A personal blog by a graying (mostly Anglo with light African-American roots) gay left leaning liberal progressive married college-educated Buddhist Baha'i BBC/NPR-listening Professor Emeritus now following the Dharma in Minas Gerais, Brasil.
It’s
important to note that anger is a form of fear. Someone does something,
and suddenly the mind feels ungrounded and reacts with anger, trying to
reestablish a firm ground by reaffirming one’s narrow sense of self.
Anger’s aim is to establish safety in that deluded way.
And
here is where we come to suffering, because what suffering tells you is
where the mind is clinging. Now, I am talking about your suffering. I
am not talking about somebody else’s suffering. Let’s just deal with us.
For me, suffering is telling me where my mind is clinging. If I
experience suffering because I am getting old, it’s because I have a
model of myself that’s other than what this is. This is what this is,
including dying, pain, loss, all of it.
The models in our heads about it, and the way we cling to it, is where
the root of suffering is. So when you wanna get free badly enough, you
begin to experience your own suffering as grace. You don’t ask for it.
You don’t say, “Give me suffering,” but when it comes you see it as
something that’s showing you a place where you are holding. The place to
release.
I’m not going to sugarcoat this at all. We are in for a full-blown assault on LGBTQ rights the likes of which many, particularly younger LGBTQ people, have not seen. Progress will most certainly be halted completely, likely rolled back. And it’s already underway.
First, forget any of your thinking that Donald Trump is from New York City, probably has gay friends, sent Elton John a congratulatory note on his civil union in 2005, used the term “LGBTQ” (in pitting gays against Muslims at the Republican National Convention, when he vowed only to protect us from a “hateful foreign ideology”) or any other superficial things you may have read or heard.
Ronald Reagan was from Hollywood, and he, too, had many gay friends, including legendary actor Rock Hudson. Reagan even came out against an anti-gay state initiative while he was governor of California. But once Reagan made his pact with the religious right leaders in his 1980 successful run for the presidency ― for him, among them was Jerry Falwell, Sr., for Trump it’s Jerry Falwell Jr.― he had to bow to them if he wanted to get re-elected in 1984.
That meant letting thousands of gay men, transgender women, African-Americans and members other affected groups die from AIDS (including his friend Hudson) without even saying the word “AIDS” until years into the plague, let alone take leadership on fighting the epidemic with government dollars and research.
That was then, and this is now: Earlier in the year, before Mike Pence was chosen as Donald Trump’s running mate, former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, using Trump’s analogy of running a business to explain how he’d run the country, told HuffPost’s Howard Fineman that the vice president of the Trump administration would really be the “CEO” or “COO” ― or, the president of the company ― while Trump would be more like the “chairman of the board”:
“He needs an experienced person to do the part of the job he doesn’t
want to do. He seems himself more as the chairman of the board, than
even the CEO, let alone the COO...There is a long list of who that
person could be.”
That person turned out to be Pence, and, before and after the election, there’s been some analysis and commentary suggesting that Mike Pence could be “the most powerful vice president ever.”
And now, just days after the election, his power has increased tenfold as he is replacing Chris Christie as chairman of Trump’s transition team, filling all the major positions in the incoming Trump administration.
Mike Pence is perhaps one of the most anti-LGBTQ evangelical Christian political crusaders to serve in Congress and as governor of a state. Long before he signed the draconian anti-LGBTQ “religious liberty” law in Indiana last year, he supported “conversion therapy” as a member of Congress, and later, as a columnist and radio host, he gave a speech in which he said that marriage equality would lead to “societal collapse,” and called homosexuality “a choice.” Stopping gays from marrying wasn’t biased, he said, but was rather about compelling “God’s idea.”
Ben Carson, who compared homosexuality to pedophilia and incest, is a vice chairman of the transition team and so is Newt Gingrich, who has attacked what he called “gay fascism” and, in 2014, “the new fascism” around LGBTQ rights.
And right on cue, already appointed to lead domestic policy on the transition team is Ken Blackwell, formerly the Ohio secretary of state. Blackwell has compared homosexuality to arson and kleptomania, which he called “compulsions.” In an interview with me at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul in 2008, he explained:
“Well, the fact is, you can choose to restrain that compulsion. And
so I think in fact you don’t have to give in to the compulsion to be
homosexual. I think that’s been proven in case after case after case...I
believe homosexuality is a compulsion that can be contained, repressed
or changed…[T]hat is what I’m saying in the clearest of terms.”
