Category Archives: Inner Struggles

The Summer of the Rising Tides, Day 26: Why Is The Ground Itself Steaming?

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, Historical, impediments, Inner Struggles, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

June 26, 2020-

It’s been hot and dry here, this month, as it usually is in Arizona, during the month of June, and often during the first half of July. There are high clouds, that keep the sun from becoming too blazing in intensity, and sometimes, we get the cooler air that’s left over from the storms that are hitting the Rockies and Great Basin. The monsoons, though, come from the south and southeast of us.

The very ground, though, doesn’t usually sizzle. I feel it starting to smoke, this year, though. Earth has a memory, of how her children, whose remains lie in her near crust, have been treated- often in the name of profit; sometimes in the name of convenience; most often in the name of ego gratification-which takes the other two along for the wild ride. She also has a memory of how she herself has been treated.

Reckonings have, historically, been very hard-and are resisted by those who are being asked to face the music. So it is now. There are events that have already happened and those yet to transpire, which have caused, and may cause, me to wince. Many of the great national heroes of our past are being lumped with those who challenged our country’s more enlightened social constructs.

The Confederates, even with the attempted revisionist history of the period 1985-2015, are still relatively easy to relegate to museums and scholarly study. I have visited Stonewall Jackson House, in Lexington, VA and learned that he taught his male slaves to read and write-using the Bible as text. I have learned that he was an organic gardener and herbalist. I recall thinking that, well, Hitler was a vegetarian. There is a difference between Thomas Jackson and der Fuehrer, in terms of degree of supremacism. Nonetheless, Stonewall OWNED people.

George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, and John Tyler each owned people. They did great things for the Nation, but they OWNED people. The Presidents from the northern and midwestern states didn’t own human beings, but they supported the institution of slavery, to one extent or another, right past the Emancipation Proclamation (which only freed the enslaved people of the states which had seceded). New York City even had a plan to secede from the Union, in 1864, to guard Wall Street’s investments in cotton and tobacco.

All Presidents, with the possible exceptions of William Howard Taft and John F. Kennedy, had blindspots when it came to the First Nations-and, except for Lyndon Johnson, none had a true sense that African-Americans were the equals of European-Americans. There were limits to how much the country was willling to do, to set things right.

For purposes of this post, I will stop by saying that “Liberals” and “Progressives” do not have a sterling track record, when it comes to empowering and working WITH those for whom they claim to support. There are many paternalistic efforts being made, which only draw the condemnation of conservatives and their supporters among the African-American and First Nations communities. Doing things FOR people has only resulted in a lack of progress for these communities.

I remind those on the Right, though, of two things: The Democrats who actively engaged in segregationist policies, until 1970, or so, became Republicans, at the invitation of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, in the 1970’s and’80’s. Donald Trump is accelerating that effort, in the current era. Secondly, there is still a climate of fear being stoked, by the leaders of both parties, but the Republicans are in charge-and can fire up the machinery of pushback.

Personally, I see value in some aspects of both sides of the aisle. There remain these, however: African-Americans, for lack of a better collective, are not “Negroes”, “coloured people”, or even “people of colour”. There is no “Negro Problem”. Native Americans, asking for their land titles, are still not intent on destroying long-established communities with diverse populations. I was in Maine, duirng the Penobscot Land Settlement. The once and again owners of 2/3 of the state’s land did not evict anyone from that territory. The settlement was legal and financial, not socially disruptive. It was gratifying, as the Penobscot Nation includes some of my distant relatives.

Both sides would do well to get past hatred of the other and dispense with any air of superiority, especially when approaching the communities about whom they claim to care.

Here is a link to a very important, and challenging, presentation. It is worth a lot of thought, in my humble opinion. God bless America.

