said i’d sleep on it. i have. wake up this morning and it’s still in the top of my head, so i’m thinking i got a lot of thinking done during the night. i don’t recall any dreams, so looks like all the cycles were on this. which is good.
snagging coffee while my brain starts the loop of words spinning up out of the deeps. back in a moment and then… wherever my fingers take me.
ok. first, some background. i have a really good friend with whom i talk a lot about the things happening in my life. his name is daezen. and i only know him here, online. i am often surprised by his willingness to just… listen. rare. very rare. i’m thankful for it, because usually, i’m the one doing the listening and i really need someone who will just… listen… to me.
right now, that’s my good friend, daezen.
life has had daezen on the road and away from the place in which we usually meet. and i’ve spent the last weeks being reminded just how precious his friendship is to me by its absence. we’ve tossed hellos in passing at one another… me being offline for the move when he was online… him being offline for increased workload now that i’m ‘back’, etc. just keeping in touch and reminding one another to smile.
last night was the first time we’ve really just had time to sit and talk since about oh…. october. heh.
so, he was catching me up to date on his world and life and happenings, and i was catching him up on mine.
one of the things i like best about daezen is that he never assumes the worst of me.
in fact, he so consistently assumes the best that i am left to correct him in those many times when the truth is … well… not as pretty.
but this too, is a gift and blessing. mostly because it forces me to be honest with myself and with him.
it occurs to me that his kindness in this area is something i should work on myself. i see very clearly that he has a degree of kindness i simply have not found yet. i think it has to do with patience and humbleness… two areas that i especially struggle in… and shamefully, i admit, the only time i tend to really devote much thought to it is when i have his presence in contrast to myself that is such a quiet, kind, and wholly gentle reminder.
so… anyway… we were talking. he knows about the entire, year long blood trail that recently (finally, finally, finally!!) was set to permanent end.
he said he thought that ‘something that off the charts’ was necessary for me to finally be willing to admit it was just impossible for heath to ever really see past his own fear.
he is more than happy to blame heath for all of it. even as i know he must know that is an impossible thing. so, as usual, when faced with more than is deserved, i have a need to give credit where it is due, take blame where it is due, and try to keep the ledger of truth in balance.
the truth is, the entire situation was this really terrible comedy of errors. miscommunications and misses, compounded by fears and exacerbated by anger and pride. his and my own.
i won’t bother talking about his. i’ve done enough of that and the truth is, as long as i’m talking about his, i’m not really facing my own.
now here is where recent decisions to make of heath and michael teachers sets the rubber to the road.
and the epiphany, in a nutshell (though i will definitely crack the booger open and dissect it ad nauseam in a bit) is:
i haven’t been trying to give to others out of care for them. i’ve been trying to give to others out of care for me. ego. selfishness. pride.
ouch.
OUCH.
fuck. that’s hard.
and it isn’t getting any easier. ok. there it is.
a few admissions, all of which are just as hard to type…
i have pushed what might be good things onto others because it was more important to me that i give them than whether or not they wanted to receive them.
i have thoughtlessly and cruelly not cared if others were hurt in the effort, hiding it from myself by telling myself the benefit existed in spite of any hurt that might happen in the process. (oh fucking stars. that’s ugly.)
(the weight of this is settling in. oh stupid me.)
i have have used the excuse of ‘no boundaries’ to justify such acts repeatedly, and, in the face of the inevitable hurt, let ego and pride justify it and absolve me of fault or error.
i said all of this to daezen. and his response was a kindness i really do not deserve. he said to me that good intentions that result in hurt to others were not made bad by it. then, he said:
i disagreed. in that moment and in this one. even as i admit i placated my own inner disgust and knowledge of this with it… until this moment.
hah. sitting here, suddenly, the little ‘pop’ of the florescent bulb that is my faulty insight…. i wrote some days ago that Focus was swelling and something massive was on the way…. and in all the days since, this entire self-inflicted shit storm has been swirling.
i sit here now and example after example of this, underscored, hairy and ugly, are parading through my head. dave. j. chris. horatio. namdag. jatson. the universe has been steadily tapping me on the head and increasing the strength behind each one in the face of my stubborn blindness.
i cried myself to sleep last night, beginning to see the outline and hurting for the stupidity and thoughtlessness of it all… but that’s just ego. the part that really hurt and still hurts is sitting here knowing… KNOWING… that i’ve not only haven’t been benefitting others, i’ve been actively hurting them.
willingly. arrogantly. ignorantly.
markers in the field. i don’t need to look back. the pressure of their presence tilts the ground under my feet. makes what should be level ground into steep incline.
ego and pride make it easy to ignore these things when they arrive on the lips of others.
it is impossible to ignore them now.
i’m not crying anymore. just sitting here with the last tears drying on my cheek and letting this sink in. if anything, taking the biggest stick i can find and chasing after it/me.
i’m not angry with myself. i’m disgusted with myself. sick, thick, revulsion. and a feeling of being lost.
i see it now. but will i forget? is this just a transient surfacing? will it last?
i wish i could say i knew. i wish it were possible to outline it in starlight, in blood, in neon color strobing light so i could know it isn’t going to disappear as soon as i turn my thought elsewhere.
i want to learn. i want to not hurt others.
i wish rinpoche were here.