Sweet, Suffering Money

Poverty is not synonymous with suffering.  In fact, having little money can be a relief.  I contemplate my comfortable bank account, following my recently cashed biannual financial aid check.  Now that I have money, I am obsessed by what I should do with it.  Choices that I have not worried over in months or years once again plague me and I am afraid of making the wrong one.  On the other hand, being so poor as to be constantly worrying about the source of one’s next meal causes a similar level of anxiety, but with a much less pleasant undertone.  So money is suffering.  And not having money is suffering.  All life is suffering – the First Noble Truth.

Dharmic implications aside, something else strikes me – our society is actively structured to punish poverty.  This goes beyond the mere suffering of poverty.  Worrying about that next meal is hard enough, but this is more akin to what Buddhist’s call the suffering of suffering (dukkha-dukkha), the poverty of poverty.  Not only do I struggle to pay for the next meal, but I also struggle to acquire it, spending twice or thrice the time simply traveling to buy my food.  Not only do I receive my medical care from the local free clinic, but I fret over scrounging the bus fare to get there and easily spend four times as long in the waiting room as compared to a conventional doctor’s office.  Naturally, I am thankful that I can find affordable food in my neighborhood and that other people’s generosity results in my continued health.  However, this constant struggle to obtain some of the most basic necessities further limits my ability to provide for myself.  It takes so much more time to be poor, time that could be otherwise spent caring for one’s family or working for a paycheck.  The system is designed, whether by accident or malice, to perpetuate poverty by punishing it.

At this point, I starting writing a long-winded piece full of statistics about mass transit, commute times, government investment, and income distribution.  If you want those statistics, they are readily available from the Department of Transportation and the U.S. Census Bureau.  Have at it.

'girl on a scooter' by Chris Blakeley

Statistics have little bearing on the dilemma facing me now, as is the case of many living just on or under the poverty line.  Earlier this year, I wrote a post about learning what things we can live without and what things make an honestly positive contribution to our lifestyle.  I now find myself contemplating a small electric scooter (the Roketa ES-44).  I’m not even wondering if I can afford it (I can) but rather wondering whether or not I will find it worthwhile.  I’ve rarely waffled so much on a single issue.

In this case my own desire to be content with what I have is causing a small welling of discontent to bubble up in my life.  I want a simple life and I fear the addition of a vehicle, any vehicle, will complicate things.  But isn’t my life already complicated by broken bicycles and insane bus schedules? So the difference?  Seven-hundred dollars, seven miles, and forty minutes.  I’ll be less the money, but gain the miles in range of freedom to travel and the minutes by spending less time in getting there.  Oh, and there’s one other thing – self-sufficiency (or at least something approaching it).  That’s what money can buy – freedom (or at least something approaching it).  And that’s also what money takes away, because before I had it I was blissfully free of all these worries.

That’s the trouble with attachment.  I’m attached to the idea of a simple life.  I’m attached to the idea of freedom and self-sufficiency.  I want both.  But real happiness isn’t to be found in either of these ideas – because they’re just ideas.  I’m waffling because I can’t figure out how to let them go and continue living my life and making everyday choices without them.  Money plays a huge role in both ideas and I don’t have the courage to let go of that either.  I sometimes think of how utterly brave the Buddha’s earliest follows were.  They shaved their heads, donned robes, and set forth into a life of homelessness, begging daily for their food and never touching money.  No doubt my current troubles are why they did so, but I just don’t see that happening for me.  Mostly this is because such a life would be so full of anxiety, I don’t think I could bear it well enough to practice the way they did.  Then again, perhaps that anxiety helped their practice.  Who knows?  But the rules about money have been relaxed for even modern monastics, given the changing world we now find ourselves in.  To have just enough, but not too much seems to be the goal, but how do you know when you’re there?

That also leaves the question of the system that punishes poverty.  This system also makes a simple life very difficult.  It rewards consumerism and excess, practically congratulating it for being so clever as to exist.  All those drivers out there, alone in their cars that could easily carry five.  And me, sitting here and browsing on Etsy, discontent with the simple jeans and faded tees I’ve been wearing for so long.  I want a simple life, but the consumer culture in which I’ve been raised has programmed me to believe I can buy it.  Thus the current scooter dilemma, when what I really need is some insight or wisdom.  That’s easy enough to come by, though, if you’ve got the money to buy yourself a month-long meditation retreat with some guru or other.  If there are still buddhas wandering the countryside and teaching for free, we no longer know how to find them, or maybe they starved to death long ago because they didn’t have the money for even a gas station pretzel.

If you thought this was the point where I get to a point, either condemn money or praise it, buy the scooter or don’t, resolve all the inherent contradictions in life, then you’re bound to be disappointed.  The First Noble Truth is a truth after all – life is suffering.  Desire is certainly the cause of my current predicament, as the Second Noble Truth lays bare.  But while the Third and Fourth Noble Truths are simple, the end and the path to the end of suffering, that doesn’t mean they’re easy.  Money has the ability to make many things possible, but it cannot make anything wise.

