Cultivate Direct Communication

Here is something I wrote for the Zen Center website.

How to avoid gossip, talking in the bushes, hearsay, rumor mongering and other misdemeanors.

One of the most important guidelines for harmony in a community is the practice of direct communication. When we are triggered by someone or something it is very tempting to talk about it among our friends. At SWZC we practice taking our upset to the person who triggered it or to the person or group most able to do something about the situation that triggered the upset.


If you find yourself upset with someone, here are some steps to resolution.

1. Cultivate emotional intelligence. This means be aware of what the emotion is (anger, fear, hurt etc.). Then take responsibility for the emotion. This means acknowledging that the action of another triggered this emotion but the emotion is mine. Then decide: what is the action that I want to take around this feeling.

a. Realizing that this feeling is almost completely repressed emotions from the past, I decide to meditate with the feeling, letting go of the trigger. For example: When the person next to me clears their throat in an irritating way, I realize that the burning anger that takes over my body is all about me. The trigger (throat clearing) is not the problem, it just triggered repressed anger. I can be happy that I am aware of the emotion and decide to just let it go or I can work on it in meditation in terms of transforming anger into wisdom.

b. Realizing that this feeling has to do with someone treating me inappropriately, I also realize that there is nothing I can do about it. For example: When my boss tells me I have to stay late and I cannot financially afford to offend my boss right now. Something real triggered my feelings, but I make the decision not to confront my boss about it because of circumstances. So just like in the first example, I work with these emotions in meditation. Let go of the story about the boss and be one with the anger and it will transform into wisdom.

c. When I’m not sure if this feeling is all my stuff or if I have a legitimate gripe with you. Or, if I’m pretty sure, your behavior is inappropriate. This is the time to use direct communication.

d. When the event that triggered my feelings is such that I need to take an action. For example: I hear the neighbors beating their children. This is the time to immediately call the police. My emotions may be giving me the information that I need to leave, to notify the police, to sign a petition, to quit my job, to march on Washington etc.


2. Practice compassionate communication without blame

First calm down. Let the feelings settle a little and put the incident into the compassionate communication model. When you did such and such, I felt such and such. I have this need and I have this request. For example: When you didn’t keep your appointment with me, I felt hurt and angry. I have a need that my friends keep their agreements with me. My request is that you keep your appointments, and if you can’t call me. Then listen without judgment to what the other person has to say. There may have been a good reason and no phone. Or it may be that they have a need for spontaneity and you may have to reach some kind of compromise to maintain the friendship.

3. When you have to talk about it to someone else first

There are many healthy ways to practice direct communication and to work out what you are going to say beforehand. You can write everything out. If you are feeling very emotional you can write everything out, venting anger and resentment, and then burn it (or as one therapist told me write it down, tear it up in the toilet, and then shit on it and flush). You can talk to a therapist or another professional and get help on how to proceed with your grievance. You can talk to me or any other spiritual teacher. You can work on it with your 12 step sponsor. You can share in an anonymous 12 step meeting such as codependents anonymous or adult children of alcoholics or alanon etc. The indirect communication happens when you decide to share to other people who know the person you have a grievance with. It can possibly be healthy but only if the person you are sharing with can maintain the intention of helping you to do direct communication. If the two of you fall into blame and judgment then there is usually trouble in the community. Be aware if you are talking about your grievance with others as a way of creating a bond. Sometimes when we feel isolated we find solace in finding allies. If that is happening everyone who is participating needs to look at, how did we fall into indirect communication and how can I bring this out to the community.

4. How to make the communication

In general these kinds of communication do not go well by email. There is a give and take that requires face to face communication. Ask the person you have a grievance with, if there is a time that you can talk. I prefer not to know it’s going to be about a grievance because then I suffer from anxiety about what the issue is until we get together. However if you are bringing a facilitator or ally you probably need to let the other person know that you do have a grievance. Give yourselves enough time to do the back and forth necessary to reach resolution. You may not use the compassionate communication model directly but keep in mind to use I statements, speak from your own experience, speak from the heart and listen without judgment. You may want to bring someone to facilitate or to be your ally. Especially if there is a power differential in the relationship you may want an ally.

