Bad Poetry

More breaking news--The sunrise and the morning air are unbelievably gorgeous. I can see why people are moved to write bad poetry. In the past, people have tried to get me to enjoy things like the sunrise and flowers, but I thought that was way too trite and hippie-ish. I was much too impatient and worried about all the stuff that I wasn't getting done. I couldn't enjoy those other things if I tried. And I did try. It just didn't work.

I've been sickish for over 2 weeks and I've enjoyed every minute. I didn't do anything other than study day trading and watch Glambert videos. No practice, no volunteer work, no phone calls, no social obligations. It's really wonderful to be a recluse.

My mom's been giving me gentle chores to get me in the fresh air. Yesterday she told me to go pick the blueberries off the bush.

I love my mom :-)

Who knew life could be really enjoyable?

I mean, I did appreciate life version 1.0 and especially in Idaho and then in the SF Bay Area.

But, well, money and possessions don't buy you happiness. In fact, all that excess is an extreme pain in the ass.

Maybe I should start a stress junkie rehab camp where people can learn that their self-worth is not based on how much they accomplish or what they do or what they have. They can learn that they are worthy simply because they are a living, breathing being. They'll all come here and just do nothing.

Life 2.0

Breaking News--When you get regular sleep and plenty of it, you have no trouble staying awake during the day and you don't even need coffee. Who knew? You totally need to try this sleeping thing out. It's so necessary for your well-being. Promise me you'll try it. Try it for a month. You'll be amazed!

I used to feel terrified of death, especially during the time when my husband, Karl, was dying of cancer.

Then when I was working for Rigpa, I reached a point of, what I thought was a bit of renunciation. I was happy that I was helping people find and follow the Buddhist teachings and I didn't care if I lived or died. I could die knowing that my life was well-spent and hopefully I would meet the teachings again in my next lifetime or at least eventually.

Now, however, I am enjoying my new slacker life so much, I would really, really prefer to live!

So on the one hand, you could say I was so miserable that I didn't care if I lived or died and I was so tired I was numb to all pain and discomfort. On the other hand, I feel as if I've ended one life and am now in heaven and probably I'm using up the good karma I created in my life version 1.0. Either way it's all good. Liz calls working for your buddhist group "Staff Ngondro" and now I do believe it's true. Ngondro is a practice of purification. It's sort of like polishing the tarnish off to reveal the gold underneath. My life version 2.0 would not be this amazing if version 1.0 hadn't come first.

The Secret to Being Liz

I have this friend who is an accupuncturist. She's always going to India, does triathlons, spends every weekend at her boyfriend's house in the country, which is a remodeled barn with solar panels, is doing a Buddhist chaplaincy program, and does lots of volunteer work. She has the freedom and flexibility to follow her dreams. It seems like she's always having fun and knows everyone and she has a big heart. I've always said, "I want to be Liz in my next life."

I was trapped in my high stress, endless work lifestyle and death was the only way out.

There are millions of impoverished people around the world who are, indeed, trapped in poverty and misery. They work all day and still it's not enough so they need to have children and send them to work too so collectively they can earn enough money to house and feed themselves.

Generally, though, as Americans, we're not one of those millions. We have choices.

We choose a lifestyle of overconsumption which traps us in the golden cage of our jobs.

We choose to occupy ourselves with projects in the hope that it will improve our situation but just robs us of time and money.

We choose complexity over simplicity to keep ourselves busy so that we don't have to look at our inner selves and follow our secret dreams.

Now, I'm Liz too. I just had to choose to be Liz. It was as simple as that. Everything I needed to be Liz was there all my life.

The Buddha said, "He who loves himself would never harm another."

So forget about your goals and follow your dreams, be the real you, and be happy.

Don't be afraid to dream big, as in helping half a billion people out of poverty in one fell swoop and making a profit while doing it. Here's an inspiring (long) video of Vinod Khosla, a founder of Sun Microsystems and now a venture capitalist, talking about microfinance.

Renouncing Stress

I used to be a stress junkie. I used to work in corporate IT. I helped to deploy and maintain mission critical business systems. If the computer system went down, business ground to a halt and all kinds of very bad things happened and lots of blame and anger ensued. I loved being so important.

Now I have completely renounced stress and coffee and I have embraced slacking and sleeping.

Our lives are rife with hope and fear. EVERY little thing in our lives is a source of stress. Can you name anything that is not a source of stress? Even fun things, like these Charles David sandals on bluefly.com, are a source of stress. Can I afford them? While wearing them, I'll have to be constantly careful so I don't scuff them up.

We say and do all sorts of things in frustration, blame, and anger because we are stressed. But you can have the right answers and still be wrong. Right answers and wrong answers are really just ideas on the relative level. So aren't they really part of this grand delusion that is samsara? What's really important are your fellow human beings. Those people standing right in front of you. Besides, getting upset is, well, so stressful :-)

We can sometimes have so many grandiose ideas about our work, our goals, our mission in life. My last job was working for the Buddhist group to which I belong. I completely missed the irony of my having so much hope and fear about contributing to the work of my Buddhist teacher, whose life's work is to free our minds of hope and fear.

The end doesn't justify the means. In Buddhism, I think the means are the end.

Practice and Insights

There's a one to one correlation between my practice and having insights:

Wed - no practice, no insights to report
Th - no practice, no insights to report
Fri - a little practice, small insights, nothing to write home about
Sat - no practice, no insights to report
Sun - a little practice, small insights nothing to write home about

Slacking is Good

Being a 46 year old living at home with mom is cool.

Here's my new schedule. So far it's awesome, but I'm only on Day 1! HAHA!!!

5:00 am - 9:00 am

• Meditation practice

9:00 am - 4:00 pm

• Day trading

12:30 pm - 3:00 pm

• Meetings & appointments
• Phone calls
• Personal paperwork
• Help mom with stuff
• Take Alex to tutor and play soccer mom
  

5:00 pm - 10:00 pm

• Volunteer work for Rigpa Fellowship