I love the concept of synchronicity, the idea that sometimes, things come together in unexpected but serendipitous ways. Today, it's a column by Margaret Renkl in the NYT; she's an author whose writing I love, especially when she's describing the natural world, which she does with a deep sense of connection and joy. Today's column is about rest, which she explores in the context of the commandment to rest on the Sabbath. It's worth saying here that I am not religious, but the call to rest, to appreciate the world from a place of rest, and to allow wisdom to arise from rest, is one that resonates deeply. In fact, there was a time when I took a weekly digital shabbat (idea taken from someone else), stepping away from email and texts and blogs and online anything from sundown one day to sundown the next. I only left my phone on to receive phone calls from my daughter at college, or from my mom and dad. I really loved the stretched-out feeling of that day. And I loved that it challenged me to be present for my own downtime, instead of finding easy distraction in the form of digital lethe. I spoke with a mentor on Friday about reinstituting this practice in my life - and then spent the weekend grading. It did have to be done, but I would like to frame it as a rare instance, rather than the norm. And then this morning, I opened the Times during a rare break in my day (reading and eating at the same time, and why yes, that is rather mindless, isn't it?), and there was Renkl's column, reminding me of the sacredness of rest, reminding me that I owe myself and the world space and spaciousness.
It occurs to me, reading this over before hitting "post", that this has implications for my magpie year. But it also occurs to me that the goal of this year was to encourage myself to write, and to see what I learned by doing so. And maybe what I'm learning is that I write better from charged batteries, and that recharging my batteries is a legitimate thing to plan to do. I will mull this week, and you will be the first to know if I end up reclaiming a day from the online world.
Showing posts with label reflection. Show all posts
Showing posts with label reflection. Show all posts
Monday, October 21, 2019
Wednesday, October 2, 2019
Day 83: Perfectionism
This project has given me an interesting lens through which to view whatever streaks of perfectionism I may have. I say it that way because I don't tend to think of myself as a perfectionist, and, looking at how I manage these posts, I'm beginning to understand why.
So, first off, I was going to write and say that I've had to learn to, to at least some degree, shoot from the hip. I write something and let it go, on a pretty quick turnaround. I definitely reread and edit, but I don't spend hours on these posts (as if you couldn't tell). So, in that sense, I've had to let go of any desire I might have to polish and re-polish.
I have also posted a whole lot of really trivial stuff. This is in keeping with my stated goal, and it has definitely loosened me up a lot. Thinking about Disco's coat? Write about it. Noticing that I tend to trick myself into swimming laps in sets? Write about it. Feel stupid for posting something that seems stupid? Post it anyway.
So, you could say that, in those ways, doing this has helped me to relax my grip on things a little bit, or maybe even a lot. (Because dudes, there have been a lot of trivial posts over the past nearly three months.)
But, I realized as I went to write this post, to a very significant degree, those are places where I already had a fairly gentle grip on perfectionist tendencies. Which is why I felt able to say that bit, up in the first paragraph, about not being much of a perfectionist.
Except.
Except then I thought about all of the posts I haven't written. The posts that I think about for hours, sometimes, about the topics that are really capturing my heart and mind right now. The posts that I really want to get perfect - to get right - before I put them out there. The posts that I am so worried about getting perfect that I never even start to write them.
Oops. And dammit. And also, interesting.
So, first off, I was going to write and say that I've had to learn to, to at least some degree, shoot from the hip. I write something and let it go, on a pretty quick turnaround. I definitely reread and edit, but I don't spend hours on these posts (as if you couldn't tell). So, in that sense, I've had to let go of any desire I might have to polish and re-polish.
I have also posted a whole lot of really trivial stuff. This is in keeping with my stated goal, and it has definitely loosened me up a lot. Thinking about Disco's coat? Write about it. Noticing that I tend to trick myself into swimming laps in sets? Write about it. Feel stupid for posting something that seems stupid? Post it anyway.
So, you could say that, in those ways, doing this has helped me to relax my grip on things a little bit, or maybe even a lot. (Because dudes, there have been a lot of trivial posts over the past nearly three months.)
But, I realized as I went to write this post, to a very significant degree, those are places where I already had a fairly gentle grip on perfectionist tendencies. Which is why I felt able to say that bit, up in the first paragraph, about not being much of a perfectionist.
Except.
Except then I thought about all of the posts I haven't written. The posts that I think about for hours, sometimes, about the topics that are really capturing my heart and mind right now. The posts that I really want to get perfect - to get right - before I put them out there. The posts that I am so worried about getting perfect that I never even start to write them.
Oops. And dammit. And also, interesting.
Tuesday, September 24, 2019
Day 75: When a joke isn't
I am teaching my language and gender class this semester. And I am a linguist, which means that I'm always thinking about the ways in which the use of language serves to (re)create social structures, especially structures of power. And I have a fantastic student doing an independent study this semester on toxic masculinity and ways of changing the production of masculinity to avoid toxicity.
