Tag: comfort

Used To

It’s funny how much our comfort level is dependent upon what we are used to. When I was used to having a washer and dryer in my house, it was a pain in the neck to do the laundry. There’s the collecting and separating of the dirty stuff (which requires scouring the whole house and inevitably forgetting something), keeping an ear out for when the first load was done so that the wet load got moved to the dryer and the next load started (which almost never occurred in a timely fashion and therefore usually meant a mad dash to finish the job when I really wanted to be sleeping without the noise of a dryer keeping me up), the endless folding and folding and folding, and only then maybe, just maybe, actually having energy left over to put the dang things away (almost never happened until much later… or in truth we lived out of the laundry hamper until it was time to do the whole thing over again). 

All of that seems like a royal pain in the ass until, well, you no longer have a washer and dryer at your disposal in your home. That is the case for us in Vermont because nothing in our house at the lake was plumbed to the septic system except the toilets, and it could barely handle that. So that means that we have to go to the laundromat. Want to talk about a pain in the ass now? Add to all of the steps above the fact that if you forget to put something in the pile before you head out it’s too late. It’s not going to get washed this week. I will say that it is easier to have multiple machines at your disposal as that speeds up the job considerably. But you can’t just go about your business as the laundry is going. Best to bring a book along. Add then my least favorite part, which is having to figure out how to wrestle the folded clothes back into a laundry bag to cart it back home for unpacking (good luck with them maintaining any memory of having been folded). Lastly, there is the putting it all away, which of course comes with all of the same resistance as mentioned above except now some of those clothes are in a laundry bag rather than a hamper. It’s very hard to find what you need in the morning searching through a bag, so inevitably the clothes end up stacked in a pile on the floor because it would take way too much effort to move that pile to the shelves that we put in place for that purpose in the closet. 

That all seems like a royal pain in the ass until, well, you no longer have a laundromat at your disposal. Add to that not having running water in your house, much less hot water, and the real fun begins. I’m just going to be very real with you right about now. Shannon and I have pretty much been smelly most of the time since this pandemic began. Yes, we shower, but certainly not every day or even every other day. It just takes too much time and effort to set it up (although Shannon has made many innovations to help speed up the process). As for clothes washing, after the first few weeks of wearing the same clothes (because we don’t have room for all of our clothes in the tiny house, we had left a lot of our clothes in the lake house which was for most of that time up in the air), we finally broke down and washed a few items by hand in a bucket and hung them out to dry. Thanks to Shannon for motivating on that front. She could only wash a few things however, because as anybody who was alive before the invention of washers and dryers knows, washing clothes is a full time job without them. And it takes hard physical labor.  It’s no joke to equate the invention of washers and dryers and such things with the beginning of the liberation of women. 

In fact, pull on the string of this one little tidbit of understanding and you’ll pull down the whole house. Let me explain. The creature comforts that we are used to require, and have always required, cheap labor. Scratch that. Not simply cheap labor, but in many cases free labor. In other words, the creature comforts that we are used to require some form of slavery. This has been true since humanity “evolved” from a hunter-gatherer society into an agricultural society right up to today. In the former, labor was divided equally according to what one was best equipped to do and all jobs were valued as equally important. That meant that things that typically tended to be “women’s work” such as gathering, weaving, cooking, etc., were valued equally to things that tended to fall on men such as hunting. This was in part because it was understood that while the hunting may have taken more strength, the gathering provided much more of the tribe’s subsistence than the hunting did. Women were, therefore, equal. That is to say, there was no such thing as patriarchy, or any such notion that men were superior to women. 

It wasn’t until we settled down that labor got thrown for a loop. Agriculture takes a whole lot more effort than hunting and gathering. It also leads to population increase because frankly, you need more labor. Yet even getting busy in the bedroom won’t do the trick on that front. You need more labor than you can produce and you need it as cheap as possible. So what did we do? We enslaved “others.” This didn’t just happen over night. It took time. It began, as it turns out, with the demotion of women to a possession of males. The male head of household became the owner of his wife and children. Literally. That became the law. Interesting too that he could elect to end the life of his children- after birth. Go figure. The patriarchy was born.

From there, it simply got more and more sophisticated at co-opting free labor from “others.” When owning women as wives proved to not provide enough labor, some women were demoted even further to slavery. Yes, women- those captured from a conquered peoples- became the first slaves. Women. That’s because the conquerers couldn’t trust men with hoes. Those hoes were way too similar to the types of weapons that were used in battle at the time. Women, on the other hand, couldn’t defend themselves. Don’t go on thinking that the dominance of men over women (patriarchy) is a natural occurrence. It was invented to deal with a labor shortage. 

