Lesson from a Dying Kitten

This has been a terrible day for me. I started the day in a major conflict with my girlfriend, one that resulted in a great degree of distancing and disillusionment and uncertainty about our future together. I think it's safe to say both of us are suffering the pain of great heartache, confusion, and a sense of a breach of a deep connection tonight.

Then tonight I went to dinner with an old friend who's going through a very painful and bitter divorce. The suffering experienced not only by herself but also by her children, family, and others affected is also great, and sure to be prolonged due to the contentious and complicated nature of their situation.

In between those two events I was driving into town this afternoon when I passed an object on the freeway on-ramp which at first looked like a small bag blowing in the wind. Just as I passed it I saw that it was actually a badly injured kitten, shaking and contorting from the effects of its injuries. By the time I could circle back around, pull to the side of the road, and wait for traffic to clear enough that I could run out there and move it from the roadway, it had stopped moving. As fate would have it, there was an emergency veterinary hospital right there within 100 yards of where it was hit. So I ran over there with the kitten, hoping against hope that there was something that could be done for it yet. But by the time I got inside with it, the kitten had died.

I don't know if it died while I was holding it or sometime before. But I do know that regardless of when that was, the kitten managed to teach me a very valuable lesson in our brief time together.

Much had been said about the death of Jack Kevorkian this week, the doctor who performed assisted suicides on individuals in Oregon until being jailed for it. The kitten taught me that all the arguing and finger-pointing and judgmentalism that has marked the conversation about that since the doctor's death means nothing when the moment of truth and action arrives. The kitten taught me that no matter how much I may think about it or argue one way or another about some scenario, there's no way to know until I'm actually in any given situation what life/spirit/God/love will lead me to do if I allow myself the freedom to open up to that voice and let it guide me. With the kitten, I didn't stop to think about whether running out into traffic was safe or legal or what I was or wasn't allowed to do in response to the situation; I just wanted to help ease its suffering however I could.

Throughout the day, I had many choices to make regarding how to respond to suffering. No amount of debating a bunch of what-if scenarios beforehand, and no amount of legislated required responses or limitations, would have mattered in any of these situations, at least not for me. My heart told me how to respond in each case, and I tried to be wise enough to listen and follow its lead.

We're all in this together - all us humans, all the animals, the plants, the planet, everything and everyone, and in every moment there is suffering to be found all around and often within us. For those who want to, let them have their debates and establish their set of canned criteria by which they then take action or not in any particular situation. But for the rest of us, I think each instance of suffering we observe or endure is a call to a greater level of spiritual awareness and to the development and exercising of ever-deepening levels of empathy and compassion for each other. If we wish to be truly prepared to respond to suffering in any situation, I believe our most productive effort will lie not in debate about legalities or philosophies; it will lie in expanding our awareness of our interconnectedness and in deepening our capacity for empathy so that we can face and embrace the suffering we encounter with great wisdom and compassion. Our goal shouldn't be a society in which the central question in response to suffering is "what am I allowed to do?" or worse, "what am I obligated to do?" but instead, "how can I help?" with the answer coming from within, based on compassion and a sense of our oneness with each other and with all things.

Leia Mais…

I Am

There are so many people talking about oneness and the interconnection of all much more eloquently and creatively than I am here.  Go see this movie and you'll see one example of this.

I think the important thing though is that more and more people are waking up to this awareness and are openly and actively promoting it.  And when that number gets large enough and we reach a tipping point in that awareness, big changes and much healing and growth will happen.

Leia Mais…

WWF Video

Beautiful, profound video capturing our interconnectedness...

WWF - We Are All Connected from Troublemakers.tv on Vimeo.

Leia Mais…

Peeling Stickers and Cementing Memories

I was just peeling the price stickers off of the new frames I got for the pictures of my grandmother and grandfather. The pictures sit on a table in my study where I see them every time I enter the room.

As I was doing this it struck me that, although they've both been dead for many years now, they have a living legacy in the lives of their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and also in the lives of the descendants of some of the families who knew them. They live on in memories that are so cherished that we still keep pictures of them out to remind us of them daily. Those pictures remind us of their personalities, their stories, and ultimately of the value of their lives.

And then it struck me that I won't have that. When I die, that'll be it. With no children of my own, and nobody close enough to me that I'm aware of who would care about me enough to maintain an active memory of me, I won't continue to sit posed in a frame on anyone's desk. I won't be someone that anyone gives any thought or remembrance to, certainly not on any regular basis. My story, however significant in my own mind, will quickly be forgotten and lost. I'll just fade away like I never even existed.

Maybe at most some pieces of my work will remain for some relatively short time, and maybe once or twice someone will ask "who did this?" and maybe my name will be remembered and mentioned. And then soon, no more.

So how to live with this? And how to respond to this notion? I really don't know at this point. There have certainly been billions upon billions of people who have walked this earth at one point or another who have long since been forgotten by humanity. Very few achieve anything that warrants lasting recollection by more than a generation or two after them, if even that.

So are we really then just here for ourselves? Or are we here to love and serve without any concern for how or if that energy continues on after our deaths? Does it really matter that we make any sort of positive difference in anyone else's life if they're just going to die soon too? How do we speak then about the purpose of a life, or measure its value? Is my life any more significant than that of my dog, or some random tree in a forest somewhere?

