Cool Mind Warm Heart

Death Reminds Us Not To Miss a Moment

Death is visiting, bringing reminders not to miss a moment.

My grandson, Sam, 14, lives in upstate New York.  Like countless other adolescent lacrosse players in his part of the world, he dreams of the day his blood turns orange as he takes the field for Syracuse.  This past week, at a local indoor sports complex, Sam was waiting for a game to wrap up so his team’s contest could begin.  A boy on one of the teams playing in that preceding game, a boy from a neighboring town whom Sam had competed against any number of times, was struck by the lacrosse ball on the chest in the perfect spot at the perfect moment in the heart’s rhythm to cause his heart to stop.  It is a rare, freakish event with the medical name of “commotio cordis.”  As almost always happens, apparently, resuscitation was unsuccessful.

Sometimes We Must Risk It All

You have to reject one expression of the band before you can have another.  And in between you have nothing.  You have to risk it all. 
~ Bono (of the band U2), in the documentary “From the Sky Down”.

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the essay

The Most Accomplished Person on Earth Has Nothing on Us

The rest of us may not be able to jump underwater on a pogo stick in the Amazon for three hours and forty minutes, but we recognize that what it takes to do so is no more than what it takes to meet each moment of our day with love.

the essay

Never Give Up

Never give up on someone you can’t go a day without thinking about.
~ On a scrap of paper among my belongings

Becoming Seekers

Imagine being 50 and fabulously successful on society’s terms at every step of your life.    You were probably valedictorian of your pre-school class, and the playground kids always voted you captain.  Today you’re CEO of a prosperous organization populated by wonderful colleagues who, for good reason, think you’re pretty terrific. 

Now imagine discovering that all that has brought you to this point in your life is not enough to take you where you want to go.

the essay

Loving Knowing Nothing

Since birth, it seems somebody’s been whispering in my ear, “Look outside yourself for reflections of God, but for the experience of God, look within.” 

The universe has a great sense of irony.  I find the inner depths fathomless.  I know nothing, really.  And yet, the more nothing I know, the happier I am. 

Thomas Merton, speaking to God 70 Christmases ago, said this better than I can:

‎"Your brightness is my darkness.

I know nothing of You and, by myself,

I cannot even imagine how to go about knowing You.

If I imagine You, I am mistaken.

If I understand You, I am deluded.

If I am conscious and certain I know You, I am crazy.

The darkness is enough."

~  Thomas Merton, prayer before midnight mass at Christmas, 1941 [Thank you Parabola magazine.]

The Power of Thought

    In my childhood, I used to get angry at injustices.  One day I saw how foolish it was: I could not change the world in a minute by a display of wrath.  I raised my hands and vowed: “I will never be angry again.”  Since then, I have never been angry within, though I can be outwardly fiery when necessary.

    Just as by the power of thought you can change yourself to be whatever you want to be, so most importantly, you will be able to change your consciousness from that of a mortal to a divine being.

~ Paramahansa Yogananda (1893-1952)

Peace, Irene

Hurricane Irene beat the snot out of Vermont this past August, 2011.  The most destructive natural disaster in the state’s history, they say.  A few lost their lives.  More than a few lost everything else.  Everybody lost something, if only their attachment to what is and isn’t possible in their own backyard.

The Root of a Lot of Laughter and Forgiveness

Some smartypants, who heard me pontificate that how we define our world creates our world, recently asked if I could define myself.

If I’d thought about it, I would have said what my beloved Yogananda once remarked: I’m a tiny bubble of laughter in the sea of mirth.  Thankfully, instead of searching for poetry, I simply opened my heart and found myself blurting, “I am a very gifted person.”  By that I didn’t mean talented, as many do when they use that adjective.  I meant, literally, a person who has been given gifts––in my case, beaucoup.

Comfort Kills...And Brings Us Back To Life

Comfort is among life’s essential treasures and most dangerous pursuits.  Without it, health is impossible.  Yet, when it is life’s goal, it kills us.  Fortunately, any choice we make can serve us on the journey of waking up.

Extravagant Humility

An eccentrically spiritual zillionaire of my imagination once asked me to design a “golf experience” on his private nine-hole course that comprised the backyard of his Adirondack summer cottage. 

The only direction I received can be summed up by his remark: “Anyone who thinks this course is about golf will think naked skydiving is about transportation.”

