Man's Search for Balance

It’s irritating. This skin of mine feels too short. Ready to get out of it, become something new. Many are thinking the same thing. Squeezing out of the old could have, should have been delightful. But it’s been a forced push. Change is upon us and the transformation is confusing and even scary. From deaths due to the coronavirus to people peacefully protesting for equal justice getting tear gassed for the So-Called President of the United States’ photo-op, we are truly in some weird times.

So what is the new normal? Or can we only hope for nearly normal. Even though we don’t yet know, each of us can find a sense of balance. For me, the Torah is a teaching that instructs us on how to resolve the inherent disparities of life. For example, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is a concept consisting of diametrically opposed notions. Our sense of spirituality includes non-rational aspects, inherent conflicts, and outright paradoxes. It requires the seeker to decouple from, or dispense with our everyday way of viewing the world. In other words, it pulls the rug out from what is considered normal and requires a more poetic way of seeing to achieve understanding.

Then you have to apply what you comprehend. We live in a real world and not just what we think about it. You have to manifest your desires and thoughts. The time to do so is always now.

Take for example the term ‘social distancing’. At first blush, applying it in our daily lives seemed counterfactual, and caused uncertainty and unease. It implied being in the physical company of others, yet staying at least 6-feet away from them. Without some sound advice, the requirement by our state governors and city mayors was perplexing. Yet communities creatively adapted. Of course, a determination about our national wellbeing and guidance on how to stay healthy was warranted to achieve a balanced approach, especially in high population density areas such as New York and Seattle. However, three and half years into his occupation of the White House, the cognitive dissonance set up by Trump is overwhelming. Although he wants to portray himself as caring, his recent publicity stunt before a church, crudely holding a bible for a photo-op after his secret police on horseback tear-gassed peaceful protestors, is more proof he is unfit to lead.

I came across this tweet by HowardinDC, “Explains why MAGAts create all the Trump "porn" - like a muscular Trump standing on a tank: it must alleviate the cognitive dissonance they feel when they realize their 'hero' is actually a draft-dodging, mind-bendingly incompetent, cowardly bully.” A September 2019 article in the Sonoma Index-Tribune about why Trump’s lies don’t affect his standing in the polls noted something similar, “People who believe in someone will believe almost anything he or she says, also refusing to believe almost anything negative about them.” According to the Oxford dictionary, cognitive dissonance concerns circumstances involving “conflicting attitudes, beliefs or behaviors. This may result in feeling mental discomfort, which can cause you to alter one of the attitudes, beliefs or behaviors to decrease the discomfort and find balance”.

I purposefully wrote ‘My Random Death’ to not come across as a know-it-all, new age guru. Rather than a self-help book, my memoir is a guide for self-discovery, to live life in your own way. I encourage people to pay attention to the meaningful coincidences in their lives, learn to trust their intuition and follow its inner guidance to find your own sense of poise, and the self-confidence to move forward in the ‘real’ world.

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Empathy, Loneliness, and the Coronavirus.

Sporting events canceled, people told to work from home, gatherings of large groups banned, schools closed, Broadway goes dark and because of insufficient leadership and testing many in the US are undergoing self-quarantine. This is our new normal, for now anyway. Former Surgeon General of the United States Vivek Murthy notes the disturbance to our social interactions can lead to depression and an increased sense of loneliness from the isolation.

His comments got me thinking about the relationship between loneliness and empathy. While researching the correlation, I came across a 2018 survey done by the BBC that found those individuals who are most empathic can also be the loneliest, “In the survey two kinds of empathy were measured. One was empathy for people’s physical pain – how sorry you feel for someone who has accidentally slammed their hand in a door, picked up a scalding frying pan or been stung by a wasp. The other was how much empathy you have for other people’s social pain – for someone who’s been bullied at school, not invited to a party or dumped by their partner. There was no difference in empathy for physical pain between the people who felt more or less lonely. But the people who said they often or very often felt lonely scored higher on average for empathy for social pain. Maybe because they have experienced for themselves what it feels like to be left out, they empathise more with other people who find themselves in the same situation.”

