Category: life

Thanksgiving 1951: Delayed Pilgrims

I was born in the short Summer of Love to parents who endured long Winters of Hate in madness-torn Hungary. My parents came to this country in 1951 after spending about seven years in a Dispaced Persons (DP) camp in Austria: a place with little hope, food, shelter, clothing, heat. Hungarians each, they lived through the European Depression (which dwarfed what happened in the U.S.) and then the horrors of World War II. My parents met in that camp, eventually got married and had two children, a girl and then a boy.

My parents could have gone anywhere in the world. Through all the hell they experienced, they worked hard to come to only one place on earth, the last refuge of freedom in the world: America. Here they are, on November 22, 1951. The Wilmington New Journal’s caption: City DPs (Delayed Pilgrims) to Give Thanks:

From Last Import

From left to right: two of my maternal aunts who journeyed here with my parents; my brother Julius; my father Julius Sr; my mother Laura; and my sister Laura (yes, my parents named their first born children after themselves).

In the DP camp, my parents had practically nothing. I never understood why they would have children amid such ruin and despair: the trauma alone of war and persecution and starvation must have been overwhelming. Now that I have a child of my own I understand why: a child is a gem from the future, a kindling of hope.

When you give thanks today, think of the people who endure, every day, terror, starvation, evil government, wrath, disease and despair.

After thinking of all the pain there is in the world, look at the picture of my family. It’s not something we see everyday. But there it is: the beautiful result of laboring your hope into a dream and your dream into a moment of pure gold. If there’s gold on your Turkey today it’s the color of someone’s difficult dream.

Think good thoughts, as hard as that may be.

Happy Thanksgiving, my brothers and sisters.

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Zen and the Art of Thinking

It’s not as bad as you think. It’s better. It’s worse. What you think is a part of a larger picture. And the picture always changes. If you get stuck thinking about the same thing, you’ll miss the rest of the show.

Right now, a lot of people think things are bad. There’s a lot of (justifiable) anxiety about the future of our global economy. There’s (justifiable) manic anxiety about this year’s Presidential election. There’s a lot of bad news from all parts of the universe to madden anybody.

Japanese Zen master Kodo Sawaki (1880-1965) in full lotus posture.

If you believe that what you think is who you are, then you are limiting what you can become. Thinking is merely a tool. You can use it to enhance your life and the lives of others, or you can use it like a hammer to bash your own head or bludgeon others to death.

Life can’t be all thought out. Life has to be felt. You have to feel around its bends and turns and turbulence.

So the art of thinking is a simple one: use it the way you use a raft down a river.

The Zen of the art of thinking is this: the raft can get smashed in a moment of chaos. Thinking about the violence of the river won’t save you from drowning. Feeling your way to land becomes your only option.

Don’t confuse what you think with who you are. Build a sturdy raft. But don’t nail yourself to it.

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A Bad and Meaningful Day

Optimist or Pessimist? You Decide

Image by waɪ.tiː via Flickr

On a bad day, when one moment hits you hard, it’s easy for you to stretch the moment over the rest of the day. Our brains are probably wired that way.

I wonder how much we lose from bad days. The self-help crowd tells us to turn our dangers into opportunities. And I buy into that philosophy myself, usually.

Sometimes, however, a good day gone bad is just how things are. Happenings. You can read all sorts of meaning into anything that happens. If you’re optimistic, the meanings are bright. If you’re pessimistic, the meanings are dark.

But: if you pay close enough attention to that edge between optimism and pessimism, between bright and dark, you have a chance at experiencing something beyond optimism and pessimism: sight. Seeing things as they are, no matter how painful or pleasant, is really the only way to get to the truth of your life.

I don’t know what the mutual truth of our lives is. I don’t know your truth; maybe you don’t either. If I had to bet on that shared value, I’d say something good would come out of our mutual understanding. This universe permits synergy, which might be how good prevails over bad. Just a thought.

Today, I had a bad day. A bad thing happened and it hurt. That’s now a truth of my life. I don’t need to share the details with you, but I think you understand.

If I had to start today over again, I’m not so sure I would change things. There’s something about a bad day that has meaning. I suppose it’s up to us to choose the meaning and hope it matches the truth.

I hope you enjoy the rest of your day. What’s more, I hope you find meaning in whatever kind of day you’ve had. Because if you had a good day, then it means the world isn’t all bad. I’m cool with that. Are you?

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