Managing Change in Real Time

We knew she might be dying––and that that was beside the point.

the essay

 

We Humans Have So Much Power It Should Take Your Breath Away

Disappointment is anger.  Anger is fear.  Holding on to fear is a choice.  Therefore, disappointment is a choice.  People and events don’t disappoint us.  We impose disappointment on ourselves by how we choose to see.  Love or fear is the only choice we make...because it’s the only real choice there is.  And the fun part is: love and fear can’t exist simultaneously.  It’s either one or the other...moment by moment.  We humans have so much power it should take your breath away.

Gratitude for 9/11

9/11 has been one of the most life-affirming events in our nation’s history––unimaginably painful, to be sure, but inspiringly beautiful nonetheless.

I’m speaking specifically of the countless stories of how individual people (from those who perished that morning to those born since) have chosen to respond to the trauma initiated at 8:46 A.M ten years ago. 

The stories are everywhere on this 10th anniversary, one more poignant than the next, so I have nothing to add on that score.  What can be useful to remember, I find, is a lesson the stories offer us.  At the core of every circumstance, beyond good and evil, is the opportunity to grow love. 

Furthermore, love is a choice...as is our every response to life. 

What's Worth Saying?

Arresting, emotionally powerful, meaningful, memorable––those four terms may define effective communication, but they don’t mean much until we’ve decided that the idea in our noggin is actually worth banging our gums on.  So how do we do that?  What filter, if any, might we wish to place between the phantasmagoric smorgasbord within our cranial vault and each sound that pops out of our mouth?

Why No Bliss

There’s only one reason why you’re not experiencing bliss at this present moment, and it’s because you’re thinking or focusing on what you don’t have.
~ Anthony deMello

Embracing Messy

A man I’ll call Bob spoke of how choosing to discipline his kids by hitting them has changed his life...by breaking his heart.  The handful of us present, Bob included, took another step in understanding what it takes to love.

Death Ends a Life, Not a Relationship

Forty years ago my pop dropped dead while playing golf one glorious October Saturday morning on his home course overlooking the oddest of New York’s Finger Lakes, the one shaped like a Y.  At 65, it was a fitting exit for a guy who’d lived a charmed life.  That today I, too, enjoy no shortage of wild-ass blessings amidst the many pains of ignorance, reminds me how much my dad is part of me.

An essay for Father's Day

 

Why I love Alzheimer's

I can’t count how many times my own unmanaged fear prompted me to wish that the elders in my life with Alzheimer’s would die.  Still, it wasn’t anywhere near the number of times I’ve been grateful for all they’ve taught me about how to love.

from the archives

Creating From The Heart

If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing.
~ Marc Chagall

My Phone Call With Osama

[This essay, offered in May 2011 upon the announcement of Osama bin Laden's death, was first published in February 2007]

❦

I’d food fight the Dalai Lama on the back of a crocodile (prime time on ESPN, of course) if I felt the world’s love quotient would rise a tick.  So if Osama bin Laden were to ring me here at the farm and ask would I consider taking him on as a client, I’d say sure, I’d consider it.  In my imagination, the rest of our conversation might go something like this:

MORE

The Price of Beliefs

One hundred fifty years ago this month (1861) our nation’s Civil War began.  More than 600,000 participants died because those with the influence to bring about such devastation trusted that they understood the mind of God––at least enough to create enemies and kill them. 

Seventy years ago this month (1941) in Annapolis, Maryland (according to John McPhee in his essay “Spin Right Shoot Left”), the lacrosse team of the United States Naval Academy refused to take the field if Lucien Alexis, Jr., of Harvard did, too.  Alexis was black.  Harvard sent him home.  Of course, both institutions, I’m sure, were convinced they represented the noblest ideals of our nation, and indeed of humankind.

Surely we can all think of examples today of how such ignorance manifests itself...maybe even in ourselves, if you can believe it.

Buddha Sitting Across the Breakfast Table

Maybe someday our moments will include a unique, in-the-flesh, relationship with a being whose consciousness and God’s are one.  And won’t that be wonderful.  But Buddha sitting across the breakfast table, and our days guided by a host of angels doesn’t change the reality that our spiritual journey is our responsibility—choosing love, breath by breath.
~ Mirror Man

The Only Dance There Is (Maybe)

The devastation and danger in Japan in the wake of the recent earthquake is distinct in its excruciating magnitude, but it is as ordinary as the sunrise in what it requests of each of us.