Bravery and Anger and Talking to Each Other, Dammit!

'062' by My Brain Hurts! via Flickr.com

Sometimes it’s really hard not to spiral into a pit of despair, where the life sucked is out of you by a grotesque machine while seemingly pleasant people watch on indifferently … oh, wait, that’s The Princess Bride.  But sometimes it’s just hard not to be sad.

I talk to people who feel like they are not making a difference, like they’re not valued, like their work has no meaning.  That’s hard.  They feel so frustrated and angry but they’re unable to express those emotions in a constructive way.  That makes it harder.  And I get sad, because I feel bad for them and me and the whole situation and I don’t know what to do about it and I don’t see it getting better anytime soon.

I often think if people could just talk to each other in public the way they talk to me in confidence, maybe some good could come of it.  But this is scary.  People don’t like the idea and they instinctively back away.  I’ve tried to work with that.  Sometimes we make tiny steps of progress while protecting everyone’s egos (including mine!), but it goes slowly.  There’s just so much to risk in honesty.

That’s the trouble with anger.  People are afraid that if they give honest voice to their discontent it will set off a conflagration that will engulf everyone and everything.  Anger will be met with anger, aggression with aggression, and the whole thing will burn down.  It’s too much to risk.  Maybe they’re right.  I’m from a prairie state.  Fire is part of the ecological cycle.  Everything must first burn down to the ground before anything new can grow.  But the earth is rich and full of potential.  The wind and rain return and soon enough the flowers bloom again.  Can’t it work like this with people, too?

It takes a lot of trust.  I give people a lot of credit.  They are rich like the earth, with energy like the wind and rain.  I believe collectively, we are wiser and kinder than we are individually.  Not because individuals are mean, but because individuals are afraid.  One person has a hard time protecting themselves and taking care of themselves alone, but together we are safe, together we can accomplish much.

Sometimes when disparate groups come together, though, there are divisions, differences, and obstacles.  Because we feel safer together, we don’t want to jeopardize the group by pointing at the places where we disagree.   We try to work around it, but eventually it become too exhausting to bear.  Eventually, like a new iceberg calving from a glacier, it all just falls apart because there’s nothing supporting it anymore.

Ice and fire, surely they can’t get along, right?  But I’m not talking about metaphors, just using them to make a point.  I’m talking about people, and I have a lot of faith in people.

I believe honest communication can solve so many troubles, even when the thing being communicated isn’t what we want to hear.  I don’t want the doctor to tell me I have cancer, but if he doesn’t I’ll never be able to get treatment.  I don’t want to criticize others, but then how can I expect the situation to change?  I don’t want to be criticized, but how will I ever learn?  Moreover, how can I expect myself to change if I never have the opportunity understand some else’s view of the situation?  If I point it out, maybe it won’t change, but maybe they’ll tell me a little more about how they see it.  We could both grown and learn, but only if we’re brave.

Sometimes people mistake aggression for bravery.  That doesn’t help.  When we criticize others, they think we’re trying to hurt them and protect ourselves. To be honest, maybe we are.  That’s what anger is after all.  Anger flares up when we’re afraid.  Fear comes from a sense of threat.  We may perceive what we’re criticizing as a threat to ourselves or what we hold dear.  I’m not an enlightened enough individual to say I’m beyond that.  To be truly brave doesn’t mean not being angry.  Being brave means being willing to work past that anger, work through it, and ultimately let it go.  Anger is a very unpleasant emotion, like a burning coal in our bare hands.  Who wants to hold on to that?  Unless we look at the burning coal, acknowledge it’s there, we’ll never be able to open our hands and let it go.  We’re stuck with it, burning away day after day.

Being brave is about being able to let go of our anger.  Sometimes in order to do that, we have to talk about it, communicate it to other people, even and especially to those people we feel are the source of our current frustration.  Maybe they have anger of their own they may need to express.  Maybe that anger or its underlying fear even leads them to act in the way that frustrates us.  Being brave means we have to acknowledge both their anger and our own anger, their fear and our own fear.  Our own already feels like more than we can deal with.  How are we supposed to deal with theirs too?

Most often we meet other people’s anger with aggression.  When we do this we undermine the validity of their feelings and their viewpoint.  We tell them their anger isn’t legitimate and we push all the blame for the current situation onto them.  It’s not our fault they are afraid.  But when we delegitimize their feelings, we delegitimize our own.  When we close ourselves to them, they close themselves to us.  We all just grip that burning coal even tighter.

So we have to be brave enough to let go of both our anger and our aggression.  We have to be brave enough to talk about the underlying fear.  Some people believe we shouldn’t even be talking to each other until we can be calm about it, until we’ve cooled down.  As Buddhists, we have lots of inner practices for dealing with negative emotions like anger and aggression.  Yet we live in a world full of other people.  We’re not monks in monasteries who can sit all day ruminating on the Noble Truths and cultivating compassion.  Wouldn’t it be grand if we were?  But when it comes right down to it, we’re just not that enlightened yet.

