hmmmmmmmmm.......: wallie

hmmmmmmmmm.......: wallie

Tuesday, June 01, 2004

wallie

Well, off to observe in "Wallie"'s classroom! I'm a bit nervous, but only a little, since I have two options that both look reasonably good, and I'm determined to make the best of it either way. Hopefully this semester will be less stressful.

Yesterday we went shopping and blew an enormous amount of money, some of it on very useful things, some of it on beer and candy. It's the American way.

In The Poisonwood Bible which I am re-reading while walking, this morning it said something about it being "the American way" to "demand perfection and revile the missed mark." I am trying not to demand perfection of myself, and to look at teaching as something I decided to do to make my life interesting and meaningful--instead of looking at it as a way to redeem my sinful soul by saving unfortunate children--since the latter perspective appears to guarantee misery all around. Good luck to me!

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*The quote in the top bar is from Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, whom I tend to view with some suspcion as a person (great teacher or charismatic cult leader? I'm not sure!), but whose teachings I often find useful nonetheless... here is a further elaboration:

The sense of trust is that, when you apply your inquisitiveness, when you look into a situation, you know that you will get a definite response.

If you take steps to accomplish something, that action will have a result--either failure or success. When you shoot your arrow, either it will hit the target or it will miss. Trust is knowing that there will be a message.

When you trust in those messages, the reflections of the phenomenal world, the world begins to seem like a bank, or reservoir, of richness. You feel that you are living in a rich world, one that never runs out of messages....

You trust, not in success, but in reality.... [W]hatever the result that comes from your action, that result is not an end in itself. You can always go beyond the result; it is the seed for a further journey.

And,

Often, when someone tells us we should be fearless, we think they're saying not to worry, that everything is going to be all right. But unconditional fearlessness is simply based on being awake....

[F]earlessness is unconditional because you are neither on the side of success or failure. Success and failure are your journey.