Expect each of these individuals and more religous bigots to have prominent positions in the Trump administration.
It may or may not be difficult or unrealistic to overturn marriage equality over time, though the anti-equality National Organization for Marriage, which backed Trump in the election, has sent Trump a plan. But by passing bills like FADA ― already introduced in the Republican-controlled Senate and House ― and others yet to come, gay marriage can be made into a kind of second-class marriage. Clerks like Kim Davis can be given exemptions from giving marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples. Federal employees would be able to decline interactions with gay and lesbian married couples. Businesses such as bakers and florists, who’ve become flash points in some states where they refused to serve gays, could be granted the ability to turn away gays under federal law, and all that could head to a much more conservative Supreme Court if challenged.
Trump has said he would overturn what he saw as President Obama’s unconstitutional executive orders, and those could include Obama’s orders on LGBTQ rights, such as banning employment discrimination among federal contractors.
Mike Pence, as Dominic Holden at Buzzfeed points out, has already said that he and Trump plan to withdraw federal guidance to the states issued by the Obama administration protecting transgender students:
“Donald Trump and I simply believe that all of these issues are best
resolved at the state level,” he said in an October radio show with
Focus on the Family’s James Dobson. “Washington has no business
intruding on the operation of our local schools.”
No one should take solace in the fact that gay billionaire Peter Thiel, who spoke at the GOP convention, is on the transition team. Thiel has never been a champion of LGBTQ rights, and is now most noted for bankrolling a lawsuit against Gawker -– shutting it down ― in an act of revenge because the site reported the widely-known fact that he is gay.
If Trump treats the presidency the same way he treated the GOP convention in Cleveland, he’ll make gestures ― like giving Thiel a role in his administration or using the initialism “LGBTQ”― that will feed the media notion that he is somewhat pro-LGBTQ, while giving the nuts and bolts of halting or rolling back progress on LGBTQ rights to others. While Trump was onstage at the convention uttering “LGBTQ” (and had used Thiel’s speaking slot as a bit of window dressing too), the platform committee of the RNC had just hammered out the most anti-LGBTQ platform in history in the basement of the convention center. Tony Perkins, head of the anti-LGBTQ Family Research Council, told me at the RNC that he was “very happy” with the platform, which, as a member of the committee, he made sure included the promotion of “conversion therapy.”
Trump was hands-off on the platform when it came to queer issues (unlike on the issue of trade or, in what seemed like deference to Russia, on aid to Ukraine), letting people like Perkins push an extreme agenda, and knowing he needed to court them. He spoke at the FRC’s Values Voter Summit in September, promising to uphold “religious liberty,” and a large majority of white evangelicals did turn out to vote for him on Tuesday ― comparable to, or greater than, every other GOP presidential candidate in recent years. He will need them if he wants to get re-elected, and that means he’ll have to give them some big things now. And evangelical leaders told The New York Times this week they expect him to deliver:
[W]ith Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana, an evangelical with a record of
legislating against abortion and same-sex marriage, as vice president,
Christian leaders say they feel reassured they will have access to the
White House and a seat at the table. “I am confident he will do as
president what he said he would do as a candidate,” said Ralph Reed,
chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, who helped mobilize
Christian voters for Mr. Trump.
If Trump is thus as hands-off on LGBTQ issues as president as he was at the RNC, letting people like Pence ― again, possibly the most powerful vice president ever ― get his way, along with people like Carson, Blackwell, Gingrich and likely many others, you can bet that the assault on LGBTQ rights is already underway. It’s only a matter of time before we know the full magnitude. And that’s why we must pull ourselves out of grief, get fired up, and begin the fight right now.
Correction: An earlier version of this article misidentified the location of the 2016 Republican National Convention. This has been fixed.
As a yoga teacher I often see an influx of students around the New Year. Many students are honoring fresh resolutions and commitments to return to the body, hoping to heal, nourish, or strengthen it in some way.
In times of significant change or transition—such as a new year or a presidential inauguration—decisions to support the body can be very useful. What many practitioners may be pleased to discover is how the body can support them in return. The five yoga postures and practices described below remind us what it’s like to experience groundedness and balance in the body. And, if we practice these postures regularly, they may also help instill more equanimity and tranquility in the mind.