The Summer of the Rising Tides, Day 25: Monumental Possibilities

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Posted by on in collaborating, Community, Education, Historical, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

June 25, 2020-

I see that Arizona’s Confederate Memorial, ensconced on the State Capitol’s Wesley Bolin Plaza, is cleaned up and the focus of more civil protests than that of a lone vandal, who splashed red paint all over it. The namesake of the Plaza himself had a checkered record on Civil Rights, having grown up in a rural area of west central Missouri, and adopting a “live and let live” attitude towards the former Confederacy. He readily permitted the erection of this monument, in 1962, and spoke at its dedication. At the same time, he did not stand in the way of the advances made by nonwhite people in Arizona, after the passages of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Many argue that Confederate forces were fighting against the United States of America. The heart of the matter is a bit more disconcerting. They were fighting FOR a vision of the United States that was doomed to failure-secession or no secession; victory over the North, or not. Chattel slavery was either abolished, or on its way to abolition, in the countries which had fueled the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, in the first place-by the time Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, in 1863. This table gives a complete account of the installation and abolition of both slavery and serfdom, from ancient times: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_abolition_of_slavery_and_serfdom

It remains, though, that slavery is reprehensible, in all its forms. There is much to be done, in eliminating the chattel aspect of imprisonment, for example. Finally, there is enough civic awareness for people to recognize that the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution contains a loophole:

“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” The involuntary servitude part has been used as justification for inmate labour, for nearly 140 years. More people than is often recognized have been incarcerated for relatively minor offenses, and the majority of these have been Black-or Native American.

Last July, I visited the South Carolina State Museum. It has, in aquiet corner of the first floor, a Cofederate Relic Room and Military Collection. There, and in small museums in Charleston and Greenville, is where the first state to secede from the Union, in 1861, has chosen to present its Confederate past. There are statues around the state, as there are across the South-and across the nation. These will continue to be problematic, as we move towards a true sense of unity in diversity.

My own thought is that, no matter where the statues, flags and memorabilia of the Confederate past are presently found, they are best placed in a current, or future, museum of history- or National Historical Monument. There is already a Museum of the Confederacy, that is nested under the National Museum of Civil Rights. No one is proposing razing Confederate cemeteries, or closing our National memorials to the event, anymore than we would want the institutions that commemorate the War for Independence, French & Indian War, the conflicts between First Nations and settlers, or the Holocaust of World War II, to be shuttered and forgotten. Conflict is a hard teacher, but it is a true one, and must remain so, if we are to avoid reverting to the very behaviours that brought on the conflicts of the past, in the first place.

We are already witnessing severe proposals, across the country-to remove memorials to just about every historical figure who had blind spots, when it came to some, or all, people who weren’t white. This has extended to other parts of the world, as well. Washington, Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt despised Native Americans; U.S. Grant was of two minds towards the original inhabitants of this country; Churchill despised anyone who wasn’t European; Gandhi had to overcome his bigotry towards Africans. When it comes down to it, most of us have had to go through personal growth, when understanding and fully accepting people who “don’t look like us”.

Nelson Mandela had it right: Reconciliation, not revenge, is the most promising path forward.

The Summer of the Rising Tides, Day 23: Calming the Conniptions

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Historical, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

June 23, 2020-

Taking part in a lively debate, in the Age of Hypersensitivity, is no small thing. Most of those who operate from a place of political correctness have at least recognized that I operate from a humble posture of learning, and if I can be proven wrong, by facts rather than well-presented emotion-based opinions, I will actually be grateful.

Any man who voices opposition to abortion is going to get pushback, unless that opposition acknowledges that the mother of the fetus and has the final say. Making that acknowledgement, and prefacing my own qualms about the matter with the sacredness of being, from the moment of conception, has been, for all but the most fervent abortion advocate, enough room to set common ground.

The same may be said about the dispostion of controversial historical monuments. I have reservations about the wisdom of wholesale destruction of statuary. Certainly, those figures whose presence causes extreme anxiety for African-Americans , First Nations people or anyone else who has faced systemic persecution, need to be removed from public view-not because there is a need to comfort the overly sensitive, but because there is a deeper genetic memory than is commonly accepted.

I will discuss this last, in another post, insofar as it pertains to my own being. For now, note that the practices adopted by enslaved people, over the period of chattelhood and right up to the end of the Jim Crow Era, in order to ensure the safety of both their children and of themselves, have found continuity, in the seemingly draconian disciplinary practices of a good many African-American families. Keeping the child safe, by limiting his/her freedom to explore, is one feature of this. It goes back to keeping the child safe from exploitation.

