(Just like) Starting Over

As long as we're breathing and aware, I suppose that - hopefully - we're growing, too.

Sometimes I think I've had enough of the growing, really. When will there be a flower? How about some new leaves? Maybe it's just time for a new pot?

There's no question that growth is, or should be, a natural part of life, but what if we thought we were going to produce big, fragrant, red flowers and we only make little yellow bursts of color that are short lived and not-too fragrant? What if there are no flowers at all? What then?

Sometimes I feel like that - my education, experience, training...successes and lessons from all of those; they just don't matter.

True enough, an education can never be taken away, nor can the lessons from experiences - both personal and professional - but they can seem useless if they cease to have value. How is the value determined? Is it the market price, i,e, can I get a job with it?, or is it the personal sense of satisfaction (ego)?

For the entirety of my adult life, I've worked to create some kind of stability - went to college, bought a house, tried to engage a bit in "lifelong learning" (real estate certification, American Planning Association certification, TESOL certification...)

I guess the long and short of it was that I wanted to be "safe".

Five years ago I embarked on a journey that was both safe and not safe - a path that seemed to be perfect - a job (safe) that blended all of the things that I worked so hard to cultivate, stockpile, and that were meaningful to me; education, experiences, and most of all, my faith, but to a place far, far away with a culture that is, in many ways, the exact opposite of the one from which I come, or as I like to day, the same, but different.

Three years ago I threw safety to the wind. Accountable, honest, and ready to accept the consequences for my decisions and actions, everything.

Today I not only reflect on the idea of "safety"; stability, predictability, and comfort, but I also reflect on what it means NOT to have those things - is that the essence of life? How often do we THINK that we're safe - our jobs are secure, our relationships are forever - only to be taken by surprise when we discover that we were wrong?

Maybe I thought I'd be one step ahead of the game - all we can control, after all, are the things that are IN our control...namely our actions and our thinking. Was I safe in being accountable for those things? Did I mean to be safe, or was I merely trying to take ownership of my life and my decisions?

Looking back, the reasons don't really matter. I did what I thought was best based on the situation at hand.

The fallacy in my thinking is as multi-faceted and complex as would be expected in a cross-cultural experience. Knowledge, indeed, does not equal understanding (and that is demonstrated so effectively in this video)

Even though I KNEW what needed to be done or SHOULD be done, my brain just couldn't/wouldn't/didn't do it - after watching this video, I realized that I've been way too hard on myself for a few years.

The first time I began to cultivate my awareness that indeed, knowledge was not understanding may have been in August 2011 ... I was certainly feeling lost, all right.

To mediate those fears and the muddled confusion, I rode my bicycle. Two things that have been constants in my life that ALWAYS, always, make me happy are riding a bike and playing in the woods.

Riding my bike allowed time to think, reflect, and deplete some pent up energy.

I once wrote a post about how living here is like riding my fixie.  The point was that as long as I paid attention and kept peddling, the ride could be enjoyable.

Now, almost four years later, knowledge is yielding to a bit of understanding, but the bias that is in my brain is still there and even though I'm aware of it, it's mighty hard to change.

In conclusion, the education, experience, and lessons I had learned throughout my life are really helpful in the appropriate context, but now...here? They're not that useful. And I even think they're not all that valuable.

I need to start over. To begin and build again.

It can't be too hard, can it? I mean, it's as easy as riding a bike.

Freeze Out

My cousins and I had a bit of a joke about who among us was currently in "freeze out" - which one of us was the one nobody (especially our Grandmother) was talking to at the time. Truth be told, it was usually me or my other outspoken cousin who never knew her place, either. We just couldn't be quiet and accept things. I don't think we've changed much, but I'd like to think that we've grown wiser as we've gotten older and can, when absolutely mandatory, keep our mouths closed - if only temporarily.

While we can laugh, even sometimes much later, at the tensions that happen in our family lives, some of in the US often have little idea what it's like to live in a culture in which such a freeze out happens not only in families, but in greater society.

When it's really easy to surmise many things about a person just by looking at them, whether it's race or ethnicity, marital status, religion, level of education, or economic status, the world is a different place. In some places, making such off-the-cuff assumptions is treated as an art form - or maybe a survival mechanism.

Sometimes it takes getting out of context to see things.

Now, imagine that being friends with an outcast person or member of a marginalized group - maybe even as superficial as having a conversation or participating in dialogue - could cost you your job. Could cost you your own stability and safety. Could negatively impact your spouse or children. What then? What if you had been friends before they were outcast or marginalized? Can you afford to stay friends with them or speak to them in an intimate manner?

Flash back to high school - I remember clearly how there were rules to follow...the white rules. Make no mistake, being "white" involves a LOT more than skin color; now some of those secrets are leaking out...coded language, election decisions, where people choose to live - when they have a choice. Lots goes into that structure and there is hell. to. pay. if you don't, especially in the South of the 1980's - I can only imagine what it would have been like in the "old days".

I'm often in a state of shock when I hear flippant dismissals by some travelers of the mechanisms of social violence employed in other cultures as "exotic", "cute", "traditional" or "tribal". It's easy to dismiss mechanisms that marginalize and hurt people in other countries. I used to think that it was more of a reflection of cultural superiority rather than something some of us are trained to do from the minute we learn our place in our own society.

We are all masters of ignoring systems of violence when it's convenient or necessary.

And we are also adept at pointing out those cultures of violence when we have little to lose from making such assertions.

I've often said that things in Indonesia are just the same as in the US, but different. I tried to figure that out, but now I make a simple claim based on something my mother told me during my term as an Elder in my church. Wherever there are people, they are going to act like people.

We may be more connected now than ever and we may be learning that we're not as different as we thought, but remember this: we all, everywhere, are still are busy with what to do with the ones that don't fit, as well as with the ones who deserve to be heard - or not.

We just go about it in different ways, but it happens. Everywhere.

I pray for greater awareness and peace. I want to know when to keep my mouth shut and when not to, but most of all, I want to try not to participate in systems of violence.

The problem is that the definition of violence is as fluid as the oceans that divide us.

Tenth Avenue Freeze Out - Bruce Springsteen

Well I was stranded in the jungle

Trying to take in all the heat they was giving

The night is dark but the sidewalk's bright

And lined with the light of the living

From a tenement window a transistor blasts

Turn around the corner things got real quiet real fast

I walked into a Tenth Avenue freeze-out

Tenth Avenue freeze-out

And I'm all alone, I'm all alone

And kid you better get the picture

And I'm on my own, I'm on my own

And I can't go home