Saturday, October 23, 2010

getting the fear out.

I sent out an email almost a week ago, inviting all my friends, family members, & acquaintances to attend or help with a fundraising event that I've created.  Here's what I sent out.  

I was so excited.  I had a hard time going to sleep that night.  I was feeling so positive about the good we were going to do in the world.  In the morning, I checked my email first thing, so excited to see who would be joining us at the event.

Here's the first response I received.  I've left the name of the responder out, but otherwise this response is verbatim, exactly as I received it.
Hi there!
Now, you know I adore you...but...

I met a young woman as a passenger on my vehicle last year. She cheerfully told me that she had been working as a volunteer in an area where things were pretty bleak. It was a social sharing kind of thing, I can't remember whether it was soup kitchen, yeah, I think it was.
She was quite happy to tell me that she had been doing that, but when I (sagely) responded, "That must have been hugely disappointing.", she responded, much less enthusiastically, "Yeah, it kinda was."  She went on to tell me that none of the people there seemed to have even the least interest in moving forward with their lives. She was surprised that they weren't eagerly taking the needed help and 'getting out there to do it for themselves.' She came to the realization that everything she knew about 'the poor' had been instilled in her in 'school', and not in a way that was balanced, much less true. In short, the people, their psychology, their world outlook and the lies by which they live their lives were so overwhelming that, in spite of her best efforts to resist the thought, it all came down to the realization that these folks were in their predicament for their own reasons and failings, not because society had abandoned them. Their will to 'do anything' was simply not there. No amount of help will aid them, nor redirect them.
I fear it is the same with virtually all parts of Africa, except that you must include dictators with guns. All of the aid that will be raised in this effort to 'do something' will be either lost to bureaucracy, stolen by the dictators goons, wasted on 'contracts' that line the pockets of the elite's friends and as such, can trigger instability even in the ruling classes themselves. Great hearts, good intentions, donations, small or large do more to de-stabilize an abusive situation than to help. They'll go for guns, not butter. And the despair, and danger, will deepen, not lift.
Sorry love!
Say hi to Adam and Jordan.

 
I've been sitting with this email for almost a week, wondering how to respond to it.  In rereading it and meditating on it, I began to feel a deep, deep sadness.  Not because my friend doesn't want to help with my event, but because of how cynical his beliefs must truly be if he would send this.  What happened to him in this life to bring him to such cynicism?  How did he come to believe that the words he offers are "sage".  This email shocked me in so many ways.  And at the end of the week, I'm offering gratitude for it.  Not because I agree with it in any way.  But gratitude for writing down what some people must be only quietly thinking and not venturing to say out loud.  And gratitude that it has deepened my resolve to meet my goal, to be even more clear about what my purpose is, to show that the generalizations are simply not true, to offer hope.

I don't know if the girl that my friend was speaking to/of went on to find brighter days in her service work.  What I do know is that I have never felt bad or disappointed after giving a gift of service unless I attached expectations or judgments to said gift, thereby rendering it not a gift at all.  "A gift or a present is the transfer of something without the expectation of receiving something in return.

Gifts given with no strings attached bring as much joy to the giver as they do to the recipient.

I was a little sad that my friend obviously hadn't gone to the trouble of reading about where the money would go or why I was taking on this huge fundraising challenge in the first place, before telling me in not so many words that I was wasting my time.

I was deeply, deeply saddened that he believes that small children, orphaned or nearly orphaned, by the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and the people that are helping those children, don't deserve our help in any way.  I hope my friend never finds himself in a position of needing help, but not necessarily deserving it, and finding only judgment scales offered to him.  And I can't imagine what would ever make me feel that I was qualified to decide who deserves to live or die, who deserves food, water, shelter and who deserves to be left out in the cold to suffer with hunger & thirst.  Who deserves life saving education about how to protect themselves from a deadly disease and who deserves to stay in the dark about that knowledge?

I do know that the author of the above email likes very much to think of himself as a wise man and as a critical thinker.  But what wise person lumps the population of an entire continent - more than a billion people, young, old, male, female, rich, poor, powerful, powerless, hopeful, hopeless - into one group all undeserving of our compassion or our action?

I do know that if I was required to live this life all on my own without any help from friends or strangers, that I would not still be living.  How many gifts have I squandered in this life?  How many gifts do I currently benefit from that I have done absolutely nothing to "deserve".  How "ungrateful" I was as a child and young adult.  How unproductive and self indulgent I've been even just this week while suffering from a little cold.  I'm sure glad I didn't have to prove that I was worthy of the tender loving care I received from my husband and mother this week.

