Unplugging

 

This is me soon preparing to unplug for an extended period of time, as I prepare to be on retreat at Deer Park Monastery. I won’t be unplugged entirely but I will be unplugged mostly, and for a longer period of time than ever before: 4-months. I am both looking forward to the respite of being offline and I also feel a tension and strain and sadness about it too.

I will be writing while on retreat, in penned words on actual paper and also in typed form on my laptop. Writing while on retreat is a great joy for me and I find that I especially enjoy daily journaling, which is not a form of writing I do really at all outside of my retreat stays.

This is me just wanting to let you all know.

This is me imagining I will have much to post here upon my return back to the magical Land of Internet. 

As my 2020 practice of daily haiku writing continues – and ending with a poem of some kind almost always feels like a good idea to me – here is the one I penned this morning:

The sky fills with light

A gentle rain is falling

The unknown awaits

 

On Activism

In my continued journey of practicing to find ways to use my voice in matters concerning topics I tend to stay quiet on (in part for good reason), I’d like to see where this topic takes me as I write about it out loud.

Recently, I came across a twitter post by Roshi Joan Halifax that said:

I think it’s easy to make the mistake in Buddhism that neutrality is some kind of spiritual goal that we as practitioners have. I know I’ve suffered from this misunderstanding. I’ve also suffered from thinking that I needed to squelch certain types of emotions from arising, such as: anger, sorrow, disappointment, and sexual desire. I am now, thankfully, at a point in my practice that I am able to dismantle some of my misunderstandings about the teachings and actualize more clarity based on my own experiences.

In our current U.S social landscape, with respect to our upcoming presidential election, protest climate, and covid pandemic, my bristling reflexes around activism and activists are front and center for me. NOTE: part of my work to speak up on topics I feel so moved to put voice to centers around my own opinions involving subjects that I feel are either unpopular (to my close sphere of people anyway) or awkwardness-producing. My views on this topic are situated in the unpopular realm of things.

I have a number of friends who would self-identify as being an activist: a social justice activist; an environmental activist; an animal rights activist; a human rights activist; a political activist; some combination of the above or maybe simply an activist with no specific classification.  And while I love my friends dearly, when the word activist or activism comes up or is mentioned, I’ve always taken a few energetic steps back, and depending on the intensity level of activism involved, I might also take a few physical steps back from our friendship as well.

I get caught in those words; entangled in what I take them to mean, which is partly fueled by collective narrative and conservative-based discourse. When I think of an activist, I think of someone who is propelled by blaming and anger, and more specifically as someone who shames others for not thinking/acting the way they do. When I think of an activist, I think of someone who is fueled and propelled against someone(s) verses for something. I think of someone who is fighting verses transforming. I’m not saying it’s right or fair, simply that these are some of what is situated behind my bias towards activists.