I have been gaslit in three jobs where I was as the Executive Director (ED) reporting to a board of directors, and in one case, as a Deputy Director reporting to the ED. I will also say upfront that in each of these cases, I managed an escape plan that left me financially and reputationally sound.  But seven years after the last of these jobs, the emotional damage still haunted me…nightmares brought up old wounds, feelings of shame, and the sense that the good front I put on about my career was a lie. And, of course, the question that all gaslit people ask, what did I do wrong? When that happens four times in distinct situations and types of organizations, the commonality is me, so why did I continuously walk into these situations?

��The question that all gaslit people ask, what did I do wrong?��

Gaslighting occurs when those in authority use their power to make another question their own version of reality. So can an ED who theoretically has the highest authority be gaslit? Power is the operative word here. In all organizations, power exists based on position, expertise, ability to reward, moral authority, intimidation and information control. All of these can be involved as a means to gaslighting. In non-profits, one of the most important powers is the ability to control information. Even the lowest position in a hierarchy has information which they alone control. Oftentimes sharing such information is giving up the little power a person has, so it is done sparingly. And in many organizations, the most common form of information control is gossip, not only what people share, but in the ways gossip is shared and who shares information with whom.

I specialized in turnarounds, where significant financial and personal problems threatened the organization´s continuation despite the good cause they were pursuing. A common theme often was founder´s syndrome and EDs that shaped the organization around their personal charisma and power. I was hired for these jobs because I exhibited a confidence in my ability to listen and problem solve, characteristics these groups were yearning for. With a traumatized staff and board, an important part of my job was to reassure people that change could happen and that through our mutual commitment we could do that together.

I must admit that I was attracted to the challenge and the requirements of being involved in all parts of the organization simultaneously. The learning curve was steep, as I urgently needed to get a grasp on the level of the problems, which were always much deeper and messier than anyone knew. Opaque financial systems covering up losses, partners who had lost trust, foundations and government funders threatening to take back funds, underpaid staff that were owed wages, non-existent HR procedures, computer systems teetering on collapse were all part of the picture. I had an ability to prioritize, problem solve and build new systems, while listening and supporting the needs of staff and the people we were serving.

From day 1, I would emphasize and demonstrate listening and consensus building. I acknowledged and rewarded my direct reports and gave them leeway to manage their staff. My door was literally always open to signify that unlike their predecessors, I had nothing to hide and anyone could walk in to talk to me at any time. I made sure that personnel decisions were done in confidentiality. I tried to have friendly and professional relationships with all board members.

My blind spot, however, was the lasting effects of trauma and mistrust.

As the new leader, I was always trying to find out the information I needed about the past, about our relationships with others and our programs. Despite an openness and acknowledgement of each individual´s contributions, I could never break this information power barrier. Board and staff held on to information like their life depended on it, which unconsciously for many was exactly how they felt.

��But they had learned that trust itself was untrustworthy.��

I knew most people had been traumatized by their last leader, so I could understand their mistrust in me despite my efforts to gain trust. But they had learned that trust itself was untrustworthy. This message was repeated over and over during my tenure.

My experiences in organizational transformation taught me that culture change does not come easy. Team building workshops, ropes courses, developing organizational aspirations and charters about how we want to work and respect each other, bringing in specialized consultants, providing outside personal coaches to key staff members, and even our courses on trauma-informed care, did little to change our culture. In trying to refocus on the positive aspects of work lives, I never dared to delve deeply into the way personal and organization trauma affected us all. Ultimately, I was set up to fail and to be blamed.

Trauma was deeply embedded in the boards as well. In retrospect, I should have required the boards that hired me to have a plan for their own rapid turnover. Many members were recruited by the family and friend networks of the previous management with little regard for competencies and skills. None of them fully acknowledged their own lack of oversight and management of my predecessors. I was often shocked about how completely disconnected with the organization they were. Despite new leadership, they still acted in the old ways.

A traumatized board cannot be relied on to renew themselves and govern appropriately. In the three cases where the board managed me as the ED, none had term limits or would consider them, few had any management experience, and most had no clear understanding of the programs and goals of the organization despite any number of reports that I produced and discussions we had. And even when new board members were recruited, they either fell into the behaviors of the old board or quit as they realized the futility of expecting a professional board environment.

I expected to be judged on my accomplishments and was very clear with the board in getting their approval for my and the organization’s yearly goals and objectives and for an annual review process. Yet despite monthly detailed reports both written and oral, certain members complained that the did not know enough. Individual meetings with them, program tours and meeting program participants did little to change this.

It is quite usual for the leaders of turnarounds to leave once the organization is stabilized and headed in a better future. I accepted that reality and even went into the last job with the clear intention that I would be there for a stated period of time. However, I had imagined a successful turnover of leadership following the best management principles. But instead, I was gaslit, the organizations stumbled (and one of the four went under) and there is no indication that anything changed for the new leadership.

And as I said in the beginning of this essay, I rarely talked about my accomplishments, even with the board. I never liked hearing my nonprofit leadership colleagues brag about what they did as if they were the only ones in their organization. Almost always, I talked about what we as a team had accomplished and made the false assumption that the board and organization would understand my role in making things happen.

This was part of my downfall. Unscrupulous and traumatized staff and board members would complain that they did not know what I did. My reaction was frustration that they couldn´t make the connection with my leadership and the achievements of the organization. This is classic gaslighting.

Gaslighting can only occur when the organizational culture nurtures it. When the avoidance of responsibility and blame is a norm, it grows. When certain people are protected over others, when all voices are not heard equitably, when teams are set against each other, gaslighting is sure to occur at all levels.

