Our search of the truth is the search for how we belong to the larger picture and why.

The truth of our existence is that it is inseparable from relationships.

The fulfilled life is one of companionship, affection and belonging. This is made possible by ever deeper and more meaningful personal experiences and relationships with others.

When near death, most people reminisce about the experiences of deep connections they had with others—family, friends and colleagues. It is these empathic moments in one’s life that are the most powerful memories and the experiences that comfort and give a sense of connection, participation, and meaning to one’s sojourn.

True companionship requires that one exercise vulnerability rather than invulnerability. If happiness is the ability to live out the full potential of one’s possibilites, and if the measure of one’s life is the intimacy, range, and diversity of one’s relationships, then the more vulnerable one is, the more open he or she will be to creating meaningful and intimate relationships with others.

Vulnerability in this sense does not mean being weak or a victim or prey, but, rather, being open to communication at the deepest level of human exchange.

Real courage is allowing oneself to be exposed—warts and all—to another person. It is the willingness to place the most intimate details of our lives in the hands of another.

To be vulnerable is to trust one’s fellow human beings.

Trust is the belief that others will treat you as an end, not as a means, that you will not be used or manipulated to serve the expedient motives of others but regarded as a valued human being.

When one is treated by others as an end, not as a means, one truly becomes free. Freedom is never a solitary affair. Freedom is a deeply communal experience.

Although there are ascetics and misanthropes that are able to live their life apart from others, their lives are less than complete. They have closed up the emotional channels that make human beings human.

Consider some of our culture’s popular mega-church leaders. I can discuss this, because (pardon the french,) I are one.  At least, I was one.

Invulnerability conjures up the idea of a super human being, unencumbered by the frailties and foibles that make us vulnerable, less than perfect, in need of each other and, therefore human.

Psychologists are quick to point out that a person feigning invulnerability (or for those of us who are mega-church leaders—forced to feign invulnerability by our peers and parishioners expectations) and exhibiting an extreme libertarian sense of personal entitlement, devoid of emotions, is often someone so frightened by his own sense of vulnerability that his macho personality becomes a mask for hiding his fear.

One can’t truly empathize with the vulnerability and struggle of another unless he is able to acknowledge the same vulnerabilities and struggles in himself.

As I struggle through my own personal crisis, literally surrounded by a community of christian leaders, this unexpected truth has been the most chilling. And the most lonely.

I have come to realize that the communites and individuals that ostracize their fellows who have made mistakes are just as alone as the person who has been ostracized or banished. They are just alone together.

Tomorrow I write a conclusion about being alone together and how we can eliminate loneliness—forever.

Question: Do you have someone that you can expose yourself to—warts and all?

If this article resonated with your experience, please click the buttons below and share it with your friends.

Note: This post is a close paraphrase of pages 156-161 from the powerful book I am currently reading, The Empathic Civilization by Jeremy Rifkin.

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As adults living in a sexualized Western civilization, we fantasize often, but how long has it been since you played?

Let’s take a look at benefits of adult play.

— Play is inherently open and accepting.  Although there are consequences that flow from one’s actions, all of the players feel free to express themselves, to be vulnerable, because forgiveness permeates play. “I was just pretending” is a standard retort that every child in history has understood and used when engaged in play.

— Play tends to be open-ended.  The world of play is often a timeless realm, as anyone who has ever been caught up in play and lost track of time knows. “Playgrounds” are often safe havens, independent of the “real world.” A “playground” is not something someone owns or possesses but, rather, a pretend setting that people temporarily share.

— Play is transcendent. Play takes place in a temporal and spatial dimension but is often experienced as timeless and spaceless. The experience itself is “pretense,” giving it a transcendent quality. It has both a worldly and an otherworldly feel to it.

— Play develops empathy. The play environment is the classroom by which we learn to be empathic with our fellow human beings. It is where we exercise our imagination by placing ourselves in other personas, roles, and contexts and try to feel, think and behave as we believe they would. When little girls and boys play house or pretend to be mommy, daddy, or older sibling, or their teacher at school or President of the United States, they are practicing empathic extension. It’s difficult to imagine how empathy could develop without play.

— Play develops abstract thought. When a child imagines what it might be like to be riding on a horse, he might take hold of a piece of wood, put it in between his legs, and yelp and gallop down the street. The wood becomes an imaginary symbol of the horse and a way for the child to create a simulation of the experience and ride it out.

— Play and freedom share common ground. True play is always entered into voluntarily. One can’t be forced to play. Human beings can never be really free until we are able to fully enter into play. French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre syas, “As man apprehends himself as free and wishes to use his freedom…then his activity is to play.”

What makes play such a powerful socializing tool, then, is that it is the means by which imagination is unleashed. We become explorers of the vast other—all of the infinite possible realms of existence that could be. We become connected.