As population increased and urbanization progressed, more and more free labor was needed. The patriarchy needed those conquered men too. It wasn’t long before humans figured out that it is much easier to implement slavery through psychological rather than physical oppression. All you have to do is isolate a certain group of people into an “other” category and give it an “other” label according to gender, family/region of origin, and of course race. Then rank the categories and convince everyone that the ranking is the natural order of things. Easy enough, as history has more than proven. I need not say that white men are at the top of that pecking order. We all know that quite well. We have been telling that story for literally thousands of years, since the dawn of Western civilization.

That story permeates everything: our economic system, our social system, our educational system, and especially our religions. Make no mistake about it, the patriarchy was well established by the time the Bible was written. If you think that no human would ever co-opt a sacred message to serve their own need for control over cheap labor, they’ve got you. True divine messengers never, ever said any such thing that would indicate that one person, or category of people, was more valuable than another, or that the dominance of one group of people over another was divinely justified. Nope. Any truly divine messenger has known full well that there is nothing but God, and that everyone and everything is That. I am sorry, but to whom is God subservient? To whom, therefore, does God need to be obedient? Nobody. 

Yes, I am calling bullshit. I am calling bullshit because, like you, I’m tired of it. I’m exhausted in fact. I’m so over it that I barely have the energy to respond to the endless drama that is born of the Story of Patriarchy. As a gay woman I know oppression first hand. I of course will never know the more severe oppression that comes with being Black in this country. I am honored, however, to have had the opportunity to be a witness to the inner world of Black life during my time at Prairie View A&M University. I was teaching there when Sandra Bland lost her life at the hands of the county sheriff. I got to see first hand not only the grief, but even more so the resignment, of a people.

You see, while us Whites are so busy being appalled by each and every new event that makes it into the news, for Blacks this is just everyday reality. Trust me, it is. I can’t tell you how many times a student would show up to my class shaken because they had just been pulled over by said county sheriff and asked to step out of their car for a minor, if any, infraction. Being resigned doesn’t mean it hurts any less or it makes one any less indignant at the status quo, it simply acknowledges that it’s hard to keep up the fight on a daily basis knowing that this is the way it has always been. At some point you just have to try to cope. You have to try to live your life as best you can, even as you are constantly watching your back- because you have to in order to stay alive. 

So what do we do? My answer to that question is always to get to the root of the issue. The root of this issue happens to be the same root of every other issue we are facing. It’s the Story of Patriarchy (aka, The Story of Separation). Please understand. It is a story. It is a story that we made up a very long time ago because we couldn’t imagine a better one. We couldn’t think up a better solution to what was essentially a labor problem. All of the shit that has gone down since- war, oppression, slavery, poverty, environmental degradation, climate change, and on and on- are a result of this very shitty story that we made up about the nature of reality. We are way past due to write a new and better story.

Now I’m not suggesting that we should be ashamed of ourselves. I don’t believe that humans are evil. I think that we almost always do the best that we can according to what we know. What drives me nuts is that long after we have known better, we keep telling the same old tired story. Why do we do it? Ah…. comfort. We are comfortable with what we are used to. Change is hard. It’s disruptive. It’s particularly disruptive when you have to dig all the way down to a faulty foundation and start over. Nobody really wants to be that uncomfortable. It’s easier just to make the best of it, until it isn’t. What gets lost in our comfort is the much better world that we are aiming for and that we all deserve. 

So let me be as clear as I can be: what we are used to is a bag of shit. I can’t be any clearer than that. If we truly want the better world, then we must be willing to get very, very uncomfortable while we transition. I will leave you with an invitation to consider the things that we are used to in this country. Ask yourself what is required and by whom in order for you to enjoy the things that you do. Are you paying the true price for them, or is somebody or something else taking on that cost for you (often with a loss of freedom and/or life)? Here is a list to get you started (in no particular order):

  1. Cheap and fast food
  2. Cheap clothes
  3. Cheap stuff that we don’t need but somebody has convinced us that we do
  4. Cheap energy
  5. Cheap anything really
  6. Oversized, perfectly conditioned, energy intensive housing
  7. Gadgets designed to take the place of any physical exertion
  8. Fast transportation to anywhere in the world
  9. Free delivery of just about anything right to your front door
  10. Instantaneous connectivity
  11. Constant entertainment
  12. Throw away containers, or throw away anything really
  13. Toilet paper (just because)

Now dig a little deeper and consider the ideas that you are used to. If you think that you don’t think certain things, then you are not yet aware of the fact that they were built into the worldview that was given to you and is reinforced day in and day out by our culture. Here is a list to get you started:

  1. Men are inherently superior to women: smarter, stronger, more rational, more divine, etc.
  2. Whites are inherently superior to all other races.
  3. Our genes determine who we are and what we are capable of becoming and achieving.
  4. People are inherently evil (sinners).
  5. People are inherently lazy unless motivated to be otherwise.
  6. Women are the birth of sin.
  7. Blacks are dangerous.
  8. Homosexuality is unnatural.
  9. Humans are superior to all other species.
  10. No other living species is sentient.
  11. No other living species is intelligent.
  12. Only humans have a soul.
  13. The world is an objective place that has no soul, much less intelligence.
  14. Rational thought is the best and only way to know the truth.
  15. Matter (physical things) and energy (non-physical things) are two different things.
  16. Life is a lesson that we must endure until we graduate out of it.
  17. Heaven (our true home) is somewhere other than here.