All of this is to say that, when a dear friend said this weekend, as someone who believed he is doing a favor for us in watching over our younger daughter while she's at college, that he'd get a pitchfork to fend off the droves of people who would want her, it arrested my attention. When I pointed out that she's more than capable of making informed and intelligent choices about her body, relationships, and sexuality, he said he was just kidding, with a bit of a wink and a nudge.
I didn't point out all the ways that it wasn't a joke. I didn't point out that, for that statement to be a joke, it must rely on our shared understanding and acceptance of a set of social structures that have been labelled patriarchy, the oppression of women, toxic masculinity, and rape culture. I should have. But I did that social smoothing over thing, and copped out. I should have, though, because when we put "jokes" like that out in the world, we repeat, believe, and create the structures that those jokes rely on. In other words, they aren't jokes - they not only reflect but also make the world we live in.
Basically, that joke assumes that: men are sexually aggressive; women should be sexually pure; the sexual purity of women is of consequence to the men to whom women "belong" in some way (older brothers, fathers, etc); those men become upset when other men advance on those women and thus have to fight those other men off.
Those assumptions are at the heart of the structures I mentioned above. They subordinate women to the will of men (either men's will to have sex with them, or their will that women not have sex). They license aggression on the part of men by presuming that it is natural and innate (the evidence is strongly in that it is not). Those two things coupled make rape culture seem natural (rape is what happens when females are available to male sexual aggression, which is why women are often blamed for their rapes - they shouldn't have been available, which is something they control; while men are not blamed, because their aggression and their sexuality are assumed to not be under their control). All of these are hallmarks of patriarchy - a world which centers male stories and perspectives.
For this reason, I absolutely loathe the jokes about fathers waiting in the bushes with loaded guns to scare their daughters' dates. They depend on the same idea that daughters are their fathers' possessions, and that fathers don't want them to be taken away by boys/men. I also hate the "don't hit women" trope - it assumes the male violence is normal and that it must be restrained to protect weak women. Why don't we say, don't hit people? Honestly - why don't we say that?
Don't hit people, y'all. And please don't make jokes that aren't.
All of this is to say that, when a dear friend said this weekend, as someone who believed he is doing a favor for us in watching over our younger daughter while she's at college, that he'd get a pitchfork to fend off the droves of people who would want her, it arrested my attention. When I pointed out that she's more than capable of making informed and intelligent choices about her body, relationships, and sexuality, he said he was just kidding, with a bit of a wink and a nudge.
I didn't point out all the ways that it wasn't a joke. I didn't point out that, for that statement to be a joke, it must rely on our shared understanding and acceptance of a set of social structures that have been labelled patriarchy, the oppression of women, toxic masculinity, and rape culture. I should have. But I did that social smoothing over thing, and copped out. I should have, though, because when we put "jokes" like that out in the world, we repeat, believe, and create the structures that those jokes rely on. In other words, they aren't jokes - they not only reflect but also make the world we live in.
Basically, that joke assumes that: men are sexually aggressive; women should be sexually pure; the sexual purity of women is of consequence to the men to whom women "belong" in some way (older brothers, fathers, etc); those men become upset when other men advance on those women and thus have to fight those other men off.
Those assumptions are at the heart of the structures I mentioned above. They subordinate women to the will of men (either men's will to have sex with them, or their will that women not have sex). They license aggression on the part of men by presuming that it is natural and innate (the evidence is strongly in that it is not). Those two things coupled make rape culture seem natural (rape is what happens when females are available to male sexual aggression, which is why women are often blamed for their rapes - they shouldn't have been available, which is something they control; while men are not blamed, because their aggression and their sexuality are assumed to not be under their control). All of these are hallmarks of patriarchy - a world which centers male stories and perspectives.
For this reason, I absolutely loathe the jokes about fathers waiting in the bushes with loaded guns to scare their daughters' dates. They depend on the same idea that daughters are their fathers' possessions, and that fathers don't want them to be taken away by boys/men. I also hate the "don't hit women" trope - it assumes the male violence is normal and that it must be restrained to protect weak women. Why don't we say, don't hit people? Honestly - why don't we say that?
Don't hit people, y'all. And please don't make jokes that aren't.