Mountain pose (Tadasana) In mountain pose we stand as upright as possible. When we align the joints and actively engage the leg and core muscles to support the standing body, we can experience our innate stability.
To stand in mountain pose, separate the feet six to eight inches apart. Contract the muscles in the front of the thighs and draw the abdominal muscles in. Reach the arms down along the sides the body. Lift the chest forward and up and pull the shoulders back. Raise the chin so that it is parallel to the ground. As you breathe, rest your gaze—strong, but soft—on an unmoving point in front of you.
Mountain pose can help us discover balance and poise by teaching us to reach in opposite directions. We root down into the ground through the feet while simultaneously lifting up through the top of the head. If you close the eyes when you’re in mountain pose, you may notice how muscles in the toes, feet, and ankles make micro-movements to steady the body. This can be a useful reminder that no matter what kind of change is going on around us, the body intuitively knows how to steady itself.
Tree pose (Vrksasana) Tree pose is a one-footed standing posture that encourages us to practice focus and balance while remaining as grounded as possible.
Begin by standing with both feet flat on the floor. Separate the feet six to eight inches apart. Raise the right knee, which will lift the right foot several inches off the ground. Turn the knee out to the side and press the sole of the foot against the inner calf, aligning the arch of the foot with the calf muscle. For additional support, you can also place the ball of the foot on the ground and press the heel of the foot into the ankle of the standing leg. Press the hands together at the center of the chest. Rest your gaze on an unmoving point in front of you. To maintain your balance, pay close attention to the breath moving in and out of the body.
Practitioners sometimes lose their balance in tree pose or find themselves wobbling despite their best efforts to remain grounded. Embrace this; it’s in the nature of trees to sway and shift.
Illustration by Megan DaileyCorpse Pose (Savasana) While corpse pose is typically done at the end of a yoga practice, resting in this posture at any time can teach the body how to relax and release muscle tension. It can also restore breathing to a natural, passive state, which may settle an anxious mind.
To practice corpse pose, lie on your back on a comfortable surface, such as a yoga mat or a soft carpet. Extend the arms out alongside the body. If you feel tension in the lower back, roll up a towel or blanket and place it underneath the knees. Move the arms slightly away from the body and open the palms up to the ceiling. Let the feet gently fall out to the sides.
Close the eyes. Bring your attention to your toes. Silently suggest to yourself, “toes, relax.” Then continue up the body, gradually suggesting relaxation to different muscle groups, providing extra attention and care to areas where you feel tension. When you arrive at the top of the head, let go of all suggestions. Let the breath be natural. Rest.
Some people daydream or fall asleep in corpse pose. Others may find it very difficult to rest, so they twitch and fuss about. Like all postures, corpse pose is meant to be practiced, not perfected. Offer yourself time and patience. It may take a while for the body to unwind and settle into a calm, peaceful state.
Illustration by Megan DaileyAlternate Nostril Breathing (Nadi Shodhana) The Hatha Yoga Pradipika, a classic yoga text, describes nadi shodhana as a type of pranayama (breathing practice) that activates and harmonizes the right and left energy channels in the body. This practice is said to balance the flow of energy (prana) as well as stabilize and deepen the breath as it moves through the right and left nostrils.
To begin this practice, sit upright in a comfortable way. Raise your right hand. Curl the index and middle fingers in toward the palm. Bring the hand to the face. Close the right nostril off by gently pressing the thumb against the nose. Release. Then use the ring finger to close off the left nostril. Release.
Keep the hand near the nose and release both nostrils. Take a long, deep breath in. At the peak of the inhale, press the thumb against the right nostril. Exhale through the left nostril, slowly and steadily, over three counts. Then slowly inhale through the left nostril over three counts. At the peak of the inhale, close off the left nostril and release the right nostril. Exhale through the right nostril over three counts. Then, slowly inhale through the right nostril for three counts. At the end of the inhale, close off the right nostril and release the left. Exhale through the left nostril over three counts. This cycle is one round of nadi shodhana. Try completing five complete rounds. If you become lightheaded or feel like you are straining or forcing the breath, stop to rest.
