How Can I be a Hero? Ten Things to Try Now!

Posted on December 4, 2012 by Chris

“Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind.” –Kansas

“We are the champions my friend, and we’ll keep on fighting til the end!” –Queen

Fate and impermanence are powerful concepts. I’ve dwelled upon them in my previous posts…just about all of them, in fact. You can find examples of this here, here, and here. If I am destined for failure, doomed to death, and my world will eventually crumble before me, what’s the point? Should I just throw in the towel? If we are all destined for misery, then why should I even try?

Should I just give up?

No, no, no! That is not my point! It is true that much struggle, much strife will befall us. It is also true that your existence, as well as that of all around you will be gone in no time. Face it, in about 100 years it will all be new people. 100 years…that’s a blink of an eye in the continuum of the 13.7 billion (or so) the universe has existed. For comparison, think of the age of the universe as a year. If you live to be 100 years, your life span would be less than second in that year (actually, about 0.23 seconds). So if our time is so short, then what does that mean? What is it you want to do with those 100 years…with that blink of your existence? How can I be a hero? Here are some suggestions:

13.7 Billion Years!

Make Something – Set yourself to building, or creating. Build your child a treehouse, build a business. Create art, music or poetry. Design a widget to make someone’s life better. Leave a legacy…for your own sake.
Help Someone – You can volunteer at a soup kitchen, be a crossing guard, find a career where you can help someone…as a doctor, nurse, architect. Be a banker, but bank with passion and compassion to make a difference in your world (not the ENTIRE world, just yours).
Become a Master– Master the piano, brain surgery, flying a helicopter, fixing motorcycles.
Master Brain Surgery!

It may take years, it may take much of your time, but find something you love and master it! It will make you proud, it will be worth it.
Love Someone – Take a chance on an old relationship gone bad, maybe it is with your mother, father, brother, ex-husband, or an old friend. Take a chance on telling someone how you feel…someone who might not know it…maybe it’s that huge crush, or a friend who doesn’t know about your romantic feelings.
Love Everybody – You don’t need to trust everybody all the time, but you can give them a chance. “Respect all, measure each.” Most of those around you struggle to hold their ground in this wrestling match called life, and many are doing it honestly. Have compassion for them today.
“Be” with Someone – When you are with someone you love, pay attention to them. Really listen. Feel their feelings. Empathize with them. When you interact with anyone reallypay attention. Be with them in the moment.
Listen!

You will notice more if you really pay attention. Remember, you only have 100 years so use every moment wisely.
Appreciate this Day– What kind of day is it? The warm sun, the cold breeze, the wet rain, the cold snow…appreciate them all. Take a deep breath…notice how it feels so refreshing as it replenishes your oxygen stores. If 100 years is .23 seconds, then 1 day is 0.0000063 seconds. Sands in the hourglass, no?
Teach – Share what you know with someone. Share your talents, pass on your skills to the next generation, or your current community.
Reach a Goal – Finish that marathon, lose 10 pounds, golf below 80. Finish college (just make it a degree worth pursuing)! The pursuit makes life interesting.
Relax – Yes, just take a break once in a while. Maybe you could use a “staycation.”

No need to try them all, although you could in a 100 years, but maybe just try a few. So, even though fate will have its way with you, you can take it on with tenacity. You can be a hero if you put yourself to it.

…and you can be proud of it, because YOU made the effort!

Anchor #4: Persistence

Posted on November 8, 2012 by Chris

In Buddhism, there is an Eight-Fold Path to enlightenment, recommended to break the chain of suffering (called “Dukkha”). The Eight-Fold Path as explained by most texts takes awhile to digest, and its components overlap in many ways. It is a product of Eastern thought, which for lack of a better term, requires some absorption. The path is a powerful concept to understand and put into practice in your pursuit of virtue. Today, I will reflect on two of the eight because they have a lot to do with our Fourth Anchor, Persistence: Right Effort and Right Concentration. Together these two Eastern concepts will help me convey the value of persistence.

If we were to have perfect patience and nothing else we would wait for things to happen…and nothing would happen. To complement patience, I would say we need to take actions to make ourselves and our surroundings better and to do so with persistence. Persistence implies hard work…persistence is hard work. We try and try over and over again, we fail, we get up. To maintain our sanity, we must have patience; but to keep going, we must persist!

Champion Powerlifters Must Have Persistence – Lots of Right Effort!
(www.liftingpictures.com)

But at what should we persist? Hitler was persistent, and so was Osama Bin Laden. How do I guide myself to persistent good? I have found the concept of Right Effort and Right Concentration to be very helpful guide to how we should persist.

It is at this point that I will explain Right Effort. Right Effort requires that we persistently make effort to become more virtuous. According to Zen this effort, to be right, should be focused on 4 endeavors:

Prevent arising unwholesome views and feelings
Abandon unwholesome views and feelings you already have
Create new wholesome views and feelings
Maintain the wholesome views and feelings that you have

This kind of effort requires persistence and lots of concentration. Which brings us to Right Concentration. To be persistent in our pursuit of the good, we must maintain our focus on it. The best way, I think, to do this is to concentrate on what is important. And the best way to concentrate on what is important is to reflect or meditate on what is important. Concentrating on what will make us more virtuous is what makes it “right.” With the Right Effort and Right Concentration, I can eventually get beyond “thinking about virtue” for 5 – 30 minutes a day, and create the motivation to live and act virtuously.