Monday, September 16, 2019
Day 67: axolotl
The NYT published this poem in its Magazine on Sunday, and I just loved it.
axolotl
- ire'na lara silva
little warrior
almost imperceptably
scarred
from so much healing
how many regrown limbs
how many repaired organs
even precious
brain tissue
created anew
teach me this
little warrior
how you remain
tender and
infinite
soft and eternal
in the face of struggle
how is it the healing
has already begun
even before the wound
axolotl
- ire'na lara silva
little warrior
almost imperceptably
scarred
from so much healing
how many regrown limbs
how many repaired organs
even precious
brain tissue
created anew
teach me this
little warrior
how you remain
tender and
infinite
soft and eternal
in the face of struggle
how is it the healing
has already begun
even before the wound
Wednesday, September 11, 2019
Day 62: An honest horse
I was mulling over a post I want to write about Disco (which will be forthcoming), when the phrase "an honest horse" came to mind. She is an honest horse. When people say that, I take it to mean that the horse they're talking about is out there, doing their best, and if they spook or don't do what you ask, it's not out of malice. It's honest. They were scared, or they didn't know what to do, or they were hurting. It means that even if you have a bad ride, or (knock on wood) get hurt, it's not because the horse was trying to get you off or hurt you.
As that came to mind, I found myself thinking - I wish people were honest people, in that same sense.
And then came the very interesting thought: I actually think they usually are.
Isn't that interesting? To consider that, maybe, most people, when they do something hurtful - even really hurtful - are acting out of fear or ignorance or inability, rather than true malice. I think that's interesting because it so often feels like malice, especially when it's a repeated behavior. Especially when it's a really damaging behavior that we have no control over, and maybe can't even remove ourselves from the influence of.
I'll be honest. I know that I've hurt people. (OK, that's a ridiculous way to say that - I'm human, of COURSE I've hurt people.) But if I'm being straight with myself (instead of mean and self-judge-y and setting myself up to fail), it's usually an honest hurt. It comes out of my own ignorance or fear or inability. (Is this resonating with the hurt people hurt people thing from last week, or what?)
But (still being honest), when someone else hurts me - especially when, outwardly, it's actively directed at me and who I am and what I do - it feels like malice. It doesn't feel like an honest action. (I also feel that way when D's being particularly troublesome - it can feel personal. But it's easier for me to step back and realize that it's not, in fact, personal when it's a horse instead of an adult human being.)
I think I need to think more about this. It's a very unformed sort of thought. But it feels both true and useful in some important way.
As that came to mind, I found myself thinking - I wish people were honest people, in that same sense.
And then came the very interesting thought: I actually think they usually are.
Isn't that interesting? To consider that, maybe, most people, when they do something hurtful - even really hurtful - are acting out of fear or ignorance or inability, rather than true malice. I think that's interesting because it so often feels like malice, especially when it's a repeated behavior. Especially when it's a really damaging behavior that we have no control over, and maybe can't even remove ourselves from the influence of.
I'll be honest. I know that I've hurt people. (OK, that's a ridiculous way to say that - I'm human, of COURSE I've hurt people.) But if I'm being straight with myself (instead of mean and self-judge-y and setting myself up to fail), it's usually an honest hurt. It comes out of my own ignorance or fear or inability. (Is this resonating with the hurt people hurt people thing from last week, or what?)
But (still being honest), when someone else hurts me - especially when, outwardly, it's actively directed at me and who I am and what I do - it feels like malice. It doesn't feel like an honest action. (I also feel that way when D's being particularly troublesome - it can feel personal. But it's easier for me to step back and realize that it's not, in fact, personal when it's a horse instead of an adult human being.)
I think I need to think more about this. It's a very unformed sort of thought. But it feels both true and useful in some important way.
Tuesday, September 3, 2019
Day 54: Back at work
One of the interesting differences between summer and the semester, for me, isn't really the amount of work - I do work more during the school year, obviously, but I also work during the summer - it's being around people all the time again. Often the same people (academic departments and colleges are like families - you're with the same people for decades - and, like families, they are more and less functional, depending on their composition at any given time).
Two quotes* that have kept running through my head last week and this week:
Hurt people hurt people.
Buddha would love boundaries.
They go together, right?
*Dudes, I'm an academic. I have tried to get good attributions for these, but I can't! I've always heard the first in the context of AA, and the second I have heard attributed to Pema Chodron. My apologies to the originators of these sentiments, if it is someone other than these.
Two quotes* that have kept running through my head last week and this week:
Hurt people hurt people.
Buddha would love boundaries.
They go together, right?
*Dudes, I'm an academic. I have tried to get good attributions for these, but I can't! I've always heard the first in the context of AA, and the second I have heard attributed to Pema Chodron. My apologies to the originators of these sentiments, if it is someone other than these.
Saturday, August 31, 2019
Day 51: The second arrow
I've been thinking a lot lately about the Buddhist teaching of the second arrow. The basic idea is that a pain happens (the first arrow), and then we pile other things onto the pain - stories, regrets, fears - and that is the second arrow.
