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Sunday Musings - October 30, 2022

10/29/2022

Sunday Musings - October 30, 2022
Daily intentions

Many of us can easily allow the events de jour to dictate our behavior. We may have intended to set aside time for sabbath services or our meditation practice; to live each moment acutely aware that our only purpose is to leave a rich trail of spiritual petals . Yet, here it is the next sabbath or meditation day and it seems as if, once again, life events have dictated our behavior.

In the United States, and sadly increasingly in many other countries we seem to design a life journey which is filled to the brim with “important” responsibilities including the accumulation and care taking of many things. We may tell ourselves that our primary responsibility is to make sure our children receive the education which is most likely to result in their attaining jobs which ensure they can repeat or surpass our financial achievements.

Often our marriages may begin to feel like a business relationship requiring decisions made over breakfast or other meals. One may continue to plan family dates or even a date night once a week with our life partner. If very lucky, one may daily catch a glimpse of one’s partner and other family members; those who help us be our best selves emotionally and spiritually.

During the pandemic some individuals and families got a taste of what it felt like to have time to enjoy and challenge each other. Sales of bicycles and other exercise and play equipment went up despite the supply chain issues. For some, relationships became primary whether one was sitting quietly together or l preparing a meal together. Sabbath celebrations, meditation and other spiritual practices began to be woven into the design of one’s life journey. Love was suddenly a verb again. The God of one’s understanding was evident in the joy of being present to and with each other; even one’s neighbors.

When ordered back to the office many were acutely aware that the office or plant wanted them to leave their spiritual goals at home and focus on production - for production’s sake. The era of quiet quitting soon visited many offices, stores, and plants. Obviously not all could quit and look for jobs which allowed them to put family and spiritual practices first. One must, after all, have food, water, heat, and electric services for which one must pay. Not all employers will empathize when one is clear that God and relationships are primary.

Daily, I challenge myself to formulate and share with at least a couple of people my spiritual intentions for that day; set a goal to come as close as humanly possible to being my best spiritual self; to notice when I am judging myself and others; to notice when I am more focused on tasks than on relationships; to notice when I treat others as objects; to notice when I decide it is too risky to take the leap of faith which allows me to be present; to notice when I fail to speak out against racism, sexism, homophobia, and other ways we create an us and them; to notice when money for the latest fashion item or new gadget is more important than how my neighbor is doing. Noticing is not about shaming myself or others or pretending that that I can be more god like than God. It is an opportunity to invite myself back to center; back to my spiritual goals; back to the reality that all that really matters is that we do our best to love and take care of each other and Mother Earth. No matter what spiritual or religious framework we inherited or adopted, the goal is to show up to do our best to fill that tiny space which we need to fill just for today; that space which is no more or less important than all the other spaces which together create the circuit board design for a life well lived in community. Perhaps the sum of that community is the God of our understanding.

Setting a daily spiritual intention does not permit me to be more than the perfectly imperfect human that I am. It may permit me to approximate my best; just for today.

Written October 30, 2022
Jimmy F Pickett
Coachpickett.org

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Sunday Musings - October 23, 2022

10/22/2022

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Sunday Musings – October 23, 2022
Attachments/addictions/compulsions

The world is often not as many of us dictate it should be to accommodate our wants, needs and comfort level. Often, we decide to avoid dealing with our disappointments or the pain of some parts of this life journey by drinking alcohol, doing other drugs, shopping, seeking frequent sexual pleasure, money, power or getting angry. Those who find an avoidance technique that works at least temporarily often continue to repeat a behavior until it becomes part of one’s muscle memory. The avoidance behavior or technique which works depends, in part, on how our particular brain is engineered. Each of our brains are engineered in a unique way despite the basic structural similarities.   For example, if I drink more than a small amount of alcohol, I get immediately physically sick. I have no tolerance. Yet for many years I had a significant tolerance for nicotine. For a tme, anger and blaming others did provide consistent temporary relief from uncomfortable emotions. Although I was not, to myself, admitting that I was using anger to avoid uncomfortable situations, I later realized I sometimes did.   I also attempted to keep myself and my home clean and neat as if taking control of one area of life alleviated some of the powerlessness I felt in other areas of my life.

