I've been trying to figure out how to reconcile my mindfulness practice (which is calm and inwardly focused) to my near rage and desire to blast out at the political fear-mongering McCain tactics. Then I realized how these issues are directly related.
In one of the Compassion parables, the story goes that a person leaves the market, arms full of produce and food for their family. Another person roughly bumps into them and both fall down amid broken eggs, running juice and bruised fruits and vegetables. The angry shopper is about to yell out, "Are you blind?" when he realizes the person who bumped him is indeed blind. His anger quickly vanishes, and he helps the blind person up out of the muck.
So, I want to yell out, "Are you stupid?" to the voters who seem so blind to the vicious and abhorrent McCain tactics, but then I realize many of them truly are ignorant -- oblivious to the facts. It's our responsibility to shed light on the facts, not join the name calling and same nasty tactics we despise. McCain, of all politicians, should have compassion recalling the unconscionable tactics Bush used to destroy him in the 2000 republican primary.
Resorting to character assassination by attempting to link Obama to a 1960's radical anti-war activist (when Obama was only a child at that time) is ridiculous. Clear-eyed facts are our only hope of winning this election. Irrational emotional responses will only escalate tensions and divisions.
This is why I must stop ranting here. As much as I want to rant, and ranting is my Number One Klesha, it's the absolute antithesis to converting even one voter to Obama. Compassion, not anger, is the only antidote to fear. And, fear is the issue. People are afraid of terrorists, evil, the economy, loss of jobs, wall street "fat cats", and mostly of losing the America they love. If we, as Democrats, aren't compassionate and assuring, republicans and even independents, will run ever further to the Right (you know, their "guns and religion" - yikes how offensive was that!)
Ranting won't help. Making fun of Palin on SNL, in the media and blogosphere, is a sure fire way to increase opposition to Obama. So is Maher's outrageous commentary and "Religulous" mocking movie. Kay's compassionate messages and taking time to speak one-on-one with people is our only hope. Thank you Kay, and may we all be more mellow and less hostile, in our message of Hope. Let's think before we curse at the blind person. And, even better, let's help them out of the muck.
6 comments:
Your comments show a lack of depth of understanding of your compassion parable. Perhaps you believe it is only to teach compassion to those less fortunate. See beyond the simple wanting to call the blind person blind to learn something about yourself.
You then twist your 'mindfulness' to blast those that don't agree with you as those deserving pity.
Your phrasing to 'convert' poor, blinded McCain supporters to your messiah is just as offensive as the tactics you are so santimoniously deriding.
Using teachings of peace and writing in the plural (we) when clearly you are one (1) is a smoke screen put up to hide that you are just adding one more 'irrational emotional response(s) [that] will only escalate tensions and divisions'
Ah, and the tenor and tone of this anonymous response does just the same -- escalates tension and division. I was the first to admit, in my own post, that ranting is problematic and that I am struggling with it as my number one weakness (klesha.) This reply makes me feel like an alcoholic or someone attempting to get off drugs who had the nerve to blog about their addiction, and was attacked for trying! It is eye-opening, however, to see how offensive my original post was. I will strive to be more perfect. That's all any of us can do -- (making sure to stay in the singular tense) I am only human.
None of us can claim to have the BEST or completely true perspective on anything in this world, but I think that it makes no sense to be "offended" at the statement of the other. That, too, shuts down dialog. Let us all keep trying, in all humility.
Thanks, Zenwoman, for your kind comments about "my compassionate comments . . ." I aspire to that compassion, but in reality I get as angry as you do with the fear-mongering, and even more frustrated when the audience takes it to heart. The one-on-one contact with potential voters is difficult, because you have no idea what you'll encounter. But as the team leader at the Obama office said, we need to LISTEN first. That's hard to do, because we leave ourselves open to whatever they may say - we are afraid of the unknown! But in this process we show that we are open-minded enough to consider opinions different from our own - hey, we sometimes even LEARN something in the process!
Kay
Ahhh, zenwoman, you touch my heart... or whatever that little stone there is called. You step from your house and say unto the crowd, "I must bash myself for thinking you morons; I must bash myself for lacking compassion, for surely it is not your fault you are morons." And the crowd, quickly forming a chorus, respond with, "you must be bashed for calling us morons and you must be bashed for lacking the compassion and thinking it is not our fault we are morons." And then you weep, for the crowd has bashed you and you weep more for they have bashed you unnecessarily since you were already bashing yourself.
