DailyGood.org – KM Huber's Blog

Thursday Tidbits: The Wu Wei In All of Us

Posted on March 14, 2013August 21, 2014 by KM Huber in Thursday Tidbits

This week’s Thursday Tidbits post considers Taoism’s “wu wei,” literally translated as non-doing or non action. Reaching for the good that is in all of us—listening to our heart over our head—is innate in us, as is the risk of opening ourselves to the world. In addition, wu wei is the current prompt in rarasaur’s delightful series, Prompts for the Promptless. Here is rarasaur’s description of the essence of wu wei:

“Wu wei, or non-doing, is a Taoist practice involving letting one’s action follow the simple and spontaneous course of nature rather than interfering with the harmonious working of universal law by imposing arbitrary and artificial forms. In other words, it is the action of non-action.”

I had not considered wu wei for this week’s Thursday Tidbits until I read rarasaur’s prompt, yet wu wei encompasses the heart of the three posts I chose from dailygood.org. In considerably different ways, each is a story of the open heart, the voice of instinct.

An Astounding Act of High School Sportsmanship is about a high school basketball game in El Paso, TX. Although the video is no longer available, the words revealing the thoughts of the young basketball player will open your heart. It’s a wu wei reminder that every day we have an opportunity to let another person shine, to realize it is the other person’s light that is necessary, and our role is to make that happen. In this case, the game’s outcome was not in jeopardy for this moment was not about the game. It was about knowing whose turn it is and rising to the occasion.

The second story opens with: “It says something about where we’ve come as a society that the simple act of fixing something that’s broken is considered a revolutionary act. Yet here we are” at The Repair Café. The Café originated in the Netherlands in 2010 and is slowly but steadily gaining global awareness. It is a decide-for-yourself café where people can learn how to fix items or have items fixed. They can have a coffee or read a do-it-yourself book to learn how to or wait for an item to be fixed.

The Café is a place to work with stuff—recognizing what comprises it and how it works—it is a place to hone inner resources as well, passing skills from one generation to another. It is the wu wei of sharing who we are and what we have with one another in respect for the resources of the planet.

Finally, there is the poignant story of Susan Spencer-Wendel who wrote Until I Say Goodbye, a book based on her year of living with joy. She used her iPhone to write her 89,000 word book as she only had the use of her right thumb.

Her herculean effort is consistent with her comment regarding her diagnosis of ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease): [I was] “equally grateful for a life of perfect health and determined to face it with bravery.” Hers is the way of the wu wei warrior, brave in her acceptance of what is and ever seeking all that it may give her.

Wu wei is the way of the open heart, immersing ourselves into what is without trying to control the outcome. It is acceptance. Wu wei is not something we pursue but a reminder that our natural state is to open ourselves to all that we are so we may be:

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom” (Elizabeth Appell).

This week’s video features the Indigo Girls’ “Galileo,” a man who risked a lifetime for truth.

Thursday Tidbits are weekly posts that offer choice bits of information to celebrate our oneness with one another through our unique perspectives. It is how we connect, how we have always connected but in the 21st century, the connection is a global one.

Thursday Tidbits: The Fragrance of Forgiveness

Posted on March 7, 2013August 21, 2014 by KM Huber in Thursday Tidbits

This week’s Thursday Tidbits post considers forgiveness, which is also the Bloggers for Peace challenge for March. Forgiveness may be the heart of peace but giving and getting forgiveness from the heart is not easy for any of us.

Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it. (Anonymous)

Always, we wish to know the fragrance of the violet but must it always come at such a price? It seems to be the history of humanity that it does, yet it is also the history of humanity to know peace, compassion, love, and equanimity, all inherent in the fragrance. We begin where we can, within ourselves.

Consider The Four Agreements of Don Miguel Ruiz:

Be impeccable in your word
Don’t take anything personally
Don’t make assumptions
Always do your best.