Whether we call repeated, short term avoidance behavior attachment, addiction or habit may not matter. Although there is an increased body of research regarding addiction to alcohol and other drugs, I am convinced that we may eventually discover that there is significant similarity among various, repeated behaviors which help one avoid dealing with life on life’s terms. Some of the similarities are:

o   Repeating the behavior until it becomes embedded in muscle memory.

o   Enough short-term reward to result in one repeating the behavior

o   Compulsive/obsessive need to keep repeating the behavior.

o   Blaming people, places and situation for one’s behavior.

o   Repeating behavior, no matter how it affects others and how much it violates one’s core values.

o   Often neglecting one responsibilities and commitments.

o   Lying to oneself and to others.

The healing process is similar for all these behaviors and includes:

o   A daily/hour/minute decision to choose an alternative, healthier behavior.

o   The support of loving people who understand the nature of the “dis ease” and disease.

o   Not allowing “relapses” to prevent one returning to one’s particular recovery program.

o   Some system for being accountable but not shaming self for the hurts one’s caused oneself and others.

o   A return to dependence on one’s core values.

o   Consistent belief that one should and can deal with discomfort and pain - physical, emotional and spiritual.

o   Gas stations to fill up one’s emotional, physical, and spiritual gas tanks. This may include mediation and other necessary medical treatment.

o   The ability - financial, physical, nutritional and emotional - to     access the healing resources one needs.

o   The increasing ability to experience and focus on the positives of this life journey - the positives which sit alongside of the negatives of this life journey. If one only experiences negatives it is impossible to force oneself to consistently live with such pain.

Unless and until we, as members of healing profession, come to terms with these similarities we will continue to treat dysfunction/hurtful compulsive behavior by labeling people as bad, evil, sinful or less than. Currently although there is increased acceptance by some that addiction to alcohol and other drugs is a disease, too often:

o   Individuals are diagnosed based on symptoms and the underlying disease is not identified or treated.

o   Certain addictive/compulsive behavior or attachments are rank ordered with some being viewed as evil and others being viewed with a modicum of compassion. Compulsive/addicted sexual behavior is often judged as an evil choice and different than other ways of hurting self and others.

No one decides to become an addict or attached to a dysfunctional, hurtful way of living. One may decide or come to believe that one is too weak or fragile to deal with life on life’s terms. One may be treated as weak and powerless by parents or parent figures who themselves have not had an opportunity to heal from their own pain. One may thus come to internalize the belief one cannot deal with pain.

We all deserve to heal regardless of our addictions/attachments/compulsions which hurt us and others.   When one person heals, we all benefit.

Written October 23, 2022
Jimmy F Pickett
Coachpickett.org

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Sunday Musings - October 16, 2022

10/16/2022

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Sunday Musings - October 16, 2022
“You are nothing to me.”
Claiming the right to discard others.

Daily one can read or listen to so called objective reports of we humans hurting other humans. There are reports of those who physically harm others; who kill another while driving impaired; who rob or attempt to rob another; who attempt to control another physically or psychologically; who discard others as if they are a disposable/single use plastic bag ; who drain others emotionally or financially.

Daily, a number of teenagers are thrown into the streets because their parents are unable to fit their GLBT child into their tightly constructed gender or sexual identity boxes. Daily, some children discard parents who shut off access to family money.

Daily, one might notice that the objective reporter seems able to self-righteously discard the discarded.

Daily, many of us discard those who refuse to meet our expectations of how they should behave.

Discarding is much different than setting boundaries. Certainly, if someone is emotionally or physically abusive one needs to take protective action; one needs to keep oneself safe if at all possible. Thus, I am not likely to open my office or home door if I know someone is impaired because of their use of alcohol or other drugs. Clearly, I am not going invite someone who is actively psychotic and threatening violence into my home or office. Clearly, I am not going to invite someone, especially someone who is angry, into my office or home if they have a loaded gun. If someone is threatening me in any way, I am going to set up a physical or emotional barrier.

Although we talk as if all or most have free will. Our justice system is predicated on this assumption, I am increasingly convinced that we all do the best we can at any given moment. I am not implying that it is appropriate or even helpful to release ourselves or others from accountability or from acceptance of the extent our actions impact the health and even the life of others. I am also not implying that feeding one’s addiction to power, sex, alcohol or other drugs, possession, money or the internalization or the belief that one is more deserving that others is healthy.