We had a little less than five days between Tilly's diagnosis and her death. Her diagnosis came as a total shock. She was only eleven. In June, she was hiking all over the eastern Sierra with us. A little more than three weeks before her death, she had bloodwork done (pursuant to starting a medication for itchy skin), with no hint that cancer was raging through her system. But the day we got the diagnosis, xrays showed her lungs filled with tumors (and since dogs rarely get primary lung cancer, that suggested that there must have been other tumors elsewhere, probably abdominal).
She'd spent the night with the vet, waiting for the results and getting stabilized. Then we brought her home with Tramadol, drugs to help with congestion, and painkilling injections for when things started to really go downhill. I also cancelled my then-upcoming five-day silent retreat at Spirit Rock. (It was on compassion; and I was very clear that the most compassionate thing I knew to do for myself, my dog, and my family was to be here at home.) And, while my formal sitting practice frankly went to hell, I lived those five days as a practice of mindfulness. (And please note that word "practice". It means that there were a lot of nonmindful bits in there!)
The definitions of mindfulness that I cite in my classes generally involve at least these elements: moment-to-moment awareness of what is happening (this can be physical, environmental, emotional, psychological, etc), on purpose, without judgement (and, I would add, with compassion).
And that's what I tried to do.
And it was really interesting.
During those five days, there were a lot of first-arrow pains. There was the night that she went to scratch the rug next to my side of the bed as she always did before going to sleep, and she had to stop and lie down to pant because it was hard to catch her breath. And the day she couldn't get up into the car by herself anymore. All the markers of decline, all the signs that she was uncomfortable. It's hard to watch anyone we love suffering, and that causes suffering. Those things were really happening, right there in the moment, and the emotions that came with observing them were painful ones.
And then there were the second-arrow pains. Lying on the front lawn trying to get work done, with Tilly curled up in the sun next to me. A good moment. And the second arrow hits - I won't be able to do this any more. I will miss her terribly. I can't imagine my life without her. And then the realization - but she is here. I am doing this with her now. If I am present for this moment now, she is not gone. All the pain was coming from my mind being somewhere other than in the moment that was actually happening. (Except, notice, that those thoughts were actually happening and causing actual pain - something to bring non-judgemental, compassionate awareness to.)
Such an interesting thing to notice. Because here's the thing: preowning all the pain of not having her around didn't in any way lessen what I'm feeling right now. What it did do, though, was move me away from whatever peace there might be in the moments I had with her then. Isn't that interesting?
Noticing the second arrow is useful. But the definition of mindfulness suggests that we observe that second arrow without judgement (I'm such an idiot! Why am I doing that?!) or pushing away (I shouldn't feel that, I don't want to feel that!), and with compassion (this is a painful moment). Doing that made it easier to work with it, without pushing it away or blaming myself for "doing this to myself" - it's normal to think and feel all those things.
But, in that last week, the great gift of noticing was that it made it a bit easier to allow the second arrow to fall a bit more lightly and sting a little less, while being present for the whole experience. It also meant that I was able to take on board the gift of those good moments - like lying in the sun with my girl - just a little bit more.
On her last morning, as we waited for the vet to come to the house, all four of us stopped everything we were doing and came together in the living room. I sat on the floor next to Tilly while she napped in her favorite place on the cool tiles. Rick and the girls sat in their usual chairs, and we all read or sat quietly, or whatever seemed best. It was exactly the kind of quiet family moment that we all love. And for whole minutes at a time, I was able to let the second arrow go and just be in the present moment, which was a really good moment.
Since then, I keep noticing the first and second arrows. Coming home late at night and grabbing my stuff so I can hurry to the door to stop Tilly from barking and waking up the neighbors - and then realizing that I don't have to? First arrow. Putting on my walking shoes and waiting for a nose to get in the way while trying to "help"? First arrow. Imagining that I will never again find a dog like Tilly? Second arrow. Wanting MY dog back, right now, thankyouverymuch? Second arrow. Wanting reality to be something other than what it is? (Which, by the way, it turns out I want quite often - who knew?) Second arrow.
It's not that I'm not feeling how much all of this hurts. It's that watching it all rise and fall and rise and fall gives me a lot of hope that there will be fewer hurting moments in the future, and more equanimity about feeling how much it hurts now. It's a really interesting experience. My very own godawful mindfulness retreat.
We had a little less than five days between Tilly's diagnosis and her death. Her diagnosis came as a total shock. She was only eleven. In June, she was hiking all over the eastern Sierra with us. A little more than three weeks before her death, she had bloodwork done (pursuant to starting a medication for itchy skin), with no hint that cancer was raging through her system. But the day we got the diagnosis, xrays showed her lungs filled with tumors (and since dogs rarely get primary lung cancer, that suggested that there must have been other tumors elsewhere, probably abdominal).
