Doing, Being, Dreaming

Last week I had a surfing dream. I haven't had one of those in a while and this one certainly gave me something to think about. To minimize the bore that it can be to read about other people's dreams, I will be as brief as possible:

1) I paddle out behind a huge pack of men. If we surf in this configuration, someone will certainly get hurt. I  paddle around to the side, so that no one will crash into me.

2) I paddle out between two piers in a marina. Dolphins splash in the water in front of me. Then they start swimming towards shore. One of them almost crashes into me and gives me a very annoyed squeak.

3) My "surf instructor" tells me to surf into an empty house, through open windows and doors. "This is your wave," he says. "Take it."  "Screw that", I say. "This is NOT my wave"

4) Later, my "surf instructor" tries to fit his surfboard through the open windows and doors. Of course they don't fit. But he can't figure out why. He was sure they would.

5) Lastly, I sit on my board in the open ocean looking towards the shore. The water is glassy, not a wave in sight. I bob on the current, going nowhere. It's beautiful.

Sections 1through 4 suggest that - between the danger of other surfers crashing into me, dolphins annoyed at me for being in their way and going against the current, and "surf instructors" ordering me to do the un-doable - there's somewhere in my life that I'm not going with the flow. 

Section 5 suggests that, perhaps, sometimes the only thing to do is just sit.

I don't think there is a single spiritual teacher who would disagree with that message.

Expanding Beyond Balance

A good friend sent me this link today from parenting coach Scott Noelle. To all you mommies and daddies -  and all you children of mommies and daddies out there -  I recommend you read it.

In it, Scott points out that, while the catchword for most parents is "balance" - i.e. how to balance work vs. home, them vs. me, permissiveness vs. boundaries - a more potent kind of  power  is available for parents who explore "expansion": of ideas, of lifestyle, of possibility.

Ever since that day on the beach when I realized that I am not "separate" from my children (or from anyone), I've been exploring the possibilities of expansion. Parenting is not what I thought it was. In fact, I can't even say that I'd really "thought" about what it was at all. Instead, I'd inherited a mass of assumptions - from my own family, from history, from culture - that had gone largely unquestioned until now.

Truthfully, I started surfing to get the hell away from my family. I needed something for "me". Of course, there's nothing inherently wrong with that. Everyone, parents and kids alike, needs some time to themselves. The irony, however, is that the joy I've found in the water is bringing me closer to my family and more willing to spend time with them. And more likely to enjoy it. Not because I've necessarily found  "balance." After all, two hours of surfing a week does not equal the remaining 24/7.

Instead, I've been inspired to expand myself and my vision of what is possible for my family and for all families - including yours. Because  family is the foundation of any society, where families are unhealthy, stressed, and basically dysfunctional, the society that is built on top of them will suffer the same.  But where families are nurtured, functional and at ease - imagine what is possible.

More People From My Village

One day I stood in the waves lamenting the fact that - because I'd sent out a group e-mail announcing my summer vacation field trip schedule - I now had to answer an almost equal number of questions. Questions such as: what time will you be going? do you think you'll go again in August? Can you get back to me closer to the date?


Sheesh, I thought, it'd be nice to have some company on our field trips, but it's really easier to just do it on my own. If I'd died last week, thought it would have been easier to do it on her own could have been my epitaph.

But standing there in the water, I started to giggle. I'd always thought my problem was that nobody wanted to help me but right at that moment I realized my real problem was that I didn't want to deal with all the baggage I associated with accepting help - the tit for tat, the expectations, the relationship-piness of it all.

I'd been blaming my loneliness on the world, when it was really me who was to blame. Really, I started giggling. To myself. In the water.

And then this guy looks at me with a serious expression on his face. He says something like "if you leave your hands on your board after you catch the wave, your balance will be better." And for the next hour or so,  Ernie - 50ish father of four, plumber, former gymnastics coach at Venice High and lifelong surfer - coaches me through the best surf session ever. He gives me tips on my hands, my board, going under, turning, catching the wave - everything I could have wanted, really. And I receive it with gratitude.

