Blog entry for:

any help my peers and friends are offering me. for me this morning there are a few, seemingly disparate themes running through my head and i guess i will start with the one i feel the strongest about.
eight days ago, one of my peers drowned in a fast moving mountain stream trying to save their dog. i do not know whether or not the dog was saved, but i do know a few years ago, that same person, nearly drowned locally, participating in the same bit of unnecessary heroism. not that saving his dog was unnecessary and risking life and limb to do so is something that i would probably do as well, one would have thought, that after that event happened, one would take precautions to prevent it from happening again. there are many directions i can go, but one thing is for certain, dogs are not people, and they cannot reason out complex problems. i keep my dog on a leash, not because i desire control or power, but i want to protect her from herself. it is my job, as the rational adult in this relationship, to protect her from as much as i can, and i see training classes as part of the program to teach her to listen to me, as it just may save her life. i would not let a two year old reach up and touch a hot stove burner, even though i know the pain of the experience would be a very powerful lesson, i watch that two year old, and correct them from doing stuff that is dangerous. i have the responsibility to care for that child, and i look on my relationships with my canine companions in a very similar light. i keep them as safe as i can, i care for them, and i anticipate where i need to restrain them from their own lack of experience. it is my diligence that keeps her safe, and she returns the diligence with unconditional love and the desire to please me. i am certain that many of my peers and dog owners, wholeheartedly disagree with me, and so be it. i am the responsible one in my relationship with my canine companion and i accept the responsibility to teach them how to be safe. they have taught me that my capacity to love is not a finite amount, and there is always room from more. that cup will never overflow, as it just keeps getting larger, as required.
so the other thought i had, was a tangent off the whole self-will topic, that was yesterday's thread. part of why i have not been sharing at most of the meetings lately, was that all i had to offer was cross talk and rebuttals. i mean i have heard some incredibly, pick your adjective, notions and ideas lately that tripped off the rhetorician within me. what i have come to see, is that even though i judge some of those ideas ludicrous enough to be dangerous, it is certainly not my job to offer the contrarian point of view. i can say this though, if you say that it is in the literature, it better be in the literature, because i am certainly going to go and look it up.
BTW nowhere in the FIRST TRADITION text does it say i may not like everyone in the rooms, but i MUST learn to love them.
but i digress! seeing myself as the righter of sharing wrongs, is self-will being exemplified. so i have been keeping those opinions to myself, and as a result, not sharing. seeing on how the other night, i could let go of that part of me, and share about what was really going on, as it pertained to me, and me only, was certainly a step in the right direction. BTW, cynicism is not now nor has it ever been a character defect of mine, so it does not need to be transformed into a different entity., it is just part of who i am. i used to think that because cynicism looked at the darker side of human behavior, that somehow it made me defective. now i see that was cultural training coming out and i need not always look on the bright side of life. in fact “life's a piece of shit, when you look at it…”
today i take the good with the bad, and now that i am once again growing, perhaps i will have more to offer than just rebuttals and corrections, to my peers, my friends and those who just happen to be passing by.
anyhow, the time has come to give a little whistle and head on over for another day of gainful employment. it really is a good day to be walking on this side of the dirt and to be clean, and to Jim Paul, rest in peace, brother.
an afterthought: to base my self-worth and self-esteem on the belief that GOD does not make any shit, is quite a dangerous proposition, after all GOD created Ted Bundy, child pornographers and molesters, Charles Manson, Ebola, Super Storm Sandy and the Westboro Baptist Church all which are certainly very shitty things, when one looks at them.

∞ DT ∞