Frederich Schiller says, “Man plays only when he is in the fullest sense of the word a human being, and he is fully a human being only when he plays.”

Play, therefore,  is better than fantasy and far from a trivial pursuit. It is where we stretch our empathic consciousness and learn to become truly human.

Question: What was your favorite play as a child? 

If this playful post was fun, please take time to “play” a moment in Facebook, Twitter or Google + and  share it with your playmates by clicking one of the buttons below. Thanks.

This post is a close paraphrase of pages 92-96 from the powerful book I am currently reading, The Empathic Civilization by Jeremy Rifkin.

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Guilt and shame are often thought of interchangeably, when in fact they are quite different. Guilt can trigger the desire to reach out and make amends, while shame makes a person feel worthless and inhuman.

To be shamed is to be rejected. Shame is a way of isolating a person from the “collective we”. He or she becomes an outsider and a nonperson.

If one feels like a nonbeing, socially ostracized and without self-worth, he is unable to draw upon his empathic reserves to feel for another’s plight.

This leads to withdrawal and in effect death.

When one is made to feel guilty, it is one’s humanity that is being called upon to do the right thing.

But when one is made to feel shame, he feels isolated from humanity.

Guilt is an internal mechanism that reminds one of his deep social connection to others and the need to repair the social bond.

But shame tells one they are not living up to other’s expectations, and, therefore, not worthy of their consideration. Other’s expectations, rather than his humanity, become the focal point of the discipline.

One feels as if his very being is a disappointment and that he must conform to the “ideal image’ of what others expect from him or suffer the consequence of rejection.

Cultures of shame create very different people than cultures of guilt.

Ironically, while a shaming culture pretends to adhere to the highest standards of moral perfection, in reality it produces a culture of self-hate, envy, jealousy and hatred toward others.

When one lives in a shaming culture, one believes that you must conform to an ideal of perfection or purity or suffer the wrath of the community.

In the Muslim community, it is not uncommon to hear about a woman who has been gang-raped and who is then stoned to death by her own family and neighbors, because she has brought shame on herself and her family.

In the Christian culture, a person who has made a moral mistake, is often ostracized and and treated as a non-being. Rather than empathize with his suffering, the community inflicts even greater punishment by treating him as an object of  disgust to be blotted out.

The power of shaming cultures to squelch empathy and transform human beings into non-beings is chilling to behold.

However, an empathic culture has the ability to experience a person’s pain as if it were their own.

An empathic culture is able to  emotionally and cognitively take notice of the whole of another person’s existence and develop an empathic response to the totality of their experience and being.

Question: Do you think religion promotes a shaming culture or an empathic culture?

If this post caused you to think (not agree with it, but caused you to think) please consider sharing it by clicking one of the buttons below.

Note: These words are not my own. They are from the powerful book The Empathic Civilization by Jeremy Rifkin. The contextualization is mine.

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A New Day

27″ x 37″ Unframed Original Watercolor on Arches Handmade Paper

$850.

Special prices on prints also available:
8.5″ x 11″ $85. $35.
11″ x 14″ $95. $45.
plus S&H $4.95
(Other print sizes available on request)

Perfect for bedroom or bath.

Options

Original 27" x 37" $850.00 USD Print 8.5" x 11" $35.00 USD Print 11" x 14" $45.00 USD

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(pronounced fu—as in, well, you know)

Ingredients

4 ounces dry Thai Rice noodles
6 cups chicken stock
2 tablespoons fish sauce
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger root
1 tablespoon minced lemon grass
5 green onions, chopped
2 breasts thinly sliced on bias cooked chicken
1 cup bean sprouts
1 cup chopped Napa cabbage
1 Handful of chopped Cilantro leaves
1 Lime wedge
1 sliced Jalapeno (ribs and seeds removed)

Directions

1. Bring a large saucepan of water to a boil over high heat. Add noodles and return water to boil. Boil until soft, about 8 minutes. Drain and reserve noodles.
2.Bring chicken stock, fish sauce, garlic, ginger, lemon grass, and green onions to a boil in a large pot. Reduce to a simmer; cook for 10 minutes. Stir in the chicken and napa cabbage. Cook pho until heated through, about 5 minutes.
3. Divide the cooked noodles between 2 large bowls. Place cilantro over noodles. Pour pho over noodles. Add Jalapenos if you want more spice. Place bean sprouts as desired in pho. Squeeze lime wedge juice into pho. Serve immediately.

This is my variation on Miss Ashley’s recipe.

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1. Super 8 — This movie was magical and grabbed me on many levels. An instant classic!

2. Midnight in Paris — Woody Allen’s finest movie and Owen Wilson’s finest performance. This movie is now in my top 5 all-time!! I was spellbound and it transcended time and space.