Finally worn out by Ernie's strenuous training regimen ("paddle, paddle, paddle!" he yells constantly) I say thank you and head to the parking lot. There I meet Mark - another Venice old timer - who admires my beat-up 1980 Mercedes Surf Wagon because it looks like the one his dad had back in the day, when he was a kid and they used to go on surf trips. We talk  cars and beaches and discover we're practically neighbors.

A few days later, when I wonder why all the surfers are gathered on the north side of the Venice Pier rather than the south, I'm schooled in swells and tides by John, the surfer foregrounded in the photo above.

What more can I say? Maybe it's not easier to just do it on my own.

In Case I'd Forgotten...It Takes a Village

This week, my friend Grant's family was in town from Kansas City to celebrate his college graduation. On Monday, they invited us to spend the day on the beach. While other family members kept an eye on the older kids, Grant's Mom Connie volunteered to look after Ashton while I hit the waves.

It was a beautiful day - sunny and warm. The waves were not big, but they were big enough. There was a strong rip current, but otherwise conditions were perfect.

Even though I could see that Connie was a watchful grandma, I kept checking on her and Ashton from my location in the water. Due to Ashton's new red hat, they were easy to spot.

As I watched them, it occurred to me that it was due to Connie that I was surfing. And it occurred to me that, as a mother, it is only due to other people that I am able to do anything. And that is because, as a mother, I am not only responsible for myself but for other people as well.

And because I am responsible for those others, I am essentially, no longer an individual. I may inhabit one body, but I am no longer "one."

So much of my conflict as a parent has stemmed from my insistence that I am still an individual. So much of the conflict I think so many parents experience stems from the fact that our society, our culture, expects all people - each of whom inhabits only one body - to be an individual when, in fact, many of us are not. When in fact, none of us are, though for some of us - estranged from family, estranged from community, "single", childless -  it may be easier to deny.

The  realization that a statement like "we are all one" is neither metaphor, nor abstract ideal, has, frankly, blown my mind. Previously, I'd thought it was something a person "gets" when on acid, or ecstasy, or once they have achieved enlightenment. It was never something I thought I'd grasp from simply standing in chest high waves on Venice Beach.

God Bless Us, Everybody

Strangely enough, when I got to the beach, I saw these two Buddhist monks.
I guess I'll have good company in hell.

On Wednesday, I was at Euphoria Loves Rawvolution, a raw/vegan cafe near the beach in Santa Monica. It was my first chance to go surfing since being back in LA, but I was so hungry that I had the shakes and knew I'd better eat first. It was the raw/vegan lunch rush and the only seats available were at a community table already occupied by two older ladies. I asked if I could join them. They said yes and we started to chat. They asked what I did and I told them that I'm a stay-at-home mom and that I write. Then they asked  what I write about.

"Sports, family and spirituality," I said. When they asked what kind of spirituality I meant, I told them how much strength and wisdom I derive from the water and how I feel  god is everywhere and in all people and that spirit is alive in everything.

Who would have thought that those two nice looking ladies at the raw/vegan cafe in Santa Monica would be Born Again Christians with zero tolerance for earth-based spirituality? And that, minutes later, they would tell me I was going to burn in hell forever? I mean, really. It's not what I expect when I'm in Santa Monica drinking a spirulina warrior shake and about to go surfing.

On the one hand, I'd  never told a complete stranger that I write about sports, family and spirituality - and then gone so far as to describe what I mean by "spirituality." On the other, I'd never been told, to my face, that I was going to burn in hell for eternity due to said "spirituality".  It was certainly a day of firsts: one which made me see, unequivocally, that when a person chooses, with all his or her heart, to walk (and talk) their path, not everyone is going to like it.

Save the world in 250 words or less...and win a surf vacation!

Late Thursday night, I was browsing the internet and discovered that the fabulous Las Olas Surf Camp was having a scholarship contest. The prize was a one week surf vacation. Because one of my goals for this year is to take a fabulous  surf vacation - and because I can't afford a  fabulous surf vacation - I jumped at the opportunity and wrote the required 250 word essay. In response I got a lovely email from Jackie at Las Olas saying she'd enjoyed my essay (and my blog) but that, because I'd missed the deadline - I'd missed the deadline.

