The Infatuation of Evil

I have been noticing a lot while we have been down in Florida that there is this fascination with evil. A friend of ours had a shirt that said something like, "Who needs a God when you've got a Satan!" We spoke to another girl on the shire on a faire day who was telling us that she is evil. She could not be convinced otherwise, she was evil. She had the black eye liner and deep mope lines to prove it. She is not the only one. Lots of people really really like the bad guy, so why this fascination with evil and being dark and brooding?

I think part of it is that people really do not think about what they are saying and what it actually implies. A lot of the images we think of as evil, like Darth Maul here, i am going to face it, they look really cool. But, it is not really what evil is. Evil in the real world is not just wearing cool make up and a black cape and kicking butt and taking names. Real world evil is much more exemplified by the Senator Palpatine role to stick with Star Wars analogies. Evil is the creepy politician in the background pulling strings and shutting down factory towns to line the pockets of his cronies. Evil is the adult who takes advantage of a child and abuses them because of their position of power. Hitler was evil. I really think that most of these people who claim to be evil do not revel when they think about these things. Does the person who likes Satan hear that her nephew was molested by their local preacher and go, "Yeah Satan!" Does the evil girl from the faire wake up in the morning to find her car stolen and raise the devil horns in the air and cheer, "Yeah evil!" Does the guy who is an evil dude who can't be contained find out his boss is closing down the plant to ship jobs to a sweat shop in Asia and say, "Yes dude, that was so evil!" I really don't think so. But, those are the things that the bad guys really do.



I think what it comes down to is that people are mostly addicted to the mope. We have created a culture that loves to think life sucks. We find the brooding vampire and gaunt pale moping guy sexy. We also idealize the selfish. These two things are coming together to create a pretty miserable society. Very few people are actually decent to each other and we are addicted to our sadness.

We here at the Lords of Adventure (the sword fighting show i do with my buddy John Williams) have fully embraced being good guys. We are also really addicted to the air we breathe and living life to the fullest. I definitely see it taking people by surprise and they don't really know how to deal with it. One thing is for sure, they love it. Being positive and embracing the side of the light is kind of addictive. We have found that on occasion, we will say something like, beautiful morning today! When the mopers have sent us back a "Why is it a good day?" We reply with a truth that is really really primal and deep, "The choice is yours."

That is deeply deeply true. You can choose the type of day you have, you can choose to wallow, or you can choose to live your life deeply and with meaning. Smiling and being positive is actually a lot sexier when you are around it for more than about 2 minutes.

Endorphins

I have been training in the martial arts for a very long time. I have spent thousands of hours in the gym, hitting a bag, sparring, grappling, lifting weights and generally working out. It keeps me in good shape, but honestly, that is a side effect. I have never worked out to be in shape although that is nice. I love that i can run up a set of stairs or play all day with younger cousins or kids that i am teaching and have them get tired way before i do. It is pretty awesome, but truly, that is a nice side effect and not the reason why i keep going back.

The practical side of the training is to improve my martial arts skills. That has always been my quest. The philosophy of Jeet Kune Do is perfect. I see no difference between the spiritual quest and trying to figure out what is the most efficient and effective fighting style. I am a man of peace, make no mistake. It takes way more than it should to drive me to be angry, but i still want to know, honestly if what i am doing works or if there is a better way.

Those are the practical and the side effect, but the addiction runs deeper. Make no mistake, it is an addiction. I need it to feel good as sure as any junkie does. On days that i do not get to go to the gym or get my body moving, i feel groggy and i withdrawal. I love this addiction though. Those endorphins make the world come into focus and when they pump through my veins, i can imagine no sweeter high. I am glad to be an addict in this case.

The thing about the endorphin addiction, and the key that i think makes it a healthy drug, is the fact that you have to strive and work for that high. You do not achieve a state of higher consciousness or feel that runner's high after a single punch or five steps on a run. Opening the door to the gym and stepping in does not put you over the top. You must achieve it and push through the hard parts of the training to arrive at bliss. And that certainly is what it is. There is that point in the work out where everything is flowing smoothly and the body is alive with reaction and action. It is a moving meditation. It is no longer TJ punching the bag when i get to that point, it is just punching of the bag. My ego dissolves away. It is lovely and one of the favorite things i have ever done.