Yoga philosophy associates the right energetic channel with the sun and masculine energy. The left energetic channel is associated with the moon and feminine energy. By bringing balance to the right and left energy channels, we activate the central energy channel, which is said to bring greater balance to the body and help cultivate higher levels of awareness and compassion.
Illustration by Megan Dailey Chanting (Kirtan) When I first started practicing yoga, I was fortunate enough to be part of a community that practiced kirtan, or call-and-response recitation of mantras. I found chanting to be both meditative and uplifting. Sometimes the melody was slow and our voices were inbued with longing. Other times I found myself clapping, swaying with the beat, and even dancing.
Chanting with others—especially mantras, prayers, or uplifting words—can be a powerful antidote to feelings of powerlessness or fear. If other people aren’t within reach, I’ve found that singing or even humming to oneself can also offer a subtle yet transformative sense of peace. Try lokah samastah sukhino bhavantu (“May all beings everywhere be happy and free”) or Om.
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Anger toward social injustice will
remain until the goal is achieved. It has to remain.
Of course. That anger is directed toward the social injustice itself,
along with the struggle to correct it, so the anger should be maintained
until the goal is achieved. It is necessary in order to stop social
injustice and wrong destructive actions.
The word inauguration reaches back to the Roman Republic. There the prophecies of augurs—state
oracles—guided decisions of great consequence. In our modern-day
republic, the word has come to mean nothing more than the swearing in of
another president. But thisinauguration
takes us closer to the word’s archaic roots: like the ancient Romans
who watched birds in flight, straining to detect a signal from the gods,
millions of Americans are waiting for the future to reveal its shape.
What should we expect?
This world is burning, the Buddha declared in the Adittapariyaya Sutta: “Bhikkhus, all is burning. . . . Burning with the fire of lust, with the fire of hate, with the fire of delusion.”
The Buddha himself had seen the “fire” up close. Near the end of his
long career, the Shakya Republic, his native land, fell to the army of a
neighboring state, whose leader then deliberately set out to
exterminate the losers. Nine centuries later, in 403 CE, when the
Chinese pilgrim-monk Faxian arrived at the Shakyas’ capital, he found
only “desolation,” splendid neighborhoods reduced to dusty mounds,
wolves and lions prowling alleyways.
The Buddha’s kinsmen were the victims
of a genocide, yet he persisted in the work he’d taken on since the
time of his enlightenment, instructing anyone who asked for his help.
His message remained the same as well: “Hatred is never appeased by
hatred in this world. By non-hatred alone is hatred appeased. This is a
law eternal.”
What the Buddha didn’t say, however,
might be as important as what he did. He never predicted the coming of a
day when hatred would disappear from human affairs. Instead, he assumed
the very opposite.
By contrast, we Americans have long
believed existence is perfectible—a straight line from savagery to
utopia. That’s one reason this election came as such a shock to so many
of us. When the Flower Ornament Sutra describes greed, anger, and delusion as “beginningless,” it also implies these will never end. Surely this is true.
Arriving in China in 838, the
Japanese monk Ennin expected to begin practicing with the leading
teachers. Instead, he found a country in advanced decay, unable to
recover from a civil war that had killed, according to some estimates,
two out of every three people. And now, the sangha was under siege,
thousands of monks and nuns defrocked, buildings aflame, statues melted
down or deliberately defaced.
The instigator of all this was
Emperor Wuzong, a fearful, power-hungry narcissist whose attacks on
foreigners and their ideas helped to end China’s brightest period. Urged
on by the Confucian elite and Daoist fanatics, Wuzong ransacked temple
treasuries to pay for costly wars at China’s borders.
And yet, if we flash forward just
half a century, everything looks different. The greatest masters of the
Tang dynasty—Zhaozhou, Dongshan, Yangshan, Linji—lived through the
terror and began to recreate the dharma in ways the world had never
seen. One of Zen’s most vibrant periods followed heartbreaking
destruction.
How was this achievement possible? Why didn’t these great masters fall into despair?
A clue can be found in the anthology of koans or Zen stories known as the Blue Cliff Record. Case 29 relates this exchange between Daizui and a monk:
[The] monk asked Daizui, “When the great kalpa fire arrives and the whole universe will be destroyed, will THIS also be destroyed or not?” Daizui said, “Destroyed!”
Zen teaching holds that when the
kalpa fire comes to incinerate the universe at the end of the present
world age, absolutely everything will be destroyed. Naturally, we’d like
to think that something will persist, but no—the teaching is that
everything must go.
