc had said no pushups or plank for six weeks (!). I had said, no way!

But then I allowed myself to stay home every morning this week, to not rush off to strength training or yoga classes at 7:30am and it has been LOVELY.

I miss the exercise, but not the rushing. Which tells me something I don’t want to hear: that if I don’t want to rush I’d better be getting up a lot earlier (and going to bed a lot earlier too, because I need at least 8 hours of sleep).

This morning I really really was going to go to yoga, and just chill in the back of the room in a restorative pose whenever we were supposed to do a planky sort of position. But here I am at my desk writing, hoisting a cup of coffee instead. Happy.

I’m one of those people who is slothful enough at heart that if I don’t routinize my life with specific commitments to be at a certain place at a certain time to exercise it won’t happen. ANd I’ve discovered that if it doesn’t happen first thing in the morning, it generally doesn’t happen at all, because the day takes over.

On normal weeks I go to a strength training class 2x a week, yoga 2x a week and I walk with a good friend the other 3 days. My pulled muscle did not prevent me from walking except for the first couple of days when I could scarcely breathe, but my friend was out of town, so I didn’t even do that.

Little vacations from routine are a good thing. I hope by Monday I’m eager to get back with the program.

Earlier today I read a post from a well-respected feng shui consultant in LA who gave her top ten feng shui tips. I can’t believe these are truly her top ten tips if by “top feng shui tips” she means “best suggestions for improving the ch’i in your environment.” They included keeping your windows and mirrors clean, your toilet lids down, your dead lightbulbs and dried flowers replaced in a timely fashion.

These are all good tips - but top ten????

When I go on a feng shui consultation dirty windows are usually far down on my list of where I believe the client’s priorities should be. Based on the issues I see in people’s homes, these are far and away the top problems:

1. Clutter, clutter clutter. This should hold the top five spots on my list. We have too much stuff.

2. Stuckness in the past (too many objects that no longer represent the person’s present or future life - and a staleness in the energy around them)

3. Lack of personal expression in the home. Furnishings, art and other decorative objects were either chosen by a decorator or are the kind of stuff you get at the mall. Either way, it’s not representative of the unique people who live there. Who are you? Figure that out then let it show in your surroundings.

4. Dull dead dreary color choices. Beige walls. Brown sofas. Color is transformative people! and paint is cheap.

5. The expectation that putting a symbol in a particular gua will magically bring their desire to fruition. Put a statue of two love-birds in your Love & Marriage corner and bingo! your prince arrives. No. He won’t unless you get out into circulation. Or lose a few pounds. God helps those who help themselves, isn’t that the line?

Why would you want to purge your excess possessions? Let me count the ways…

No, actually I’m not going to enumerate them right now; it’s too depressing. I’ll just say that we Americans have a serious Possessions Problem, and it’s choking our ch’i.

So if you’re looking around your place feeling stuck, stagnant, stale and stupefied, consider purging. Here are the four most basic steps.

1. Stop clutter at the front door. Prevention is always the best strategy! Only buy what you need and have a predestined place for. Stop going to garage sales. Throw out junk mail before it settles on the kitchen table. As catalogs arrive, call their 800 number and ask to be removed from their lists. Accept other people’s stuff only if you really need it. If you acquire a new piece of furniture, let go of a piece of furniture that someone else can use. Ditto with clothing. Recycle or compost early and often.
2. Tackle small chunks at a time. Avoid feeling overwhelmed by the enormity of the task ahead by biting off manageable chunks. Set a timer for fifteen minutes and choose one drawer, one shelf or one category of clothing. Do this for fifteen minutes every day and you’ll see remarkable progress in no time.
3. As you approach each item, ask yourself these questions:
   • Do I love it?
   • Do I need it?
   • Do I use it?
   • Does it enhance my life? (or does my heart sink when I see it?)

Then sort your things into 4 piles or boxes for dealing with. Mark the boxes Yes YES!; Yes, but…; No, but…; and No NO!

• Yes yes! I love it and I need it, it works and it’s useful
• Yes, but… I love, need, use it - but it needs fixing or is in the wrong location
• No, but… Someone else should have it (Goodwill, relative, friend, Ebay)
• No no! Toss it out (or recycle)

If you get stuck, enlist a dispassionate friend to help. Trade time. Or pay if you must. Their job is to keep you focused, to cheer you on, to help you realistically assess value (or lack therof), and to ask you the hard questions: “Do you honestly think you’ll be a size 8 again?” “Do you really believe your children will want that?”

You CAN do this. And you’ll feel sooooo much better. (I just finished de-cluttering my bedroom and home office and I feel like a new woman.)

Lather, rinse, repeat. (This is an ongoing process, not a state of perfection. Sorry)

My neighbor up the street has the most phenomenal oriental poppies. In full open mode a blossom is about nine inches across. Watching the phases of a blossom is like watching an egg hatch. Here’s part of the sequence: