Conditions Change

Yesterday, I learned that one of my publishers has decided not to take one of my manuscripts.

Okay, two of my manuscripts.

This doesn't feel good -- it never does. But that's the way it goes. Sometimes it takes a while to find the right publisher, and sometimes it takes a while for the manuscript to be ready. And sometimes, some manuscripts are never ready, but through the process of development, they serve to strengthen other projects, or the author's vision.

That's the perspective I'm choosing to have.

In honor of honorable rejections, a poem that appeared in the Mindfulness Bell (Summer 2009):

Kill the Buddha haiku

A letter comes back:
Sorry, these haiku are just
not Buddhist enough.

-- Charles Suhor

Such moments offer a good opportunity to contemplate the Eight Worldly Vicissitudes.

"Monks, these eight worldly conditions spin after the world, and the world spins after these eight worldly conditions. Which eight? Gain, loss, status, disgrace, censure, praise, pleasure, & pain. These are the eight worldly conditions that spin after the world, and the world spins after these eight worldly conditions. ...

Gain/loss,
status/disgrace,
censure/praise,
pleasure/pain:
these conditions among human beings
are inconstant, impermanent, subject to change.

Knowing this, the wise person, mindful,
ponders these changing conditions.
Desirable things don't charm the mind,
undesirable ones bring no resistance."

Conditions change; they most certainly do. The whole publishing world has changed, and the market into which books are now published. (I.e., it's the economy, buddha.) I will try not to resist the condition of walking down the avenue along which certain kinds of publishers set up shop and finding that they don't fill my bowl the way they used to. But it seems intelligent to explore other avenues, along which different publishers set up shop. And also to make note of the sorts of books that booksellers along those avenues find are filling their bowls.



















Sources:

Lokavipatti Sutta: The Failings of the World" (AN 8.6), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight, June 7, 2009, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an08/an08.006.than.html.

The alms bowl is available at DharmaCrafts.com.

The Truth

I saw this bumper sticker on a car yesterday:








"The truth will set you free": this, of course, comes from the Christian Bible, specifically the Gospel According to John, 8:32. It is a saying that has meant a lot to me over the years, from the time of my upbringing in a Congregationalist church. One thing it has said powerfully to me is that to embrace what is really going on brings freedom and life; hiding from and denying what is really going on brings pain and suffocation. No wonder Buddhism felt like home, once I found it.

But my idea of the "truth" in question has always been quite different from what the "truth" has traditionally been interpreted to be. The context of this verse is an argument between Jesus and the chief priests and Pharisees, and phrases from this chapter have been used to justify persecution of the Jews. John is my least favorite among the gospels, as it seems to be written as a polemic against all who reject this Jesus who proclaims himself Christ-as-Savior; to me, this telling of Jesus' life and teaching paints him as a raving narcissist. (He does go on and on about his wonderful self.) But I am sure that some of the potent sayings are indeed authentic; to give voice to them, the writers of the Gospel created a Jesus character who served their purposes. (As did the writers of each of the Gospels, and of all scripture, and the creators of any kind of literature or art).

But I digress. Seeing this bumper sticker got me thinking about what variety of truth the bumper sticker refers to, and what variety of anger. The car also featured a "Quakers!! Where? Quakerfinder.org" bumper sticker, so I assume that the car belongs to a Quaker. If this is a Quaker of the universalist, New York Meeting stripe, the sticker is probably pointing a bit ironically to the truth-of-Christ-as-savior concept. It points more wholeheartedly to the truth-of-God-as-justice notion, which springs from the powerful message of the Hebrew prophets. The prophets such as Jeremiah, Isaiah, Micah, and Amos.

They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. (Isaiah 2:4)

And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. (Micah 6:8)

But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. (Amos 5:24)

And so the truth that sets you free, but first makes you angry, is the truth of power, of seeing who has power and who doesn't, and who is using that power in self-service. Once you see how the game is really being played, you are free from delusion. One could say that it is the truth of suffering, of the First Noble Truth: Suffering exists. And perhaps seeing the causes of that suffering, the endemic injustice within human society, is an echo of the Second Noble Truth, that suffering has discernible causes.

And those aspects of truth are enough to make anyone angry. As angry as the prophets of old.

But what do you do with that anger? Because feeling angry is not enough. Just as suffering is not enough (as Thầy says), anger is not enough. The Dharma teaches us to see ill-being for what it is, and to transform that ill-being into freedom -- freedom from the delusion that traps us into reenacting the causes of ill-being. How are you going to use that energy of anger in a way that will not simply perpetuate these causes?

I know I'm asking a lot of a bumper sticker, but I wish it had said something about love. Because our society has a very distorted view of anger. We conflate the energy of anger with the expression of anger. Many interpret the Christian tradition as teaching that we should never feel angry, that we should turn the other cheek, forgive immediately, and to someone who takes our cloak, give our coat as well. On the other hand, we're taught how important it is to express your feelings, to vent rather than to hide your feelings. So we have a victim mentality mixed with self-righteousness mixed with entitlement. What's missing is an alternative to so much self-involvement. What's missing is the idea of expressing your angry feelings in a way that shines a light on the situation that triggered the anger, without exacerbating it. You do that through love, through compassion.