But of course, to be virtuous takes great persistence. The world around you won’t change very much at all, despite your efforts; however, with time your view and your impact on your immediate world will change for the better.

…as long as you are persistent.

Anchor #2: Understanding

Posted on November 3, 2012 by Chris

Always ask yourself questions…this is the key to understanding. “Why questions” seem to work the best. Why am I feeling so blue today? Why doesn’t my mate find me attractive any more? Why is that lady such a pain in the butt all the time?

As humans, we often make snap judgments about what is right and wrong, acceptable and not. Moreover, we assume many stereotypes and take shortcuts to conclusions about the things we see.

In the morning we assume the sun will “rise.” Some ancients thought they lived on a flat surface and that the sun was moving through the sky because that is the way it appeared to them. Eventually, it occurred to someone that we might be inhabiting a round planet and that the Earth’s spinning was the real reason the sun appeared to move in the sky. To start on the road to understanding, someone had to start asking “why” does the sun rise in the East and set in the West, or “why” do ships’ masts remain visible as they sail away while the hulls disappear? Through why questions like these, eventually people began to understand the reason for the sun’s apparent movement.

What about this one? Let’s say you are treated rudely by someone in public or maybe even a friend. You think, “This guy is a real jerk, I ought to punch his face!” Before you act on this impulse maybe you should ask, “Why is this guy being such a jerk?” The answer, should you have some magical way to attain one, might surprise you. What you might not be taking time to understand is that this “guy” was just dumped by the love of his life and his mother is dying of bone cancer. On top of all of that, he is working for a struggling company that is looking to reduce its workforce. Since he is one of the newest employees there, he is worried about losing his job. With all of this going on, does that give him the right to be such an ass (see definition) to you? Well, have you ever let your issues affect your attitude with others? It certainly would be nice if he could keep his personal problems from making him so difficult with you, but then again, he is only human. Are you understanding now? Do you have some understanding of why he is being such an ass?

Picture of an ass

“Why” questions seem to help us get to the root of things, but who, what, where, when, and how questions are useful also. Especially when it comes to the results of certain actions we may take.

For example, let’s deal with your urge to punch someone in the face.

Who will you be hurting if you commit such an act?–the guy, his family, yourself (after you get charged with assault or he hits you back), your family, etc.
What will such an act accomplish (or not accomplish)?–make him angry, make you look like the “jerk,” not help you in your relations with him, not likely to change his attitude, etc.
When will you cross paths with him again?–maybe never. tomorrow when he is in a better mood or willing to share some of the reasons for his bad behavior
Where will you be tomorrow?–going about your business if you walk away, defending yourself in court/a lawsuit if you act on your urge to “punch.”
How will this act make you feel?–Eventually, like a “jerk.”

So, maybe by taking the time to ask questions of yourself you might have an understanding of what punching someone in the face actually accomplishes. What is the success rate of a punch in the face accomplishing its intended goal? What is your goal in committing such an act in the first place? Is it merely to punish, to make yourself feel better, to correct someone’s behavior? What are the long term implications?

The key to understanding is to always ask questions. Always dig further. Those ancients would not have unlocked the secrets of the universe if someone hadn’t of asked, “why?”

“Why” can’t I play now?

“Why” can’t I go swimming?

I think we will be nearer to a virtuous life if we persistently ask questions like the ones above in as many situations as possible.

Don’t you think so?

7 Meditation Anchors

Posted on October 31, 2012 by Chris

Am I being virtuous? Am I focusing on what is important? What follows are what I call my Seven Meditation Anchors. During times of relaxation (before bed, with morning coffee, or even when I think I need to relax–e.g. heavy traffic or when family has driven me to the limit). I use these 7 anchors to help me come back to what is important. Sometimes I focus on one of them, other times I meditate on each in turn. I rarely meditate for longer than 15 minutes.

Thanks, Siddhartha!

For those familiar with Zen/Buddhism, four of these, Compassion, Love, Joy, Equanimity will have a vaguely familiar look…the Four Sublime States are a cornerstone of my anchors. They are what I call the spiritual/emotional anchors. They speak to the cerebellum, the medulla, the spiritual/ancestral (limbic and reptillian) brain.

The remaining three, Understanding, Patience, and Persistence, I consider rational anchors. They speak to the cerebrum (Neocortex), or thinking brain. They elicit cause and effect, and help with the “why’s” of what to focus on.

So, here they are with a short description for each. Don’t worry, I will expand upon each in the upcoming days. (Rationals are blue, Spirituals are green)

Compassion – is to feel the suffering of others.
Understanding – is to put yourself into another’s mind, or into a situation and really think about what you would do
Patience – is to understand that things take time, despite large amounts of effort
Persistence – if things take time, then great effort is required over and over and over…
Joy – is not just joy, but sympathetic joy. This is to revel in the good fortune of others…the opposite of envy
Equanimity – is the ability to see things as they are, from a distance, to be the water and not the waves (see Passionate Equanimity)
Love – as in Lovingkindness; this is love without possessing, without judging, without expecting it in return, it is to love as if a god

Note: You may be wondering why these are listed in this particular order. It’s a simple practical decision for me: it’s because in this order, they spell CUPP-JEL, which I can remember easily. None is more important than another, in my opinion (see last paragraph of my credentials here). You might choose to start with the “rationals” and finish with the “spirituals,” or vice versa (that would spell UPPJELC). For all I care, use PLUC-JEP.