We’re not enlightened enough not to become angry.  We’re not enlightened enough to deal with that anger all by ourselves.  The reality of our lives is that this anger is going to get out and burn people.  So how do we ensure that when it does, it happens with a purpose?  How can we make this constructive, rather than destructive?

Mostly I just wish people would talk to each other, even when they’re angry – maybe especially when they’re angry.  Yes, take a few deep breaths, open your heart, be willing to listen, but don’t be afraid to speak up.  Silence will rarely, if ever, change a situation.  Sometimes we as individuals can change inside, but it’s very hard and it takes a long time and sometimes, in this fast paced world, waiting can cause more damage than acting.

Sometimes amazing things happen.  We get up and shout about how frustrated and unhappy we are.  Then someone else gets up and shouts.  Maybe for a moment we think it’s all gone to hell, but then someone realizes we have something in common.  We’re both angry.  We’re both frustrated and unhappy.  We’re both suffering and afraid.  It’s truly amazing that sometimes that by itself is enough to arouse compassion.  I don’t like being this way and neither do they.  Isn’t that enough motivation to try to move forward, let go, get beyond these painful feelings?  Because we work better together, shouldn’t we at least try?  Suddenly things seem more workable than they did a minute ago.

All too often that scenario seems implausible.  I’ve seen it happen.  I’ve also seen it fail to happen.  Mostly I’ve seen people who never believe they could get there from here.

So people come to me with their anger and frustration, and I feel sad.  There is so much fear in the world.  We hurt because we’re afraid we aren’t valued.  We hurt because we’re afraid of our own anger.  We hurt because we’re afraid of other people’s anger.  There is so much suffering.  When people tell me things, sometimes they feel better even though they’re still angry.  I just wish they could tell everyone what they tell me.  If they feel better telling one person, maybe they’ll feel ten times better telling ten people.  Well, maybe not, but it’s a nice wish, right?

My Grandpa’s Truck

‘The old truck’ by ecstaticist via Flickr.com

My neighborhood has many small used car lots.  Though I don’t particularly miss having a car, I still look with interest on the shiny, newly washed hoods and fenders.  Today an old truck caught my eye on the way to the grocery store.  I’d seen it before, back amidst its younger brethren, but today it had been moved up front.  It’s a dark red Chevy C40 with white trim, probably from the mid-1970′s.  From the outside, it’s in remarkably good condition.  A classic truck with a steel body and a bench seat and none of this extended cab nonsense.  It’s beautiful.  I have a fondness for old trucks, probably because of my grandfather.

My Grandpa was a good man.  My mom once said he wasn’t very good at business, which is why they eventually sold the ranch she and her siblings grew up on, but he was good in many other, more important ways.  As long as I can remember, he drove a truck.  The one I remember best is his black Chevy Silverado with the silver stripe.  The bench seat had been re-covered in some grey and brown fabric.  The steering wheel was big, but thin, with little finger notches.  It had a large silver toolbox behind the cab and a sturdy metal frame above the bed.  This is because for most of my life he worked as a carpenter, first in their small town of Ainsworth, Nebraska.  After they moved to Omaha, he worked for Habitat for Humanity as a job site foreman.   He organized work, taught volunteers, and did finish carpentry from then until he reluctantly retired at the age of seventy-six.

Habitat for Humanity finds small parcels of vacant land, usually foreclosed upon by the local government for non-payment of property taxes and donated. They build small, simple homes for families in need with the help of the volunteers and the family who’ll live there.  In Omaha, my Grandpa convinced them to accept not only land, but old homes as well.  They still built from the ground up, but also renovated and repaired many houses in the poor, older neighborhoods of Omaha as well.  The people in those neighborhoods got to know that truck and the man who drove it.  This provided a small extra measure of safety in neighborhoods that were otherwise considered rather shady.

My brother and I would sometimes borrow that truck to move a piece of furniture or a bit of lumber now and then.  It was an automatic, with the gear shift on the steering wheel, so even I could drive it.  It wasn’t too big and drove very well.  Grandpa was always there with it when my family moved or renovated anything of our own.  The two of them where a reliable pair.

After Grandpa died, Granny sold the truck to a lady I worked with.  My brother and I sighed with regret.  Had we the money, we might have bought it ourselves, not that either of us needed a truck.  That was almost a decade ago.

When we look on an object we immediately experience a sense of aversion, attachment, or, occasionally, neutrality.  This feeling is predicated by all our past experiences and our habitual patterns.  In a word, it’s our karma at work.  My karma include an old Chevy truck my grandpa drove.  Fond memories of Grandpa color over my memories of that truck.  They even color over other habits of thought, such as my aversion to automobiles as smog-making, traffic-jamming, wallet-sucking, time-stealing, mechanistic monsters.  Those pleasant memories are strong enough to color over my intellectual objections.