In rereading my friend's email this strikes me...  "She was quite happy to tell me that she had been doing that, but when I (sagely) responded, "That must have been hugely disappointing.", she responded, much less enthusiastically, "Yeah, it kinda was."   It strikes me that my friend takes a certain pride in knocking the wind out of a person who is trying to do some good in the world in whatever small way.  And I want him to know that he knocked the wind out of me, for a minute, but I'm coming back up swinging.  I'm no quitter.  No small or large disappointment will keep me from doing whatever good I can in this world.

In nearly the same breath he criticizes "the poor" in this way....  "In short, the people, their psychology, their world outlook and the lies by which they live their lives were so overwhelming that, in spite of her best efforts to resist the thought, it all came down to the realization that these folks were in their predicament for their own reasons and failings, not because society had abandoned them. Their will to 'do anything' was simply not there."  So he is criticizing "the poor" for their lack of will to 'do anything', while it appears that the point of his email to me is to criticize my will to so something to help.  The truth is that just by living and breathing we change the world, the choice is HOW we are going to change it?  The comforting lie that we tell ourselves is that our actions don't matter.  They do.  All of them.  hmmmm.... 

"All of the aid that will be raised in this effort to 'do something' will be either lost to bureaucracy, stolen by the dictators goons, wasted on 'contracts' that line the pockets of the elite's friends and as such, can trigger instability even in the ruling classes themselves."

What I want to say about this is that the funds that I am working to raise with this event will go DIRECTLY to people who ARE ALREADY helping themselves AND helping others.  The organization that I am working to raise funds for has been working DIRECTLY with holistic projects in communities in crisis for severel years.  I took this Seva (selfless service) Challenge because I believe in the work they are doing, because I want to be a part of something larger than myself, because I want to deepen my yoga practice through service, because I want to raise awareness about how each and every one of our individual actions in life affect everyone else on this little blue ball we call Earth for good or ill and sometimes both at the same time.  And I am now even more determined to meet my fundraising goal of $20,000 and go to South Africa and work side by side with the people who are receiving these monies.  And I will take photographs of the work we do and the people we do it with and I will write about it and share it and be joyful.

My life has already been enriched by this challenge in so many ways.  I have already met so many bright, shining, joyful people who are ready to do whatever it takes to make our whole planet a joyful place-- to eradicate poverty and hopelessness wherever it lies.


"Great hearts, good intentions, donations, small or large do more to de-stabilize an abusive situation than to help. They'll go for guns, not butter. And the despair, and danger, will deepen, not lift."

Those two sentences are just simply dead wrong.  The money we raise will absolutely NOT go for guns and the despair is ALREADY lifting, not deepening.  I have been so blessed by the opportunity this challenge has given me to meet and better get to know some AMAZING hearts and intentions.  Even if I raise not one penny more for this cause, my life has been so utterly enriched already.

I cannot sort out what it is that my friend wants me to do, except quit doing ANYthing.  He probably thinks my job at 9-1-1 is a waste of my time too.  I mean, why bother sending an ambulance to someone who just got hit by a car, it was their own inattention that got them there, right?!?  What I think is that my friend needs to get his fear out and turn his love/joy ON.  I don't know if my writing this will make any difference to him- it might just tick him off.  I doubt that he reads my blog anyway.  But, I needed to write this for me.  To let the sadness and fear about the darkest sides of our humanity out of me so that I have room to embrace all the best of us.  It's scary being a beacon in the dark, maybe my friend is just afraid for me.  But I'm alright.  I'm surrounded by the brightest of bright human beings a girl could ask for on a moonless night.  And full of gratitude for them.

Here's the thing...   Selfless Service enriches the giver as much as the recipient.  Selfless Service enriches entire communities.  It is the opposite of greed.  It is the opposite of dictatorship.

I promise that if you take your own Selfless Service Challenge to raise some funds ($108 is a nice starting goal) and come to the One Love Colorado event and do 108 Sun Salutations with us, your body and mind and soul will get stretched and strengthened and it will feel GOOD, because it does feel good to do good in the world.  You can sign up or donate here....   www.coloradoonelove.org

And if you didn't already know - we're putting together a ROCKIN' silent auction with donations from local businesses, yoga studios, local artists, etc.  and we're going to have the sweetest little yoga dance party you've ever met right after the Sun Salutations.

It's all coming together.  It's the weekend before Thanksgiving, the weekend before the ski slopes open, the weekend before everyone goes shopping -- what better way to give thanks for all of the abundance in our lives, do some ski conditioning and perhaps even get some Christmas shopping out of the way.

Come out!  Have fun!  Dance!  Smile.  Feel good!!  You will meet some Great hearts and souls (probably a few quite pretty bodies too)!

