A Brief Rant On Religiosity And Ego
The trigger that fired this diatribe was Brit Hume’s assertion that Tiger Woods must, “Turn to the Christian faith,” rather than to his own Buddhist practice. I have little doubt that Hume is sincere in his own beliefs, and no doubt that Christianity has worked and can work wonders for those who are drawn to embrace it wholeheartedly. But I am thoroughly put off by those who profess to religious wisdom (of any brand) on the one hand, while at the same time remaining oblivious to how their beliefs have become hostage to their egos.
Nothing To Prove
On a birthday with a zero in its number, in an unexpected flash of clarity, I understood that I have nothing to prove to anyone. The catalog of things I had tried to prove before that moment is long: that I am smart, clever and creative, that I am competent and capable, that I am successful, sexy, and insightful, that I am one of the guys during happy hour, that I belong almost anywhere I go, that I understand both the outer and inner game of baseball, that I see what is wrong with the world and what is needed, that I see what is wrong with an organization and what is needed, that I see what is wrong with you and what is needed, that I am quick-witted and funny, that I have taste and style, that I can write, and probably lots of other things that I can’t recall at the moment.
Let It Go! Let It Go! Let It Go!
It’s sing-along time, and time for a little silliness (silliness is under-rated). It’s also time to reveal that I am no song lyricist. Oh well.
The lyrics below are sung to the tune of Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow (with apologies to Sammy Cahn).
I’ve even provided the music! So click the link below that turns on the music and then sing the whole thing through twice! Go ahead; you know you want to.
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A Wonderful Thing Someone Said About You
Listen carefully and you may hear the sound that I make when I read the words below from Geetali Tare. It is a whooshing sound, a strong but gentle out-breath that begins deep inside me. I can’t seem to stop doing it right now.
Geetali, who lives in and writes about the town of Shimla, India, at her blog, Shimla Gallimaufry, offered the words in her latest post, Spreading The Love:
Killing Fish And Holding On To Reality
Bert and I went to his family’s hunting and fishing cabin for a week of pursuing trout. The small stout cabin squats in a clearing, snuggled up next to a hillside, near the center of Pennsylvania’s Tioga State Forest. The center of the forest is the only thing that the cabin is near. We arrived late in the evening and went directly to bed. The next morning, early, after we cooked and ate breakfast, Bert said, “Are you ready to kill some fish?”
A Curious Case Of Spiritual Hostility
I don’t have a whole lot to say about the story I am about to relate (or maybe I have too much to say to fit into a blog post). I am tempted to trot out my inner Keith Olberman; you know, righteous indignation, sarcasm, maybe my own Worst Person In The World Award. But I am not so good at those things. So, here is the story. What do you make of it?
In June 2008, Mark Groubert of LA Weekly wrote an article critical of Passages Malibu Addiction Center entitled, Buying The Cure. I feel sure that you have heard of Passages Malibu by virtue of watching its founder, Chris Prentiss, selling his book about his addiction cure in countless TV commercials.
When Procrastination Is Arguing With God
I was scrolling through some 250 comments posted in Liz Strauss’s recent “open mic” forum about procrastination. Many comments are about the roots of procrastination, and they cover all of what I have in the past told myself about the roots of my own procrastination: fear of failure, perfectionism, monotonous tasks, etc. All of those reasons once rang true for me but do no longer.