Now I look fondly on that red Chevy C40 in the lot near my house and think I’d like to have an old truck like that some day.  I have no idea why I’d need it, but I’d like to think I’d put it to good use.  This is karma at work.  I perceive the truck, I remember my past, and I feel attachment.  However, because I’m aware of the nature of karma, the nature of myself, and I’ve engaged in some forms of mindfulness and introspection, I know what is happening.  So rather than having an unexamined desire for this truck and becoming frustrated or saddened when I can’t fulfill that desire, I can merely examine the pleasant memories it brings up and let it go.  I keep going, just like Grandpa’s reliable old truck always did.

Moral Lessons from Star Trek

Ethics are inescapable.  I learned that watching Star Trek.  Now I’m learning it again reading articles like “Guidelines for the Chaplain’s Role in Health Care Ethics.”  One of those sources is far more entertaining than the other to say the least, but I’ll try to talk about them both.

There have been five Star Trek televisions shows to date (six if you count the cartoon) and eleven movies, but let’s forget the latter for the moment.  Each show was comprised of a “crew” of disparate individuals fulfilling various roles.  Over time it became clear that on each crew, no matter how different or unique they tried to make the characters, someone always served as the moral compass.

On the original series, there was “Bones,” or Dr. Leonard H. McCoy.  Bones was passionate, argumentative, even cantankerous, but he was also the conscience of the crew.  Kirk went to him for advice, to express his deepest fears, and to seek compassionate moral balance against Spock’s cold logic.

On Star Trek The Next Generation, it is the captain himself who is most concerned with ethics.  Captain Jean-Luc Picard had the logic and intelligence of Spock but the deeply moral sensibilities of Socrates. Although aided by the ship’s counselor, Deana Troi, with her empathy and expert knowledge of psychology, it is clear that he stands at the moral center of this crew.  Yet even he had someone he relied upon for guidance and to unburden his soul, Guinan, the ships bar-tender.  Upon watching episodes of The Next Generation again via Netflix after not having seen them since I was a teenager, I am amazed at how many of the conflicts and dilemmas faced by the Enterprise are not physical battles but moral ones.  This particular iteration of the show spent more screen time agonizing over ethical dilemmas than shooting at each other than any other version.

On Star Trek Deep Space Nine, they left the starship behind entirely in exchange for a space station, but they could not escape the need for that moral center, this time filled by the reserved and aloof Dax.  Lieutenant Jadzia Dax is the member of a species called Trill, who pass sentient symbiotes with the accumulated wisdom of many lifetimes from generation to generation.  In essence, you get a beautiful, compelling woman with several hundred years of accumulated wisdom.  Moreover, she also fulfills the role of counselor and confidant to the leader, Commander Sisco.

On Star Trek Voyager, we see a partnership, creating a moral balance between Captain Janeway and Commander Chakotay, the second in command.  Janeway herself is supremely moral, but also driven by her duty to save her people after then are stranded in a far quadrant of space.  Janeway is a scientist and a humanist while Chakotay brings in a uniquely spiritual worldview as part of his Native American heritage, but also a certain tough practicality.  He often served as a foil against Janeway’s sometimes reckless drive to get her crew home no matter what.

Finally, on Star Trek Enterprise it is once again the ship’s doctor who stands at the moral center, Dr. Phlox.  Although the cheerful Phlox has a less central role than Bones, he is frequently the voice of reason and compassion.  This last iteration of the franchise is perhaps the least interested in morality, each episode being more or less a battle for survival, but nonetheless frequently deals with where the boundary is between what is right and what is necessary.  I sometimes wonder if this is reflective of it’s post-September 11th run. (The first episode aired on September 23, 2011, and the show finished in 2005.)

I offer this list not merely because I enjoy Star Trek (some versions more than others), but to demonstrate that even in the most fantastical of settings, ethics are inescapable.  And where there are ethical dilemmas, there is always a moral compass.  Interestingly, each person who serves that role is amazing different from the next.  Passionate, logical, aloof, tough, or cheerful, they all demonstrate the capacity to provide that extra little bit of conscience when things start going wrong, as they inevitably do.

In addition, I found a fun little video with clips from several of the iterations of Star Trek which explores the philosophical and moral question of whether or not the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, a classic Trekian dilema.

The chaplains article points out that “Advances in medical science and technology, the evolution of integrated delivery systems, and the changing economics of health care present benefits and ethical dilemmas.”  It lists principles for the chaplain to fulfill, duties and roles she should aspire to.  The principles outlined in the text at first seemed daunting.  You mean a chaplain has to do all that in addition to her work with patients?  It seemed like an extra burden, a second full-time job.

Then I thought a little about some of the models of a moral compass I had observed in my life.  (The ones who came to mind just happen to be fictional thanks to the ready availability of streaming media.  I tend to believe fiction often reflects basic human truths, so no matter.)  They did not go through the actions of providing moral guidance like making marks on a check list.  It was not really their “job.”  Rather it was who they were, their character (not in the fictional sense), that allowed them to stand at the moral center.