Inherent in the agreements is maitri, of which compassion is certainly a form, but maitri is the complete and total acceptance of one’s self. No conditions. Maitri is where forgiveness begins, a seed that we all may plant, and as the seed grows, so grows our ability to accept ourselves.

In accepting ourselves, we pursue compassionate truth, regardless of outcome. We do not deceive ourselves for outcome is often a sticking point, but if we do not take things personally and do not make assumptions, we are doing our best to be impeccable in our word.

Anger has a role in forgiveness as well as in peace, and not to acknowledge anger is not to pursue peace. There is the anger from a closed heart, the kind we all readily recognize, and then there is anger that is not personal or based upon any assumptions, the anger of the impeccable word, the anger-with-the-heart-open:

“For when there is no desire to wound or punish or blame, we become able to speak with great clarity and power. We may roar like a lion, but it is a healing roar. We may be challenging, but we are infinitely fair. We may be outraged, but we are respectful. This is ‘anger-with-the-heart-open’ and it has a beauty, a passion, and a clarity that is unmistakable”
(Processing Anger With An Open Heart).

In forgiveness, we leave the past where it is, when it happened, who did it, and what occurred. We accept that the past cannot be changed:

“Forgiving someone can mean giving them another chance, not necessarily because they deserve it, but because they need it. When you forgive, you love. You stop being a victim and you let go of the pain. Forgiving others can give us back the laughter and the peace in our lives.”
(grandmalin.wordpress.com)

We immerse ourselves in the acceptance of all that we are and are not, our wisdom and grace, our missteps and shortcomings. We accept that all the life we have lived up to the present moment is the foundation for our being here now. On our impeccable word floats the fragrance of forgiveness.

This week’s video features an acoustic version of Matthew West’s “Forgiveness.”

Thursday Tidbits: the 11th Possibility

Posted on February 28, 2013 by KM Huber in Consciousness, Thursday Tidbits

This week’s Thursday Tidbits considers the 11^th possibility as defined on rarasaur’s wonderful blog series, Prompts for the Promptless. The series is not just for bloggers but for anyone who wants to stretch and flex the mind. To me, that is where the 11^th possibility resides:

“The 11th Possibility is the idea that, regardless of data to the contrary, something unexpected and outside the realm of ordinary thought is always potentially around the corner” (rarasaur).

Perhaps the 11^th possibility is the heartbeat of curiosity, comfortable in the uncertainty that a nine out of ten result is lost in the light of the one time it is a glimpse into the unknown. We are startled into complete attention, our creativity sparked, for we see in way we did not, which makes all the difference.

Consider Albert Einstein’s thoughts on a human being in contrast to how we might consider being human:

“A human being is a part of the whole called by us ‘the universe,’ a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of consciousness.

KMHuberImage, Waverly Pond, Florida — KMHuberImage

“This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening the circle of understanding and compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty” (Einstein).

In that regard, what if we eagerly anticipate the 11^th possibility–the idea that the unknown and uncertain might occur–rather than relying on the ten probabilities that precede it? Clearly, I am mixing math and probability with mere musing but the 11^th possibility is so like Randall Jarrell’s sick child crying out, “all that I’ve never thought of think of me,” and so I do.

Perhaps my favorite illustration of the 11^th possibility is the story of the monarch butterfly that caught a ride with Southwest Airlines. True to its own timetable, the monarch butterfly overslept in its New York state cocoon and missed the insect group flight to Texas. Thanks to a woman who simply asked an airline if it would transport a butterfly to Texas, the butterfly caught a ride to San Antonio.

“It is a grand gesture, to be sure, ushering that lonely insect back on its way — but If the gentle flap of a single butterfly’s wings can shape the weather, then perhaps the kindness shown towards saving one butterfly’s life could change the course of history for the better” (Daily Good.org)

Regardless, with a little help from each other, the uncertainty of the unknown is a mere 11^th possibility. Imagine that.

This week’s video features Joe Cocker singing his rather famous reminder of our connection to one another.