Thus, the strength of an emotional trigger is far different for a person whose forebears faced oppression, than it is for one whose hardships have been more in line with the struggles inherent in earthly life, in its generality. Life is complicated like that, and we do best to grow a thick hide of patience, along with a strong spine of fortitude.

The Summer of the Rising Tides, Day 15: By Definition, Part 2-Does Behaviour Define Us?

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Education, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

June 15, 2020-

I referenced traits,yesterday, in considering how people sometimes define who they are, by their external qualities or, unfortunately, how OTHERS see them.

We have also reached the point where many are judged, defined, by something they did, or said, years or even decades ago. There will always be those who look under rocks, to find fault with others. There will always be those who jump out from behind a bush, and scream: “I remember when YOU did this to ME!”

I am not referring to heinous crimes, like rape, molestation, gross physical assault, calumny or theft. Those need to be brought to justice, and there should be no statutes of limitation. I am referring to personal slights that are stored away and used like traps-often by mentally ill people, for whom treatment is a far better option than revenge.

Essentially, what I want to say here is: For those personal slights, those shortcomings that were not heinous, I will apologize, and I claim the right to live the changes I have made in my life. Everyone else who is in similar straits deserves the same right.

These are what define me: Unconditional love; commitment to the health and safety of children, adolescents, women and the elderly; commitment to equality and dignity for all, regardless of physical traits, level of development; sexuality or philosophical stances; the prevalence of humaneness over profit-motive or doctrine.

Each can find redemption. Each can make the change.

The Summer of the Rising Tides, Day 11: More Than One Wall Must Fall

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Posted by on in collaborating, Community, Historical, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Striving

June 11, 2020-

Every so often, someone will raise the issue of one aspect or another, pertaining to the wall being built, in segments, along the U.S.-Mexico border. There are certainly very legitimate concerns about wildlife corridors and ecosystems, the desecration of Native American ancestral gravesites and sacred places. There is also no guarantee that this wall will succeed in achieving its goal of establishing law and order along the frontier, in perpetuity.

Of equal, or greater, concern to me, however, are the mental walls that have risen up, long before the physical barrier began taking hold. People, within our borders, have taken the stance of refusing to associate with anyone who expresses a viewpoint that is counter to one’s own. It does not take a genius to figure out that the underlying issue is one of personal insecurity. Too many have drawn the conclusion that, if the “other side” gets in power, that all their cherished values will be smashed to smithereens. The group in power draws the same notions about the potential replacement.

At the risk of being misinterpreted, which I will own, if that comes to pass, I can say that there are indeed good people, all along the political spectrum. Those who loudly fulminate against such an observation are, along with the violent and unsettled, on both sides, part of the problem. I have met fine white people in the rural South, who are curious as to why I show kindness to Black folks, and vice versa. That they are willing to hear someone who doesn’t share their fears, is a step in the right direction. The same has happened with people here in the West, who are wary of Native Americans and/or Hispanics.

Living without a need for walls has been a labour of love for me, and there was a time when I had little mental walls constructed in my psyche. Taking them down, one by one, has only made life better. I don’t know of anyone who expanded their heart, because someone came at them, swinging a hammer.

The Summer of the Rising Tides, Day 8: Persuasion and Fake Rain

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Posted by on in collaborating, Community, distraction issues, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

June 8, 2020-

Today was a good day. I got to visit Raven Cafe, and while I wore a mask into the establishment, and while ordering and paying afterwards, I found the al fresco dining experience both comforting and free of any worries about COVID19. The young ladies who work there, like all those I encounter during this Twilight Zone of a year, are worthy of no less than the utmost care that each of us who patronize the place can muster.

I finally have restored all the photos that I eliminated from my 2012 posts, whilst still in the limited storage space of Word Press’s free account. Writing means more to me now, so maintaining a Pro Account, with its unlimited storage, has made such restoration possible-and with better quality versions of the older photographs.

