Filling the Vessel

This has been a good weekend. I've enjoyed practice with my sangha, lunch with a friend, physical activity, reading, socializing with 2 good friends, ballet - live performance, sleep - including 2 naps, TV watching, enjoying Frankye's company, learning how to use Photoshop - suceessfully at times, playing with our dogs...

What could be better than to "fill up" before starting another work week?

The other really good thing I did for myself this weekend was NOT watch the news. More and more I am realizing that watching the news keeps me in a state of anxiety, anger, and fear. There is nothing I need to know happening out "there" on a day to day basis. If there was something really earth shattering happening, information would get to me without my having to watch it on TV. More importantly, the news, whether real or media manufactured, is a distraction and diversion from the real issues and responsibilities of my life. One of those responsibilities is to keep my mind focused and clear. How else to be able to pray for the suffering of the world?

Speaking of suffering, I heard a blurb for an upcoming news program that 2 more American service men were killed in Iraq over the weekend. The pain this causes their families must be monumental. I don't know these people yet I whince when I hear this news. There is so much unavoidable pain in this world caused by the nature of the material world. Why do humans create more suffering and pain, when it is so avoidable?

I read recently that shame is referred to as the "master emotion." It is considered the underlying "push" emotion that motivates our decisions and behavior. Is it shame that keeps us in this war? Is it shame that keeps this administration on this path of war? Are they shamed by no weapons of mass destructioned and forging ahead anyway? Are they motivated by the shame of being wrong and the need to find something, somewhere that will justify attacking another sovereign country and wreaking havoc on its people? Is it shame at what we, America, has done to the people of Iraq that keeps even smart, level headed people from standing firm to get out now? The excuse that we have to fix what we have broken as a justification to keep 150,000 soldiers on the ground is not valid. It just creates more pain and more suffering and more shame.

See why I am staying away from the news? Just that little blurb takes me away from what is really important in my life right now. Not that my head should be stuck in the sand. Watching TV and getting lost in events on the other side of the planet is living with my head in the sand. If my mind is there, it is not here.