would you rather?

Would you rather hit a home run 2 out of 10 times and strike out the other 8 or would you rather hit a single 8 out of 10 times and strike out the other 2? 

You might be swinging too hard. 

the ego can't be alone.

Our ego can't live in a world where there aren't other people to compare it to. Think about that for a second. If you're alone on an island, you ego is going to have a much harder time corrupting you than it is helping you. 

The next time your ego is driving you crazy, just look for the person it's comparing you to and kindly ask your ego to stop paying attention to them and start paying attention to you again. 

two important things.

One. We should all read this. It's important to remember the humanity of victim. 

And then we should all read this: Between 2001 and 2015, more Americans were killed by homegrown right-wing extremists than by Islamist terrorists... It's important to remember the humanity of enemy. 

what to do...

[ t h e ] n o r t h [ e r n ] [ o f ] i r e l a n d

It is both a dignity and
a difficulty
to live between these
names,

perceiving politics
in the syntax of
the state.

And at the end of the day,
the reality is
that whether we
change
or whether we stay
the same

these questions will
remain.

Who are we
to be
with one
another?

and

How are we
to be
with one
another?

and

What to do
with all those memories
of all those funerals?

and

What about those present
whose past was blasted
far beyond their
future?

I wake.
You wake.
She wakes.
He wakes.
They wake.

We Wake
and take
this troubled beauty forward.

Tuama, Pádraig Ó. Sorry For Your Troubles Canterbury Press Norwich

we can't say these things anymore.

1) "Banning guns won't stop shootings." 

In actual reality, we can't possibly have a more ridiculous statement. 

Guns shoot. If we take away all the guns there will actually, guaranteed, be no more shootings. There's nothing more true or predictable.  Banning all guns would definitely stop all shootings. 

I get the sentiment. We can't remove all the guns or we shouldn't remove all the guns. That's fine. Just please say that instead. It's a much more productive conversation and might actually get us somewhere. 

2) "It's too soon to talk politics." 

In actual reality, politics are part of the reason there were police officers, first responders, hospitals, ambulances, roads for the ambulances to drive on, electricity in the hospitals, cars for the police officers to drive... we get it. 

Politics are also the reason a man could buy machine guns (plural) legally.  

I get the sentiment. People are hurting and we should not take advantage of a fragile emotional state to manipulate. Of course, there is never a right time to do that. So, let's just never take advantage of fragile emotional states to manipulate and never stop talking about practical ways that help us have less grief and more healing, even if they are political. 

Also it’s not too soon after Sandy Hook and Orlando to talk politics so let’s talk about those tragedies. 

3) "Thoughts and prayers to..." 

We can do all of those things, without announcing them. 

I get the sentiment. We are hurt. We don’t know what else to do. But action is always better than announcement and sometimes announcing distracts from action - as though it’s accomplished. On the flip side, action always leads to announcements that arrive naturally. Posting that you are starting your diet is way less effective than losing 50 pounds. 

So pray. Maybe meditate. Think. A lot. About guns and politics and humanity. Engage with people. Love. And call a Representative or two. Thank a police officer or fireman or woman or doctor or nurse that you know for doing a hard job. Research gun violence and restriction around the world. Don’t take someone’s word for it. 

This has to stop happening. And it can. It has stopped in countless countries around the world who stopped responding to preventable tragedies with thoughts and prayers and, instead, with purposeful and humble action. Because they cared enough.

witness.

Interesting word with multiple definitions most of which center around two very different ideas; one is perceiving, seeing, knowing by presence... an experience... and the other is retelling or informing that experience to others to convince them in some kind of manner of its validity. 

It's interesting that some religions picked up on the word "witness" as something its adherents should shoot for. 

It's an amazing idea if we're talking more about the first kind of witness: seeing, knowing perceiving a person and experience in its entirety. Listening. Seeing. Hearing. Observing. 

It's a pretty bad idea if we're talking more about the second kind of witness: retelling and informing someone of evidence to them. Validating. Arguing. Persuading. Talking, talking, talking.

Confusing the two seems dangerous.  

the wrong fear.

File this one in the massive category of "fearing the wrong thing". Obesity kills more people worldwide than car crashes, terror attacks, and Alzheimer's combined.

a gun statistic you probably haven't heard.

The Rural Suicide Rate Is Driven by Men With Guns. 

"The reason that rural suicide rates are higher is because people in these areas are killing themselves with guns," lead author Paul Nestadt of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health said in announcing the findings. "The media focuses on homicides with guns, but only one in three deaths by firearms are homicides. The other two are suicides. Most of the other leading causes of death are going down. Suicides are going up—and firearms are a big reason why."

it's not about creation or evolution.

