Waandering Along the Path: Right Speech

In the past I've failed at right speech sometimes when I wanted to be "cool".  When I was fourteen my family was visiting friends who had two teenage daughters older than me, and desperate to be "cool" I let them tell me the entire story of the Hitchcock movie "Psycho".  Believe it or not, my family was staying at a motel at the time, because we'd just moved from Virginia to California.  I wouldn't take a shower the whole week.  To this day, I've never seen the film, though a few years later I tried with my first husband.  Even on TV, it was terrifying, and I had to turn off the set and sleep with the lights on that night.

Okay, I was fourteen.  I'll cut myself some slack on that one.  But in my forties, I let my husband persuade me that Jodi Foster in "Silence of the Lambs" was so amazing, I needed to see it.  He had already seen it with his friend Ron, and promised to tell me when to close my eyes.  I had to fork over $80 to a therapist to talk about the movie, it disturbed me so much. 

Here is what I wish I had said, "I'm afraid of these kinds of films for all kinds of reasons.  I'm going to be haunted by the images in a bad way.  I wonder if supporting these films doesn't cause copy-cat crimes.  They probably are too suggestive to disturbed individuals.  Kids will inevitably see these and not admit it to an adult who might help them process their reactions.  There is no good reason for this film to be out in public."

I didn't have the nerve.   But I have not been convinced into seeing another horror film.  I've missed all the cult favorites, and I don't really care.  I'm relieved the images are not floating around in my mind.  I don't care about what is true.  I've heard a lot of stories as a counselor in safehouses for battered women.  I know what the world contains.  Kowtowing to the culture is not my idea of being cool.  In the name of cool we don't speak up when we should.  If we said no, others might as well.  Who cares if the actors will be up for Oscars?  Not me, not any more.  Count me out of the conversation.  And by the way, don't tell me the plot when you see it.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Nothing is simple.  I saw a movie yesterday, a courtroom thriller, that reminded me of how speech is withheld, people don't take the stand, don't fully cooperate with the law, because they make the call that they would harm another.  In this film, a defendant harmed himself by speaking fully and honestly.

When I was a safehouse counselor for battered women, sometimes we'd get a subpoena to testify.  You would think it would be to protect our client, but no, it was always because of a custody battle, and the batterer was trying to prove that the mother was unfit because she allowed the kids to reside in a shelter.  He was usually the bread winner and the house and lifestyle belonged to him.  The kids' quality of life would suffer if the mother got custody.  Yes, crazy - making, but true.

We were compelled to come to court.  And our files were not protected, as those of therapists are.  What to do?  We didn't keep files for longer than a day or two, everything was destroyed to protect our client's privacy.  When lawyers asked us about the client, we said we couldn't remember.  Because they were trying to force us into what would not be right speech.  Our highest oath was to keep the client alive.  And we didn't believe that it was her fault if she fled the home, the kids missed some school, and the presents in Santa's bag were light or non-existent.  The kids, we felt, had a right not to witness their father beating their mother, feel intimidated, and without intervention, repeat the battering cycle.

Right speech is not harming, to the best of our ability.  None of us ever went to jail for contempt of court, though we were threatened.  We had a little amnesia thing going.  And yes, we did have a bit of contempt for the court.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I'm in a writing group.  We meet every other week, and last night there were only four of us, and going in I anticipated that we would be done early, having plenty of time for quickwrites and maybe be a bit forelorn without all our members.  Just goes to show.  We had a dynamic discussion of each of the three pieces presented and then veered off into a subject that we all are contemplating:  getting older.  We discovered none of us quite know what to do with ourselves.  The two widows and two long married ladies.  Where is the manual that guides us?

We went an hour over time and had to tear ourselves away.  I'd tell you in detail about the discussion except that wouldn't be right speech, would it?  But right speech, when it is honest and heartfelt is a treasure I have an impulse to share, because it is enlivening, thought provoking and connective.  Yes, right speech is connective.  It places us in each other's positions, searches for commonalities, and affirms our glorious humanity.

Call me old fashioned, but I like to be in a room with another human being when I speak with her.  The emailing, texting, phoning is fine, and sometimes efficient and appropriate.  But the talk isn't as free wheeling as what happened last night, and it can't open up a subject and let it flow and divert and meander.  Our discussion was spontaneous, exhilarating and somehow so comforting.  We have trust and have sworn confidentality to help us feel open to whatever is coming up for us in that moment.  The four us us were wide awake and in the moment .  What we spoke was what was in our hearts.  We've known each other a lot of years, decades, and this trust has happened subtly over time.  How lucky we are.  Right speech is liberating.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

For many years I practiced Zen Buddhism, which involves a whole lot of silence.  A student might have an opportunity to ask a question or might not.  I spoke during an interview with the teacher.  But I usually came and left the zendo in silence, and driving home, I'd not even turn on the radio.  Why?  I wanted to keep that silence close to me for as long as possible.  In the silence my ego and personality dropped away.  It felt like a heavy backpack being lifted from me.  In the silence I didn't have to attempt to have people like me or have a favorable opinion of me.  I could just be my no self.

Now my Zen teacher is retired.  I see her once a month at our study group, but for the last three years, I've been a member of the Tibetan Rinpoche Anam Thubten's sangha.  I go weekly to meditate and listen to his dharma talk.  I'm still adjusting, because this sangha is the opposite of the previous one.  People come early and talk, they have tea and talk during the break, they talk afterward.  There is no gentle transition from silence to socializing.  The first few months I felt judgment arising.  I didn't think Anam's students were behaving well.  The noise bothered me.  And an ancient shyness rose up in me that made it difficult for me to initiate talking to people sitting next to me or around me.  I felt I'd been thrown into a lively, confusing mob.