When we can cultivate our spirit in such a way, ethics come naturally and people will automatically look to us the way the crews (and script writers) looked to these people/characters (in the fictional sense).  Nor do we have to cultivate ourselves to be or act a certain way we think is expected or a “ethical guide.”  We need only have integrity in who we already are and cultivate a strong inner moral life in all our thoughts, speech, and actions.  In order to be genuine, ethics must be lived.  They are part of life.  That’s why they are inescapable.

Hard Questions

'LOVE&LOSS Redux' by kristinmarshall via Flickr.com

Questions of meaning are the fundamental questions of human life.  Why am I here? Who am I? Why is life so hard?  In their article “Professional Chaplaincy and Its Role and Importance in Health Care” the authors point out:

“The word Spirituality goes further and describes an awareness of relationships with all creation, an appreciation of presence and purpose that includes a sense of meaning.” (p. 82)

Yet in modern life we seem to so often neglect these questions.  In hospitals, chaplains seem to be tacked-on extras and the first to go when budget cuts loom.  Spiritual care is undervalued. How can this be so if these issues are really that basic to human nature?

I have two thoughts almost at odds with one another.  First, that spirituality and all its attendant religious practices and trappings is an immense source of strength and comfort.  We literally can’t get along without it.

“Persons find that their spirituality helps them maintain health, cope with illnesses, traumas, losses, and life transitions by integrating body, mind and spirit. When facing a crisis, persons often turn to their spirituality as a means of coping (Pargament, 1997).” (p. 83)

Second, that spirituality is hard.

“Losses such as physical and cognitive capacities, independence, work or family status, and emotional equilibrium, along with the accompanying grief, can seriously impact their sense of meaning, purpose, and personal worth. … Approaching death can engender serious spiritual questions that contribute to anxiety, depression, hopelessness and despair.” (p. 83)

Much of what we consider to be “our” spiritually, that which forms the value centers of our lives, never really was “ours” to begin with.  It was bequeathed to us by our cultures and families.  Most spiritual seekers will only barely begin to question the truths to which others have already clung.  On the one hand, this is incredibly useful.  We can learn from one another, our parents, elders, and teachers.  Many methods are thus “tried and true.”  On the other hand, it often leaves unexamined gaps in one’s worldview, gaps which become glaringly apparent in times of crisis or trauma.

Worse yet, even those who have stared squarely at the gaps may not have even attempted to bridge them.  This is because, as the second point states, spiritual questions are hard.  What is the meaning of life?  That’s the most cliché and at the same time most profound of the questions, isn’t it?  And even though I study the subject, sometimes I just want to throw my hands up in the air and say “How the hell should I know?”

I too fall back on the truths to which others have clung, Buddhism chief among them.  Religion is a form of “received wisdom.”  We all have many forms of received wisdom from our cultural and family heritage.  But it’s all just mythology until we start to internalize it and integrate it into not just the way we look at the world, but into our own motivations and actions.

Sometimes we do this so early in life that we just go about like automatons, busy with the technical aspects of living, too busy to look at those hard questions.  After all, thinking that hard makes my head hurt.  So who’d want to do it if they didn’t have to?  But eventually we all have to, because we all get hurt or sick.  We will all die.

That’s when we run into a curious thing.  Our life seems to pause.  Our normal routine breaks down and everything changes.  The article calls this a “loss” of our capacities or independence.  It rightly pointed out that such a “loss” can cause grief and make a person question their “meaning, purpose, and personal worth.”  It makes it sound as though asking the hard questions is a bad thing.

Yes, there’s a lot of suffering in grief, doubt, and hard questions, but it’s also the only way to find the strength to give meaning to adversity.  Someone said in one of my classes that the best way to help someone cope with the death of a loved one, a bad accident, a serious illness, or a trauma was to help them find meaning in it.  I thought about it long and hard and in the end I think they’re on to something. When I look back to the people I’ve lost, I’ve looked not to their absence, but what their presence meant in my life.

As chaplains, all we can do is shine the flashlight under the bed so people can discover what they’re searching for.  We turn the painting upside down so as to see it from a fresh angle.  We help people understand that the hard questions are also the good questions and that a “loss” can also be a gain.  As much as number two is true, that spirituality is hard, so is number one, that it is absolutely necessary.

Almost In the Navy

“So we’ll try to get you into MEPS next week.”

“Next week?”

“Either on Tuesday or Friday, but Tuesday is better.  We need to stay on top of this if we want to get you commissioned by April or May.”

“Okay…That would be okay. …That’s fast.”

Somehow it’s still surprising when something I’ve aspired to for over a year now becomes a concrete reality.  I’m so used to having big dreams – constructing buildings, planning cities, writing novels, traveling the world – and no expectation they’ll reach fruition.  Joining the Navy is a big dream, but this time it just might happen.

