Lost Coin notes 5-28-09: 

-The hunt for a location for our fall retreat continues. If you have any ideas contact Rebecca.

-If you havent done so, pay your quarterly dues.

-Lets let our work, both within Lost Coin and our professional lives, be informed and affected by our practice. As Lost Coin members, lets work to clarify our working structure within the group.

-D opened up the meeting to the group to come up with a topic for this week.

-A question was asked about how to deal with someone with whom you dont want to interact. The example was given of being on an airplane, sitting next to someone that is not respecting your personal spacethey keep talking to you even though you have no interest in talking to them. How would deal with this person? 

-The groups answers ran the gamut from telling that person not to take it personally, but that your just not interested in having a conversation, to engaging in a conversation just to make the other person happy (even though you much rather just read your book).


-This brought the 4th Way idea of inner vs. external considering. In a situation like the one above, when we feel like we have to explain ourselves or we find ourselves engaging in a conversation that we dont really want to have, were probably inner considering. Were engaging in the conversation because we dont want to be critically judged by the other or by ourselves. Inner considering is being a slave to what you think other peoples judgments of you are. Somewhere, sometime in our lives parents/schools, etc. convinced us to behave a certain way, and when we act in accordance with what we think other people expect of us, even though we would like to act otherwise, we are inner considering. Inner considering is accompanied by a feeling of physical uneasewe dont feel quite right about what were doing, physically and emotionally.

-We need to see ourselves objectively, as others see us.  

-External considering is having flexibility in the moment, having the flexibility to do what the moment calls for rather than what you think other people expect of you. When what the moment calls for and what you feel others expect from you coincide, thats fine. That can still be external considering. 

-D talked about giving a speech at a local college and feeling that he wasnt accurately told what the situation was going to be like. He felt very uncomfortable upon arrival and felt trapped once he was there. This feeling of being trapped is inner considering. Feelings of being trapped in any situation are usually signs of inner considering. Inner considering is always waiting for someone else to ask you to dance instead of taking the initiative to get up and ask someone to dance or being willing to dance alone. (This is a lot like being content to staying in the victim role in your life.)

-Another question came about how to deal with anger when it arises. 

-We can become addicted to our personal dramas of anger. It can become somewhat of an addictive emotion because it doesnt demand much of us. It gives us an excuse to stay stuck where we are with our anger rather than engaging in goal-directed thinking and getting what we want.

-Anger is inefficient; we dont get what we want if we stay stuck in our anger. If we spend a lot of time in anger were leading inefficient lives.

The discussion turned to the idea of anger coming from expectations that we have of situations and people that arent met. When our expectations arent met, we become angry. It would make sense then, that the fewer expectations we have of the world, the more we can drop our beliefs of how others should be, the less disappointment and anger we will subject ourselves to. (The flexibility of external considering.) 

-We should be like spies in this world, whose mission is to be free. We dont need to explain ourselves.         

-We must understand that weve created what we have in our lives, whether wed call it good or bad. We have to take responsibility for our lives.

-Ds father was a good example of someone who was very tactful and strategic in doing and getting what he wanted from situations. He wouldnt take the bait of others and respond with anger in potentially stressful situations. He treated others very politely even when he was being treated impolitely, and this way he usually got what he wanted rather than being right.

-We often have a choice in situations: we can get what we want or we can be right. Being right is the booby prize. The booby prize winner can say, I didnt get what I wanted, but at least Im right. Thats not worth anything.

-D had an experience of the ugliness and inefficiency of being right while in college. There was a meeting in the college commons between those who were pro-war and those who were anti-war (Vietnam), and, although Doen was essentially against the war, it occurred to him, as he watched the two groups argue unproductively back and forth, that the anti-war protesters were just as stuck on being right as the pro-war faction. This meeting/confrontation was going nowhere because both sides were stuck on being right. 

-The last topic of conversation centered on the idea of not trying hard enough to create the live that we want. If we dont lead the lives we want, its because were not trying hard enough. We all have the talent lead the lives we want, we typically dont try hard enough, however. 

-Our practice is not intellectual. Our practice is based on effort, intention and commitment.

-When we wake up each morning we should ask ourselves: How can I try harder today?

-We should also make the distinction between being busy and trying harder. Being busy is not necessarily trying harderits just being busy.

-We sometimes create these gentlemans agreements with ourselves where, if we fill our lives with busy work, well not really question the nature of this busy work and let ourselves off the hook from actually doing those things that are hard.

-Trying hard to get what we want is one of the best ways to see ourselves and how we relate to the world. Make this our practice. 


   