3. Moneyball — Riveting. An expose not only of baseball, but also religion, mega-churches and politics.

4. Being Elmo — A must for creatives.

5. What was your favorite movie of 2011?

Two movies of 2011 I can’t wait to see….

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

The Tree of Life

Worst movie of 2011 — The Skin I Live In — Disturbing and pointless.

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Because I know about them doesn’t make me smarter than you, but it does mean I have some really well-read friends who have introduced them to me.

I commend them to you.

In fact, I dare you to read them (really read them, not scan them) and remain the same.

1. The Complete Essays of Montaigne. With many thanks to Hugh Hewitt for challenging me to be a Montaigne to others.

2. The Cultural Creatives. While Richard Florida has garnered most of the attention, this relatively unknown book has far more content that will change any creatives life and legacy.  Forever.

3. Reality And The Vision. I doubt if you can even find a copy, but this edition edited by re:create 2012 guest speaker Philip Yancey has challenged me to read, not more, but better.

4. Beauty. This decidedly non-Christian book has shaken my beliefs and foundations to the core.

5. The Courage To Write. A book that has given me the courage to attempt to advance beyond the standard Christian drivel.

6. Diffusion of Innovations. The reason I live my life. Period.

7. Human Universals. While most communicators continue to answer questions no one is asking, this book truly reveals the universal questions. Why do we not know about it? More importantly, why do we not care?

8. For The Life Of The World. Some say this is written by the Anglican counterpart of C.S. Lewis, I say “the layers underneath” have changed my life. Forever.

9. Cognitive Surplus. One of the most important books of today.

10. The Empathic Civilization. This book helps me understand why I am so misunderstood. And if you have a creative bone in your body, it will help you too. It foretells my present and my future. And it starkly reminds me why I am utterly alone.

Question: Have you heard of—or read—ANY of these books?

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Father eternal, giver of light and grace,
I have sinned against you and against my neighbors,
in what I have thought, in what I have said and done,
through ignorance, through weakness, through my own deliberate fault.
I have wounded your love, and marred your image in me.
I am sorry and ashamed, and repent of all my sins.
For the sake of your son Jesus Christ, who died for me,
forgive me of all that is past, and lead me from darkness
to walk as a child of light. Amen.

I personalized this prayer from Common Worship: Services and Prayers for the Church of England

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The answer is that stories of mistakes and failure surprise us. They are unexpected, and therefore, trigger alarm and heighten our interest.

It is a bleak commentary that of all the good content on this blog, the most read and “googled” post is one of deep sadness and woe.

The German philosopher Hegel once remarked that happiness is “the blank pages of history” because they are “periods of harmony.” Happy people generally live out their lives in obscurity.

History, on the other hand, is more often than not made by the disgruntled and discontented, the angry and rebellious—those interested in exercising authority and exploiting others and their victims.

Is it really possible that all the good things we’ve done will be dismissed and forgotten if we also happen to exercise our human nature and make mistakes?

To paraphrase a popular television soap opera, “Like sands in an hourglass, these are the blank pages of our lives.”

But shouldn’t real life be different?

Although life as it’s lived in the real world is peppered with suffering, stresses, failures, injustices and foul play, it is, for the most part lived out in hundreds of small acts of kindness, mentoring and generosity.

In short, it is the extraordinary comfort and compassion we give to others that creates goodwill, establishes the bond of sociality, and gives joy to people’s lives, even if it not been given the serious attention it deserves by our historians. Or by our television newscasters. Or  by our leaders. Or by our pastors. Or by our “friends.” Or even by ourselves.

Anybody’s blank pages can be filled in and, through the love of others, complement the pages already filled with dissonance.

Anybody’s story can have a happy ending.

Anybody.

Is it possible for us to empathize with another’s joy? Or will we continue to allow those pages to be blank?

Oftimes empathizing with another person’s joy comes from a deep understanding of their struggles. Another person’s empathic embrace can even transform one’s own suffering to joy.

Is it possible for us to write in the blank pages of each other’s lives?

Carl Rogers puts it poignantly:

When a person realizes he has been deeply heard, his eyes moisten. I think in some real sense, he is weeping for joy. It is as though he were saying, “Thank God, somebody heard me. Someone knows what it’s like to be me.

Question: In the words of my therapist, “How does this make you feel?”

If these words filled in a sentence or two of your blank pages, please share them and fill in a sentence for someone else by taking a moment and clicking one of the buttons below.

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9. You and I — Lady Gaga

8. Good Life — OneRepublic

7. For The First Time — The Script

6. Dog Days Are Over — Florence and the Machine

5. Down By the Water — The Decemberists

4. Lotus Flower — Radiohead

3. Gold On The Ceiling — The Black Keys

2. Lorelai — Fleet Foxes

1. With Love — Elbow

Question: What was your favorite song of 2011?

If you like this, share it with your friends by clicking one of the buttons below.

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