Over time, I realized that having the buffering traditions I was used to had caused me to think in a dichotomy.  I was a Buddhist only in the right setting.  The rest of the time I was unable to move my practice into my ordinary life.  Not good.  Not skillful.  Now I'm attempting to erase the transition, and be mindful in the midst of chaos.  It no longer matters so much where I am when I'm practicing, because every moment has it's challenge to be present.  Opportunity arises and I try to meet it.

So now I'm chatting away with the best of them.  I have friends whose names I actually know, and I don't feel upset with myself if we discuss, as Susie and I did yesterday, where our babies were born or when we lived in the same town.  It's all good, as Bruce Almighty would say.  It's all good.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Every few weeks, a man on the street above us screams obsenities and rages so loudly that we hear in our houses no matter what is going on.  We've called the police, and they are familiar with him, and, as most police have to do these days, they talk him down, get him to a 72 hour hold or to jail.  What a tragedy.  Lack of mental health services is a shame upon our nation.  Should we have the right to hold them?  Should they have the right to refuse?  It's complicated territory.

But his voice, his absolute rage, is emblematic of powerlessness.  He can't control his demons, he doesn't deserve to suffer in this way.  Is he afraid of the danger he might be to others?  Can his speech or anyone's express such agony? 

I pray for him.  I pray he gets the help he needs.  I pray we get more shelters, half way houses, therapies, and medications that truly help a person live a dignified life.  Compromised perhaps, not what it might have been had the person not been struck down with this illness, but not alone, not so entirely alone that the only people who speak to him wear uniforms.  I pray for those uniformed people as well, that they find the gift of speech that will soothe and sort out what the problem is and how best to address it.  And I pray the rest of us listen, not leaving these people's care to the risk of others, but problem solve ourselves to get these people help and a life where they can be around people and not be so isolated.  It's our responsibility, as surely as it is to make every effort to feed those hungry, house those without shelter and develop the structures so no one is marginalized, but acknowledged as our responsibility in a country which can well afford to help, and strangely chooses not to.  Let's not be that country any more.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Several months ago I arrived on a Sunday morning to have my hair cut by a woman who only has Sunday appointments because she's in school.  She came to the door and asked if I could come back in a few minutes as she was running late.  Luckily, the salon is a couple of doors from one of my favorite bookstores, so I happily browsed and returned after about 30 minutes.  I sat down and waited.  I thumbed through all the idiotic haircut magazines.  I meditated, I thought of errands I needed to do.  And I stewed.  An hour later, I got up, in frustration, came around the wall and told her I was really upset.  She apologized, but that made it worse, because she had squeezed this person in who needed color without bothering about my time.  She said she had tried to call me but I was gone, which meant she tried to call about the time I left my house and it takes only ten minutes tops to get to her salon.

Dear reader, I was in tears.  I said I had lots of things I could be doing.  Evidently, crying was one of them.

What is wrong with this picture?  Carrie, who up until then had seemed dependable, was desperate for clients, and she thought she could juggle it all.  She used wrong speech by not telling me it would be an hour, not a few minutes.  Honesty would have allowed me to do an errand or two and not twiddle my thumbs.

What is right with this picture?  I spoke up and told her my feelings were hurt, showed her how vulnerable and upset I felt, at that moment.  She heard me, we talked it out, and I sat down and had my haircut.  She offered for the cut to be free, and I said no, I would pay.  I understood how she struggles to be in school and work and get the balance right.  I've been late getting back to relieve a babysitter, misjudged what I could get done in a given amount of time, and disappointed others.  We're all human.

I stood up for myself, but I was empathetic to Carrie.  I left the salon feeling dead center in the middle of Right Speech.  No name calling, no rage, just how it made me feel.  As if my time and person didn't matter.  It's awfully hard to say that kind of thing, so my gift to Carrie was my transparency.  And I felt heard.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My granddaughter loves to visit our neighborhood pet store.  Currently, she is hoping and praying for a hamster.  I'm fairly certain her mother is riding this one out.  So we visit the hamsters, and the cats, which her mother is also adamant about not adopting, as they just got an adorable dog last year, she works full time and has a two year old as well.  None of this affects my granddaughter.  She would own a zoo if she could.

This week we made our visit.  This shop is known for exotic birds.  There are every kind you could imagine.  They are babysitting many birds each week as well.  I'm fond of going around, and, you guessed it, talking to the birds, many of whom have good vocabularies.  This time there was a huge parrot, bright emerald green with feathers of red and yellow, just out on a bird perch instead of in a cage.  A little girl rushed up to us and said, "Look at this!".  She kept saying hi and hello, and the bird greeted her back, but then he raised one claw and waved at us.  He had me at the wave.  So I stood there while my granddaughter walked around and talked to him and waved back. 

Birds are extremely social, and when I'm in the store I try to make the rounds, talk to most of them, and read the cards so I know what words they've been taught.  Often it's "pretty boy" or "how you doing?" but they all respond to a soft kind voice and make eye contact.  They clearly appreciate my speaking to them.  And they are obviously intelligent.  What a pleasure to use my speech to connect with another species.  They definitely appreciate my effort.  It brightens their day.  And mine.  I can't forget the parrot waving.  In fact, I might have to stop in today, by myself, and say hello.