William James said that drugs were a valid form of religious experience. He was right, from what i have heard really, i do not have a lot of experience. I have never needed to because my drug was always found in the sweet sound of flesh pounding into canvas and the music coming out of the speakers. Drugs can do for you what the endorphins do, but it is like the dark side of the force. You do not need to go through the fires and the battles to get there. It is the quick and easy way. The same thing could be seen in the eyes of the people i saw in their cars on Mount Washington in New Hampshire. I had walked there from New Jersey, i arrived on that peak after a grueling day of seventeen miles through the woods. They drove up for a half an hour. They could never feel exactly the same connection and spiritual peace i felt with that mountain, because i mixed more of my labor with her majesty.

I have watched friends who need the drugs. They have to smoke pot, or drink from the bottle they keep ever on hand because they have managed to turn the volume of their lives down. It may have been abuse or a gradual turning away from life living itself over time, but they have found their way to the easy drug. It saddens me a little.

The quick and easy drugs turn the volume of one's life down. The quest to release your own endorphins, the healthy high of your own mind, turns the volume and clarity of life up. It feeds on itself. It is a circle ever returning into itself and it enhances ... everything. I am alive, i am alive. I feel the fire and electric running through my legs of muscles pushed to their limits as i type this and i know it is true. I am alive.

Not saying i would not enjoy a beer right now either. Just saying. That can be awesome too. But, people of the world, find your inner drug and get high on your life. It is pretty awesome, even if you might not think so at the moment.

New Year's

New Year's have never been a very eventful holiday for me. It started with Calvin Martin at Rutgers University i think. It was his philosophy and classes in Native American history that got me on this road. I don't really know what to call his classes really, history seems inappropriate even though that is the department they were seated in. Calvin thought history was the problem, and because the native peoples of these lands would not have dealt in history as we know, he would not deal with it in his classes either. It was not their story. The native peoples of the Americas told myths, so that was what we learned in the classes of Calvin Luther Martin at Rutgers in New Brunswick. We also talked a lot about the nature of time. We had a seminar class that was entitled simply "Time." Calvin claimed it was the only class in a history department anywhere that he knew of that talked about time at all. Odd since that is really the subject of the whole business.

Anyway, what he said was powerful. There was a veritable cult of Calvin Martin at Rutgers. Our classes would have upwards of 400 students attending, all wide eyed and eager to here the weekly lesson. He spoke powerfully. Myths are like that though. I saw that first hand when i taught high school. The most unruly classes would sit in rapt attention for 25 minutes without a word whenever i would tell them a story. It was amazing. There was a truth there that rang out to all of us in the class. I learned much and it has shaped me and the ideas i have had ever since. Since my philosophy is Jeet Kune Do, i took what was useful from the class and it is definitely a core component of what makes up the way i navigate my world view. Others had a harder time separating the knowledge and the power of the stories from the man himself, and some people were broken when Calvin moved on. I feel it was probably similar with Bruce Lee. He tried to get people to find their own way, make their own style, but they followed him and wanted to be like him. He eventually had to go because students were not getting it. I have wondered at times if that is partially why Calvin moved on.

Anyway, to move on now myself. Those stories and what we learned about time in Calvin's class led me to much of the worldview i hold today. It led me to give up age and really led to a separation and eventual divorce from time. It has been an amazing road. As a short recap, i have given up time and age, that does not mean that i think i do not "age." It is the measurement i have a problem with. I can be totally down with the event of a changing body and the way we live our lives from birth and growth, through eventual slowing and decay to death. It is a beautiful cycle, but i do not need to deal with trying to place numbers and value of years on that process. I think it has dire implications that i have talked about in several earlier blogs.

It hit me tonight driving home from my friends house after making merry for New Year's Eve, that the holiday has really never held any real value for me since i shaped some ideas in those classes at Rutgers University. It is holiday that is all about the measure of time and since time and i have had our divorce, i have really not given much care or thought to this holiday that is the child of time. There have been years i have done nothing, gone to bed or headed out into the woods. None of it was done because it was New Year's Eve or day, but because it was what i chose to do as i would have chosen it on any other day of the year. I go to parties on New Year's the same way. I will go for the same reason i would go any other night. I even participate, but it is really to be social.

Thoreau said in Walden i believe, "Time is but the stream i go a'fishin in." Beautiful words that exactly get what i am talking about. I do not believe that Thoreau meant that he went fishing in the stream called Time, but that the way he dealt with time, literally was the stream he had his line in. It was the event of the place, the Earth living herself, that was real, not numbers on a wall or in a calendar. Just some stuff to think about.

It is beautiful when you get into living in the event. People all around me say that time is going by so quickly. I feel that nothing is further from the truth. If anything for me, time is moving more and more slowly as i become better and better at living in each moment, infinitely. It is hard at first, because time wants to hold on to you and gets his claws into you. But eventually, if you are persistent, Time will begin to realize that he is more desperate than you are and he will start to slowly let you go. Once that happens you can fall into the vast canopy of the stars and persist there forever in a night. You can float on your back down a river and be carried on the time of the Earth, not on the time on your wrist. You can be here in this moment breathing in and out as the lungs of the Earth and you can realize what it means to be truly and deeply alive and forever in a moment. The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand lads and lasses, embrace it. When you get outside the shackles of time, your life will be set free.

Ideas

I got to thinking the other day that the biggest problem our politics is having right now relates to something Chris Rock said in Dogma, “I think it's better to have ideas. You can change an idea. Changing a belief is trickier. Life should be malleable and progressive, working from idea to idea permits that. Beliefs anchor you to certain points and limit growth. New ideas can't generate. Life
becomes stagnant.”

Our politicians on each side are holding onto their point of view like religious beliefs and no one is willing to see that what they really should have are ideas that we can all work together to change and shape to the benefit of everyone. Either side of the political spectrum also seems to have this belief that to listen to anything the other side says and think about it is tantamount to blasphemy. If the other side says it, it must be wrong. We can not get anywhere like this. Lets start having some ideas people and stop taking ourselves so seriously.

The Adventure

There have been dark valleys. There have been long walks in the shadow. I realize that reading the last post in my blog here. I do feel like there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I have learned a great deal about myself. I am becoming the adventurer i tell everybody that they should be.

John and i recently did the Connecticut Renaissance Festival and someone asked us how we are able to do it, how do we keep so happy and energetic all day. His response was brilliant. He pointed to a child of about 7 or 8 years old who was all smiles and running by and he said, "Because we never forgot how to do that." So true. The embrace of one's inner child is so fundamentally important, especially when you are working in interactive theater and want to bring that joy to the people you see who desperately need it.

My Godfather Bill Cash knew that. He passed away to the next adventure this week and i spoke about him at his funeral. My earliest memory of my Uncle Bill, as i called him, was when he took me to a Phillies game when i was probably about 8, back when i had an age. We had to park in Section 8, because, as he explained to me, a Section 8 is the discharge crazy people get from the military. Bill was definitely crazy in that way that is awesome. He even made parking at the baseball game fun, he made it an adventure.

I have been feeling that again. It has been a long and winding road but i am definitely embracing the inner joy. I got a pair of pants the other day that had a fuzzy lining and they are warm and feel like a cloud inside. I told my old roommates, "These pants are awesome, it is the best thing that has ever happened to me." And in that moment it was sincere, although a little crazy to think of a pair of pants as the best thing that ever happened.

But, that my friends is the childlike way of looking at things. Everything to a baby is awesome because everything is new. The sheer joy of seeing the sacred in everything, in life living itself, the whole dream of all of this. It is brilliant and i am truly honored to be a part of it. Life is good and i feel stronger for my journey through the valley of darkness. The sunlight looks all the sunnier and i am excited for what adventures may come.

The chaos storm in my head

There is never room for anyone to sit in my car. It drives me slightly mad. Heaps of clothing, a lap top, bags of martial arts equipment, boxes of marketing materials for one of too many projects litter everything but the driver's seat and there is even spill over into that sanctuary for my bum on occasion. It drives me slightly mad as i said. The idea, indeed the dream of enough time to actually clean it out seems nigh impossible. It is the same as i watch the miles click over the due date for an oil change, 1000, 2000, 3000 extra miles. There is no time for any of these small maintenance things that make one feel civilized and functional. The same is true of my room.

I do not know how i always wind up here, but i do. I am not sure why i can not say no to a project or how office work became such a part of my life. It is really not in my skill set and it makes me angry to do. I think that it is too much for one brain. I also find it really annoying when i suggest that and then people tell me that it is not really stressful or ask me why. Maybe i am just not as resilient as you, maybe i am a failure, but truth of the matter is, it is highly highly stressful. My mind and thinking does not function like that. I remember when working as a waiter standing at the computer screen to input orders and nearly hyperventilating worried that i had forgotten someone's drink and fearing that someone would ask me a question and make the reason i was standing at the screen be completely gone from thought. This time period is like that but at all times. There is so much. I live in constant fear that i will forget something. I spend April to June on a yearly basis now not being able to sleep. As i lay there at day's end, alone with my thoughts, certain things that need to be done flood over me like a storm. Sleep does not come. Sometimes i have to get up and make a note of it to get beyond. For the most part i lay there completely awake. When i finally do sleep and manage the hour or two that i am apparently allotted, my body goes into full rebellion, cursing the idea of getting up and going to play positive with people.

