Not Zen 135: Grateful Mistakes

Grateful Mistakes

He took a deep breath as he sat down.  Bill hadn't been to his parents' home for years because his work had taken him to a distant city.  For many months, he'd wanted to bring his girlfriend home to meet his family but he'd never seemed to find the time.

The smell of baked bread wafted into the room.  His father had burned it.  Bill's nose detected the roasted hen, too, from his older sister.  She'd brought sweet potatoes, butter, green beans, and other dishes for the visit because she lived a block away.  His older brother, who lived in the house with his father, had bought canned peaches.  They gave off a syrupy perfume as they sat out in a bowl, an item to add to the salads.

His girlfriend had insisted that they make pies but, at the last minute, she'd bought them from a store.  The pies sat on the table to her left, a little too far for him to reach but close enough to smell cinnamon and nutmeg.

"Good to meet your fiance, Bill," his brother whispered into his right ear.

He nodded.  His brother accepted the loaf of dark-crust bread from their father and found a spot for it at the table.

"I'm sorry your mother can't be here," said his father as he sat down.

His father's wife, Bill's step-mother, had died two years ago due her refusal to wear her medical bracelet.  When she'd gone to the hospital emergency room for ulcer pain, she accepted a treatment she shouldn't have, which made her pass out.  Then the doctors administered medicine contraindicated by the warning on her bracelet.  They wouldn't have prompted the reaction that killed her if they'd known.

"Me too," he said.  He felt sorry for his step-mother and also for his birth mother, now remarried and not in a position to see her grandchildren.

"Yeah," said his brother and sister.

"But I'm grateful for another year," his father continued.  "Let's go around the table and give thanks, please."

The oldest, his sister, clasped her hands and bowed her head.

"I'm thankful that my husband will finish his prison sentence this month," she said. "I'm grateful to be off drugs. I'm thankful for diabetes medicine. I'm thankful for my daddy. I'm thankful for my little girl."

Bill watched his fiance. Her eyes widened.

After a short pause, his brother took a turn.

"I'm thankful that my son can be here with us tonight," he said. "His mom didn't want him to come. I'm thankful for the doctor who reattached my pinky finger. I'm grateful for the car my little brother gave me. It's nice to drive to work again."

Bill's fiance already knew about his brother. She hadn't heard about him cutting off a finger at work. She nudged him with her foot under the table.

"I'm thankful for Uncle Billy!" shouted his brother's son.

"Me, too!" said his sister's daughter. "And for his girlfriend. She's pretty."

"How sweet," his girlfriend remarked. "I'm grateful for Bill, too, and I'm happy to meet you all."

Bill had finished reading a lot of legal papers earlier. When he raised his clasped hands, he found that he smelled like dry books. He took a moment to contemplate how fortunate his life had been. He was the only one of the three who made a good living. On top of that, he hadn't injured himself or caused himself medical problems.

"I'm glad that I knew everything that my older sister and brother did as we were growing up," he concluded with a sigh.

"Amen," said his girlfriend.

There was a pause and a grateful smile from his sister.

"Is that all?" his father prompted.

"I'm happy we made it this far.  The bread smells great, dad."

Not Zen 134: Attention to Words

The sun cast a warm light across the city market. Two women wandered through the shops and stalls. Patrons jostled one another. Shop owners called out. Bicycles weaved through the rows of pedestrians. Taxis crawled between the stalls and bikes. Through it all, the women wandered at their leisure.

They saw an elderly fellow step out of a shop down the street. He hesitated, a bag in each hand. Someone knocked his elbow from behind. His groceries tumbled to the ground.

"This is yours," said the quickest one. She stepped forward and scooped up a can of beans as it rolled. Her friend grabbed a plastic bottle as it spun in place. Other folks nearby saw what they were doing. They crouched, each to pick up an item and return it to the bag.

"That's what I like to see." A stranger approached. His clothes looked expensive and well tailored. He extended his hand in greeting. "I like helping people. And I like people who help others."

The older, shorter woman shook his hand. She felt a professional grip, strong and energetic. She looked him in the eye as he described how he was running for re-election as their state representative.

"I'm just here to remind you that I'm looking out for you," he concluded. A tall woman in a business suit walked up and touched him on the elbow. Another aide approached. They pointed up the street and headed off.

"That man is a criminal," said the woman who'd shaken his hand. She wiped her wet palm on her clothes and shook her head.

"Yeah, too bad," agreed the old man. He had stepped out of range for the handshake.

"How do you know?" asked the younger woman.

"Didn't you see the way he behaves?" Her friend pointed to the politician's back. "His friendliness is calculated. His gaze is hostile. His hands and posture betray his intent."

"He didn't pick up any groceries," the man added. "Help came from all around, thank you very much. But not from him."

"He represents us. He votes for us."

"And you're fooled by that?" The shorter woman pointed up the street. There, the representative and his aides had re-positioned themselves. They rushed to greet a family as the family exited an expensive shop. "Look, the baby starts crying as he approaches. The baby understands. But his parents don't."

"I'm sure his parents are listening to his words. They hear what he says and try to give him the benefit of the doubt."

"When a politician announces that he supports family values, look to his actions. Has he worked hard to keep his marriage good? Has he supported his children? Or does he ignore his family in favor of mistresses?"

"You can't pay much attention to anything that anyone says," the old man agreed.

"Including you two?"

"Be skeptical of everyone. Why not?"

"Well, what about friends?"

"As your friend," said the older woman, "I'd say that you should judge everyone. If someone makes a promise, watch that they keep the promise. Otherwise, words aren't much use."

The younger woman had been the first to leap to assistance. She had also been ready to trust her representative. She remembered voting for him.

"All sorts of words are important to me," she said. "They affect my feelings. What about complements? What about insults?"

"Insults are people being mean. That's the action to watch for."

"What about lying?"

"Lying is important not for the words but because it's cheating," said her friend. "When someone spins the truth out of self-interest, it hurts others. That's why I don't pay much attention to anyone's description of events or of themselves."

"Statements of intention are probably false," said the old man. "Or incomplete."

"They can be sincere," the woman allowed. "But they can be wrong despite the sincerity. If you want to know how someone really thinks, watch what they do. That's the way you can understand if their words have meaning."

The man they'd helped nodded and waved for a taxi. The first one passed him by. Then another slowed for him but it proved to be full. He set his groceries by his feet and hailed with both arms. The women joined in. After a minute of calling and waving, they managed to pull over a taxi for the fellow.

"Thank you," he said. He picked up his grocery bags.

As he stepped toward his ride, the state representative and his aides hopped into it. They slammed the door behind them before the old man could reach it. The representative shouted to the driver. One of his aides waved to the women who had hailed the cab. The other waved to the family with the baby.

The old man sighed. He set down a bag and raised his arm for the next taxi.

Not Zen 133: Regulation and Self-Regulation

"You want me to enforce your diet?"  Their guest scratched his beard.

"We feel it's worth a try."

The three men and two women sat around their dining room table.  It was where they held group meetings in their tenement, which lay on the border of the university.  In the dining room, they planned their menus in advance, transcribed their meal plans onto the group calendar, and arranged for purchases of food.

The five of them bought nearly all of their groceries from the local farmer's cooperative.  Their guest headed the purchasing program.  He pooled money from a row of similar tenements and bought supplies at volume discounts to keep everyone's costs low.  Since he controlled so much of their edible provisions, the housemates felt it made sense to ask him to help with their diet.

"I've been studying cognitive science," said one of the women.  "There are all sort of methods to help us with self-regulation.  But as individuals, we haven't been able to put them into effect.  For instance, each of us has foods we like too much and need to avoid.  But other members of the house like them too, so they buy them.  Then those foods lie around the house as temptations."

"So you're buying snacks," said the purchaser.  "And that's why you're gaining weight."

"Yes."

"Let's make a list of them, then.  I agree not to allow those in your house."

The purchaser left with his determination to help and a list in his hand of the forbidden foods.  The house meeting continued.  The oldest housemate, a graduate student in sociology, tried to get his partners to support one another.  He felt that they could help most by shaming cheaters.

"We need quick, negative feedback," he said.

"And positive feedback," said the psychologist.

"We need reward substitution," said the cognitive scientist.

The youngest woman, who was studying physical therapy and yoga, said nothing.  The discussion ended with each house member resolved to try a different strategy.

Although the list of forbidden foods started small, within a week the housemates discovered the need to expand it.  The house was devoid of their favorite vices but they found other high-calorie items to snack on.

A week after that, they added more to their list to avoid.  But the more the purchaser limited their diet, the more they ate outside of their home.  One of them started to wolf down fast food to satisfy his cravings.  Others pretended to go for walks so they could stop at the local convenience store.  The cognitive scientist visited her friends' houses in the neighborhood and ate their snacks.  The sociologist hid packets of cookies in his room.  The youngest woman increased her exercise and meditation but the others, generally, did not.

The food purchaser doubled his efforts to enforce the diet.  The housemates grew resentful toward him and toward one another.  Finally, the purchaser himself called the house and begged them to hold another meeting.

"This isn't working," he announced when they met.  "You guys are eating less from the farmer's co-op.  But you're clearly not losing weight."

"We're gaining a bit, as a household."

"This is like the drug war, man," he said.  "And I'm the cops.  It sucks.  Now you guys see me on the street and avoid  me."

"We should have known this wouldn't succeed," said the sociologist.

"Why?  It should have worked," said the psychologist.

"We tried to ban sweets.  But we've all seen how well that's worked with alcohol, marijuana, and other things in our culture."

"We're not part of that."

"I think we are.  Being part of a culture doesn't mean agreeing with everything in it."  He spread his arms wide as if to encompass the whole room.  "Look, the fact that we tried a ban means we took the idea from our culture.  But if a rule isn't backed up with a sense of morality that's universally held in the culture, then people feel no shame about circumventing the rule."

They fell into a long discussion, each with a view on their weight gains based on their backgrounds in sociology, psychology, cognitive science, physical therapy, and religious studies.

"All of the tactics we talked about are good ones," said the physical therapist.  "But they need to come from our own self-restraint, not imposed from outside.  Choosing an authoritarian approach is a barrier to self-regulation."

"But we used authority to reduce the temptations in our environment," the cognitive scientist pointed out.

"It's a right tactic," she agreed.  "But the authoritarian approach is self-fulfilling.  If people don't practice self-regulation, they don't have the emotional muscle for it when the time comes."

"That could be," the other woman allowed.

"It leads people to think that legislation or some sort of reference to authority is the way to go when, really, that doesn't work.  Mostly, we need to spend more time watching our own thoughts and actions.  We want a substitute for that.  But there isn't one."

Not Zen 132: Same Person

"This map is wrong," she muttered.

The city had changed the route of her march to the town courthouse. So here she was, as one of the march leaders, re-surveying the route on the morning of the event. Yesterday, her group had placed signs along the previous route. Today she needed to make sure her committee moved nearly a third of those signs to direct marchers onto different streets.

"This looks like kind of a rough neighborhood," one of her companions pointed out. He pointed to a tenement that had suffered a recent fire. Next to it, four men leaned against a neighboring building. They seemed to have all of their belongings with them.

"It's early morning." She kept walking. "No one will bother us."

As they passed the homeless men, the four demanded money. She ignored them. They didn't move to threaten her or any of her friends.

Half a block later, she and her team stopped to re-position the march signs. They discovered a roadblock had been set across their march route. Police had set it according to the old route but now it would be an obstacle. The march leaders been warned they would be arrested if they deviated from their route, so they stopped to debate the portable wooden barriers.

"Do we have the right to move these?" one of her companions asked.

"I don't think ..." At that moment, someone struck her in the head.

The next minute was confusing. She learned later that one of the homeless men had followed her group and had targeted her in particular. When he attacked, her friends tried to help. One of them called for police. She kept her arms up to keep from getting hit in the head any more. It worked. She couldn't escape the blows entirely, not even with the help of friends, but she could keep herself from injury.

The police who had set the barriers arrived in a minute. They subdued the homeless man. One of the officers asked her to sit down while he checked her arms and head for bruises. When he was done, he helped her to her feet.

"Do you want an ambulance?" he asked.

"No, I'm all right."

"I work this neighborhood a lot. This guy who attacked you is a problem. He picks on women. You don't need to press charges since I saw this but I have to ask, are you going to fill out a police report? Will you appear in court to testify against him?"

"If it will help."

Filing the report took her hours, much of it travel time to the station and back. It forced her to delegate the re-surveying of the protest march route to her companions. But when she was done, she felt she'd accomplished something. She headed to the march in high spirits.

The rally started out in the downtown park. The clouds, which had threatened rain earlier in the day, lifted. The afternoon turned warm. The orators at the rally gave short, impassioned speeches. Musicians drummed up a sense of movement and progress in the throngs. Then they all headed out.

As one of the organizers, she took her spot in the second row. From the rightmost position, she gave cues to the march leaders.

When the march neared the courthouse, their destination, they encountered a counter-protest. A group of nearly a hundred people blocked their path. Rather than confront them, the march leaders decided to turn.

She was never sure if they decided to turn because it was their original route or because of the informal blockade. They'd all been warned that if they deviated from the approved route, they would be arrested.

"I think this is deliberate," said a marcher next to her. "Our opponents want us arrested. The police are on their side."

"Are they?" she wondered. This could have been a coordinated, deliberate ploy by the authorities. It also seemed reasonable that it could have been an accident. Even the counter-demonstrators could have set up where they were because they were acting on old information. Who would have told them about today's change?

The march leaders pushed down a wooden barrier. Police on the sidewalks swarmed into the road to stop them. There were only a dozen officers at first. That wasn't enough to control the crowd if people fought. So instead, the officers moved to block the street. It seemed to be an indication that this wasn't part of their plan. But the march kept moving. Police reinforcements arrived.

"It's a set up!" one of her companions yelled.

The reinforcements came armed in riot gear. This force did look like they'd expected the deviation in the march. However, they didn't charge in with their weapons. The officer in charge shouted through a bullhorn instead.

"You're under arrest!"

One of the protestors tried to march through the police line and got knocked down. Others fled backwards along the march route.

"Don't resist!" she shouted. "Everyone sit down! Cooperate!"

"Don't resist!" others shouted. "Sit down!"

It turned out that many of those at the front of the march were willing to submit to arrest. After the initial group that fled, everyone else stayed. In a few minutes, police vans arrived from farther up the street. Officers began to cuff the protestors, hands behind their backs, and toss them roughly into the waiting vans.

One of the officer walked over to her. She recognized him.

"You're arresting me? You?" She had been furious with the suspicion that this had all been planned to go wrong. But as she sighted her arresting officer, she felt tears come to her face. She laughed even though she didn't think it was funny. "You're the one who saved me this morning."

"I remember." He knelt and cuffed her as he'd done to the others. It was hard for her to put herself in his place. He had seemed so nice before. Now this. She tried to get a sense of what it was like to work in his job.

"You've had a long day."

"It's normal for me, ma'am." He hesitated. His eyes swept the scene. "Now, I've placed you under arrest. I could carry you to the van. But will you get in under your own power?"

"Yes." Handcuffed, she walked in front of him to the line of police vehicles. When she got to her spot, she turned and hopped up backwards. The officer had to help her get her feet inside. She accepted his gentle push with gratitude. "I'm sorry to be such a trouble to you today."

"Not many people say that as we arrest them." He stepped into the van to help her onto the bench seat.

"It's been, well, a shocking day. I'm not sure why I'm apologizing but here I am. Sorry."

"I apologize too, ma'am. I'm the same person as this morning."

"Thank you. I think I may be slightly different."

"Ma'am, I know what you mean."

Not Zen 131: Samsara

They met during a technical course at their local college. They sat near the back. When they were put into the same group for a project, they discovered that they had philosophies in common. Their main difference, it seemed, was that one of them felt motivated to study the technical aspects of medicine, even chemistry, while the other felt relatively unmoved. 

"Are you not here to meet your goal of healing others?" said the motivated one.

"I am not so attached to that." The other shrugged. He fidgeted with his pen. "And didn't you say that you had let go of your worldly attachments? Why do you hang on to this one?"

"My worldly life is many years gone but I deliberately reached out to find a transcendent goal." He smiled and stretched out his left arm as if to encompass the room.

"That is an attachment."

"It is." He dropped his hand, his expression serious. "I was aware that I was re-attaching myself as I did it. But consider your own life. You have no goals, neither small ones nor large ones. Why is it that you do anything at all?"

"Mostly, I act because I am forced." The younger fellow sighed. He closed his eyes for a moment. "To avoid starvation, I eat. To make a place to live, I work for money. On my job, I follow orders because it is that kind of a job."

"Listen to your answer." The older one leaned forward slightly. "You say that you do things because you are forced."

"My answer remains." He shook his head. "That is why I act."

"Does that make you happy?"

"Not really, no."

The motivated man stood up. He paced around his chair. A few other students in the classroom glanced over but they turned away soon, occupied by their own projects. The professor looked up from writing out an chemical equation at the front of the room. He nodded and smiled as he noticed the passionate conversation at the back.

"When I come to this class, I am happy," said the fellow. "When I learn, I learn with zeal. When I help others, I feel joy. All of the things we do here are in aid of my goal. I pick up my books with care. I tie my shoes each day with a great affection for the little bit of progress they represent. Do you do these little things with love?"

"Tie my shoes with love? I don't think so."

The older, larger fellow sat back down. For a moment, he scribbled on their chemical equation project.

"This speaks to why I chose to re-attach to my life with a transcendent goal," he said when he finished another line of chemistry. "Until you find such a goal as helping others, as healing them, as feeding them, as any other worthy goal, then you will never do things that you want to do. You will only do things that others want or that your body wants."

"There is no shame in it," said the other, defensively. "Many people live this way."

"Yes. It's not shameful. It's only being less than you can be."

The motivated fellow returned to his work. He'd been intrigued to learn of the younger man's similarities to him but their differences still seemed vast. He found his studies vital to his life, not because he enjoyed chemistry but because he felt that learning it brought him closer to understanding how to help others. To an unmotivated student, it was a meaningless exercise. To him, there was a connection to other, greater works to come. 

"Aha," he said. He set down his pen. "I think that this combination of water, carbon dioxide, and these nutrients gives us the chemistry of breath."

"The respiration equation. So you finished it."

"It is a fundamental thing."

"But it is a mistake to get so involved with it. People would be happier if they let go of their desires."

The project finished, they were free to sit back. 

"Some people place themselves in the worst of both situations, I suppose," said the older fellow. "They retain their worldly desires. And they have no goal beyond them. They are forced to do things for what seems to them to be no particular reason."

"Yes, that it how it seems to me."

"But you can let go of your worldly attachments and yet still be in the world. You can work toward enriching those around you, as ephemeral as we all are, and you will find yourself always reminded that every action is your own, every decision you make a moral one, vital to the trajectory of your life and the others you affect."

The other fellow shook his head. He picked up his pen and dutifully began to copy the equation.

"Here, take my copy," said the motivated one. He pushed the page across the desk between them. "I'll make another."

"Thank you."

"I'm sorry that you have no greater goal."

"And I'm glad that I do not." He tucked the finished equation sheet into his notebook.

"Without a goal, I think people are reduced to reacting to circumstances, always working for other people's desires, always doing things because they must and not because they love to do them." He took a fresh sheet of paper from his notebook. "Every act can be done with love, even the smallest."

Not Zen 130: Incompetence

wikimedia 

Incompetence

"This is where I am promoted beyond my competence," she said as she packed up her office. That day, she had been elevated to division chief in her state's transportation department.

Her former assistant said, "You'll be fine."

From the glances he gave her as he helped pack, she could tell he was worried.

She had never wanted a career. She had never wanted anything worldly. At the age of seventeen, she had joined her local nunnery as a novitiate. She'd lived with other nuns under an novitiate's vow. She'd traveled through her community with the sisters to do good works. In doing so, she met a man she liked. Although she had thought her infatuation with him was secret, he surprised her by proposing.

At the advice of the nuns and other novitiates, she left the professional ministry. She had intended to marry, raise good children, and work as needed. It was to be an ordinary life for her although, secretly, she hoped to return to her religious life.

In the eyes of her youthful self, the act of raising a family seemed simple. Soon she discovered that her work in the home was never done and that as he children grew she wanted to work out of the home to support them better. When she got a promotion, she still put in overtime so she could give to charity. She supported her extended family. She lent her money to friends to help them through crises. All of these choices led her to tie herself to her ordinary life more than she'd thought possible.

Three promotions later, here she was, packing her office.

She arrived to her new desk during lunch. That afternoon, she started in her role as the division chief with a series of interviews. She pulled her staff aside, one by one, to find out how things had gone wrong before. She accompanied them to their stations. She evaluated their work and learned who among them was capable of more.

"We've had three bosses here in six years," said a woman who worked at the front counter. Her movements seemed tired. "All of them failed. Two of them just gave up."

"I will not give up," she promised.

The next morning, she found orders on her desk from her supervisors. She let them wait.

Within a few weeks, she confirmed for herself that she'd been promoted beyond what she could manage. She'd seen that her staff had more than they could handle. With that in mind, she moved people into the roles that best fit them. She taught everyone to apologize.

Three years later, her old assistant visited.

"Everyone complains about your department," he said. "But everyone also says that performance has never been better. And you're still here. So I suppose this was not beyond your competence."

"I could tell you had doubts." She laughed. "In fact, it's beyond everyone's competence."

"No. You're doing it."

"I'm not, really." She folded her arms. "And no, I'm not managing with better staff or giving the old ones more responsibilities. They already had more than they can handle. All I did was teach them to drop their lowest priorities and to apologize for doing that."

"But everyone says service improved."

"I suppose it has. Once I told the staff they could do their most important tasks well and leave the rest undone, the only thing to teach was the apologizing. The staff are constantly saying that they're sorry they can't take on more tasks. But what they do, they do as well as they can."

"Your supervisors want to give your department more funds for the first time in twenty years. They wouldn't want to hear that you feel incompetent."

"Some jobs are beyond everyone's competence." She shrugged. "But still they need to be done."

Not Zen 129: The Spokeless Wheel

"There are no precepts, really," the nurse said as he strolled through the cracked-open door. A crowd of people had broken into the storefront.

"That is a dangerous thought." His friend's scowl deepened. He hesitated before he entered. When he finally moved, he jammed his hands into his pockets and kept his eyes on the broken glass that lay all over the floor.

"Look for something besides bandages," the first one said. "They're not having luck with those. We need tourniquets."

"I will not steal. I told you already, that is against the precepts."

"We should try to save the wounded people regardless."

They had come upon a crowd of around twenty people in a panic. Some in the crowd had participated in a demonstration, which had met a counter-demonstration, which had turned into a riot. Stones had been thrown. Shots had been fired. Now there were wounded men and women among the crowd. They and their friends had rushed to the drugstore to seek refuge and medicine.

When they found the doors locked, they broke in. Passers-by helped, including the nurse, who felt he could stop some people from dying if he worked quickly.

"The woman you are thinking of has surely bled too much already," said the reluctant fellow behind him.

"I see iodine." The man pointed to a shelf of bottles. "I'll grab that too. That's helpful."

"This package actually says it's a tourniquet." With an air of regret, the follower noticed the right box. He took two steps, bent, and picked it up. Behind it was another box of tourniquets, and another. The first man rushed over.

"Come," he hissed. He grabbed the rest. "We have to be fast."

Outside, the two men approached a woman who had been shot in the leg. Her friends were trying to stop her bleeding but her heartbeat pushed the red liquid through their fingers. They had not slowed her impending death.

The nurse pushed supplies into his friend's hands. He gave orders to the woman's companions, who were frantic and eager to help. They elevated her leg and held her. He knelt next to her and tied a tourniquet rope around her thigh. He tightened it until her bleeding slowed to a trickle.

"Right," he said. "You say you have experience. So bandage her. Who's next?"

A young man offered his left arm. He had ripped off his sleeve and tied it near his shoulder. The cloth didn't reach his pressure point and he hadn't pulled it tight enough. The nurse's friend elevated his arm while the nurse tied a proper bandage.

Finally, three people rushed forward with a late arrival, a young man who couldn't walk. A white splinter of bone jutted out of his bloodied leg below the knee.

"There are two stretchers in there," the nurse said to his friend. "Go in and grab them both."

"But ..."

"Hurry. This man needs carried somewhere else and so does the woman who was shot. Her friends put a bandage on and it looks good. But she's passed out."

A half-dozen people rushed back into the drugstore. The nurse's friend followed them. He had seen the stretchers, too, behind the sales counter. He gave directions. The other folks shouted in triumph as they carried out the body boards and straps. Then they grabbed other medical supplies. Again, they shouted with glee as they discovered what they needed.

"Why are you crying?" the nurse asked his friend on his return.

"Because they are wounded." His dark-haired friend had to wipe his eyes. He sniffed. "Because they fought other people. Because they stole. And because we theived these bandages and tools."

"We are doing what we can to save lives." The nurse kept working on the broken leg.

"We did it wrong."

"The precepts are a guide to thinking. That's all." He finished cleaning the wound. With a nod, he allowed the young man's friends to lay the blood-matted head down on the road. "They are not a rulebook in some lifelong game. It does not help you or anyone to blindly follow them."

The second fellow closed his mouth. He wiped his face with his sleeve while he watched his friend complete the temporary splint.

"Following the precepts helps others," he responded.

"That's a good point. It shows that you're thinking. Go on, then. I'm almost done here. Pick a precept and I'll explain it as a guide, not a rule."

"One of the five, one of the eight, or one of the ten?"

"Listen to you." The nurse laughed. He covered his patient in a blanket to aid against shock. "This is why I had to say there are no precepts."

"I pick 'refrain from stealing.' It is vital. You cannot refute the rightness of it."

"Fine. I won't attempt to refute it. Who can doubt that refraining from stealing is a good thing?  But saving the wounded is more important." The nurse motioned for the stretcher. Three men and a woman brought it over. They laid it down next to the prone body. "These people and we, too, broke into the store for medicines. They recognize that it was right to do. How can you not?"

"Perhaps they are wrong. Perhaps you are wrong."

"Does it feel wrong?"

Everyone crouched. His friend, too, knelt to lift the half-conscious man onto the stretcher.

"Maybe this is not stealing," said the nurse's friend. He raised his voice as the wounded man cried out in pain. "Most of these people were not taking the medicines for their own benefit. You weren't. The need is urgent. They and you could not wait and maybe let the wounded die."

"I agree." The stretcher carriers took over for a moment. They strapped the young man in place on the board. "But the store owner would not agree. The equipment and medicine has been lost to him. The police and your precepts do not agree with this either. Do you understand?"

"No."

One of the stretcher carriers asked if they could carry away the man with the broken leg. The nurse nodded. Another bleeding woman approached. She had received a cut along her arm from fingertip to elbow. The nurse peeled back her sleeve while the nurse's friend, with care and drying tears, elevated her arm.

"The precepts are not a rulebook," the nurse continued. "There are not eight spokes in your dharma wheel. There are no spokes at all. Or maybe there are an infinite number, an endless interconnection between moral discipline and the circle of mindfulness that holds everything together."

"If there are no spokes in the wheel, then I'm lost. That is too free for me."

"You have reasons, I understand. But loosen your grip on your false simplicity.  And tighten this bandage."

Not Zen 128: Prejudice

"How did you fail to notice?" said the elder karabash dog.  He turned to the other two members of his pack.  They stood over the flesh-stripped corpse of a sheep, one of the flock they had sworn to guard.

"Two jackals led me on a chase," explained the youngest.  His tan coat was smooth and unblemished. The mask of fur around his snout was dark with no flecks of grey.  "I fought them.  They kept laughing at me.  Then they ran off."

"There was a third," said the other.  His skin and fur were thick and brindled.  "When I brought my flock to join my brother's, I heard the growl of a jackal.  I crossed the hill.  At the top, I smelled blood.  When I glanced down, I saw the reason."

"Why did the jackal growl?"

"It was facing down a cheetah.  You know how cowardly they are.  The cheetah had stolen bites.  When confronted, it fled.  Afterwards, the jackal tried to drag off the rest of the body.  I fought him and won."

"Well done."  The elder hated to see any predator collect the spoils of their hunt.  Even if the body had been torn apart, as this one had, every degree of success needed to be met with discouragement.  Otherwise, predators would descend in droves upon the flock.  He could foresee that the next few days would be difficult enough.  The jackals and cheetahs would suspect weakness.

Karabash dogs often battled wolves, jackals, and bears.  It was what they lived for.  They protected livestock and took pride in their successes.  They travelled with the herds, contended with wild hunters, and showed no fear, not even of the bears.  The elder had lost his mate to such a fight although together with her, he had succeeded in driving the bear away.

He contemplated her greatness for a moment.  She had been mother to these two although he did not feel they were the best of her litters.  But then, they had been deprived of her presence, especially the youngest one.  She had been a force for calmness and for determination.  She had sought to protect her pups and her flocks like no other.  There had been no one like her in his life before and there would never be again.

"Some predators can be clever," he told the youngest.  He didn't want to discourage this one by being overly critical.  "In time, you'll learn."

"They are stupid," the lad snarled.  "They are low born, all of them."

The three split up for a while and patrolled the edges of the flock.  Like other karabash dogs, they did not guide herds.  The rams and the ewes did the leading from place to place.  They made decisions in a fashion known only to them.  These sheep, who smelled damp from the recent rain and liked the higher ground today, had decided not to move any farther.  The dogs protected them and nothing more.

In the late afternoon, the elder climbed a hill and surveyed the joined flocks.  He thought about his former mate.  She had loved this spot.  Once, he glimpsed something as it passed through distant trees.  A spotted pattern, it might have been a cheetah.  The sight angered him.  He had respect for all of his foes except those.  The cheetahs never defended their kill, no matter how hard won it was.  They never defended anything.  They were the opposite of his mate.

"I've seen those low-life cheetahs again."  The youngest came up the slope behind him.

"Yes, I know."

"They are the stupidest of all."

"I suppose."

The strong one came last up the slope.  He still reeked of his fight, his bloody triumph.

"No," he whispered. "The cheetahs are wise in their way."

"How can you say that?"

"I have observed them."  His confident stride took him past the others to a sheer rock ledge.  His gaze swept over the sheep below, then beyond.  "I know where they meet by the Kangal stream at the bottom of the next hill.  I can't catch them of course, but I watch them."

"And what do you see?"

"Something I never expected."  He shook his head, at a loss to describe it.  "Come."

The brindled mastiff led the group to the lopsided, low hill that bordered the water.  Trees lined the banks.  Behind the trees, to the southwest, lay a clearing of tall grass.  It was the sort of hollow in which cheetahs preferred to roam.