The work of the military chaplain resonates with me stronger than the work of chaplains in other settings.  What in my disposition and background leads me to contemplate military service?  What karma is this, I wonder?

My father still tells stories of my grandfather’s service in North Africa during WWII.  He died when I was fourteen following a long battle with Alzheimer’s.  I remember him as a large, bald, genial man who enjoyed gadgets and electronics.  He lived on the outskirts of their small Nebraska town so he could have a seventy-five foot radio tower in his backyard.  My grandfather’s stories, often accompanied by photographs and post cards, revolved around building similar towers, flying as part of a bomber crew, and keeping a pet lion cub.  There were no stories of combat, blood, or death, though we all knew they existed.  Then there was Ivan, my grandfather’s older brother, who died in Europe.  Ivan’s is an unknown story.

Otherwise, we were not a family inclined to the military.  My uncle served in the National Guard before I was born.  Others barely avoided the Vietnam draft.  Despite the rural origins of most of my extended family and the higher rates of service from those areas, as far as I know, none of my cousins even contemplated enlisting.

Then I took a job, almost by chance, with the Military Science Department at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln.  I didn’t even know what the Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) was.  The rest of the staff was active duty Army, Army National Guard, or veterans employed by the Department of Defense or General Services Administration of the federal government.  I was the only genuine University employee and the only real civilian.  Not just any civilian, but a liberal, vegetarian, tree-hugging, pacifist, Buddhist civilian.

I had my doubts when I took the job, but it turned out to be a very positive experience.  Although chaplaincy was not even on my radar at that time, it was obvious to me that these were good people doing a hard job to the best of their ability.  They were deserving of care and support, so I gave them all I could, as a secretary and a person.

My only other knowledge of the military came from the tales told in popular culture.  My mother’s favorite show then (as now) was MASH, about a military hospital during the Korean War.  Another frequent guest on our television was Hogan’s Heroes, set in a WWII POW camp.  Both were unlikely settings for comedies.  Beyond that, were the dirt and blood depictions of movies like In Harm’s Way with John Wayne and modern films like Black Hawk Down.  As horrible as they were, I always found something admirable in the capacity of human beings to endure and carry on, not just to fight and kill, but to protect and save the lives of those around them.

Navy Chaplain on an aircraft carrier, from Navy.com

When I think about my influences I often wonder two things.  First, am I strong enough for military service?  Not only physically, but mentally and emotionally.  If necessary, could I endure even a tiny bit of these trials and horrors long enough to help a single person?  Could I be a voice of morality, compassion, and reason amid the trauma of combat and post traumatic stress disorder?  Second, am I romanticizing this entire notion?  Do I have a realistic idea of what military chaplaincy entails?  For the first, I often have grave doubts.  For the second, I know my expectations will inevitably fail to be realized in experience.  This is a simple truism.

I’ve studied military chaplaincy to gain a better picture of the work.  The more I read the more I know it is work I’m called to do.  The more I doubt.  The more I know it will be nothing like what I expect.  But the more I know I have to try.

Care From The Heart

'Unknown, Oct 2010' by Yunchung Lee via Flickr.com

The Association of Professional Chaplains (APC) sets written Standards of Practice by which hospital chaplains abide, as well as those in many other institutional settings.  Naturally, this includes Buddhist chaplains.  I wonder, however, if every chaplain who reads this document feels as though something is missing.  I’ve written about the danger of “professionalizing” chaplaincy before, and these standards seem to suffer from it.  Mostly, they suffer from a loss of heart, the living motivation that drives chaplains to care for others.

The Standards are helpful in knowing what our profession entails and how we should carry it out.  However, it is an extremely technical document and completely glosses over the main task of the chaplain: building relationships.  If one simply reads the standards by their titles, ‘Assessment,’ ‘Delivery,’ ‘Documentation,’ and so forth, they could easily refer to writing the engineering specifications for a new kind of catalytic converter.  Some imply human contact, such as ‘Teamwork’ and repeated use of the word ‘Care,’ while others, such as ‘Quality Improvement’ and ‘Research’ imply almost the opposite.

All in all, this document is a cognitive approach to understanding the work of the chaplain.  Meanwhile, the work chaplains do has an extremely broad affective, or emotional, dimension. This, most importantly, revolves around our ability to build a relationship with those to whom we offer care.  Moreover, I fear the technification of jargon used to describe the chaplain’s job may somehow mislead or diminish the chaplain’s true work.

In short, no matter how helpful and precise, I don’t like it.  The work of caring for hearts and souls loses something in translation to legalistic code.  For example, the first standard states:

STANDARD 1: ASSESSMENT

Assessment: The chaplain gathers and evaluates relevant data pertinent to the patient’s situation and/or bio-psycho-social-spiritual/religious health.