5. If that doesn’t work

If you do not feel resolved and are still having strong feelings of anger, shame , disappointment etc about the communication continue with the process. If you haven’t tried a facilitator, try that. If the facilitator doesn’t work then talk to me about setting up a grievance council or if the problem is with me talk to a member of the Guardian Council or the Board.



If you find yourself being drawn into indirect communication.

There are many different scenarios involving working with someone who we perceive to be out of integrity with the grievance procedure. The most common is probably that a friend in the community wants to talk to you about their grievance with another person. It is often times very difficult to do direct communication and it is also easy to fall into listening to indirect communication. The best way to deal with this situation is to keep in mind, if you are the third party, that your main job is to get the two people to talk to each other. This could involve:

1. Acknowledge that you are engaging in indirect communication. Let the person know that you feel uncomfortable talking about someone who is not present and that you encourage them to work on their grievance directly. Let them know that you will not keep a confidence that involves someone who is not there.

2. Role playing (pretend like I'm the one you are upset with--how would you tell me about it). The point of role playing would be helping the person with a grievance develop how they can talk about it directly.

3. Offer to act as a mediator when they talk to the person they are upset about. Or offer to work with the Abbot or the Guardian Council to form a group to facilitate the conversation.

4. In some cases you will be told about a violation such as abuse, sexual misconduct etc. I think that that kind of confidence cannot be kept. We need to stop any of this kind of activity immediately.

5. Seek advice from me, your sponsor, your therapist or another spiritual teacher.

6. Tell the person who is being talked about that it is happening. It is not fair to allow someone in the community to talk about someone behind their back and not let that person know what is going on.

Letters about Iceland economy

One of the Zen Center Members is corresponding with someone from Iceland. here are two of her communications. Quite shocking.

hi Barbara, Facebook is a wonderful thing, isn´t. Good to hear from

you again and I can hear you are enjoying your stay in Italy.

The situation in Iceland is not good at all. It´s like Eron fraud

for a whole nation. Three our biggest banks are bankrupt, and many

people invested in them and lost everything. I had few shares in one

of them and lost everything. Also all my savings is gone, my

retirement savings is gone, like for the most people here. Most

retirements funds invested in the banks and that is zero today. The

stock market collapsed.

Along with the world bank crisis, in Iceland the situation is extra serious as a few

young business men were gambling with our money and making them huge rich. And some of the money went to lavish parties and excursions for them, expensive homes, golf club memberships, holiday properties, huge salaries, personal jets and expensive yachts.They have all disappeared like rats and left the Icelandic nation traumatized. People are angry, sad and mourning.

Everything is collapsing, people losing their jobs, no money is coming

to the country and this winter will be difficult for us. The good thing is that the Icelandic nation is optimistic and hard working and through the years been hit by crisis and often by nature (but not by some stupid young men) and bounced back again. The bank managers for the new Icelandic banks are women, that is positive :-). Banks are going bankrupt and economy is bad all over the world but this crisis hit our small nation very hard.

All my best to you and your family

hi Barbara, yes you can share this with the world. The image of Iceland is down and ordinary people are afraid to travel abroad because we don´t feel save. those banker and businessmen were so greedy that they establish banks and bought companies (not for their money, with loans) all over the Europe, mostly in England, Holland and in Scandinavia.

These banks and companies are also down and people in those countries blame the Icelandic nation for that and show us attitude. We as a nation has nothing to do with it and the nation is bankrupt, we are all suffering and the next generation will pay for it as well. The inflation is going up and pessimistic predict 75% inflation by the end of the year.

The government of England put their terrorist laws against Iceland. You can read about it on-line the newpapers in England for the past days and see how we are treated as a nation. Students abroad are not getting the students loan transferred because banks abroad have closed business with everybody from Iceland. It´s not fair, but hopefully we learned something from this and this corporate greediness will not control the world anymore. (Am I too optimistic).

Another thing that might happen is that young people will move from Iceland. But we stick together as a nation and are like a one big family helping each other.

best regards to you and your family

Difficult Times

Difficult times are a perfect catalyst for a major shift in consciousness. The most important shift is fear becomes love. Love is a complicated word since sometimes we use it when we mean attachment. When we are attached to an object we fear that we won’t get it or that we will lose it. In this case, love does not refer to clinging and attachment, but to our very nature which is complete in itself. Fear arises because we see ourselves as separate and we fear the other or we fear that we will lose the other. Our practice is to transform fear into love or Oneness.