The elder dog liked his vantage point.  He could see the sheep, although they were not as close as he usually preferred, and he could see a lone cheetah.  It could see him, too.  Its gaze swept up to where the three dogs lie.  Nevertheless, the lowly predator strode forward into the clearing.  By the edge nearest the water, it lay down.  There, it waited as the dogs did.  Another cheetah arrived, this one from the north.  Then another came.

"We are observed," said the last of the cheetahs.  She gazed up at the dogs.

"They are welcome," said the leader.  He raised his voice.  "Karabash dogs, today we are contemplating the impermanence of all things as represented by our departed grandmother, 'Runs Like the Kangal Stream.'"

"Where is she?" called the elder before he could think.

"She drove away a bear to protect her cubs.  So here we are, alive.  But she died of her wounds.  So here we are, trying to achieve a level of wisdom without her."

The youngest karabash dog snorted.  The elder turned and barked at him.  Startled, the other dog drew back.

After a moment, the elder mastiff made his decision.  He ventured downslope.

"I believe we shall sit in the back, guru of the cheetahs."

The cheetah closed his eyes and waited for the elder dog.

He allowed himself respect and curiosity for this enemy, especially for his enemy's grandmother.  He might have liked to meet her.  He felt a presence by his side.  It was his brindle-coated son.  The fellow stayed silent.  But he carried, still, the lingering scent of bloody victory.  He had calmness, focus, and certainty of purpose.  It occurred to the elder that his brindle-coated son had been right.  He hadn't wavered in his determination about the cheetahs.  In that, he was like his mother.

The youngest caught up to them both.

"How can you tolerate this?" he growled.  "How can you sit so near?  They are lowest of the low.  They have no souls.  You've said before that we have nothing in common with them."

"We have one thing.  It's more than I thought.  Don't let your prejudice blind you."  He interposed his body between the young one and the cheetahs.  He lay down in the manner of the guru.  "And don't worry about their souls.  Sit still now and pay attention to your own."

Not Zen 127: Governance

c. Pakkin Leung via Wikimedia Commons

Governance

"How could this have happened?" the mother of one child asked the school principal. She wiped her face with a napkin.

The fight had occurred over a ball, as many small incidents had before. A girl on one team kicked a red ball out of the field of play. In the shouting and confusion, no one on the other team ran to pick it up. A different group of children grabbed it. They didn't look at the game going on. They began throwing the ball to one another. At that point, a boy on the fielding team ran up to take it away.

The boy holding the ball refused to give it up. The two contestants wrestled over it. They shouted. All the children in the area began yelling at others or calling for help.

It was the kind of playground scuffle that usually got broken up by teachers. However, the teachers in the school had recently been forbidden to intervene. They didn't pull the boys apart. Instead, due to what seemed to be a fortunate circumstance, they requested police assistance.

The two police officers were visiting the building to give a talk. One of them got the call to action when a teacher rushed into his room, shouted there was a 'terrible fight' on the playground and that he was needed. The officer, as he'd been trained to do, put in a call to his backup before he went to assist.

When he arrived on the playground, he was surprised to find the fight still going on. A minute had passed and he was aware that even a minute is a long time for a tussle between children. He was more surprised when he reached out to the boys rolling on the ground. They were big for their age, the size of small adults, and strong. They knocked him off of his feet.

That was when the second officer arrived on the scene.

The accounts of the witnesses differed wildly at this point. But even the police agreed that this was when they responded as if the children were adults. First, they each tackled a combatant. One of the boys grabbed at the female officer's weapons. The officer used a stick to beat him back. Both boys tried to defend themselves from the police sticks. Both were beaten further and a teacher who tried to intervene received a head wound from the second officer. The children were further beaten, handcuffed, and arrested. The police filed charges against them for assault, battery, and resisting arrest.

Although the children were taken to a hospital along with the wounded teacher, armed guards accompanied them. When the parents went to see their children, they were turned away by the guards and told to see the school principal, who had recently arrived.

"They're children," insisted the parents to the principal. "They're not adults. Children."

"They've been charged as adults."

"How is that even possible? It's simply not true. How are they allowed to suddenly decide that our children are grown up when no one else has?"

The mother of the larger of the two boys pointed out that he was mentally challenged and normally gentle. He had never been involved in a playground incident before.

That evening, pictures of the beaten children appeared in the news. Within an hour, the guards were called back to the police station. Nurses admitted the parents to their children's rooms. The next day, charges were dropped. Instead of talking about how wrong the teachers and children had behaved, the police spokesman at a press conference said the department would focus on what the officers had done wrong.

The larger child had been admitted unconscious. He remained in that state due, doctors stated, to head trauma. Two days later, he died in his hospital bed with his mother by his side.

She and the principal returned to the hospital several times to visit the remaining, recovering boy and his parents. They were surprised to overhear, over a news broadcast on the hospital television, that a source within the police department said the officers in the school child beating had done nothing wrong. The investigation of the incident had been conducted quickly and would soon exonerate both officers.

The parents and principal asked to speak to someone from the department. It took two days but the Deputy Chief of Police agreed to come to the hospital for a talk. He admitted to them that the news leak was correct. The investigation had found nothing against the officers.

"They've done nothing wrong? Nothing? They killed my boy."

"They acted as they were trained to do."

"They used deadly force against unarmed children."