The thing that really bothers me is that i know better. "In a hundred years we will all be dead." "Hoka Hey - it is a good day to die." I have said these things, to me a blessing, meaning that you should enjoy your life and live each day to the fullest, and that these things we stress about do not really matter. I have become a slave to the day however and the planet load of stress and the moons of stress that orbit it seeming too large a weight to carry around. I know that these things are not what is important. My grandmother is going to be turning 90 soon. Will i be able to see her before she is gone? There is a woman i love in South Dakota that i messed up with because of what i am writing here and other reasons. I do not go to her though, i continue to trudge through this mess. It is a trap of my own devise and my inability to say no.

There needs to be a reckoning. What is the effect of this lament? I am not trying to whine to the world, i see a problem though and i need to find a way through it. Office manager and marketing guy is not what i am good at and it makes my skin crawl. Teaching people the martial arts, being a philosopher, teaching people to be a hero and an adventurer is where my value lies and i think that is what i am supposed to be doing. I would love to be able to be there for my friends and family, but what i am there for is office work and emails. That needs to happen. Is this constant push, this living life at a dead run worth it? It certainly is not economically. I could work more working minimum wage at McDonald's and with that job the greatest benefit would be that i could go home and not worry about it.

Let's see if i can be the adventurer i tell everyone else to be and affect change in this life time.

Protecting Our Children

We recently got involved in a huge facebook debate about what should happen to Joe Paterno and others at Penn State who did not do more to stop the child abuse that was happening at the school. That is turning into a philosophical debate but i do not think that we should forget the bigger issue, protecting our kids and making sure this sort of thing does not happen to them.

I taught martial arts to kids for many years and learned a lot about children's self defense and i think there are some things you can do with your kids that are more help to them than any martial arts program can be. Some times, a karate class can actually become a problem if you are not careful of several things that get overlooked as we teach our children how to kick and punch.

1. Avoid giving your kids a false sense of their skills. It was essentially important for me that the kids in my classes knew that just because they know martial arts, they can not win in a stand up fist fight with an adult that outweighs them by 50 to 100 pounds. I would usually start lessons about self defense versus grown ups by asking the kids a question like this: "Ok who would win, a grown up who has never studied karate or you?" Many, many times the kids would say that they would. Understand that for a child, especially if they are under 10 or so, to train in martial arts kind of makes you a super hero. They even have a super hero uniform. You must let them know that this is not true. One of the worst things that can happen is for a kid to get grabbed by a predator and to try and stand there and fight with them. When it comes to actual physical contact and abduction prevention, children have to strike quick and surprise and then get away. There are weight classes for a reason and if your 50 pound child feels like they can beat a 200 pound man, they are going to lose and maybe disappear God forbid they are ever in that situation.
Talk to your kids about this whether or not they train in martial arts. Let them know to be aware of their surroundings and that they will not win against someone that is that much bigger than them. I would illustrate this by explaining that even though i have been training for well over 20 years, i am not going to win in a fight against a silver back gorilla. They are too big and too strong. Awareness is the key. Let your kids know to keep their eyes and ears open and if they see someone in the distance they are unsure of, avoid that person.

2. Give your kids the confidence to scream and make a ruckus. When we would do self defense training sometimes a drill we would do was to set up an area of the gym that was the attacker's car, and then the students had to avoid getting dragged or carried there. This was a painful drill for me because i would pad up and encourage them to do whatever they had to to keep me from getting them to my car, if they ended up there they would lose the drill. We tried to encourage them to yell and scream things like "this is not my dad, help me! I am being taken!" Etc. It is really hard for kids to do this. There is a sense of embarrassment at yelling out and being loud that probably has to do with encouraging our kids to be quiet at the right times. Go outside with your kids and be loud with them. Let them know that there are times when it is appropriate to scream at the top of your lungs.