She'd spent the night with the vet, waiting for the results and getting stabilized. Then we brought her home with Tramadol, drugs to help with congestion, and painkilling injections for when things started to really go downhill. I also cancelled my then-upcoming five-day silent retreat at Spirit Rock. (It was on compassion; and I was very clear that the most compassionate thing I knew to do for myself, my dog, and my family was to be here at home.) And, while my formal sitting practice frankly went to hell, I lived those five days as a practice of mindfulness. (And please note that word "practice". It means that there were a lot of nonmindful bits in there!)
The definitions of mindfulness that I cite in my classes generally involve at least these elements: moment-to-moment awareness of what is happening (this can be physical, environmental, emotional, psychological, etc), on purpose, without judgement (and, I would add, with compassion).
And that's what I tried to do.
And it was really interesting.
During those five days, there were a lot of first-arrow pains. There was the night that she went to scratch the rug next to my side of the bed as she always did before going to sleep, and she had to stop and lie down to pant because it was hard to catch her breath. And the day she couldn't get up into the car by herself anymore. All the markers of decline, all the signs that she was uncomfortable. It's hard to watch anyone we love suffering, and that causes suffering. Those things were really happening, right there in the moment, and the emotions that came with observing them were painful ones.
And then there were the second-arrow pains. Lying on the front lawn trying to get work done, with Tilly curled up in the sun next to me. A good moment. And the second arrow hits - I won't be able to do this any more. I will miss her terribly. I can't imagine my life without her. And then the realization - but she is here. I am doing this with her now. If I am present for this moment now, she is not gone. All the pain was coming from my mind being somewhere other than in the moment that was actually happening. (Except, notice, that those thoughts were actually happening and causing actual pain - something to bring non-judgemental, compassionate awareness to.)
Such an interesting thing to notice. Because here's the thing: preowning all the pain of not having her around didn't in any way lessen what I'm feeling right now. What it did do, though, was move me away from whatever peace there might be in the moments I had with her then. Isn't that interesting?
Noticing the second arrow is useful. But the definition of mindfulness suggests that we observe that second arrow without judgement (I'm such an idiot! Why am I doing that?!) or pushing away (I shouldn't feel that, I don't want to feel that!), and with compassion (this is a painful moment). Doing that made it easier to work with it, without pushing it away or blaming myself for "doing this to myself" - it's normal to think and feel all those things.
But, in that last week, the great gift of noticing was that it made it a bit easier to allow the second arrow to fall a bit more lightly and sting a little less, while being present for the whole experience. It also meant that I was able to take on board the gift of those good moments - like lying in the sun with my girl - just a little bit more.
On her last morning, as we waited for the vet to come to the house, all four of us stopped everything we were doing and came together in the living room. I sat on the floor next to Tilly while she napped in her favorite place on the cool tiles. Rick and the girls sat in their usual chairs, and we all read or sat quietly, or whatever seemed best. It was exactly the kind of quiet family moment that we all love. And for whole minutes at a time, I was able to let the second arrow go and just be in the present moment, which was a really good moment.
Since then, I keep noticing the first and second arrows. Coming home late at night and grabbing my stuff so I can hurry to the door to stop Tilly from barking and waking up the neighbors - and then realizing that I don't have to? First arrow. Putting on my walking shoes and waiting for a nose to get in the way while trying to "help"? First arrow. Imagining that I will never again find a dog like Tilly? Second arrow. Wanting MY dog back, right now, thankyouverymuch? Second arrow. Wanting reality to be something other than what it is? (Which, by the way, it turns out I want quite often - who knew?) Second arrow.
It's not that I'm not feeling how much all of this hurts. It's that watching it all rise and fall and rise and fall gives me a lot of hope that there will be fewer hurting moments in the future, and more equanimity about feeling how much it hurts now. It's a really interesting experience. My very own godawful mindfulness retreat.
Thursday, August 29, 2019
Day 49: The mission of education
I'm in the throes of getting ready to lead a faculty learning community (FLC) about contemplative pedagogy. I've been using contemplative pedagogical methods for years now, and have been part of an FLC on this subject, but I've never led one by myself, so I'm a bit nervous. That's not what this is about though (I'm sure I'll feel compelled to write about that at some point). Nor is it about contemplative pedagogy per se (although I know I need to say what I mean by that at some point). Instead, as I was re-reading the first assignment for the FLC, I found this quote, and I just needed to share it, because it says something that I believe in completely, but that I think is usually not at all on the minds of those making decisions about education today:
"When I think about the reforms needed if higher education* is to serve our students and our world faithfully and well, I think there should be a litmus test for every project that claims to strengthen the mission of our colleges and universities. Does this proposal deepen our capacity to educate students in a way that supports the inseparable causes of truth, love, and justice? If the answer is no, we should take a pass and redouble our efforts to find a proposal that does." (emphasis mine)
- Foreword, Contemplative Practices in Higher Education: Powerful Methods to Transform Teaching and Learning (Daniel Barbezat and Mirabai Bush)
Can you imagine a world where that was the litmus test for education? The mind boggles.