Essence of a Noble Aspiration

I’ve been privileged to help a rather special CEO bring forward a vision for his company that is among the most powerful statements of common intention I’m aware of.  Should you, dear reader, have an interest in such things, I would gladly mail you a copy of the foundational brochure we produced.  It’s titled, The Seed: Essence of a Noble Aspiration.

Why (Evidently) I Asked to Be a Drunk

I’m writing this on 2/22 (2011), which happens to be my 22nd anniversary as a recovering alcoholic.  Serendipitously, the day of the week is Twosday.  Other than amusement, the cosmic significance of that numerology is lost on me.  But not the significance of being an alcoholic, a blessing of the highest order.

Remembering You Kindly: The Hardest Job on Earth

 

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.
~ Maya Angelou

An essay about stuff that causes the heart to smile

Our Friend, The Impossible

 

We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.
~ Charles Swindoll, writer, clergyman

Without Resentments, What the Heck Are We Going to Talk About?

You’ve probably heard of Irish Alzheimer’s: “You forget everything but resentments.”  Much as I love the joke (being born with Guinness in my DNA), it’s hard to imagine that any tribe, even those from the isle of saints and scholars, has the corner on resentments.  The way many of us behave, you'd think we couldn't live without them.

The Gold in Niggers and Injuns

The push to change the words “nigger” and “injun” in Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, because the so-called offensive nature of those terms might limit today’s readership and appreciation of that literary classic, is a wonderful opportunity to reflect on how we avoid taking responsibility for our feelings––and therefore miss the chance to become more awake, more whole, more useful friends to one another.

Happiness: The Great Ambition

My niece Elizabeth, a high school senior applying to colleges, represents the very best in humankind because, when asked on the admissions form what idea challenges her most, answers, “How to be happy.”   At least that’s what her heart says.

More

Which Would You Prefer: To Win the Lottery, Or Become Paraplegic?

I actually saw a guy ask that in a presentation he was giving on happiness.

His point was that while, in the short-term, the answer is no doubt obvious, long-term it’s a bit trickier....

MORE

We're All Kings of the World, Whether We Know It Or Not

Most holidays are sneaky.  Their purpose is way deeper than how we commonly think of them.  Thanksgiving, for instance.  It reminds us that, gender notwithstanding, we’re all kings of the world.

For Pain and Laughs, You Can't Beat an AA Meeting

More...

It Matters Who We Vote For, But Not Who Wins

Goofball land, where the only certainty is the anguish of unfulfilled desires, is created by those of us who link our happiness to things we cannot control.  Stuff like a mosquito bite, or that our daughter’s sweetheart is female, or the election of “their” moron rather than “our” champion of righteousness.  Actually, I have a sneaking suspicion that the banner titled “Things We Cannot Control” covers every single option imaginable except one: where we choose to place our attention––love or fear. 

Lightening the Load of Taking Ourselves Seriously

A story of fresh juicy blueberry pie, even when told by the likes of Shakespeare or Beethoven or Picasso, is a long haul from the experience of actually smooshing our face into one, noshing away to our tummy’s content.

My bet is that even the most articulate among us––beginning with whatever fabulous communicator you admire most––lives with the cool understanding that there is a grand canyon between what’s in their mind and heart and their ability to express it. 

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The Myth of Hard Work and the Gift of Baloney

“It can be a dangerous thing to marry someone’s potential,” a friend remarked about her relationship with a former partner.  That four-star piece of wisdom has saved my fanny a number of times.  As has the advice of a college art instructor who used to zip around the studio squawking: “Don’t marry your effort.”

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Creating the Perfect Love

We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.

~ Tom Robbins, Still Life With Woodpecker

(At a recent family wedding, the great-grandfather of the groom, my nephew.)

Fried Grasshoppers on the Road to Enlightenment

One of my favorite cowboy movies is “Lonesome Dove.”  I especially like the scene where trail bosses Woodrow and Gus are interviewing a prospective cook and the cook offers them a sample of his handiwork.  Woodrow puts something unrecognizable in his mouth and says, basically, “That’s tasty, what is it?”  And when the cook says fried grasshopper, Woodrow spits it out as if were snake poop.

Read On

Winning the Lottery of Love

A reflection in the season of weddings

[originally published in 2006]

That my wife has offered her kidney to someone without asking me how I felt about it is among the more gratifying experiences of my life. 