3. Be aware of your surrounding. I reiterate this because it is very important, for kids and adults really. We tend to get inside ourselves as we travel around our daily lives. Lots of people look down at the ground as they walk about and try to be unaware of what is going on around them. Looking down at the ground has two bad effects, 1) you are unaware of potential threats until they are right on you and 2) you look like prey. Predators in nature and among humans do not want to work any harder than they have to. They will pick the weakest member of the society to prey on. Be aware of what is going on around you, take note of people you see on the streets from a distance. Encourage your kids to not walk within grabbing range of adults they do not know and be aware of alleys or cover that people could hide behind. Do this with your kids, take a walk and make it an adventure. Work together to figure out places that could be dangerous and learn about staying out of range where somebody could grab you. If there is a stranger by a van on your side of the street, cross to the other side or pick a different route. If someone is following, tell your kids that they can go into a public place and let them know about adults they can ask for help. That is not just police and firemen but could be managers at a crowded grocery store, a waiter in a restaurant with other people in it, etc. Getting your kids to be smart will help them much more than teaching them how to do a roundhouse kick (which i am not discouraging, i think every one should know how to do a good roundhouse kick.)

4. Expand on the notion of strangers. We used to teach the kids in our classes that there were two kinds of strangers, bad ones and those that you thought were good ones. Strangers that you think are good strangers are your teachers, parents of your friends, martial arts teachers, etc. I would ask in class if the kids thought that i was a stranger and many times they would say no. I would then ask if they knew where i lived? What kind of car do i drive? Do i have brothers and sisters? Etc. If they did not know these things i would let them know that i was indeed a stranger. Now they think that i am a good stranger and they should treat me with that respect as they should with their teachers at school, police officers, etc. but these people do not have the right to do certain things. A really big one is to ask the kids to be alone with them. No adult has a right to ask your kids this. I would ask things of them such as, "If your math teacher says, hey we are going to go to my house after school to work on math problems. Should you go? If i asked you to come with me to the gym to practice your karate should you go? Etc." Make your children aware of the things that are allowed of adults and when adults are crossing the line. Even if your child knows someone very well, that person has no right to ask your child to come home with them. This seems obvious to us as adults, but it is not with small kids, especially when someone has won their trust or is in a hero type role.

5. Let your kids know when it is all right to say no to an adult. This is a really really big one. We give mixed messages to kids. Don't talk back to adults contradicts in a child's brain with respect your elders and listen to adults. This also goes along with 4 above. A stranger a child does not know can stun them into submission with a demanding statement like, "Get in the car!" Your child's mind can have a moment of pause while reconciling the two commands in their head. They know they should not talk to strangers, but they also usually are supposed to listen to adults, and they are presented with one giving an order. This is even more needed when the child is confronted by an authority figure in their life. This is the case with the allegations at Penn State. Children were brought into the showers by someone they trusted and respected. In some way, they are following what they have been taught by listening to what their coach said. You have to give your kids permission to say no to adults at some times and you have to have some hard conversations about the kinds of things that they are allowed to say no to. Let kids know that adults have no right to ask them to go places with them unless they have your explicit permission. Also teach children that no one has a right to violate the privacy of their own bodies.

6. Remember why we want to keep our kids safe in the first place. These conversations can be scary for kids so i would always end the classes on self defense by explaining why we teach them these things. Really, the great majority of kids are not going to have to go through the really ugly awful things that we hear about in the news. They are so shocking partially because they are so unusual and beyond the norm. We teach our kids to be safe because we want them to enjoy their lives. I would tell the kids, "i am not teaching you these things because i want you to be afraid, but because i want you to not have to live in fear." That to me is one of the greatest things the martial arts has ever given to me. I do not live in fear. I feel that i am armed with a knowledge that can allow me to go confidently through my life. Tell your kids that too. We teach them these things so that they can be brave in the world, a world that can be dangerous, but can also be wonderful. Give your kids this confidence so that they can avoid being victims, but also so that they can have the confidence and power to help others as well. For example, let your kids know that they should tell you or authorities when something happens like they are approached by a stranger outside of the school or if someone is asking them inappropriate things.

In all of the talk about Penn State, no matter what your views are, remember that the ultimate goal of all of ours should be to make sure that these things happen to no one. Educated kids can help to make this a reality and to keep them safe from the hideous among us who would prey on the weakest and most vulnerable members of our society. The conversations may be difficult, but have them with your kids, you might just save their life and the lives of others at the same time.