*For my money, this applies to all levels of education - and perhaps should be even more important at the K-12 level.
"When I think about the reforms needed if higher education* is to serve our students and our world faithfully and well, I think there should be a litmus test for every project that claims to strengthen the mission of our colleges and universities. Does this proposal deepen our capacity to educate students in a way that supports the inseparable causes of truth, love, and justice? If the answer is no, we should take a pass and redouble our efforts to find a proposal that does." (emphasis mine)
- Foreword, Contemplative Practices in Higher Education: Powerful Methods to Transform Teaching and Learning (Daniel Barbezat and Mirabai Bush)
Can you imagine a world where that was the litmus test for education? The mind boggles.
*For my money, this applies to all levels of education - and perhaps should be even more important at the K-12 level.
Saturday, August 24, 2019
Day 44: (Mis)representation, Part 3
At the end of Part 1, in which I shared the true confession that I really believed that roadrunners were emu-sized, Ellen commented, simply: Misrepresentation matters.
Yes! Exactly! That is exactly it. This is the other half of my Day 29 post, representation. Representation matters, because it reminds us that our way of being and seeing the world isn't the only way. It offers us another standard for normal.
And misrepresentation matters, because we form our ideas of how the world works based not only on our own experience, but also on the stories and images that we hear and see. We experience those, too. In many cases, these pervasive images and stories about people become more powerful than our own experiences. And then, in turn, we interpret our experiences through the expectations that come from those images and stories.
Let me give you an example. One day many years ago, when I was a student in the Bay Area, I was driving somewhere in Oakland, and I got lost. This was well before cell phones, so I pulled over to get out my handy dandy Thomas Guide, and two guys came up to the car to see if I was lost. They gave me directions, and I thanked them, and I got where I was going.
If you know the demographics of Oakland, you know that the chances were good that these two young men were African-American (in fact, they happened to be). At the time, Oakland had a very high crime rate. And representations of African-Americans were (and still are) often of urban youth, portrayed as gang-involved, dangerous, etc etc. When I told someone about my experience - feeling grateful that these guys had been able to help me - her first response was, I can't believe you talked to them, they were probably planning to carjack you.
Now, here's the thing. If it had been her, and she'd pulled over and been approached in the same way, she would have double-checked to be sure her doors were locked, pulled away, and told people (and believed) that she'd narrowly avoided a carjacking. Her experience was interpreted through a lens that she already held, and then reinforced that lens and made it real.
We often suggest that if people could only meet one another, they'd understand that their stories about The Other aren't true. But I think what I'm saying is that it isn't quite that simple. If we interpret our interactions with other people through powerful preexisting lenses that are informed by pervasive misrepresentations, the chances are high that we will interpret what we see in light of our beliefs, and we'll end up reinforcing those beliefs, rather than disrupting them. I'm not saying that it's not important to create many many opportunities for people of different backgrounds, ethnicities, genders, and so on, to interact. But I am saying that it isn't sufficient. And I am saying that we need to think carefully about how people are represented. We often mock or roll our eyes at folks when they call out problematic representations - but they all matter. It's not about being politically correct - it's about realizing that all those "little jokes" and "mistakes" add up to something really big and intractable.
Because it's not just about thinking that roadrunners are emu-sized, or that rabbits hatch from eggs. It's about thinking that a young woman who gets raped after having several drinks or while wearing something revealing was asking for it. Or that she actually wanted it, but then was too embarrassed to admit it, and so made a false accusation. Right?
Misrepresentation matters. Amen.
Yes! Exactly! That is exactly it. This is the other half of my Day 29 post, representation. Representation matters, because it reminds us that our way of being and seeing the world isn't the only way. It offers us another standard for normal.
And misrepresentation matters, because we form our ideas of how the world works based not only on our own experience, but also on the stories and images that we hear and see. We experience those, too. In many cases, these pervasive images and stories about people become more powerful than our own experiences. And then, in turn, we interpret our experiences through the expectations that come from those images and stories.
Let me give you an example. One day many years ago, when I was a student in the Bay Area, I was driving somewhere in Oakland, and I got lost. This was well before cell phones, so I pulled over to get out my handy dandy Thomas Guide, and two guys came up to the car to see if I was lost. They gave me directions, and I thanked them, and I got where I was going.
If you know the demographics of Oakland, you know that the chances were good that these two young men were African-American (in fact, they happened to be). At the time, Oakland had a very high crime rate. And representations of African-Americans were (and still are) often of urban youth, portrayed as gang-involved, dangerous, etc etc. When I told someone about my experience - feeling grateful that these guys had been able to help me - her first response was, I can't believe you talked to them, they were probably planning to carjack you.
