A Prisoner of Preferences

A Prisoner of Preferences

Of late, for the past few months, the path I am walking has been rocky. There are many reasons for this, but once again, I am forced to acknowledge that I threw the rocks onto the path myself (as we almost always do). For whatever reason, and I cannot come up with a good one, I have gotten out of the habit of meditating. This happens to many people, and I am going to be gentle with myself in acknowledging it, and simply, “return to the breath.” I could feel my stress level building this morning, so I went into my room and sat to meditate. When the gong went off, signaling the end of my session, I realized it felt so good to be back in that space that I just kept on going. So lesson one is, don’t stop meditating on a daily basis, but if you do, just start up again.

For a while now, my dear wife has been telling me that I have been “cranky”, angry, and frustrated a good deal of the time. Normally I am at peace and pretty tranquil, so this has been disturbing to hear. It’s disturbing mostly because it’s true, because I know it’s true, and I have not seemed to be able to pull myself out of it. Funny thing, this period of time has coincided with the period of time in which I have not been meditating. Perhaps there’s a connection? (Please hear the sound of irony in my voice.)

I know I sound like a broken record here, but while I was meditating, I realized, yet again, the reason I have been so out of sorts is that I have allowed myself to become attached, really attached, to my own preferences. There are many things I would prefer to be different, and my frustration that they are not, and worse, that I seem powerless to cause them to change, has thrown me for a loop. 

I am suffering from having one foot in each of two different worlds. On the one hand, I wish to be gentle, tranquil, peaceful, and compassionate to all beings. On the other hand, I am a political junky! The source of my frustration is directly connected to politics on both the state and national level. I would prefer that the present election cycle, for both political parties, not be a walk into crazytown; but it is, and I fear it will only get worse as we approach November. I would prefer that Arizona’s governor and legislature, and soon to be expanded supreme court, did not belong to the Koch brothers, but they do. I would prefer that the sheriff of Maricopa County were not a bigot and racist (proven in court) who harasses Latino and Latina residents with a vengeance, but he is and does. Compassion dictates that I not hate him, but does not prevent me from hating what he does. If I am being honest, I am also frustrated by the fact that a number of people I love and respect stand above the fray, not lending their voices and prodigious talents for expression to the battle I believe needs to be waged. I would prefer they join me on the barricades, simultaneously admitting to myself they are probably happier and less crazy than I am by not doing so.

As a man trying to live his life according to a Buddhist philosophy, I should and do know that my frustration arises from the fact that the world is not conforming to my view of how it should be, the way I would prefer it to be.

It is important to realize it doesn’t matter that I have these preferences (we all have preferences and biases), but rather that I have allowed myself to be subsumed by them, to be held tight in their grasp. I have allowed myself to become shackled to my preferences rather than simply acknowledging that I have them, and accepting that they are meaningless to anyone but me.

I have been a prisoner of my preferences, but when all is said and done, I built the cell, I am the warden, and I hold the key. It’s time to get back to the cushion, where clarity and mindfulness await, and fling open the door to my self-created prison. 

Namaste

I Am Not Who I Was...Who Am I Now

I haven’t written in my blog for quite a while, but after an interesting and serious conversation with my wife and my youngest child (now 39 and a yogic philosopher and teacher), I gained some insights that I thought worth sharing.

I am 67 years old, and like so many of my contemporaries, I have had to deal with the loss of loved ones, some chronic illness, a bunch of surgeries, and even skin and prostate cancer, which I have thankfully survived. And partly because of my Buddhist philosophy, I have been been able to roll with these punches and not be knocked down by any of them.

Lately, however, I have been quick to anger and terribly impatient, two things that are just “not me”… and there’s the rub. Right now, it is me, and until last evening I hadn’t really zeroed in on why that should be so. Put simply, I am not who I was, and who I have been used to being all my life, and I am angry about that and I am saddened by it. For someone who has often told others in this blog about accepting the reality of impermanence in everything, when confronted with my own, I haven’t done so well.

I have chronic back pain, chronic leg pain, and pain in my hands and feet. Some of that is diabetic neuropathy, but much of it is not; much of it is arthritis, which has the been the curse of my family for generations. Knowing that, one would would think I should have expected this at this point in my life. I figured it was coming, but I had no idea what the reality of it would be. Now I know…I sure as shit know, and am coming to understand what it actually means for the remainder of my life. My balance has been affected; I cannot walk a perfectly straight line; any work I do that requires me to bend over or to kneel down results in significant pain that takes much longer than it used to to subside. Adding insult to injury, I have had to sell my bicycle and buy a used adult tricycle in order to be able ride at all.

Here’s the meat of the matter, so to speak. In the past, whenever I have had to face something difficult, including long hours, difficult situations, physical activity or hard jobs, I knew I could just bull my way through it. In any of these situations, I have always said to my wife, in a joking manner, “Hey, I’m Chuck Rinaldi…no problem”. Well, now there is a problem… I can no longer make that arrogant claim, and frankly, it pisses me off. I have come to realize that I have been fighting like crazy, forcing myself to be who I was twenty years ago, and trying to fool myself into believing I could be as I was twenty years ago.  I routinely ignore the physical pain I am experiencing, despite my wife’s loving concern and desire that I slow down or get someone else to do what needs to be done. If work needs to be done on the roof, then damn it, I’m going up on the roof. In point of fact, I have been trying to live an illusion. 

I am not that person any more, no matter how much I want to be. The Buddha said that life is suffering and that suffering derives from desire. It is not, however, always the desire for things. Much more often, that suffering comes from desiring that things be other than they are; that they be as we would prefer them to be. My desire to ignore my present reality is squarely at the root of what is bothering me right now.  The problem is, if I’m not that Chuck Rinaldi, then who am I? I think I’m beginning to know now, and I have to embrace him with the same compassion that I try to show all other living beings. 

I am at my happiest when I am in my classroom, teaching psychology to my students at the community college. I now realize that it is because, in that classroom, where none of my physical limitations come into play, I am the same Chuck Rinaldi that walked into a classroom 45 years ago, and it feels great. What I must find a way to do, through meditation, is accept that he and the guy who walks kind of slowly to his car in the parking lot after class, maybe a limping a little, are the same person, and he’s just fine as he is. If I can get there, and I know I can, then “Hey, I’m Chuck Rinaldi…no problem.”

Namaste.