That love becomes apparent when we experience no separation or no self. In the movie Dan in Real Life, a young man says, “Love is not a feeling. It is an ability.” That statement intrigued me. Even though our nature is love, we have to practice to realize that fact. This practice is the practice of meditation or zazen. In zazen we let go of ideas and concepts that mask the Oneness and realize True Nature. Fear disappears since there is nothing to fear and becomes love. Maezumi Roshi used to say the greatest gift from our practice is the gift of No Fear.

Now, when I am afraid, I use it as practice. I become aware of the fear and also notice what triggered the fear. For example: I may be late for an appointment and fear that the person I’m meeting will be angry and rejecting. When I shift that fear to love, I become aware that she is just like me, in fact is me. Her anger and my fear do not exist. Then I can embrace her anger without fear. I don’t have to be defensive. We can just be with what is. I was a little late. She is angry. So instead of pushing the other away I can open up to what is.

In the book The Great Shift, Fred Sterling says that there are three aspects that we must cultivate for the shift in consciousness. They are truth, trust and passion. The first is truth. If I am approaching everything in my life with love instead of fear, truth is the obvious result. The only reason I make up a lie about why I am late is out of my fear. Out of love there is no problem with saying. “I started talking to someone and didn’t notice the time. I’m sorry.” And my angry friend coming out of love rather than fear can say “I really wish you were more careful about time. I had to wait and now we won’t have as much time together.” She doesn’t have to say “O it’s ok” out of fear that the truth will harm our friendship. Just imagine how much easier life would be if we just told the truth rather than spinning and manipulating.

Out of truth comes trust. I was particularly struck by this, since I have a pattern of labeling people as not trustworthy. When I say someone is not trustworthy, I am really saying I don’t like them and I fear them. As I work with my trust issues, I find that the best way for me to reconnect with those I have decided are untrustworthy is through forgiveness. I need to do some kind of forgiveness ritual either directly with the person involved or as a personal prayer in order to reestablish trust. In the same way, if the true nature of the universe is love, then I don’t have to live in fear in this world. I can trust the perfection of life.

The third aspect of the shift is passion. By that Mr. Sterling means to find your passion and act on it. This is similar to loving action of the three tenants. No wonder the world is not working very well when so many of us are unhappy with our jobs and our situations. Find your passion and do that! When we start viewing the world as love and telling the truth and trusting the universe then the result is that we get to follow our heart and our passion. The peace that comes from trusting the universe and trusting our place in the universe is so much greater than the crazy ups and downs of living in attachment and aversion.

From a Zen standpoint, we have created our suffering by attaching to the false idea that we are separate from the environment. During the practice of meditation we see that we are one with everything and that everything is love (compassion). That experience of oneness is also the truth that we have denied ourselves. When we see things as they really are, we see that life is whole perfect and complete and we can begin to trust that life is good. Trusting in our life we can live our passion without fear.

Today a member told me we are so lucky that we have our practice in times like these. My wish is that all of us are able to embrace the oneness of all things, embrace the lessons of this time and continue to cultivate love, truth, trust and passion in our lives.

See the whole Zen Center news letter by clicking here

Doctors Orders Can Kill You

Great Camping in Anza Borrega

Here is a great camping place in Anza Borrega

N33 00.496 W 116 22.899

It is in Blair Valley which is off of S2. There are a couple of spots close to the Morteros trail head. This one is about .2 mile west of the trailhead. Totally primative. You have to bring a container for fire and water and everything. However the road is quite easy to navigate. It is about 3 miles south on the dirt road.

The trail goes to an ancient Kumeyaay village. Here is amazing energy. You will see. The rocks are whales leaping out of the earth. the whole area is protected by chollo and agave and very isolated. Just there Feb 12th and saw a couple of blooming ocotillo and one yellow flower. This petroglyph was enhanced by someone 20 years ago or so. It is at N33 00.374 W116 22.432.

PS I love my GPS!

Solstice Hike

A few of us were talking about doing this solstice walk on Thursday morning.

Cowles Mountain Solstice Sunrise Hikes to Kumeyaay solstice site and summit
of San Diego's highest peak planned by Mission Trails Regional Park trail
guides on Thursday and Saturday, December 20 and 22. Free hikes start at
6 a.m. at Cowles Mountain staging area (corner Navajo Road and Golfcrest
Drive).