Now, here's the thing. If it had been her, and she'd pulled over and been approached in the same way, she would have double-checked to be sure her doors were locked, pulled away, and told people (and believed) that she'd narrowly avoided a carjacking. Her experience was interpreted through a lens that she already held, and then reinforced that lens and made it real.
We often suggest that if people could only meet one another, they'd understand that their stories about The Other aren't true. But I think what I'm saying is that it isn't quite that simple. If we interpret our interactions with other people through powerful preexisting lenses that are informed by pervasive misrepresentations, the chances are high that we will interpret what we see in light of our beliefs, and we'll end up reinforcing those beliefs, rather than disrupting them. I'm not saying that it's not important to create many many opportunities for people of different backgrounds, ethnicities, genders, and so on, to interact. But I am saying that it isn't sufficient. And I am saying that we need to think carefully about how people are represented. We often mock or roll our eyes at folks when they call out problematic representations - but they all matter. It's not about being politically correct - it's about realizing that all those "little jokes" and "mistakes" add up to something really big and intractable.
Because it's not just about thinking that roadrunners are emu-sized, or that rabbits hatch from eggs. It's about thinking that a young woman who gets raped after having several drinks or while wearing something revealing was asking for it. Or that she actually wanted it, but then was too embarrassed to admit it, and so made a false accusation. Right?
Misrepresentation matters. Amen.
Monday, July 29, 2019
Day 18: Making meaning
“For those of you accustomed to being taken from point A to point B to point C, this presentation may be somewhat difficult to follow. Pueblo expression resembles something like a spider’s web – with many little threads radiating from the centre, crisscrossing one another. As with the web, the structure emerges as it is made, and you must simply listen and trust, as the Pueblo people do, that meaning will be made."
- Leslie Marmon Silko
I was reading something written by a friend of mine, and she included this quote, and it just hit me in all the right places - so I thought I'd share. It made me think of what I wrote yesterday, about not really knowing what themes would come up, but seeing that they are beginning to arise, and trusting that they will make sense. That meaning will be made.
And boy howdy, does this make me think of so much of my life. Where I struggle through whatever is happening (usually a whole lot of whatevers all at once, and why does it work that way?), and what it all means is an ever-present question without much of an answer, except for the persistent sense that it does mean something if I can just hang on long enough to figure out what it is.
And then it speaks to the meaning-making part of my mind. And, I think, of the minds of all humans (and probably other animals, too). That we seek out patterns. This is how epistemologies arise - we observe, we patiently listen and watch, and we trust that out of what appears at first to be structureless, unconnected bits and pieces, like magic - like a spider's web - meaning will be made. I love that we are implicated in the meaning making. And I try to be respectful of the fact that we are implicated in the meaning making, because it suggests that each of us may make different meanings out of similar events - not because one of us has it right while others are viewing the world mistakenly, but because we are each part of the meaning-making process. And that is something to respect and celebrate at the same time.
Sunday, July 28, 2019
Day 17: Round up
So, I've been doing this for seventeen days, and I thought I'd step back and see what I think of it, and (if you're interested in telling me) what you're thinking of it.
First, thank you guys for leaving comments! I've responded to the ones where I know your email address, but I can't, alas, respond when I don't. (As before, if you are interested in that kind of conversational comment style, you can tell me your email address at knittinglinguistATgmailDOTcom, replacing the AT and the DOT as appropriate, of course.) A few quick responses:
- Laine - a hairku!! dude, thank you for that! my whole family and I thought that was awesome :)
- greenmtngirl - thank you for the kind words on the intent/impact post, I'm glad it seemed useful; I'd love to know more about your nonprofit
- Elizabeth, Jean Marie, TK, Portia, Allison, Willow, and Polly - thank you all for saying hi and encouraging the magpie theme; and especially, thank you for sticking with the vagaries of this particular blog, I'm really glad you're here.
Second, it's an interesting experience to have made this commitment to write something every day. I wake up full of ideas, and my day only gives me more. But I often find that, as with so many other things, my day gets away from me, and a few times I've hit the end of the day and found myself almost doing what I usually do with things like this (physical therapy exercises, I'm looking at you): thinking, ah well, I'll do better tomorrow. In this case, though, the commitment to put something up here is an additional motivator. I don't know if that motivation will fail at some point - it will be interesting to see how it goes over time. (An unintended consequence of thinking about posts I could write is that what I refer to in my meditation practice as "narrator mind" is strengthened. This is a phenomenon to observe; I'm sure I'll write about it at some point.)