Ah, young Padawan, the crowd only wished to bash you to be helpful, for they saw that you sought bashing. Is this not the time to rejoice, for the world of morons has come to your side, to love you and help you on your way?
Come, Padawan, slide forward here and rest your tear streaked face against my knee and permit me to regale... uhh... comfort you with stories.
This very day, I listened to a full hour interview about Zen on a Swedish internet radio station. This was quite taxing, as you can imagine, for those Zen people... well, you know how they talk. It was also charming in its way for some five minutes or so, because it has been nearly 40 years since I heard some friendly, amused, and generally incoherent talk. So then, I find myself later visiting my favourite website and nearly immediately must sidetrack off to discover what a 'klesha' is. I understood immediately, as I attempted to read this text with the hypnotic wavy background that made reading so difficult, for I had instantly developed a brand new klesha of my own regarding such web page design in the first place. Oh, such negative thoughts invaded what I had thought was my steadfast journey up the 8 fold path of enlightenment (indeed, I find myself 4 centimeters closer to the beginning of the first step and since that has only taken some forty years itself, it seems to be a lightning pace). So I too began to weep, whereupon I noticed lights go on all over the neighborhood and a strange sight outside my window of torches and pitchforks gathering in great numbers.
But I'm sure you know the story of the peasant and the horse, when his friends all said "What good luck, such a fine horse!" and he replied, "Good luck, bad luck, who knows?"
And thus, in the middle of my weeping, a republican darkened my door, which would have normally been an occasion for many kleshas to arise and obscure my vision. But on this occasion, I was already in a wrestling match with a klesha, so I said, "Come here, my good fellow, and tell me what you make of this." At that, this good man immediately dropped all his McCain literature on a chair and, leaving them behind so my well trained dogs could immediately tear them all to shreds, he arrived at my side to look upon the wavy and intentionally and malignly designed web page. At that point he too began to weep at such a klesha that arose and we both wept until I offered him a drink and we could bash one another in tears of laughter for our mutual lack of compassion. At that, I not only found a new friend, but I also could get him drunk such that he would forget to vote. Why, perhaps we will end up forming a team to go visit some Jehovah's Witnesses.
So, you see, you can never know when good will arise from your pain or when progress will be made even as you despair of walking backwards.
Why, just yesterday, I received an astonishing email from another fellow. I had often bashed this fellow in years past for being such a moron and this in turn had enraged him into calling me a stupid dickhead on many a joyous occasion. But occasion led us apart and to my surprise he sought me out because he wanted to learn to be more articulate when being a moron, and thus we could recommence bashing one another. Well, imagine my surprise when he wrote to me just yesterday and expressed agreement about a litany of things upon which he would have jumped up and down, bashed me, and generally filled his head with negative thoughts in the past. Ok, granted, he immediately proceeded to make excuses for what he had previously thought, and generally tried to show that he hadn't been wrong at all, so I could see that this new found conversion would last about five minutes. But we know that can be an eternity, right. So I didn't mind that he wanted to have his cake and eat it too (doesn't that sound familiar my zenish friend) because I could also see that it might only take another forty lifetimes to swing him around to the idea that the way to deal with kleshas is not, after all, to waterboard them.
Does this not fill you with hope and optimism? Zenwoman? Zenwoman? Zenwoman!!! ZENWOMAN, WAKE UP! You're hurting my knee!
9-11 allowed the Cheney brigade to wrap this entire country in a blanket of fear. We're like the abused children who beg for yet another beating just to be touched; or who weep with gratitude over the smallest morsel to sustain us. Reversing these feelings certainly is possible,but it will take time. There are only 30 days left. If McCain wins, we have no hope of breaking the cycle.
The blindly faithful are not swayed by reason or truth. It's only those willing to listen who can be changed. I believe Obama is without a doubt doing the right things when he states the facts, presents himself as the voice of calm and reason in the midst of all this fear. He should continue to do that - I agree.
However, should things start getting really ugly - did Palin just accuse him of hanging out with terrorists in the hood - a few carefully orchestrated counter fears might be in order. You can't fix things if you don't win. When you have a group of people who are simply afraid, they will only gravitate to the one who they feel can protect them because they will stand between them and the big bad, or because they are badder than the bad. I'm not sure Obama can afford to simply stand by and do nothing about the Rove's of the campaign.
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