In my memoir, My Random Death, I’m open about experiencing stretches of depression and bouts of loneliness. Back then, the fatal flaw in my thinking was the depression will last forever and envisioned myself in a room with no doors or windows. No way out. Speaking with friends and family but not wanting to lean on them too much, I worked with therapists and came to understand those thoughts of mine about depression lasting into perpetuity was harmful thinking. Don’t do it. Lesson learned.

Seemingly counterintuitive, depression can be rewarding. It can give us an opportunity to get grounded, be close to our soul and listen to our authentic voice. So while we are in the Time of Coronavirus and isolated seek out family members to talk with on the phone, engage in ‘chat groups', use the time to listen to podcasts, text your friends, and come up with original ways to stay connected. One fun example is from Italy. Although a street appeared empty of folks walking or milling about, it was filled with song. People quarantined in the buildings lining the lane leaned out of their windows and sang to each other or in unison.

My previous blog addressed the trying times for empaths while Trump occupies the Oval Office. Compounded by his regime’s botched response to the coronavirus, his incompetence now affects all Americans. Although the World Health Organization declared the pathogen a pandemic, Trump mainly viewed the global epidemic as a threat to his financial and political future. His myopic, self-serving lens failed to protect people’s health and our general welfare. We’ve witnessed a lack of leadership back in November 2019, when he failed to send a team of scientists and epidemiologists to Wuhan in the wake of the highly contagious infection. Instead of taking a sample of the virus’ genome when it was offered by China, Trump said no thank you. A recent NPR article claimed testing was suppressed because Trump fears the number of cases would be too high and might effect his re-election chances. To fill the vacuum Individuals and communities respond to a failure of leadership by taking charge, being responsible and in some instance irresponsible. We all learned or re-learned how to wash our hands properly. It’s something I remember being taught by my parents and in my pre-kindergartner classes.

Due to the stress of these time, some folks have reverted to fear by hoarding mountains of toilet paper. A fist-fights between women went viral when one grabbed the last roll. Perhaps for some adults a short period of isolation will help them self-reflect and gain empathy for others. As Rodney King famously stated during the Los Angeles Riots, “Can’t we all just get along”.

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We Are All Ms. Hervin Khalaf

A simple definition of an empathic is someone who can ‘understand and share in the feelings of another’. With the aid of the inner eye, we can even witness what a person is going through from a description or narrative of far away events. People with sympathetic abilities contribute to the advancement of society and are a vessel for social consciousness. Compassionate individuals do not immediately judge others, but first consider what it means to walk in their shoes.

Contrary characteristics to empathy are callousness and narcissism. Senior campaign advisor Lara Trump is the epitome of a non-empathic who supports her father-in-law. On the October 14th Fox News at Night broadcast with host Shannon Bream, Lara defended Trump’s actions in Syria by stating most Americans don’t know who the Kurds are. Not a sound or rational defense for certain genocide and ethic cleansing. In a phone call with Erdogan of Turkey, Trump betrayed the Kurds who were our allies in the fight against ISIS. Like a mob boss in a second-rate B movie, Trump demands loyalty but gives none as suits his needs. Today, the House of Representatives condemned his withdrawal of troops from Northern Syria.

We are all Hervin Khalaf. A Kurdish politician and secretary general of the Future Syria Party, she was a victim of Trump’s war crimes. Turkish-backed rebels dragged her and her driver from their vehicle. Twitter was awash in images of Ms. Khalaf being raped on rocks, her face grey from the dust and pain. The boots and rifles of her assailants and their accomplices are clearly visible in the video. Reports are the driver was executed and the Turkish proxies stoned her to death. Their murder is the clear result of Trump giving Erdogan the go-ahead to invade the Kurds.

Unless you’re like Lara Trump who’s immune from the feelings of strangers, closing off techniques can be employed by an empathic. Prayers, affirmations, and visualizations are methods one can utilize to not give hospitality to other people’s negativity. Shielding oneself off enables us to understand what someone is going through, and to walk in his or her shoes. I imagine myself wrapped up in the petals of a flower, or I’ll say an ancient Kabblalistic prayer, the Ana Be’Koach to surround myself with light and protection. In my memoir, My Random Death, I go into detail about these practices.

We can employ some basic tools to protect ourselves while we still ‘love thy neighbor, and welcome the stranger, as thyself’.

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