I am implying that our energy, as a community, needs to be increasingly based on what we are learning from scientific study about the brain and all the factors which can cause or influence the thought process of each of us; how we can, without shame, examine and, when appropriate, change the thought process to perhaps arrive at a different slice of reality.

I understand that some individuals are incapable of considering the rights of others. I have no problem accepting that a person who is told from birth that they are entitled to an unequal share of material wealth and privilege will come to internalize that belief.   I have no problem accepting, as Lenore Walker suggested in her book Battered Women, learned helplessness is as real as being bound in physical chains.

I am well aware that many of we humans are so convinced that our realty is the only possible reality that any attempt to suggest one consider another may be met with disdain, arrogance, a blank stare or every defensive anger. Some of us may have learned that it is our right and even our duty to silence the messenger who suggests a different reality.   I have no doubt that President Putin believes he has the right or even the duty to bring Ukraine back into the umbrella of Russia no matter if he has to destroy all of Ukraine and kill all Ukrainians to accomplish that goal.

The question is not whether some of us are a danger to self-and/or others. The question is whether we, as a society, are going to allow grief, hurt, superstition, outdated religious dogma, arrogance, or science to work towards creating a safer, more just society. Clearly self-righteous, arrogant, emotional responses to injustice - to we humans mistreating each other - is emotionally, politically, and financially costly. It is also ineffective.

An eye for an eye approach from an emotional standpoint might make sense, but if the goal is to demonstrate that violence and punishment are not an effective response to one’s being mistreated than we need to find out what response might scientifically make more sense and reduce the hurt we cause each other.

Written October 16, 2022
Jimmy F Pickett
coachpickett.org

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Sunday Musings - October 9, 2022

10/9/2022

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Sunday Musings – October 9, 2022
Perfect in our Imperfectness

In my memory bank it was the late Louise Hay from whom I first heard the phrase “We are perfect in our imperfectness.” Ms. Hay was one of the motivational speakers and authors who worked for/with those of us living with the AIDS epidemic. At a time when many were inaccurately calling AIDS the gay plague and religious leaders were asserting it was the punishment of the God of their understanding for sinful or even evil behavior, individuals such as Louise Hay, Elizabeth Kubler Ross, Ram Dass and members of the LGBT community echoed the positive message of those who clearly understood that:

Disease is disease and not a reward or punishment.
Imperfection is contained in the essence of our humanity.
Loving is the highest of human acts.

True spiritual teachers remind us of humans that in accepting our vulnerability to physical and emotional disease we are our most creative and strongest.

Daily I attempt to articulate a spiritual goal. Today my spiritual goal is to be quiet and “listen” to:

The pain and beauty beneath the words and actions of myself and others.
The opportunity to learn from my “mistakes, shortcomings, and failures.

Many of my “mistakes, shortcomings and failures” have to do with the expectations I conjure up for other people, companies, and situations. I am well aware of how much “discomfort” my expectations cause myself and others. When people and situations do not intuit and meet my expectations, I can easily fall into the trap of blaming them and hurl insults directly or indirectly at the person or situation. As soon as I behave in a way which is inconsistent with the fact that it was my expectations and not their behavior which was the problem, I then begin to direct the insults at myself while profusely apologizing for my behavior. Sometimes I manage to simultaneously continue to blame the other and myself!!!

Angie Karan, the author, is quoted on “goodreads.com” as saying: “People who make mistakes are more like-able than those who appear perfect. We can’t connect with perfect…but we like and LOVE people who are real…”

If this is true, I should be extremely likeable! Minute by minute I fall short of being my best self. Minute by minute I am provided with the opportunity to “just notice” my perfect/imperfect humanness. Minute by minute I am reminded:

If my emotional, physical, nutritional and spiritual gas tanks do not have any fuel I cannot be my best self.
Accountability is necessary for change.
Shame and beating up self will not result in positive change.
The more accepting of my perfectly imperfect humanness I am the less I expect others to meet my expectations.
Hurt people hurt people. Whether I or someone else is beating up on me the results are always negative.

We know that most if not all the harm in the world is directly or indirectly a result of we humans not accepting that our worth is contained in our imperfect perfect humanness. The paradox is our best self-arises out of the acceptance of this reality.

Just for today I will be more accountable by being more accepting of my humanness. Today I will notice when I conjure up expectations for others.