Read on

 

No Bad

For the wise man, there is nothing to be called bad.  Any adversity of life provides a step for his growth, provided he knows how to utilize it.
~ Buddha

The World Cup and the World's Future

And when we meet...we’ll laugh tears of compassion as we compare scars from all those lifetimes, like this one, when we were so oblivious of our beauty. 

[a new essay]

Creating a Vision

New essay: Creating a Vision

It's A Blessing To Be A Drunk

Imagine the universe lovingly putting a gun to your head and saying, “Change or die, sweetheart.” 

Talk about an offer you can’t refuse, though sadly many of us do.  We’d rather the familiarity of misery than the unknown of new life.

Still, I know a lot of recovering drunks (me among them) who will tell you that’s precisely the message they needed to hear before they were willing to commit themselves to being alive rather than being a dead man or woman walking.  And since being dead but still able to fog a mirror isn’t unique to drunks, addicts at large, or pretty much any other category of human, to receive such an unmistakable invitation is a blessing.

We Can Never Have Too Many Healthy Parents

My youngest brother, Cris, has five biological children, ages 24 to 13, and virtually countless other children he’s parented in one way or another over the years.  And the guy’s a banker for crying out loud.

What Were You Thinking, Sister Margaret?

Then there was the Hugh Grant moment on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.  This was 15 years ago now.  It was the actor’s first public appearance since news accounts broke that Los Angeles police discovered him A) in an automobile, B) in the company of a prostitute, and C) “in flagrante delicto” (literally “while the crime is blazing”).  The story, which buzzed not incidentally because at the time Grant was in a rather media-rich romance with English model Elizabeth Hurley, culminated when he is introduced by Leno, comes out, sits down, and the first words out of Leno’s mouth are: WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?

A bittersweet laugh has been traveling the world ever since.  The question was precisely the thought on the mind of anyone at all familiar with the story.  Plus, there was the collective recognition, “It could have been me.”  Oh, not necessarily the prostitution part, but definitely the capacity to make bonehead moves. 

I’m reminded of Leno’s punch line by a much less amusing story told recently by New York Times columnist, Nicholas Kristof, in his dispatch of 27 May 2010.

They Kill Us. We Kill Them. We Humans Have Just Got To Get More Creative

 

On HBO the other day I saw the last half of the Harrison Ford movie “Patriot Games”.  Ford plays one of his customary heroes: a modest, self-effacing family man of enormous intestinal fortitude who stands up to the forces of evil whether they be drug lords, mercenaries or morally bankrupt colleagues within the U.S. government––and of course usually it’s all of the above and a few more for good measure.   Plus, just in case there is a belly button of doubt that Mr. Ford’s character walks on ethical water, his mentor is played by (who else?) James Earl Jones. 

In general, I’m not a fan of films where you know the outcome before the opening titles and the only suspense is “how” the bad guy and gal will experience their just desserts.  And while “Patriot Games,” in my abbreviated viewing, seems to be such a film, predictability isn’t why I find it an unfortunate role model of what it means to be a healthy person.

God's Weight Loss Program

An expert of some kind on a recent PBS talk show said there was “no way” a connection between my lucky hat and the good fortune I enjoy whenever I wear it (as I am seen doing above, 20 years ago, with my daughter).  At the heart of that seemingly sensible certainty is a form of delusion that causes so much of the harm we humans inflict on one another.  It is the delusion that “our best sense of things,” is, in fact, “the truth.” 

The Buddha's Two Cents

Do not believe anything on mere hearsay; do not believe traditions because they are old and handed down through many generations; do not believe simply because the written  testimony of some ancient sage is shown to you; never believe anything because presumptions is in its favor or the custom of many years leads you to regard as true; do not believe anything on the mere authority of teachers or priests.  Whatever according to your own experience and after thorough investigation agrees with your reason, and is conducive to your own weal and to that of all other living things, THAT accept as truth and live accordingly.

~ Gotama, the Buddha

Babies Floating in Air

There’s a family of talking robins on our farm.  They channel the wisdom of the ages.  Last spring as I was taking this photograph, the robin starts quoting Tolstoy:  “In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.” 

Chastened, I did.  Camera down, I just sat.  

After a while the robin impersonates Yogi Berra: “You can observe a lot just by watching.”