Thanks for reading.  I know I feel better for having gotten all of this out of me and into the inter-tubes.  ;D
xo
~d

8 comments:

  1. Phew.

    I want to point out that there are millions, if not billions of people who are cynical on this planet. Cynical about people, places, things, life experiences, marriages, jobs, their bodies - you name it, they'll be cynical about it. And resigned.

    Every year, i campaign - for clothes for people, especially in winter. In summer, I urge people not to throw away empty bottles, but to fill 'em with nice cold water and give them to someone who needs them first thing in the morning. Restaurants not to throw away food, but to give them to agencies that can distribute it. I've worked with lepers in a colony on the outskirts of Delhi. Guess what. Most people think I'm wasting my time. And that's not my problem. The way I figure is that most people are really resigned about themselves and their lives and so hope-less that it really is a cry for help from them. If I can touch the cynical in my communities, actually move them to see that they can be bigger than they say they are, that would actually impact a deeply rooted condition, the real global epidemic - giving up and settling for soooo much less.

    There's another thing that I've noticed. People won't alter their way of thinking about for a pretty simple reason, Dawn. If they were to actually say that they could give, they would have a whole lot more work to do.

    For me, that's the human condition. Normal. You, me and anyone else who really says that they want to make a difference on this planet, have to be voices in a world of disbelievers. No medals for me there. But I do what I do because that's something that has meat, and it gives me more satisfaction than probably anything else that I do.

    You're so darn extraordinary, Dawn.

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  2. Praveer,

    Thank you so much for your post. It was the knowledge that there are so many who share this cynicism that was pushing down on me and making me tired and sad.

    I posted this post for me, to get the sadness about the cynicism out of me. And I'm actually, truly, thankful that my friend put his cynicism in writing, because it's so hard to respond to unspoken cynicism.

    I just this second sent an email to that friend, inviting him to read this post. this is what I wrote directly to him:

    B-,

    I read and reread this email from you. Did you do me the same courtesy? Did you actually read what I had written about where the money from the event goes and why I was bothering to spend hours and hours of my life energy organizing it? I wonder.

    Anyway, thanks for your feedback. I've written my feelings on it and posted them here.

    http://breatheloveplay.blogspot.com/2010/10/getting-fear-out.html

    Adam told me not to waste my time responding to your email. He insisted on it actually. Because he cares about me. I can only assume that if you adore me as you profess to, it must be fear of me wasting my time or becoming disappointed that inspired you to write what you've written here.

    But I'm no naive child. I'm no babe in arms that needs protecting from the big, bad world.

    I've been through the ringer of what the big, bad world has to offer and I choose to offer what I can to make it a better place.

    Cynicism is the weapon of the weak.

    I ask you to read what I've written, banish your fears, find your love, joy, strength, & passion, and offer it to the world in whatever form seems best to you.

    and please stop going around sucker punching those you "adore". talk about abuse. ;-)

    may you be well.
    may you be happy.
    may you be free from pain.
    may you be healthy, wealthy, & wise.
    may the longtime sun shine upon you.
    may all love surround you.
    may the pure light within you guide your way on.

    in friendship, deserved or not,
    ~Dawn

    Praveer - you are one of the lights that make me not afraid of the night. Thank you! ~in solidarity ~dawn

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  3. Oh, Dawn. Oh my. I feel compassion for the human being that composed that letter. I can't imagine how shut off from the world I'd have to be--and how brittle my reasons!--to blanket an entire population (be they "the poor" or "Africans") with such generalizations, much less to consider it a 'service' to keep someone else from engaging. I don't want to dwell on them, though, nor on whatever judgments might be evoked in me in response to that letter. It inspired you to write something beautiful, and the alchemy of both your words inspired me to give. So I'm grateful to both of you.

    Also, I've learned it's impossible for me to predict the outcome of my actions, or to guess what effects--positive or negative--the butterfly of my own heart will have in creating a hurricane elsewhere. Allowing this fear (what if something *bad* happens as a result? what if my actions have the opposite effect I'd hoped?) to paralyze me into stillness, though, or to prevent me from acting in the world, seems to me to succumb to the saddest imaginable fate. Life on this planet--human and otherwise!!--is an ongoing process of creation and destruction, a giddy cycle of birth and death, and to *me* what matters is that I participate in it fully, with an attitude of compassion and a commitment to connection and appreciation for the unfathomably diverse wholeness of it all, and joy for my tiny part in that cruel and beautiful whole.

    I love that you live from your heart.

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  4. update: the human being that composed that letter humbly asked my forgiveness. he was busy working on a project, perhaps tired, he didn't read what I'd sent at all before typing his response to me. he said he's sorry and that he will read what I'd written when he can. I accept his apology and I do have gratitude that I was inspired to think deeply on the subject, to find my deep, deep reasons, again, for doing this project.