It really never has been. It's not about gay marriage or divorce or abortion either. 

It's about The Bible having all authority or The Bible having some authority, along with experience, culture, and science. 

Of course, very few, arguably no one, actually gives the Bible all authority so I think we have our answer.

10 things I actually care about...

Here are the 10 things I actually care about right now. Today. 
(In no particular order.)

1. My own peace of mind and ability to maintain compassion, kindness, and grace in the midst of tornados of anger, hate and retribution.  

2. A teen mom I know who can't pay her car repair bill. 

3. 1.5 million people in Puerto Rico without drinking water. 

4. A refugee family I know who can't pay their rent. 

5. Racism. (Or any kind of dehumanization of "other") Of any and every kind. Any kind. Every kind. In me. In you. In our country. 

6. Religious people who travel over land and sea - or just stay in America - and their desperate attempts to convert people that, if successful, end up making them twice the Sons of Hell they are. (That's from Jesus. Yes, I care I might be one of them.)

7. The Rohingya refugee crisis, currently the worst in decades and just part of the global refugee crisis of an estimated 22.5 million refugees, the highest estimate the U.N. has ever had.  

8. Healthcare for people who can't afford it. In any country, but starting with my own. 

9. Social media and its amplifying affects on turmoil and its destructive affects on every human trying to manage turmoil. And trying to manage differences of opinion within that turmoil. And trying to manage fear. Unfortunately, fear is feasting on social media right now like an all you can eat buffet.   

10. Resisting anything that prevents me from insisting that there is color and beauty and love and wonder and awe and good in this world. And from experiencing it every day. 

Extra Bonus Care: Being distracted by things that don't matter when there are so many things that actually do. 

strong or fragile.

Strong things bend without breaking. They are flexible. 

Strong things can take criticism. 

Strong things grow and recognize failure. 

Strong things have strong souls, not just strong fists. 

Strong things are firm enough in their convictions they are okay with disruptions. 

Strong things do the most with the least. 

Fragile things need everyone to agree. 

Fragile things can't handle criticism. 

Fragile things collapse when one block is pulled out. 

Fragile things constantly need more resources to prop them up. 

Do we have the world's strongest military? 

Do we have the world's strongest country? 

Do we have the world's strongest flag? 

----

One thing I know is that love is strong and fear is weak. So I made this shirt to remind me of that. It's my mantra right now and I say it constantly. Love is greater than fear. Fear is less than love. It helps. I have it everywhere. People asked me if it was going to be a shirt. It is and you can buy it here. 

when in doubt.

It's better to disrespect an object over a person, or group of people. 

It's better to disrespect a powerful person or group of people over a marginalized person or group of people, though neither is preferred. 

IF I have to disrespect someone or something (which at some point we all will) that's how my own logic goes.

Yes, powerful people and groups of people are lowest on my list. The first will be last and the last will be first. 

eden as the mind.

The brain is constantly trying to make order out of things. That's a basic summary of why we have so many biases. It's desperately seeking order in the chaos and it manipulates your truth, in order to help you find it. 

Many talk about the Genesis creation poem as one that brings order to the disorder and chaos. The formlessness and darkness of chaos receives days and light and systems. 

And then, humanity seeks more knowledge and the chaos returns, albeit with a new, ordered, flair. 

Maybe Eden is an image of human consciousness. There is a divine order that is pretty different than an information order.

Both really wreck the other. 

brain draino.

Into my meditating this far, I recently described the process to someone as draino for my brain. 

I feel like, already, some of that impatience, fear, discontentedness, anxiety, hate, anger, and a host of other nasty feelings that congest the access to patience, kindness, calm, creativity, courage, peace, joy, awareness, and a host of other greater feelings is being cleared out.

Better mental flow. Better spiritual flow. Who doesn't want that?   

watch out for...

Wolves in sheep's clothing. 

Jesus talked about these apparent dangerous and scary characters: the wolf dressed as a sheep. 

I've always thought of this statement - probably because I was trained this way - as referring to dangerous theologies and/or heresies, etc... 

But, I think it's much more simple.

Wolves. Violent. Bloodthirsty. Strategic. Hunt in packs. Big teeth. We write parables about them and tell them to children for all these reasons. Don't cry wolf because when that wolf comes, it'll be bad. 

Sheep. Calm. Humble. Fluffy. Nice. Cute. We count them when we're falling asleep because counting wolves, well... that would just cause us anxiety. 

So, watch out for violent, bloodthirsty, strategic, hunters who masquerade as calm, humble, fluffy, nice people. 