Now, to the title subject. As is my wont, I have engaged in reading and listening to both sides, or all sides actually, of the various debates on both COVID19 and the episodes of violence towards individuals, the vast majority of whom have been African-American. I have engaged, as well, in discourse with people who bring up seemingly minor details of these matters, both by way of expressing their concern with the matters at hand and by way of denying such problems exist. There are also those who don’t want to hear what is being said, and interject-sometimes, but not always, with pejoratives and catcalling.

Into this cacophony, have come Black Conservatives-loudly, almost tearfully, denying there is systemic racism extant in this country. The “you low life cousins of mine are bringing it on yourselves” take on the issues MAY have SOME ring of truth, in SOME situations. What it tells me, more immediately, is that these are people who have either lived more comfortable lives than many others of their skin tone or they are just hard-wired to tough out life, without thinking much of misfortunes.

I have never had to endure the day-to-day ignominies faced by, say, Appalachian whites, or trailer dwellers who work day labour, in many small cities and towns across the continent. That doesn’t mean I look down on them. I am hard-wired to tough out misfortunes, but those who aren’t, are deserving of a leg up, along with encouragement to build up their emotional immunity, so that life is not an endless cycle of tears and self-loathing,

On the edges of the cacophony, and often in the middle of it, stands our nation’s 45th President. I have to say this- I do not think he is a well man. I don’t think he’s an evil man, but he is not acting like a well person. It would be far better for all concerned, if he were to step aside, preferably at the end of his current term, as our nation’s 36th President did. Lyndon Johnson was also not well, and did what he could to save himself and the country.

If the voters of this nation want to stay the course of conservatism, there are plenty of others, men and women, who could take the reins. If, as current polls indicate, the electorate is shifting leftward, there are plenty of competent men and women who could serve, from that political stance, as well. (I am far from sold on the current presumptive alternative to Mr. Trump).

The cacophony, however, is unlikely to let up until a critical mass of one end of the spectrum either sees, or experiences, the legitimate concerns of the other. There is far too much urination, to put it indelicately, that is being sold the public as “rain”. Only independent investigation of truth can bring this to an end.

Holding One’s Temper

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Posted by on in Community, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Striving

May 29,2020–

As with every single thing that has come before the American public, the course of events, over the past few days, has had its share of back and forth. Thankfully, all comments that I have seen, so far, concur that George Floyd did not deserve to die the way he did.

I don’t like rioting and destruction. I don’t like toddlers throwing temper tamtrums, either. I understand both. A heavy hand resolves neither, but a firm, considerate tone of voice and clear statement of expectations go a long way towards stopping both.

I have seen, firsthand, when a weak leader took the word of someone who made up a story, out of whole cloth, and fired someone who had not done anything like that of which they were accused. I have also seen an out-of-control maniac grab a 16-year-old boy by the head and smash his head into a tree, three times- in the name of “school discipline”.

Both “styles of leadership” created for more problems than they were worth. Neither person deserved the position he occupied. Neither victim deserved the fate that was meted out.

George Floyd did not deserve to die aviolent death. His accused killer did not deserve pass after dreadful pass, for the previous harsh treatment he was found to have given to his “collars”/

Pain Body

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, impediments, Inner Struggles, Matters of Faith, Personal goals, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

May 27, 2020-

There has been, in the time of pandemic, a particularly acute explosion of awareness, of various acts of violence against people of colour, by both those in authority and private individuals; against indigenous or pastoral groups, by those seeking to exploit mineral or plant resources, without having done the requisite research into archaeological and anthropological remnants at the resource site; by those who are ust lashing out at whoever disagrees with them, on a given issue.

The philosopher, Eckhart Tolle, refers to the existence of a pain body, which stores physical and emotional memories of unhealed pain. This concept explains everything from the phantom limb, felt by amputees to the acting out, by dementia patients, recalling an abuse from many decades earlier.

