Making Sure I'm Still Here
.... and Life Coaching with Joe
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Believing, Really Believing, In Basic Goodness Juneteenth is no longer a national holiday, just as the celebration of Doctor Martin Luther King is no longer a national holiday. The shameful history of slavery, the Reconstruction era, and Jim Crow are all being removed from textbook history. A powerful white right-wing coalition has risen, seemingly under […]
Staring in the Face of Hate Lately there are times I find myself yelling at my computer. That’s embarrassing because as a Buddhist I’m committed to a path of nonviolence and compassion. I do what I can to my maintain emotional balance. I try to stay politically neutral and focus on the human qualities […]
FINDING YOUR GROOVE This post is inspired by the great rhythm keepers of the music of our lives. From African tribal drumming, through the ubiquitous grooves of Hal Blaine, Carol Kaye and the Wrecking Crew, to the funk groove of Tony Thompson and the beautifully intuitive timekeeping of Ringo, their grooves moved us across dancefloors, […]
BUDDHA’S LUMINOUS PROMISE The holiday season is marked by lights that shimmer and glisten in the cold darkness of long nights. This tradition of surrounding ourselves energetically with radiant color harkens back to the earliest experiences of the human race. In ancient times, humans had fewer distractions and were more attuned to the world […]
Uncovering Our Buddha Nature The Buddha grew up in relative luxury for the time and the conditions of the city-state in which he was raised as a prince. In his teens he began to exhibit a restlessness not uncommon to people at that age. He wanted to know more than he could see within the […]
Is Where We Are The good news is, you’re already here. The trick is to remember that. And to recognize that. And to experience that here, now. It’s easy. Maybe too easy? We seem to want dramatic solutions to dramatic problems. We take classes in cognitive awareness, feel crystals, and throw the I Ching. The […]
FACING THE DANGER We all feel it. Some of us live with it all the time. That live-wire sense of urgency seems to compel us to do … something. Anything. The intensity with which it hits seems to urge action. Anxiety is, if nothing else, uncomfortable. We sometimes gird for the danger locked in straight […]
Struggling Through the Hangover of Delusion There was a song by Neil Sedaka in the 60’s called “Breaking Up is Hard to Do”. Many of us have been there. It is hard to let go of someone to whom we’ve grown attached. First we try to let them go, only to find the part […]
Gratitude Without Demand Good morning. I’m writing this on a spectacular morning at the dawn of winter. The sky is blue, a few white clouds drifting by, and the weather is gentle for the week before Thanksgiving. It reminded me that Trungpa Rinpoche used to begin many of his talks, no matter the hour, […]
Turning Loneliness Toward Aloneness Everybody wants to belong. That drive, a primal self-defense embedded deep in our psychology, is so strong that when we don’t belong to something it feels empty and frightening. We often interpret that as a failing on our part. Hence, for some of us, being alone is torturous. I would […]