Third, it's also interesting to see what themes come up for me most often. I'm working on developing useful labels/categories/metadata. It seems to me that there are posts and ideas that fall together in my mind, and if I can find the right label, it will help to collect them - and maybe even help me to see themes and connections that I didn't notice at the outset, but that arise as this project continues. This is a sort of interesting unintended consequence, to begin to refine my understanding of my own lenses and areas of attention. These labels seem to fall at different levels, too (I'm not sure that's a clear way to put it...). So, for example, one is interconnection, which is rather philosophical, not to say metaphysical. Another is a sort of observation of how my mind works (like the swimming laps one), and another is curiosity/fact-finding (soon you will all know more than you wanted about which strokes burn more calories, for example). Those are much more concrete than the interconnection thing. And, of course, there's the Venn diagram of themes; social justice and interconnection appear together, and mindfulness overlaps with both of those. Only seventeen posts in, it's hard to tell what might happen, but, as I said, it's an intriguing (to me) outcome of this project. Who knew metadata would become its own theme?
So I guess all of this is to say that, reflecting on the last few weeks, I see some of the shape of what I might learn from doing this, and also the shape of the challenges the project will offer me. (I think I should keep rereading that post I wrote on swimming laps, because when I think about how many more days there are left to go, it's intimidating and tempting to let myself off the hook by quitting now; when I think about tomorrow's post, or one more week of posts, it's less overwhelming.) The semester approaches; that will be a significant challenge for me. Another is whether and to what degree I want to take risks with my writing here. I posted a few narrative/descriptive type pieces in the period of my off-again on-again writing; it felt risky, but also like something I'd like to challenge myself to do more often. So that, too, will be interesting to observe - what do I end up "using" this for?
In any case, here I am. It's a beautiful day, and the sun is shining where I am. I hope each of you has at least a bit of brightness in your day, too.
First, thank you guys for leaving comments! I've responded to the ones where I know your email address, but I can't, alas, respond when I don't. (As before, if you are interested in that kind of conversational comment style, you can tell me your email address at knittinglinguistATgmailDOTcom, replacing the AT and the DOT as appropriate, of course.) A few quick responses:
- Laine - a hairku!! dude, thank you for that! my whole family and I thought that was awesome :)
- greenmtngirl - thank you for the kind words on the intent/impact post, I'm glad it seemed useful; I'd love to know more about your nonprofit
- Elizabeth, Jean Marie, TK, Portia, Allison, Willow, and Polly - thank you all for saying hi and encouraging the magpie theme; and especially, thank you for sticking with the vagaries of this particular blog, I'm really glad you're here.
Second, it's an interesting experience to have made this commitment to write something every day. I wake up full of ideas, and my day only gives me more. But I often find that, as with so many other things, my day gets away from me, and a few times I've hit the end of the day and found myself almost doing what I usually do with things like this (physical therapy exercises, I'm looking at you): thinking, ah well, I'll do better tomorrow. In this case, though, the commitment to put something up here is an additional motivator. I don't know if that motivation will fail at some point - it will be interesting to see how it goes over time. (An unintended consequence of thinking about posts I could write is that what I refer to in my meditation practice as "narrator mind" is strengthened. This is a phenomenon to observe; I'm sure I'll write about it at some point.)
Third, it's also interesting to see what themes come up for me most often. I'm working on developing useful labels/categories/metadata. It seems to me that there are posts and ideas that fall together in my mind, and if I can find the right label, it will help to collect them - and maybe even help me to see themes and connections that I didn't notice at the outset, but that arise as this project continues. This is a sort of interesting unintended consequence, to begin to refine my understanding of my own lenses and areas of attention. These labels seem to fall at different levels, too (I'm not sure that's a clear way to put it...). So, for example, one is interconnection, which is rather philosophical, not to say metaphysical. Another is a sort of observation of how my mind works (like the swimming laps one), and another is curiosity/fact-finding (soon you will all know more than you wanted about which strokes burn more calories, for example). Those are much more concrete than the interconnection thing. And, of course, there's the Venn diagram of themes; social justice and interconnection appear together, and mindfulness overlaps with both of those. Only seventeen posts in, it's hard to tell what might happen, but, as I said, it's an intriguing (to me) outcome of this project. Who knew metadata would become its own theme?
So I guess all of this is to say that, reflecting on the last few weeks, I see some of the shape of what I might learn from doing this, and also the shape of the challenges the project will offer me. (I think I should keep rereading that post I wrote on swimming laps, because when I think about how many more days there are left to go, it's intimidating and tempting to let myself off the hook by quitting now; when I think about tomorrow's post, or one more week of posts, it's less overwhelming.) The semester approaches; that will be a significant challenge for me. Another is whether and to what degree I want to take risks with my writing here. I posted a few narrative/descriptive type pieces in the period of my off-again on-again writing; it felt risky, but also like something I'd like to challenge myself to do more often. So that, too, will be interesting to observe - what do I end up "using" this for?
In any case, here I am. It's a beautiful day, and the sun is shining where I am. I hope each of you has at least a bit of brightness in your day, too.
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