    Siona, you never fail to lift me up. I can't tell you what your words mean to me. I am so glad to know you. I really am surrounded by the brightest lights a girl could ask for, for friends. I feel so blessed. thank you.

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  5. "Life on this planet--human and otherwise!!--is an ongoing process of creation and destruction, a giddy cycle of birth and death, and to *me* what matters is that I participate in it fully, with an attitude of compassion and a commitment to connection and appreciation for the unfathomably diverse wholeness of it all, and joy for my tiny part in that cruel and beautiful whole. " stunning!!

    and Praveer, this -- "If I can touch the cynical in my communities, actually move them to see that they can be bigger than they say they are, that would actually impact a deeply rooted condition, the real global epidemic - giving up and settling for soooo much less." thank you for putting that in words. I want to move people to see that they cna actually be bigger than they say they are. it's something Siona's mama, my dear friend Farland, has often said to me-- that we are all so much stronger than we think we are. yes. we are.

    I should tell you both too, that Silke, our old Gaia friend, saw my fb status of "vicious sore throat" today and offered me some long distance healing - and what she emailed me afterward, about her perceptions, led me to connect my sore throat with my need to respond to the above referenced email, and I cannot tell you how much better I am feeling since I've done so.

    the world never fails to astound me, one way or another. (how do people ever, ever get bored?????)

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  6. I've had to sit with this for a bit. My first response resonates with everything Siona and Praveer have said, that the cynical people deserve compassion as well, but then if I'm honest I have to admit to some elements of that in myself. I don't call it cynicism, I call it realism, but that's definitely in the eye of the beholder, isn't it?
    When we ran a scenic production company with a shop in downtown San Diego, homeless people used to come in looking for some work. Most of the time within an hour it became obvious why they were homeless. One of those people though became one of our regular employees, and Ricky was great. We asked him if he would sleep in the shop to keep an eye on things because we knew otherwise he would feel that he was imposing. He usually slept in Balboa Park. San Diego has a pretty forgiving climate, but it does get chilly at night in the winter. But Ricky was the person who pointed out that in San Diego, being homeless isn't an excuse for begging on the street or being dirty or smelling bad. There are places to take a free shower, there are places to get free food, there clothing donations, there are folks wanting cheap day labor. Ricky's clothes were always clean, he never asked for handouts and he was the best painter we ever had for just painting single color flats or priming. Eventually he got a job working for a painting contractor and got a small apartment. He was always invariably cheerful, generous, kind.
    But the fact that a lot of homeless folks end up that way because they have an addiction or a mental illness doesn't make them undeserving of compassion, it just means they need a different kind of assistance that it's difficult to come by. I've seen services for people with mental illness continually cut for the last 5 years, and that's post Reagan cutting institutional placement nearly completely way back when. We're creating a population of street people and then disparaging them and saying there's no point in trying to help.
    But there's still a huge difference in feeling cynical about the situation here and feeling that it's pointless to try to distribute resources and offer our energy to people who happen to have been born in countries that are very resource poor. We have so much. Those homeless people who seem so hopeless have much more than many people around the world, and in many respects it's no fault of either, even though on the surface the homeless in this country appear to have more choices. No child says "when I grow up I want to be a mentally ill, homeless addict begging for spare change." Which doesn't necessarily mean you can do a lot to help. But whole countries ravaged by earthquakes and hurricanes and tsunamis, devasted by famine, by disease, with no resources? We can definitely help.
    I'm not sure how we can help the cynical people who feel that they are just being "sage" but I feel for them. If you let compassion slip in there's no end to it, and you're heart will keep breaking until it breaks open. And Praveer is right, there's no end to the work but that doesn't really matter because all of us can only do what's right in front of us. I can't save the whole world, but I can donate to causes that use money wisely, I can take a trash bag when I go for a walk and pick up litter as I go, I can feed the expired parking meter as I walk past, I can hold the intention of compassion. I also find I have to hold the intention of delight - it's what keeps the drudgery at bay, for me it's what safeguards against an experience being "hugely disappointing."

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  7. Perhaps the I can't make a difference, why even try attitude is shared by some of the "poor" and "well off" alike. :(

    "Their will to 'do anything' was simply not there. No amount of help will aid them, nor redirect them."

    The same attitude from the writer and the people he thinks he writes about??

    The one thing I know about attitudes, is they are contagious...
    Love , hope, joy, happiness... they are wildly contagious so keep up the amazing work, spreading greatness, Dawn!!! :)
    Love, your sis.

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  8. delighted compassion. yum!! thanks Jeannie. I knew you would have something interesting to say.

    and thanks sis. Just seeing a comment from you on my blog made me get a bit teary.

    I love you all!

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