Many are acting out their pain body memories right now. I know what they are feeling is real-I went through the purging of much buried emotional pain, some of it from my formative years, during the period 2008-14. Part of it surfaced, as I was still caring for my dying wife. The rest came out while I was rebuilding my life. It had to all be handled as quietly as possible, so I thought. None of it was Penny’s fault, or our son’s. Most of it, in truth, came from bad decisions I made, or from things happening around me that, for the most part, were no one’s actual fault.

I have reached the point of stasis, so I know that it is possible to overcome one’s buried pain. It involves communication. It involves trust. It involves commitment to self. It involves resolution. It involves reconciliation and forgiveness-especially towards self.

Those who have committed, and are still committing, crimes against humanity are also committing crimes against themselves-whether they tell themselves it’s for the greater good, for the stockholders or for the survival of the community. It is still an injurious act-with no real winners.

Let us all give some thought to healing our pain bodies.

InCel

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Posted by on in Community, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

May 24, 2020-

The relative calm, that has accompanied our state’s lifting of a stay-at-home order, was broken last Wednesday evening. In the Metro Phoenix city of Glendale, a disgruntled young man decided he’d “had enough of being bullied” and went to the large Westgate entertainment district, equipped with firepower. He used that firepower to disrupt the lives of 3 victims, all of whom have survived, and of countless other frightened diners and shoppers. He told police that he was InCel- an involuntary celibate.

In 2014, a similarly “aggrieved” individual went on an even deadlier rampage, in Isla Vista, CA, near Santa Barbara. That person’s plaint was the same-He felt he was forced to be celibate, because of snobby women. My own reaction to this, was that his complaint was balderdash-prompting one of his apologists to scold me and say that I should clean up my own backyard.

Life has shown that I did have some self-work to do, though not what the critic assumed. It has been nearly four decades, since I wallowed in self-pity, about my status in the dating field. Never once, though, did it occur to me that FORCE was the answer-to any social difficulty. Time brought Penny, along with my improved self-concept, greater respect for women as human beings and a realistic ethic , regarding friendships of all sorts. Our marriage lasted until her passing, and would still be extant, had she lived.

I happen to believe in celibacy, outside of marriage, so the concept that one is saddled with it, in an involuntary manner, does not wash, in my view. There will need, for a long time to come, be cause for parents to pay close attention to how their adolescent-and young adult-children are faring socially. There will need, for a long time to come, for society (police, social workers, teachers, weapons safety advocates and groups) to notice those who might be loners, misfits and mentally unstable. Those people do not need access to weapons, and to argue otherwise is a perversion of the right to bear arms.

People, both men and women, should retain the freedom of choice-in any relationship.

Then and Now-The May Version

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Posted by on in collaborating, Inner Struggles, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

May 19, 2020-

Change is a constant, even if some hectoring voice uses that bromide as his mantra.  It occurs to me that there was a different me, sometime ago, which is either fading or has disappeared.

Time was, when I was concerned with how people thought of me, how they looked at me, whether I’d be accepted.  Now, I see others as fellow travelers, even if they go on a path that’s different from mine.  We will all end up at the same place; we’ll just be asked different questions, by the Gatekeeper.  I accept myself, and how I look, so it doesn’t matter how others find my appearance. Besides, more and more people are far younger than I am, so they will most likely just see an old man.  As for acceptance-that starts with self-and that horse came back into the barn, a long time ago.

Then, I tended to patronize people-kids, women, old folks.  I thought it the best road to being regarded as “just folks”.  A rough old soldier called me out on the matter, and I began the long road to seeing humans as eyeball-to-eyeball.  I had made a lot of progress, in terms of being genuine, by 2005. Then, my beloved began to really go into decline and I put my self-care, and development, on hold.  After she left, it took three solid years of struggle, some travel and a fair number of mistakes, whilst on the road, to reach my equilibrium again.

Now, it’s 2020-and getting closer to mid-year.  How am I doing?  I’m good, in place, and once the curtain gets lifted, and I am cleared to be on the road again, I probably will hang on around here- to see how the school situation is shaking out, and if I am needed there.  I will also be even more focused, whether at home or on the road, than I was even last year.  There is a five-dimension sense that has taken over my consciousness.  It’ll be a most astonishing seven months ahead, and even more astonishing afterward.