Letting Go . . .

"The hardest to learn was the least complicated."-- Indigo Girls

A few years ago. I had an email conversation with a friend, who like me had discovered some affinity for Buddhism, but couldn't quite go all in for it. She had the sense that her present suffering was secondary to her attachment to a difficult relationship, to her yearning for a child, to the idea of love. She (ironically) felt some guilt over this, and her inability to "let go" of her attachments.

As the conversation progressed, I responded: "If we were all Buddhas or Christs, then we wouldn't attach ourselves--and our sufferings and our sense of fulfillment--to other frail human beings. But being mere mortals, we crave the closeness and fulfillment that comes from sharing our lives with somebody else. And while I am enamored with many aspects of Buddhism, this is why I think in the end it's not a practical philosophy for me. Because I LIKE my attachments. I don't want to let go of them--my wife and kids, ambitions, desires, ice cream and pizza. I'll let go when I die--that will be soon enough--but while I'm alive I'm going to attach myself to the things that are meaningful to me. And I realize that this refusal to let go is an invitation for suffering. But suffering is part of the human experience, and in the great karmic scales, you need the pain in order to experience the joy. It's all part of one big mystery, and it's beautiful and terrifying, both empty and full. I guess that's just . . . life."

This was not so much wisdom from me as protest. I'm not sure what the Buddha would say to it. But I know what a woman named Oriah Mountain Dreamer thinks. She wrote a famous poem called "The Invitation," which is a call to do the exact opposite of letting go. The poem is a challenge to live life to the fullest, to experience the exquisite thrills and aches of life and relationships. She seems to have a particularly robust capacity for Carpe Diem. It's a beautiful poem.

The Invitation

by Oriah Mountain Dreamer

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing. 

It doesn't interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive. 

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain!I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it. 

I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations of being human. 

It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul; if you can be faithlessand therefore trustworthy. 

I want to know if you can see beauty even when it's not pretty, every day,and if you can source your own life from its presence. 

I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, “Yes!”

It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up, after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done to feed the children. 

It doesn't interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back. 

It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you, from the inside, when all else falls away. 

I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.

I've been reading a companion book she wrote exploring these ideas. I enjoy it, but hers seems like an invitation to what? To suffering. To joy as well, of course. But the ultimate purpose of it all gets lost in the ecstasy of the moment. It's dancing for the sake of dancing. Hurting for the sake of hurting. We live, we laugh, we cry, we die. Hope it meant something to you. Is that it? Isn't there more? Why do I feel programmed to believe there is?

Which brings me back to letting go. I've had a few coffee-house conversations recently with other friends (looking at you, Steve and Scott!) where we've discussed this same thread: holding on versus letting go. It seems like there is a tightrope to walk, and the tension between the two provides the ballast. Hold on too tight? Life becomes exquisitely joyful or unbearably painful, but ultimately for naught, 'cuz we all gonna die. But let go of it all? Then what's the point of being alive in the first place. Either way, ultimate meaning evaporates. But being stuck in the middle of ambition and surrender seems to be a place to claim a speck of human dignity and purpose within this infinite cosmos.

It's a daily struggle, and a daily reprieve. Yin and yang.

For me, here are the biggest things I'm trying to let go of:

• My need to control the outcome
• My need to know the end game
• My need for approval from others
• My need for ultimate meaning

Will I succeed? And why this blog? I don't know. I'm still holding on to hope that I'll figure something out. 

Still holding on . . .

"You're an interesting species. An interesting mix. You're capable of such beautiful dreams, and such horrible nightmares.  You feel so lost, so cut off, so alone, only you're not. See, in all our searching, the only thing we've found that makes the emptiness bearable is each other."
 --from Contact, by Carl Sagan.

The Four Cs

When we left the Mormon church, and especially after telling our children, there was a sense, almost literal, of leaping into an abyss. Was anything real? Was anything solid? Through years of conditioning, we feared that without the backbone of the church and its moral structure to support us, we would be abandoning our kids' spiritual welfare to "mists of darkness," to destinies of crime, drugs, and teenage pregnancy, and even worse, coffee.

(This attitude emanates from the highest levels of Mormondom even today, with an article in this month's Ensign by apostle Elder Dallin Oaks stating explicitly that secular humanists, atheists, and our ilk are Anti-Christs, foretold in the Book of Mormon as part of the great and abominable whore of the whole earth. Ouch, Dallin! I'm seriously just trying to do the best I can to live by truth and with integrity. Sorry to upset you so much!)

As we treaded water early in this journey, my wife and I struggled with how to instill core values and socially conscious behavior in our children without invoking the threat of supernatural consequences. For those who haven't tried it, especially those with very bright and strong-willed children, this is no easy feat. Much easier to tell them that God will punish them or withhold favor or salvation.