I don't know. For now I have to be content to just sit with these questions and be grateful that I'm here in this life at all. I have to simply enjoy those few precious times when I'm able to make someone smile, or ease someone else's suffering just a little bit, and I get to enjoy the reward of feeling my connectedness to another person or to all of life.

And then I look at my grandfather's picture again. I see the mole on the side of his forehead, and I reach up and touch the identical place on my own head and feel the same mole there. And I feel the gift of a sense of love and connection that reaches across time, across life and death, and I am again grateful. I wish that experience for everyone.

Leia Mais…

Global Oneness Project

I can write about this in my little vacuum all I want, but here's a link to a project that's all about living this concept of oneness and interconnectedness.  Take the time to watch their latest movie, check out their great video library, and support them if you feel so inclined.

Leia Mais…

Extreme Community Makeover

"American individualism, much celebrated and cherished, has developed without its essential corrective, which is belonging." - Wallace Stegner

The Extreme Home Makeover crew recently did a house just a couple miles down the road from me.  I've always enjoyed the show and seeing the way the communities come together to support each of the families who receive new homes.  But it took having it happen practically in my own backyard to shake me awake in astonishment to the fact that there are extraordinary families and people and circumstances all around every one of us and not just in some faraway unique parts of the country somewhere.  It stunned me that there were people living in such challenging conditions, and living such amazing lives, so close to me but completely outside my awareness.  And of course from there it's just a small step to realize that even on our own streets or in our own apartment buildings, each of us is living our own heroic life of sorts, facing our own challenges, having our own unique experiences, and feeling our own deep feelings, and doing all this pretty much outside the awareness of most of our neighbors.  

It certainly isn't any new observation that we've become so insulated and isolated in our modern American lifestyle.  Sure, we may know the names and a few surface details of the lives of some of our neighbors, but how many of them do we really know?  It's one thing to know about somebody but another entirely to really know who they are.  Yet when we do find out who they are on the inside, what their struggles and joys and fears and challenges are, we feel more connected to them and more compassionate toward them, as evidenced by the way that community after community turns out en masse to help these people on the EHM episodes. 

And I don't think they all show up just 'cause they may get a chance to be on TV.  Most of the people who volunteer, and there are hundreds at each site, are never mentioned or seen on TV.  They're there because they care and because they sincerely want to be of service to those in need and to help make a positive difference in someone's lives.

So if that desire to be more deeply connected and supportive of each other is so much a part of so many of us, why do we settle for the lives of relative isolation that most of us live?  If that's not the kind of community we really want to be a part of, why do we choose it?  Why has it become so difficult for us to be more open with each other about the deeper, more 'real' aspects of our lives?

Neighbors are like relatives.  You don't get to choose who they are; you just have to learn to live with them as best you can.  And granted, that's easier with some people than with others.  But I bet if we took the time to really get to know each other, choosing to hold people at a distance and stay so isolated in our individual little hermetically sealed houses and lives would become much more the exception than the rule for most of us.  It just takes someone to take that first step, reach out that first hand, extend that first invitation, and allow someone else into their house and into their life.  Will you be that someone?

Leia Mais…

On A Mission

Endeavour undocked from the ISS two nights ago.  That marked the end of a 12 day (or night for many of us) stint on console working the mission, and the end of what essentially becomes total immersion in a completely different world during that time.  Six people left the planet to go on this journey, but many more of us left our normal daily lives behind and spent the last two weeks up on the Station in a sense also, focused on and dedicated to doing all that it took to make sure the mission was safe and successful in every moment.  And even though we weren’t each on console 24 hours a day, the mental commitment and focus didn’t end for many of us when our shifts ended. 

For me, as the lead for our group for this mission, that meant continuing to follow activities, process e-mails and instant messages and phone calls, and stay up to speed on what was happening on other shifts while I was home between shifts myself.  To some extent that was a personal choice – not everyone puts in quite that much effort.  But it was my last mission as a flight lead and I wanted to make sure I ended this part of my career with my best effort and that my team knew I was there to support them throughout the mission.

Something else happened, as it always does at least for me, during the mission.  I became part of a tremendous group effort to extend ourselves beyond our normal limits, doing whatever it took to achieve a successful mission together.  In this environment our normal ego boundaries were set aside (mostly) and we joined together in service to a greater good, a grander vision and purpose, to something much bigger and bolder than any one of us alone, to something that could only be accomplished if we all worked selflessly as one.  For those 12 days I knew and felt, as I believe most everyone else does who works these missions, that what really matters and why I’m really here in this job and in this life is to commit myself fully to the service of this greater good, to helping extend our communal reach into the new, the challenging, the unknown. 

In doing that I experienced the power of our interconnectedness with each other.  Space travel is, among other things, a manifestation of our collective drive to extend ourselves, explore, and grow, and it’s a great demonstration of the fact that we accomplish all that most effectively when we’re all supporting each other in that ‘endeavour.’  To be able to consciously participate in and feel that can be a powerful, transformational experience. 

The STS-130 mission ends when Endeavour lands, hopefully later tonight.  But the bigger mission goes on, both outwardly and inwardly.  Those of us who are fortunate enough to work in this business have been richly blessed to be able to experience these times of extraordinary unity, growth, and achievement fairly often.  We’ve been given multiple tastes of how far we can go together when we join up to support each other in service to a collective vision of exploration and growth.  With the Shuttle back on the ground, our larger mission remains to extend that experience and commitment to all aspects of our lives, encouraging and supporting each other on our own continuing individual and collective journeys. 

Leia Mais…