Taxi To The Dark Side... and back again.

Change is said to come from within. But without outside help it's almost impossible. 

But even with help, change tends to tango, lockstep, with one of the roughest depressions a person can go through; namely, dislocation of identity. Add geographical relocation to the mix and many international travelers, including this one, get messed up by an inevitability: that unfortunately and naturally, pain is to be expected when shifting gears to a radically different position of being in the world.

I can only imagine how difficult it is has been for everyone who has helped me through life to balance judicious intervention and skilled restraint. In Japan and Buddhism generaly, they call that role: "Bodhisattva" (lit. Compassionate Warrior). 

I am glad that the use of the word "warrior," in this context, has no New Age connotations in tow (Bodhisattva, is a sanskrit word [बोधिसत्त्व] in use since at least the 5th Century B.C.E.)... in fact, my teachers in Zen--they who almost never reveal frustration--do become testy when a student begins to fetishize "the warrior". Their concern is that New Age-y thinking is selfish. In overemphasizing the self, New Age doesn't actualize personal growth. Instead, my teachers suggest that focus on the other is really the only way to achieve sustainable happiness.

Love (esp. skilled love) IS the answer. And skilled love absolutely requires expression outside the ego's limits. Before, that was just words. Now, it's just evident.

In this vein, I want to share a kind of "truth" which I've begun to learn at a core level:

What is happening is just what is happening.

Shakespeare/Hamlet said: "Nothing is either good or bad, but thinking makes it so." And the frustrating simplicity of the statement belies how a person really doesn't need a whole lot more self-knowledge than this. However, beginning that kind of ego-mastery of no judgement (not ethical relativism), is probably only possible though radical rethinking. And the rethinking often means confronting your most sacred values--whatever they may be.

I'll give a personal example: last night I saw "Taxi to the Dark Side". If you haven't seen it, I do recommend it as the direction seems very tough-minded and organized. Nevertheless, because of its unflinching stare at torture, it's likely to cause your mind and heart to hurt. Sometimes, it (actually, not "it;" rather: me) brought me to sorrow and shame.

But, then, as I was watching the interviews with the convicted American soldiers, I became aware of a fatal relationship implicit in how I saw them. Specifically, I was apprehending the soldiers as my soldiers, my representatives. I was so ego-attached to an idea of who they were and the fear that they might be my echo, that I almost failed to actually look at the screen and see them. 

So I looked.

The truth is, when you actually see a person, you realize that you have no idea--or, at least, I didn't--who they really are. The soldiers were irreducibly complicated and singular. I had no reliable framework in which I could successfully judge them. 

This isn't a mental leap, it's a gut reaction, thank goodness. 

And I was even able to forgive them. They didn't need my forgiveness--but I did. The forgiveness process is almost indescribable... when it works, it works--in this way, I learn from their actions and the learning isn't driven by shame. 

Wow. Personal responsibility need not be instructed and learned by way of guilt? Who knew?

OK, so how does this translate into skilled love? One of my sparring partners is an Israeli soldier with whom it has been difficult for me to practice good Aikido. Why? I think I hate her guts. For the following reason: she's a member of the infamous Israeli border police, a group tasked with patrolling the "security fence" and maintaining the Palestinian checkpoints. As an organization, let's just say they aren't renowned for being compassionate warriors.

But, really, how the hell do I know?

In fact, for all I know, this woman might be amazingly thoughtful at her job--and even if she isn't, it doesn't matter.

In the dojo, she's just there, then. Real and standing.

For some reason, this actually occurred to me in the moment as I was opposing her on the mat. We practiced very good Aikido today. She even saved me from a nasty potential fall which probably would have dislocated my shoulder. Thanks, therefore, is due to the interviews with the Abu Ghraib soldiers. 

Look closer.

Change is impossible without help from an other. 

I didn't get it. 

Now... it's working out.