INTERPRETATION

Assessment is a fundamental process of chaplaincy practice. Provision of effective care requires that chaplains assess and reassess patient needs and modify plans of care accordingly. A chaplaincy assessment in health care settings involves relevant biomedical, psycho-social, and spiritual/religious factors, including the needs, hopes, and resources of the individual patient and/or family.

A comprehensive chaplaincy assessment process includes:

• Gathering and evaluating information about the spiritual/religious, emotional and social needs, hopes, and resources of the patient or the situation
• Prioritizing care for those whose needs appear to outweigh their resources

MEASUREMENT CRITERIA

• Gathers data in an intentional, systematic, and ongoing process with the assent of the patient.
• Involves the patient, family, other health care providers, and the patient’s local spiritual/religious community, as appropriate, in the assessment.
• Prioritizes data collection activities based on the patient’s condition or anticipated needs of the patient or situation.
• Uses appropriate assessment techniques and instruments in collecting pertinent data.
• Synthesizes and evaluates available data, information, and knowledge relevant to the situation to identify patterns and variances.
• Documents relevant data and plans of care in a retrievable format accessible to the health care delivery team.

EXAMPLES

• Basic: Demonstrates familiarity with one accepted model for spiritual/religious assessment and makes use of that model in his/her chaplaincy practice as appropriate.
• Intermediate: Demonstrates familiarity with several published models for spiritual/religious assessment and is able to select an appropriate model for specific cases within his/her chaplaincy practice.
• Advanced: Demonstrates familiarity with several published models for spiritual/religious assessment and is able to teach others in their use.

We do not “gather and evaluated relevant data pertinent to the patient’s situation and/or bio-psycho-social-spiritual/religious health.”  Rather, we learn about the patient by listening to their troubles.  By listening, I don’t mean with just our ears either, but with every sensory perception, including our mind and heart.  We discover the person, their cares, their strengths, their fears.  People are not “data.”

Relationships figure more prominently in the complete explanation of Standard 1.  But should we really have to go to such great lengths to explain what is mean by “gather and evaluate relevant data?”  In this explanation, “data” is used almost as often as “patient.” This is not meaningless semantics.  There are no meaningless words.

“We are what we think / All that we are arises with our thoughts,” According to the Dhammapada, verse one.

Let us do a thought experiment.  What if we go into a room and try to enact these Standards of Practice thinking we need to begin by “gathering data?”  Now, what if we go into a room thinking we need to “discover this person?”  How does that alter the nature of our mind and heart?

While the contents of the Standards of Practice are helpful and obviously the result of long, thoughtful, and reasoned discussion, I strongly believe they need to be rewritten to reflect the reality of a chaplain’s work.  We are not lawyers or technocrats or “data gatherers.”  We are spiritual caregivers.  We should have the conviction to describe our work in the language of spiritual care.  I believe doing so will better prepare and guide chaplains in carrying out that work and better inform the public as to the nature, and importance, of what chaplains do.

Compassion is Not an Emotion?

I ran across an interesting thought today.  We watched a documentary by James Zito called Compassion and Wisdom: A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life (2004).  It featured several different Buddhist teachers from the Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions speaking about the meaning of the bodhisattva.  About two-thirds of the way through, the documentary advanced an interesting idea, which I paraphrase here.

The experience of emptiness is the catalyst for compassionate activity towards all sentient beings.  Compassion is not an emotion – it is unwavering, indiscriminate, and limitless.  We should not mistake the transitory, contingent emotions of pity, empathy, sympathy, or even love and attachment for true compassion.

I find this thought very interesting and compelling.  After all, how often do we refer to the “feeling” of compassion?  Upon doing some preliminary digging, many Buddhist teachers, from Thanissaro Bhikkhu to Sakyong Mipham, refer to compassion directly as an emotion, although a beneficial one.

Yet it seems right to me to say that compassion is not an emotion, in an ultimate sense.  There is some suggestion that emotions arise from ego, but even ego-less buddhas manifest compassion.  Perhaps we, in our unenlightened state, can only manifest compassion in a limited, temporary way.  As we continue in our practice to cultivate even greater and greater compassion it moves beyond our feeble attempts into a true state of being, something we “have” or “are” rather than “feel.”  I am coming to believe that often we do mistake pity, empathy, and sympathy for compassion.  These emotions are selective, which allows us to feel for those similar to or more unfortunate than ourselves, but compassion excludes no-one, not our enemies or even the wealthy “one-percent.”  Compassion includes the one-hundred percent.

I may do some more digging on this idea is the future.  For now, it’s just an interesting thought.

Protest sign from Occupy Toronto (photo uncredited) via blogto.com

OR

Protest sign from Occupy Toronoto photo by woodrow walden via blogto.com

 

Relationships and Stolen Rum

I’m full of shit.  I’ve been aware of this for some time.  Anyone who knows me in real life is undoubtedly not surprised.  I talk all about ‘others.’  Helping ‘others.’ Putting ‘others’ first.  Being with ‘others.’  When, truth is, I don’t really know how to be with one other person.