Here is a blurb about last year
www.sdreader.com/php/roamshow.php

We will leave from the Zen Center at 5:30am. Either meet us here or at the
park.

Hope you can make it!
Seisen

Politics and Religion

Here's the campanion piece to the one about Huckabee

HILLARY CLINTON HEAVY INTO RIGHTWING RELIGIOUS POWER CULTMOTHER JONES - Through all of her years in Washington, Clinton has beenan active participant in conservative Bible study and prayer circlesthat are part of a secretive Capitol Hill group known as the Fellowship.Her collaborations with right-wingers such as Senator Sam Brownback(R-Kan.) and former Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) grow in part from thatconnection. "A lot of evangelicals would see that as just cynicalexploitation," says the Reverend Rob Schenck, a former leader of themilitant anti-abortion group Operation Rescue who now ministers todecision makers in Washington. "I don't....there is a real good that isinfected in people when they are around Jesus talk, and open Bibles, andprayer.". . .When Clinton first came to Washington in 1993, one of her first stepswas to join a Bible study group. For the next eight years, she regularlymet with a Christian "cell" whose members included Susan Baker, wife ofBush consigliere James Baker; Joanne Kemp, wife of conservative iconJack Kemp; Eileen Bakke, wife of Dennis Bakke, a leader in theanti-union Christian management movement; and Grace Nelson, the wife ofSenator Bill Nelson, a conservative Florida Democrat.Clinton's prayer group was part of the Fellowship (or "the Family"), anetwork of sex-segregated cells of political, business, and militaryleaders dedicated to "spiritual war" on behalf of Christ, many of themrecruited at the Fellowship's only public event, the annual NationalPrayer Breakfast. (Aside from the breakfast, the group has "made afetish of being invisible," former Republican Senator William Armstronghas said.) The Fellowship believes that the elite win power by the willof God, who uses them for his purposes. Its mission is to help thepowerful understand their role in God's plan.Clinton declined our requests for an interview about her faith, but inLiving History, she describes her first encounter with Fellowship leaderDoug Coe at a 1993 lunch with her prayer cell at the Cedars, theFellowship's majestic estate on the Potomac. Coe, she writes, "is aunique presence in Washington: a genuinely loving spiritual mentor andguide to anyone, regardless of party or faith, who wants to deepen hisor her relationship with God."The Fellowship's ideas are essentially a blend of Calvinism and NormanVincent Peale, the 1960s preacher of positive thinking. It's a cheeryfaith in the "elect" chosen by a single voter-God-and a devotion toRomans 13:1: "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers....Thepowers that be are ordained of God." Or, as Coe has put it, "we workwith power where we can, build new power where we can't.". . .Coe's friends include former Attorney General John Ashcroft, ReaganiteEdwin Meese III, and ultraconservative Rep. Joe Pitts (R-Pa.). UnderCoe's guidance, Meese has hosted weekly prayer breakfasts forpoliticians, businesspeople, and diplomats, and Pitts rose fromobscurity to head the House Values Action Team, an off-the-recordnetwork of religious right groups and members of Congress created by TomDeLay. The corresponding Senate Values Action Team is guided by anotherCoe protégé, Brownback, who also claims to have recruited King Abdullahof Jordan into a regular study of Jesus' teachings.The Fellowship's long-term goal is "a leadership led by God-leaders ofall levels of society who direct projects as they are led by thespirit." According to the Fellowship's archives, the spirit has in thepast led its members in Congress to increase U.S. support for theDuvalier regime in Haiti and the Park dictatorship in South Korea. TheFellowship's God-led men have also included General Suharto ofIndonesia; Honduran general and death squad organizer Gustavo AlvarezMartinez; a Deutsche Bank official disgraced by financial ties toHitler; and dictator Siad Barre of Somalia, plus a list of othergenerals and dictators. Clinton, says Schenck, has become a regularvisitor to Coe's Arlington, Virginia, headquarters, a former conventwhere Coe provides members of Congress with sex-segregated housing andspiritual guidance.http://www.motherjones.com/cgi-bin/print_article.pl?url=http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/09/hillarys-prayer.html