In the past, I wouldn't have even applied in the first place. I KNEW I'D MISSED THE DEADLINE. But I took a chance. You can't win if you don't play, right?

The assignment was to name a challenge facing the world right now and to come up with a practical solution. Coming up with challenges is, well, not a challenge for me. Coming up with solutions? I usually plead ignorance. So I made one up on the spot. A first.
Enjoy:

The challenge: America is prosperous and yet too many Americans feel they do not have enough. America is crowded and yet isolation and despair are epidemics. America has so much to offer and yet most American families struggle so hard to get by that they can't contribute to the world at large.


The fresh, concise, innovative and inspiring solution? Redesign education so that a peaceful future is possible. Redesign housing so that community is possible. Redesign technology so that health is possible. Redesign our society so that it flourishes. And do it in the name of the family.

For our solution to work, we need a team of interdisciplinary thinkers and doers who can put thoughts into action.

This solution demands synergy between visionaries, activists and entrepreneurs so that they all address the family as both the root of our present despair and the root of our future well-being. It demands that the people who create our culture not only dare to believe that sustainability, community and joy are possible, but excitedly work together to create those things and then inspire the American people to join them in the cause.

The solution demands we gather such people together on a retreat and maybe, just maybe, take them surfing. They’d catch waves, have beers and solve the world’s problems. It’d be like TED, with an agenda, on a beach. Who wouldn’t want to attend a summit like that?

Choosing Passion

   Recently I’ve been re-reading an old college favorite: Adrienne Rich's "Of Woman Born." In it, she writes how unreasonable it is for one person, or even two people, to be entirely responsible for the entire alpha-to-omega existence of a child, or children. What they need is so much more than any one or two people can give them. And then a mother is stressed, too much demand is put on her time and attention, and she turns on her own children and her partner. As Rich says, the mistake of the mother is in thinking that it is the children themselves, or as I like to add, the husband himself, who is to blame for her upset. When, in fact, the upset is a product of external circumstances which are so taken for granted as to be nearly invisible.

Contrary to what I've heard, rather than becoming more conservative  in my old age, I am getting re-radicalized. And it makes me nervous. The deeper I get into my new commitments to surfing, reading, writing, thinking and feeling, the more vulnerable and out of my comfort zone I feel. I am always comfortable if I can be logical and “safe,” if I can repeat what someone else has said, regardless of how provocative - and if I can stay detached from what I am saying.  

But when I begin to care, really care - as if what I think and say makes a difference - I feel like a target. I remember being in college, caring so much about my ideas, and getting into debates with boys that felt so mean-spirited. Boys I liked - not romantically, but whom I enjoyed – would, I felt, turn against me in debate when I was passionate. Because a passionate me is an easy target for teasing.   For them, it would just be an exercise – in legalese or debate – and they would enjoy how worked up I would get and how seriously I would take the discussion and myself. And I would get increasingly frustrated.  

Because, in the heat of the moment,  I would feel as if I had lost my faculties, as if my gifts had dissipated under a tornado storm of passion. And it's true, passion can turn into righteousness and, often, intelligent, educated people can dismiss the passionate as zealots.  So I fear this. That, because I am passionate, the people I most want to impact will not take me “seriously” and will be less likely to listen to me, not more.  

And yet, passion is a necessity isn’t it? It is the life force flowing through one. So I will continue to choose it and all the risks that accompany it. When I started surfing, I wanted transformation. But I wanted it to be effortless and beautiful, I wanted it to make me look better not worse. But true transformation is bound to take us to unfamiliar ground that leaves us, at least for a while, confused and at sea. And I can accept that.

Because I do care. And I do want to make the world a better place for all living beings.  And I believe it's possible.

So I'll take it - with all the insecurity and doubt that comes with it. Because it's better than the alternative.