Also, rum … for some reason seems oddly stronger than whiskey at this moment, my preferred drink of choice.  Whiskey, that is, not rum, for what now seems like obvious reasons.

From someecards.com

I am seven months into the first serious relationship of my life, odd as that seems for a thirty-one year old to admit.  When we’re together, I think this is right.  But when we’re apart, I think that is right, too.  I feel comfortable being a couple.  But I feel comfortable being by myself.  And the one makes me doubt the other.  It feels good to be together, and somehow easy, even when we disagree.  But when I’m alone, I wonder if I’ve been too critical, if I’m just playacting at a relationship for the sake of the experience, if this will last.  When we’re together again I feel reassured by how well we get on, how much we love each other, and I wonder why I ever worried.  Sometimes we talk about our relationship.  I try to check in to make sure I’m not missing something.  Sometimes we don’t.  But this cycle keeps repeating.

The hardest part is the future.

I’ve always been able to live my life the way I wanted to.  I have a plan for the future.  The plan changes, sometimes drastically, but I always have a plan.  What to study, where to work, where to live, how to live, and so on.  These plans have always been risky and I’ve accepted that.  After all, any failure was my failure.  Any pain was my pain.  I could rearrange my life freely without having to wonder how my new direction would impact anyone else.  That is no longer so.  I realize now the plans I’ve made are not only risky, but also require serious sacrifice and commitment.  And it’s no long just my sacrifice and commitment I’m asking for.  That’s scary.

Sometimes those plans are nice.  We both like the same kind of places, small cities in cool climate with real trees.  But I fear I’m going to take too long getting there.  We’re already thirty (ish) and I’m looking at the Navy and then a PhD who knows where.  That’s a lot for any one person, let alone two.  He has a definite wish to live close to his family.  I understand and respect this.  But what about my family?  What about my plans to retire to a little ranch in the Sandhills and write books?  And his plans to live next to the ocean and learn to surf?  Is there enough in me to compromise?  To figure it out?  To work at it?

And what about all those stupid romantic myths that say when you find the right one you’re just supposed to ‘know?’  I never ‘know’ anything.  I doubt everything.  That’s why I’m a freakin’ Buddhist and not a Bible-thumping Methodist.  It’s in my nature to question.  Does that mean I’m relationship handicapped?  Or is all that ‘soulmate’ crap really crap?  Or is everyone different?  I kinda figured relationships were work and if you decided you wanted to be in one you damn well worked at it, soulmate or not.  But sometimes I wonder if I’m too selfish for even that.  I want my Navy, my PhD, my ranch in the Sandhills.  But I want to give him what he wants, too.  I want the compromise, but I don’t know what that looks like.  Where’s my freakin’ plan?!

So that’s why I’m full of shit.  And rum.  Not even a lot of rum.  Like, less than two fingers.  And yes, I stole it from my housemate.  Sorry, Harry.  Why do you have that much alcohol in the freezer?  If I’m too selfish to handle really being there for even one other person, how an I supposed to help the other six point seven billion?

Anyway, I don’t know what to do about it.  Just keep going I suppose.  Keep my eyes, ears, mind, and heart open.  Are all relationships like this?

Disclaimer: Written on rum.  Posted while sober.

Waiting Room

'Waiting' by Bondseye via Flickr.com

“What should I be doing now?” I thought to myself.  ”What would a chaplain be doing now?  How can I chaplain to this family?”

I never came up with an answer, which was probably for the best.  We’ve been warned not to chaplain to family for good reason.  These people weren’t precisely my family, but they were close.  They were my boyfriend’s family, aunts, uncles, and cousins.

The Community Hospital of Monterey Peninsula has a very nice waiting room down the hall from the intensive care unit.  It is reached via a series of clean corridors and down a wide stair in a bright atrium.  The atrium is tall, with the back wall patterned in white art deco squares, and contains several tables and chairs on the lower level.  The sitting area is along one side, tucked cozily beneath a lowered ceiling and filled with a variety of comfortable couches and chairs done in soft beige, sea-foam green, and dark wood.  Sprawled throughout the sitting area was a close-knit clan of the descendants of the woman now in ICU following open heart surgery, along with one totally unrelated Buddhist chaplain-in-training.

So what did I do?  Not much.  I chatted, knitted, read, napped, and played games on my phone.  I held my boyfriend’s hand and patted his knee.  I offered to fetch coffee or munchies.  I listened to every update from the ever-rotating number of family members who went every twenty minutes or so, two at a time, to check on Grams.  They relayed news from the doctors and nurses as well as personal observations and managed to keep a fairly upbeat attitude despite the circumstances.

I never did “chaplain” in even the remotest sense of that word, but I don’t feel like my presence there was wasted.  I don’t know that being there helped anybody, but it certainly didn’t hurt (except maybe Chloe and Orion the cat who had to give up their bed for two nights).  I just waited, like everyone else.  I was there.  It wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it’d be.