I promise you that these two lists are inextricably related. I am imploring you to get to the bottom of it. I thank you in advance for any effort that you make to do so. My greatest hope is that we can get to a place where we can truly say that we used to think and do these things, but we now know better and do better. To get there we must write a better story, a story in alignment with the true nature of things. Godspeed.

The Zone

To be perfectly honest, I had such a rough week that I didn’t have time to wonder what I might blog about. Typically something starts brewing in my head at some point during the week, but this week just didn’t lend itself to that. I was that much under the gun. Then yesterday morning the above diagram came across my FB feed via a page I follow called Unify. Immediately it provided a common thread through everything that this week brought across my path. So to the zone we go!

Let’s start at home base in the comfort zone. Aaaaah… comfort. This week was not at all comfortable for me. I wasn’t the only one. I associate comfort with being at ease. It’s a carefree, worry-free space. It’s feeling safe and secure. It’s not just knowing that everything is going to be o.k., but sensing it experientially. To me, and I think for many people, this state of being seems like a prerequisite to happiness. And for that reason alone, we are highly motivated to stay within the bounds of our comfort zone. The comfort zone tends to get a bad wrap, right? The above chart paints it in the alternative light of fear avoidance. While that motivation is equally true, I think it’s helpful to recognize the both/andness of the comfort zone. Why, after all, should we not be comfortable in life??

I have to insert here that I am highly motivated to seek happiness at this moment in my life. This comes at the heels of a long period (many years) of sober reflection about the state of humanity and who and how I need to be in relation to that. It has not been fun. I miss light and carefree. I do know that state. I’m willing to bet that a lot of people feel the same, feeling exhausted from whatever has been holding the focus of your concerns be they sociological, political, economic, environmental or all of the above. It’s easy to arrive at a place of, well, nevermind. As in never let me bring that to mind because it disturbs my peace. And I can’t do anything about it any way so there is no point worrying about it. This is how our status quo is upheld. Less through conscious assertion and more through subconscious omission.

I find myself questioning if and how I can hold an honest view of the state of humanity such that I show up to it with integrity, while also abiding in a state of happiness. I have an inkling of an idea that figuring out how to do this is critical to any viable path forward. I’m trying. When I get it figured out, you’ll be the first to know. Of course I know that it is the trying itself that stands in my way, but that’s a whole other story that I’ll leave for another time. For now, I will say that I do think that happiness is tied to a profound sense of comfort. Profound, however, is the operative word, which is to say that there are different levels of comfort.

The lowest level of comfort is the bubble to the left in the above diagram. The bounds of this version of comfort is very much dependent on that which has been given us. That is to say that it requires us to accept without question our society and our given identity and role within it. We hardly made any of this up. Neither did our parents or elders. But somebody did, and the rest of us have just accepted it as a given. To question the given is to leave the comfort of your place within it. This. is. Not. Comfortable. So much so that while all of us test those waters, most of us learn to leave them well enough alone. In this sense, what holds us in place ranges from pangs of discomfort to existential fear. Leaving this comfort zone in a very real way threatens our survival, given that our survival is – whether in this country we like to admit it or not- dependent upon our social relations.

I currently have the responsibility of walking my students up to the edges of their comfort zone in order to bring its boundaries to consciousness. While I always proceed with this work delicately, this week brought me face to face with how fragile our worldview and accompanying identity is, and therefore how scary it is to question it. As I looked across the room to the end of the table I could see the sheer terror on one of my student’s faces. She was able to verbalize that everything that she believes in was being challenged and she just needed to be quiet. I, along with everyone else in my class (which I was quite proud of), went out of our way to assure her that she is safe. For as scary as it is, we are profoundly safe. Yet that isn’t readily apparent. What also isn’t apparent is that questioning our boundaries doesn’t mean that everything within them is wrong. What I find oh so important as we help ourselves and others to break free from old constraints is to point out that our ruling perspective isn’t wrong, but simply limited. To be clear, the thing that might help us to transgress our boundaries is the realization that we could understand and experience more of what we are already seeing and experiencing, more of who we are. The transgression doesn’t have to be a revolt. It might more fruitfully be a simple act of wonder.