Yeah, watch out for them alright, and try not to be one. We have enough of them already, especially in government and religion. 

at the hospital.

I was recently at a hospital and noticed a few things. 

1. The parking garage is not free. 

2. The parking garage takes cash only. 

3. There is a $2.50 bank charge to withdraw cash from the bank to pay for the parking. 

Besides the fact that it's 2017 and someone only accepts cash, there were a few more important observations. 

1. Imagine what a gift it would be for a hospital to not charge parking. Very few people are at a hospital because they want to be. Imagine what that would mean to them. 

2. If the hospital didn't take advantage of giving a gift, imagine what a gift it would be for the bank to not charge a fee to pay for hospital parking... because very few people are grabbing cash from that machine to pay for parking because they want to. 

3. If the hospital didn't take advantage of the gift, nor the bank, imagine what a gift it would be for the lab to validate parking... because very few people are visiting that lab in that hospital because they want to. 

Think of the opportunities to be kind and compassionate, to give a gift to people who are generally not in their favorite spots in life that are around us every day, that we miss, because we're just a tad too consumed with "paying the bills". 

As our government, again, debates health care, I can't help but imagine how nice it would be if they were more concerned about being kind and compassionate, of giving gifts to people who are often in their worst circumstances, instead of being consumed with "paying the bills". 

Or, at the very least, if they were equally concerned with "paying the bills" when it comes to giving 700 billion dollars to what is already, by far, the world's wealthiest military. 

I guess all of this is to be expected when a culture pays far more attention to money and fear than kindness and generosity. 

sin.

If sin is blindness or unawareness. Which, it is, in my head. 

And the story of the Lost (Prodigal) Son is a story about two people, one of whom is blind and unaware and the other who isn't. 

Then, sometimes, following all the rules is the worst form of sin there is. 

Of course, that is what Jesus seems to say pretty often. 

Damn, sometimes it just hits you. If Jesus came to America during 2017, can you even imagine what they would do to him? 

Then it hits. Jesus has come. Multiple times. But when you're so busy "not sinning" it's hard to see him. 

simply...

You can't make both the powerful and the marginalized, completely happy. 

As in, the powerful who are afraid of losing their power to the marginalized and the marginalized who are afraid of the powerful. 

So, you have to pick one. 

And if you have to pick one, which one are you going to pick? 

Which one did Jesus pick? 

the political excuse.

I'm a little frustrated, again. Again, I've heard from someone that they love "church" but don't want to talk politics. Admittedly, I don't know what this means, exactly, but I think it means that they don't want to talk about words and ideas that come up in the political spectrum from time to time or that might be construed as political or that appear on the news from time to time...

Honestly, I think it actually means they don't want to talk about gay marriage (unless we disagree with it) or refugees (unless we are scared of them) or racism (unless it doesn't exist) or pledging allegiance to the flag (unless as Christians it's our duty). When I dig deeper that's what I always usually find. 

Either way....

We can't avoid politics, at some level or another. We live in a world where policies affect people and those policies that affect people come from political views and discussions and actions and conversations and opinions. 

If we care about people, we have to care about politics at some level or another.
If we care about people, we have to talk politics. 
I do care about people. 
I hope you do too. 

We probably disagree. That's okay. It's good. It's healthy.

Can we talk about how we disagree rather than pretend we never do?

that soccer game.

Have you ever been to one of those Jr. High soccer games where the parents are all screaming at the players? And they are screaming the same things over and over? And the things they are screaming are only being said because someone screamed them at one time and they sound appropriate for a soccer game? But, it seems no one has any clue as to what they might actually mean? 

"First to the ball!" "Recover!" "First to the ball!" "Recover!" "First to the ball!" "Recover!" "Win in!" "Cover #5!" "First to the ball!" "Recover!" "First to the ball!" "Recover!" "First to the ball!" "Recover!" "Win in!" "Cover #5!" 

Yeah you get it. 

And the players aren't listening. At all. After the game they say things like, we don't ever listen to anyone except our coach and the people playing the game. 

Have you ever been to one of those Jr. High soccer games? 

Maybe. Maybe not. But, I can almost guarantee you, you see the same behavior almost every day. Sometimes I am that parent screaming. Sometimes I am that player playing and ignoring anything that's not from someone on the field, fighting, with me. Sometimes I am the coach, wondering why all the parents keep saying "First to the ball!" and don't seem to know what it means. 

And when you see it, so up close and in your face: such a vivid illustration..  wow, it sure makes you want to never do anything like it ever again. 

So, once, again, today I learned to shut-up more often than not. Not only do you look much smarter, you really waste much less time and get to enjoy much more of life.