Written October 9,2022
Jimmy F Pickett
coachpickett.org

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Sunday Musings - October 2,2022

10/1/2022

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Sunday Musings – October 2, 2022
The paradox of ethics and morality

I am very appreciative of those who are intentional about attempting to live a moral and/or ethical life and who also have a sense of humor regarding their journey with this attempt.

As I reminded myself and readers in a previous blog, moral and ethics, although often used interchangeably, can be viewed differently.   According to many sources, including britannica.com, “both morality and ethics loosely have to do with distinguishing the difference between “good and bad” or “right and wrong.” Many people, however, think of morality as something that’s personal and normative and ethics as the standards of “good and bad” distinguished by a certain community or social setting.”

As a philosophy major, a person who can obsessively overthink and a person who daily strives to make decisions resulting in the least harm to self, others and Mother Earth I am acutely aware there are no perfect decisions. Given my goal I am most interested in morals and not ethics. Although I do not wish to offend others in a certain community or social setting, my experience is that often what some consider ethical is based on limited information and/or on a religious standard which may have originated in a different time and place based on an attempt to explain something which was mysterious. There is, for example, now no scientific evidence that a variety of sexual practices between consenting adults is harmful to others.   There is no danger in eating certain food products if scientifically prepared unless one has a specific allergy. There may or may not be evidence that praying facing a certain direction is more powerful than praying facing another direction   There is evidence that prayers can produce positive energy which is physical in nature. There is evidence, whether training animals or humans, a positive versus a negative approach works most effectively in almost all situations.

I happen to believe that given what we now know the use of single use plastic is immoral. The reason it is immoral is related to the extent to which this plastic is adversely affecting fish and other living parts of Mother Nature.   Yet some would suggest that consistently bringing up the subject at restaurants and retail stores simply makes the staff of the establishments feel chastised and/or resentful and is not likely to diminish the use of single use plastic. Thus, one might say it is immoral to badger people with one’s concern about the use of single use plastic. In some communities where the livelihood of many is dependent on multi use plastics it is considered unethical to broach the topic unless one has a financially viable option.

Some think that the constant attempt to invite others to consider how their behavior affects others and the rest of Mother Earth is motivated by a political agenda. If this is true, the goal can be to ensure that people are politically correct only to make them seem superior to those who are less politically correct. Those who are less concerned about being politically correct would then be more moral and ethical than those who are politically correct.

Unlike most other animals, plants and certainly minerals, we humans deliberately create products which adversely affect the life of the universe and thus adversely upset the balance of the universe.   It is true, of course, that certain acts of Mother Nature - severe storms - upset the existing balance but one could postulate that storms are just being storms and cannot be labeled as ethical, unethical, moral, immoral, or even amoral.    They are busy being themselves although it is also true actions of we humans also affect acts of Mother Nature. Certain animals exist by feeding off other animals. Most would not suggest these animals are unethical or immoral.    Only us humans, it seems are capable of ethical or moral behavior and of judging others as ethical, unethical, moral or immoral.

It could be asserted that the terms moral, immoral, ethical, unethical, and amoral are themselves both immoral and ethical.   If one truly could accept that all action and thus inactions act on the entire universe than what we call immoral or unethical would not be in one’s best interest and, thus, only if one chose to act against one’s best interest would one be immoral or ethical. If indeed one chose to act against one’s best interest one would not be consider sane. If one is insane, one cannot be considered immoral or unethical because one is incapable of rational thought.

The only logical conclusion is that it is both immoral and ethical to think in terms of morality and ethics. It might be useful to think more broadly in terms of what behavior is most likely to have the least negative effects on the rest of the universe and/or to be honest and admit our goal is to kiss the Blarney Stone.

The point is that most of us want to be our best selves while, at the same time, not adding to the existential angst of the world by engaging in the unethical and immoral practice of proving that we have patented and own ethics and morality. That would be patently unethical and immoral.

Written October 2, 2022
Jimmy F Pickett
Coachpickett.org

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Sunday Musings - October 30, 2022

Sunday Musings - October 23, 2022

Sunday Musings - October 16, 2022

Sunday Musings - October 9, 2022

Sunday Musings - October 2,2022

Jimmy Pickett is a life student who happens to be a licensed counselor and an addiction counselor. He is a student of Buddhism with a background of Christianity and a Native American heritage.

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