There’s a caveat, however: everything comes back again in a different form. Nothing stays the same, but THIS returns, indestructibly. And THIS
is where we have to plant our feet, no matter how close the fire draws.
When we ask, “What should we do now?” the answer is always, “Start
again.”'
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Kurt Spellmeyer is
a Zen priest and directs the Cold Mountain Sangha in New Jersey. He
teaches English at Rutgers University and is the author of Buddha at the Apocalypse: Awakening from a Culture of Destruction.Read the original and more here.
“Hope
has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger
at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as
they are.”
Kuan Yin, bodhisattva of compassion. Photo by Liza Matthews.
Jack Kornfield on beginning this time-honored, heart-opening practice.
In our culture, people find it difficult to direct loving-kindness to
themselves. We may feel that we are unworthy, or that it’s egotistical,
or that we shouldn’t be happy when other people are suffering. So
rather than start loving-kindness practice with ourselves, which is
traditional, I find it more helpful to start with those we most
naturally love and care about. One of the beautiful principles of
compassion and loving-kindness practices is that we start where it
works, where it’s easiest. We open our heart in the most natural way,
then direct our loving-kindness little by little to the areas where it’s
more difficult.
First, sit comfortably and at ease, with your eyes closed. Sense
yourself seated here in this mystery of human life. Take your seat
halfway between heaven and Earth, as the Buddha did, then bring a kind
attention to yourself. Feel your body seated and your breath breathing
naturally.
Think of someone you care about and love a lot. Then let natural
phrases of good wishes for them come into your mind and heart. Some of
the traditional ones are, “May you be safe and protected,” “May you be
healthy and strong,” and “May you be truly happy.”
Then picture a second person you care about and express the same good wishes and intentions toward them.
Next, imagine that these two people whom you love are offering you
their loving-kindness. Picture how they look at you with concern and
love as they say, “May you too be safe and protected. May you be healthy
and strong. May you be truly happy.”
Take in their good wishes. Now turn them toward yourself. Sometimes
people place their hand on their heart or their body as they repeat the
phrases: “May I be safe and protected. May I be healthy and strong. May I
be truly happy.”
With the same care let your eyes open, look around the room, and
offer your loving-kindness to everyone around you. Feel how great it is
to spread the field of loving-kindness.
Now think of yourself as a beacon, spreading the light of
loving-kindness like a lighthouse around your city, around the country,
around the world, even to distant planets. Think, “May all beings far
and near, all beings young and old, beings in every direction, be held
in great loving-kindness. May they be safe and protected. May they be
healthy and strong. May they be truly happy.”
The Buddha said that the awakened heart of loving-kindness and
freedom is our birthright as human beings. “If these things were not
possible,” he said, “I would not teach them. But because they are
possible for you, I offer these teachings of the dharma of awakening.”
Jack
Kornfield is a founding teacher of the Insight Meditation Society and
Spirit Rock Center and one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist
mindfulness practice to the West. He is a former Buddhist monk, a
clinical psychologist, and a husband and father.
Dignity
without wisdom can be easily corrupted by pride. Generosity without
wisdom can be corrupted by self-flattery. Without wisdom, you cannot be a
perfect person—meaning that you cannot be free from complicated mind.
Without this freedom, your good qualities always risk being corrupted.
I
would say you and I are using words; we are using speaking and
listening as a vehicle for us to meet, and through which we are meeting.
Where we are capable of meeting is in the intuitive heart/mind - a way
of knowing one another that isn’t through our immediate, analytic,
intellectual process. But yet, these are word concepts that are spinning
out, and you’re picking them up, and you’re taking the concepts, and
fitting them with your concepts, and deciding they work.
You’re judging and you’re using your intellect to decide whether I’m
off the wall, or I’m here, or am I like us or am I them, or what am I?
Whatever happened to Ram Dass? And when I say I share truth with the
Beloved, it’s a place where we know how limited the words are, so we
dance with the words with our minds, while also sinking into a place of
just shared presence.
This
is the moment to return to whichever practice reinforces our moral
clarity, so that we do not wake up one day to find it eroded beyond
recognition.
Corpse Pose (Savasana)
Alternate Nostril Breathing (Nadi Shodhana)
Chanting (Kirtan)
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