"That's unfortunate. We'll change our training to prevent this sort of tragedy. But again, they did as they were trained."

"Then the whole department should be punished."

"How?" The Deputy Chief chuckled. He glanced at their faces and took a deep breath. "That isn't practical. There's no way to punish the police department without hurting public safety."

As she shook her head and fell into tears, the school principal spoke up.

"We punish schools when they perform poorly. Why don't we do it to other public departments?"

"How, smart guy? Shut down police stations?"

"We could do that as easily as we shut down schools. Why not? But there's another way. You could do it personally. You could de-fund the job pleasantries. Take away the department coffee machines or your rewards program. Withhold the fanciest equipment from your new fitness center. Take out the music player."

The Deputy Chief started to say something but he paused.

"That sounds good to me," said the father of the recovering boy. "We should strip away the luxuries for law enforcement organizations when they misuse their force. Give it back later as they improve."

"But …"

"Just as an individual is punished for misusing martial arts and hurting others," the principal continued, "a law enforcement organization should be punished for misusing force."

Not Zen 126: Cooperation

Three former teammates seated themselves for lunch. Each set down a plastic tray on the black tabletop. One placed a stack of napkins in the center for all to use. Another tossed in flatware. This wasn't the fanciest place or the best food, they all agreed, but it was quick. The restaurant was no more than a five minute walk from any of their offices. It had become their place to meet.

"Good to see you guys," said the woman. She unwrapped three straws and popped them into their drinks, each in turn, hers last. 
 
"Whoops. I forgot to grab condiments," said the fellow who usually had that job. He stretched over to a nearby, empty table and swept off the salt and pepper shakers.

"Are we getting lazy?" the first man asked, the one who had brought napkins. "We've let more than a month go by without talking."

Two years ago, they had worked together for a large company. Each had left for a better offer in a smaller company. Now they headed technical service teams. As leaders, they kept busier than they'd been before. But they kept in touch.

It didn't take long for them to trade shop talk about how they were doing, the advances in technologies, the contracts they'd won and lost, projects they'd barely gotten done, and other projects in which they'd succeeded beyond what they'd dreamed.

"It's no secret that the government is putting out a combined contract," said one fellow as he picked up a napkin he'd brought. He wiped his mouth.

"Yeah, everyone in the business has been reading the request for proposal," his friend agreed. He cut another piece from his steak. "That's the biggest contract of the year so far. We're bidding on it, of course. I'm in charge of our proposal team."

"Some of the industry giants are going to compete." The woman took a sip from her glass. "They mentioned it to me last week. It's big enough to attract them. They're putting together bids."

"Ugh." The fellow who'd brought it up set down his food. "That means none of our companies stand a chance."

"Speak for yourself." Next to him, his former teammate chewed on his steak. He folded his arms and leaned back before he paused to conclude, "We'll underbid everyone."

The other two stared at him for a moment. They glanced to each other, then down to their lunch plates.

"You can try," the first fellow ventured after a moment. "But do you meet all of the requirements? My company is a few positions short, I think, or we have to send a couple of our folks to get certified in skills we don't have on board. I wouldn't mind us teaming up on a joint proposal."

"Are you crazy?" His friend opened his mouth in a burst of laughter. His teeth gleamed. "Why would I team up with you? We're competitors."

"Yeah, but we could team up to compete against the bigger companies."

"But then I couldn't win the contract for my company, could I? Even in your best case scenario, we'd have to share the spoils. The benefits of winning wouldn't come totally to me."

"That's right." Slowly, he nodded. "That's partnership, I guess."

They ate in silence for half a minute. The fellow responsible for condiments got up to get sauces he'd forgotten. At that moment, the woman turned to her remaining companion.

"Is that offer you made to him open to my company too?"

"Of course. You're at such a high-end company, I didn't think you'd be interested. I should have asked you first, shouldn't I?" He shook his head and scowled at himself. 

"There are eight expertise areas listed in the contract," she said. "It occurs to me that your company has the best expertise in two areas. You really do. We're a leader in three of them, I'd say. And by that I mean we're better than even the big companies. You know it's true."

"Yeah, although the big ones are pretty strong at everything."

"But not they're not best. They won't be better than us combined for this bid."

"The government might not trust an offer that doesn't come from a big company." He sighed.

"Maybe. But we can have the best qualified bid. That's something." Her eyes lit with excitement. "Even if we lose, the agency will see our expertise levels. They'll probably ask one of the big companies to outsource work to us. After all, we're leaders in key areas."

"Yeah, even a loss could be a win." He had to acknowledge that everything she said was right. "Are you up for a working lunch on this tomorrow?"

"I'll draft a bid to review."

A month later, when the proposal deadline arrived, it turned out that the company with the lowest bid was deemed under-qualified. They did not show the proper areas of expertise. Their proposal was dismissed in the first step of the evaluation process. In contrast, the combined effort of the two smaller companies won the contract. Their proposal survived even a challenge from the bigger companies and a rebidding process.

As the contract was awarded, the executive who had lost his bid received a demotion.

"You were a fine engineer," his boss said as they walked from his former office to his new desk. "But you don't seem ready for an executive position. You're not the competitor we're looking for."

"I'm more competitive than anyone!" he complained.

"Really." His boss eyed him skeptically. "Then why didn't you get us on the winning team?"