In his book Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames, Thầy writes:

You have the duty to tell [your beloved] when you suffer. When you are happy, share your happiness, with her, with him. When you suffer, tell your beloved one about your suffering. Even if you think your anger was created by him or her, you still have to keep your commitment [to support each other]. Tell him or her calmly. Use loving speech. This is the only condition. (p. 57)

We have the duty (elsewhere, he says we have the right) to communicate our anger. But we must do so calmly and lovingly. Here he speaks of anger between family members, but because of inter-being, this teaching must extend to anger between constituents and governments, and to anger between nations.

Martin Luther King, Jr., worked hard to channel the energy of anger into prophetic, powerful, loving action. So did Gandhi and Dorothy Day. And Thich Nhat Hanh.

I would like to see a bumper sticker that reads:

The truth will set you free.
So that's what that funny little half-smile is all about!

A bit more about the Society of Friends:

During the two years or so that I attended the Brooklyn Friends Meeting, I learned that many of my assumptions about Quakers were wrong, or incomplete. The Brooklyn Meeting is unprogrammed, meaning that there is no pastor and no liturgy -- the meeting sits in silence, listening for leadings. But there are other types of Quaker meeting, more common in the Midwest and West (apologies for over-generalizations). Roughly speaking, the Quakers stream into four branches: Liberal, Conservative, Pastoral, and Evangelical.

Click to read about Liberal, Conservative, Pastoral, and Evangelical Friends' beliefs and customs.

Friend on the Journey

I am now revising a picture book manuscript that has been in the works for several years. It will be a companion to an earlier book of mine, Polar Bear Night. In the first book, a little polar bear cub ventures out on her own and witnesses a star shower. In this book, the cub will meet another cub, and they become friends.

I haven't worked on it at all for almost a year. About six months ago, I met with my editor, David, over lunch, to catch up with each other and to go over the manuscript. In the end, we didn't talk much about the manuscript (except, importantly, that he told me that he was as committed to the book as ever). Mostly we talked quite deeply about our early lives. Within a few days he sent me some notes, which were among the most helpful notes I've ever received. Kind, insightful, offering direction without being intrusive. Where earlier I had felt weary of the manuscript, about to give up on it, I now felt inspired.

I was eager to work on the revision right away, but other projects with more urgent deadlines intervened, and I had to put this book to the side. Now those projects are taken care of (for the time being), and so after six months away, in the last few days I've read over the notes and felt again awash in my editor's good wishes and strong faith in me, as a writer and as a person.

Here is a section of the notes that I keep coming back to.

What I think this book is about is the journey to friendship. In the way that the first book was a celebration of taking an inward journey and perhaps connecting spiritually to nature, this book is about connecting with another. It's about developing trust, learning to share, the joy of finding a companion, the give and take of play. All things that are part of friendship. And that's a great thing to explore.

Yes, it's a great thing to explore. It's also a frightening thing to explore. That has been my experience, both with this manuscript and in life. I'm trying to write a story about a polar bear cub making friends with another polar bear cub, when in truth, I have no idea how one does "making friends." At least, that how it feels. To work on this manuscript is to touch that deep loneliness that has been an inner companion my whole life. No wonder it has taken years for me to get to an "almost, nearly ready" stage with this story. I haven't felt ready at all.

The last lines of the first book are

Snow and sky and sea and ice
and mother bear's soft, warm fur ....
home.

The last phrases of this book will be along the lines of

Snow, sea, and ice, and the broad blue sky ...
friends.

On the manuscript, David wrote,

I love this ending of "...friends." It feels right to me. This book is about the journey to friendship, which is a great theme. How do you recognize a friend? What do you go through to learn to trust each other? How do you know a true friend? Actions can speak louder than words: there can be grandeur in instinctual trust.

The first book was about "home." This book is about "friend." These are the two most important themes for anyone's life, or certainly for mine: to come to feel at home in the universe, and to trust oneself and others enough to connect without fear. They are undoubtedly one theme, one journey.

"Instinctual trust": that is what I must touch if I am going to complete this story. That is the way it will have to happen.

How is it that David's notes were so helpful? Because he allowed himself to be fully present to my words and to his response to them. And when he wrote his comments to me, he strove, bodhisatva-like, to be both truthful and kind. And so I feel encouraged to approach the manuscript this way myself: with full presence, honesty, and kindness. I feel encouraged to be a friend to myself.

Thanks, David.






























More about Polar Bear Night:

AIGA Design Archives. Includes views of spreads and notes about design approach

Reviews, courtesy of Amazon.com. [I encourage people, if possible, to purchase books from brick-and-mortar booksellers (i.e. not virtual booksellers), especially independent booksellers. But I admit I am a regular customer of Amazon.]

For those who subscribe to The New York Times on-line (it's free, for now), a review and an audio slide show featuring me reading the book. The Gray Lady loved this book: Best Illustrated, Notable, Best Book of the Year, Bestseller. Thank you, NYT.

My author website, LaurenThompson.net