In the years since, we've come across a number of amazing resources. Here are just a few:

• Maybe Right, Maybe Wrong
• Maybe Yes, Maybe No
• Parenting Beyond Belief
• Raising Free Thinkers
• Mindful Parenting

But at the time, we were flailing for anything solid. After all, we had been raised in a strong (and overall positive) structure of family values, yet we had no personal experience of how to do it without religion, and not another soul on planet earth with whom to discuss it. Of course, example always screams louder than any words, and we hoped that by being honest, kind, curious, joyful and brave ourselves, we would instill those values in our kids.

One day as we were discussing a specific problem, we felt some inspiration. This is what we came up with on the spot, and it stuck:

The Four C's

• Courage
• Compassion
• Creativity
• Commitment

We developed small, fun lessons about each of these values. We identified examples of when our heroes, both real and fictional (Jesus, Lincoln, Luke Skywalker, etc.) displayed them. We stenciled these words onto our dining room wall. For several months, every night at the dinner table we would ask the kids about how they manifested these values during the day: "Billy fell at the playground and hurt his knee, and I helped him get to the nurse" (compassion); "I scored the winning touchdown at recess!" (courage); "I built a new spaceship with legos today!" (creativity); or "I finished all my homework this afternoon" (commitment). We made a color-coded paper chain, and added as many specific accomplishments as we could each day. This involved parents, too. It was fun as we watched the chain grow rapidly. The initial goal was to make it long enough to wrap around our house, though we never quite got that far.

It was a good framework for us. These universal values seemed to capture most of what we felt was essential to pass on to our kids so they could live happy, productive, fulfilling lives, without needing to invoke a deity. Fairly, all of these values in some measure were instilled in us through our Mormon upbringing. The trick, of course, is separating the value from the vehicle, and all the collateral baggage a faulty vehicle might bring with it.

Here's a brief discussion of each value:

• Courage: I think this is the most important value of all. Moral courage, physical courage, spiritual courage. If a child has the courage of his or her convictions, they can make brave choices, overcome failure and disappointment, stand up for themselves when challenged, and take a stand for truth and justice when others are turning away. Also encompassed in this value are confidence and self-esteem. 
• Compassion: Understanding our connectedness to each other, as well as to animals and the earth, that we are all bound in a common fate as humans on this planet, instills a sense of kindness, empathy, and gentleness towards others. Finding opportunities to reach out to the sad, distressed, lonely, impoverished is not difficult. Always much more difficult to offer the same compassion to those within the walls of your own home, but nevertheless the house is an infinite laboratory for this. Also encompassed in this value are charity and service.
• Creativity: Leave your mark on the world! Do something unique! Let your light so shine! Elizabeth and I are creative people, and my experience is that nothing is more motivating or fulfilling than the act of creating something unique and expressive about your experience on this planet. Also encompassed in this value are critical thinking, innovation, and independence.
• Commitment: Do what you say you're going to do. Persevere through hard times. Take a chosen task all the way to its completion. "A job worth doing is worth doing well." Also encompassed in this value are honesty and loyalty.

So there you go: our alliterative mnemonic that created opportunities for conversation around the dinner table, and a guidebook of sorts for dealing with problems and growth opportunities inside and outside the home. We found that most other essential values were able to be placed within this framework, but two others deserve special mention--although not as conveniently "Cs."

• The Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. This simple maxim has stood the test of time, and creates an easy framework for kids to understand the social consequences of their actions. "Would you like it if Billy threw dog poop at you? No. So let's not do that, okay?"

• Resiliency: The ability to bounce back from failure. Closely tied to courage, is there any more valuable trait to instill in our children? Failures will come. It's okay to experience that, feel it, grieve it. But then, son, time to get right back on that horse! (Thanks for that one, Mom and Dad!) Life is a long journey, and weathering the storms that come with courage and commitment is essential to our happiness and fulfillment. Three particular phrases that have helped ameliorate the sting of failure, disappointment, betrayal or pain: "Everything's going to be alright, "This too shall pass," and "Brighter days ahead!"

Or my kids' favorite: "Hey, guys, I just realized something! Today is the first day of the rest of my life! And it's the last day of my old life! AND . . . it's only minus one days until yesterday!"

(Okay, so that last one doesn't make much sense, but it's funny, and it gets to another core value: developing a good sense of humor, and a healthy sense of the absurdity and exquisiteness of life. Always good to keep these kiddos and their developing wits on their toes.)

Be Open To New Truth

Nice quote attributed to the Buddha:

"If at some point in your life you adopt an idea or a perception as the absolute truth, you close the door of your mind. This is the end of seeking the truth. And not only do you no longer seek the truth, but even if the truth comes in person and knocks on your door, you refuse to open it. Attachment to views, attachment to ideas, attachment to perceptions are the biggest obstacles to the truth."