Fear is powerful. It manifests in all of the ways represented above and then some. It can get ugly. We can get ugly when it takes hold of us. I can’t imagine living in this zone, but certainly some do. When somebody is operating from this state, it is difficult to know what to do. The best I can figure is to recognize it for what it is and don’t get sucked in. Just hold space for other states of existence, other zones, to emerge for that person. Maybe some day they will. Maybe they won’t. But either way, it does no good for another person to get stuck there with them. Patience, forgiveness, and wisdom are key here. It is also o.k. and fully appropriate to sometimes just walk away. We are as adults each ultimately responsible for our own growth. Our real job is to be aware if we are ourselves operating from fear and to make adjustments if so. This is no place to hang out. I’m needing to keep this front and center in my awareness at the moment. My life has me in full training mode on this front as well.

Yet the real question is can we move through all of the above levels while maintaining a state of comfort. That is what I mean when I ask if it is possible for me to show up to our challenges full on while maintaining a state of happiness. Our knee jerk reaction is that comfort equals stasis and growth requires discomfort. From one perspective, yes. Moving beyond our boundaries means stepping into the unknown. It’s hard to imagine feeling any sense of comfort there. Yet is there another perspective? What if we could embrace the mystery of the unknown? Then would it feel uncomfortable? Then would it feel scary? Or might it instead feel exciting, enriching, invigorating… dare I say fun? In fact I think it does and I think everyone has had some experience through which to relate to this alternative view. I also think that there are some people for whom this is their m.o. I envy such people, in a good way.

Applying this thought specifically to my life and my dilemma, what I see is that I don’t know what is going to happen to humanity. I don’t even know what is going to happen to me next! There are some likelihoods of course, but then life is full of surprises. That is the very nature of life- spontaneous emergence (some other time 😉 ). All it means is that anything can happen at any time. I will say, however, that what happens is very much tied to what we believe can happen. You know what Billie Jean King says- “You have to see it to be it.” When I coached I often used this principle with my players. I would tell them that if they wanted to be a college hockey player or a national team hockey player or whatever, then the best bet is to start behaving like you already are. Start carrying yourself like such a player does, training like such a player does, eating like such a player does, thinking like such a player does, etc. We are very powerful. We visualize the future into existence. Our problem is that we don’t realize that we are doing this and therefore keep reenacting our old limitations.

Step one is therefore to realize that we are creating our own realities. This is what the process of challenging our comfort zone is all about. Until we do that, we stay stuck in our old limitations. This work comes with the realization that who we are was made up by somebody other than ourselves. It was given us. Moving beyond our comfort zone is to move from acceptance of the given to acceptance of our creative powers. It is to reclaim the full possibility of ourselves, which I would claim is unlimited. It sure doesn’t seem that way though! How do we access this realm of pure potential? Now we are talking! This is what we call “the zone.” This is a very different zone that the comfort zone. “The zone” I am talking about now is the one that athletes, musicians, artists, and geniuses talk about when they describe something flowing through them as if it is coming from somewhere else. Well it is coming from somewhere else. It is coming from the extended realm of pure potential. Some call this universal consciousness, or universal intelligence, or the field, or the All That Is, or just plain God. You are a drop in that ocean, and therefore you have access to it. When you access it, you are in the zone. This is how we reach beyond old limitations.

What is scary about the current state of humanity is that we are a mess! Good grief, are we a mess. Fear is rearing its ugly head without abandon. We are so extraordinarily uncomfortable as limitations close in on us that we are clinging tightly to any old boundaries that we believe might return us to a sense of safety. None of this will work. The only way forward is… forward. It is easy to react to our predicament by operating from a place of fear, but what if we instead operated from a place of wonder? What if we met the observation of the failure of the old boundaries of our comfort zone (who we are) not as a threat, but as an opportunity? What if we leaned into the field of unlimited potential to become more of who we are, rather than less? This is how I, and many, many others, are choosing to interpret this moment in our history. Does it mean that we are for sure going to evolve to a higher state? No. We might just as easily devolve into a lower state, or no state at all. Yet that choice is fully up to us. And while that realization is daunting, it is also really, really cool.

But I don’t want to leave it there. In order to get to any future state, I have to show up in some viable way on a daily basis. It isn’t sustainable for me to be in a constant state of pressure or fear. I need to be comfortable in my skin in my everyday life. I need to get back to happiness. Even more so, I need to abide in the more profound state of joy. I need to do this while staying square in the knowledge of what is. Blinders will not get me to a higher state. Yet neither will staying stuck in the problems. I need to see through to potential. I need to see it to be it. We all do. Joy comes from a deep sense of knowing that we are all of it already. We are already all Olympians. We are already all enlightened beings. We are already the higher state we seek. That being the case, what on earth is there to not be joyful about? Our old crappy selves are a thing of the past. Soon. Very soon.