In the end, gaslighting by the Board made it my problem that they did not understand me or the organization. In one case, despite the clear homophobia of one board member, the board reacted to the board member’s concerns, not to their legal responsibilities or my own achievements. Ironically, as I was being publicly honored by our major partner and funder, the board was plotting my removal. In a second case, a board co-chair met secretly with a staff member and promised them my job, while in guise of board oversight met with me about vague and unspoken issues that I was to fix. The hurt I felt deepened when almost none of the other board members chose to talk to me about what was going on.

It is this hurt that lingered. The purpose of this essay is to open this door about the abuse of people at any level in a hierarchy that are entrusted to do good. Despite my meditation practice, therapy and specialized workshops, I continued to carry this trauma with me. Writing this essay helped to spur an acknowledgment of the hurt and the gaslighting I experienced. And then I had a remarkable dream that helped my healing take a new step.

��I see you.�� These simple three words touched me deeply in a way that I never imagined possible.��

In the dream, I entered a room filled with a number of former staff, who were the most abusive and secretive in their gaslighting. They began to apologize to me. I resisted their apologies as our current world is rife with unapologetic apologies. And more importantly, I had learned not to trust them and was angry.

Then, one of the ringleaders said, “I see you.��

“You see me, what?�� I snapped.

“I see how you really are, how hard you are trying to get us to change. I see what you are doing for us.��  

I was unmoved. “If you see me, why were you so awful towards me? Your behavior was despicable and hateful. You don’t have any idea of the harm you caused me.��

“I do know. At the time, I was too deep in my own hurt and mistrust from what happened before you got here. But even so, I am now telling you honestly, that I always saw what you were doing. I see you and I am sorry for what I did, for what we did. I see the good in you I could never acknowledge when you were here. I see what you have accomplished and know without you, none of those things would have happened.��

“I see you.�� These simple three words touched me deeply in a way that I never imagined possible and sent a shiver down my spine. For the very first time my work and efforts were acknowledged by the perpetrators that harmed me. I never really realized how much I needed to hear them to own their harm. But most importantly, I felt unequivocable pride in my previously unsung accomplishments. Being seen was the missing element in my healing.   Even though it was a dream, I woke up feeling the traumatic past loosening its grip on me.

This experience made me wonder, do I see others? In the next weeks, I experimented using those words “I see you�� with friends and acquaintances that were suffering. And in each case, I saw an immediate change, as people’s eyes lit up and their words softened. “I see you�� as an individual. I see and acknowledge your struggles. I see that you are more than your struggles or accomplishments.

“I see you�� is simple to say. Try it out in conversation with someone you trust first to get the hang of it. Follow up with an acknowledgement of what you see in them. With one friend, I saw how hard he was trying to overcome his past. Talking to another, I saw her emotional pain and the difficulty she had to live with it. I did not offer a fix for their problems, as I did not have one. All I needed to do was to listen to what opened up for them.

I hear some of you saying all of this is too simplistic for a complicated issue like gaslighting. Perhaps that is true. By the time that gaslighting is happening and the relationships have been set in motion, it may be too late to respond in any way other than a protective mode. I do wonder what would have happened if “I see you�� was in my toolkit when I was working in these turnarounds.

Seeing someone, seeing their humanity is a way to put empathy into tangible action, something we all can do. It does not negate the past, but seeing a person and their humanness models better behavior and makes it harder for all parties to objectify and demonize each other. Recognizing that humans are imperfect, allows one to see how the past, present and even future have seeds of potential that can be nurtured. With this perspective, trust can be created. While it is a long road to travel, seeing a person, just might be a way to cut off pernicious behaviors like gaslighting from taking hold in organizations.

I realize this is an audacious statement that might offend scholars that have spent lifetimes studying and analyzing Dōgen´s words. How can a modern novel that is a love letter from a father to the daughter he never met possible be related to the Genjō ��ō����? However, Dōgen`s words are not just for the scholars but all of us.

“That myriad dharmas come forth and illuminate the self is enlightenment.��  

After doing a number of readings and talks about the novel at Zen Centers, I came to realize one can look at the novel as yet another interpretation this line from the ��ō����. There are unlimited ways of becoming aware and awakened in our lives and one of my goals in writing Make the Dark Night Shine was to make people curious enough about Zen that they would  seek more knowledge. And for current and future practitioners, I hope they find the novel another dharma gate in awakening.

Most often, Zen students read the ��ō���� from a perspective of what does it tell us of Zen. However, for me its importance has always been what does it tell us about living this very life through our own body and mind. Just as we create a story about what we call our lives, a novel is another way of exploring a life, in this case that of Kenzo, a Japanese diplomat turned Zen priest, who discovers many years after the fact that he has a daughter living in NY.

Knowing and not-knowing infuse the novel, as it does in each of our lives. Life is a very messy affair. Whether it is long or short, so many things happen over a lifetime. Minute by minute, second by second, experiences come and go, and our body changes. Our interactions with our physical environment, with other people and with our thoughts all are non-stop. While we have a notion that meditation and other mindfulness practices help us slow down, that is not what they are meant to do. They can only allow us to perceive differently, notice the things we might not notice or want to notice, endure things we might choose to ignore or engage with things with which we might not normally engage.

Just as our life is in motion, Dōgen´s depictions of the natural world in the Genjō ��ō���� are in constant movement.

“A fish swims in the ocean, and no matter how far it swims there is no end to the water. A bird flies in the sky, and no matter how far it flies there is no end to the sky�� When their activity is large their field is large. When their need is small their field is small.��

My novel explores the small and large fields of life. Although it focuses on the period between the two world wars for the characters, the larger world of history, symbolized by Constantinople and other ancient cities around the world, the arts, religion and the movement of people set the scene. Human-created world events, such as wars, cities being built and destroyed and natural ones like earthquakes, fires or pandemics shake up the character´s lives. And they, as do we, search for some meaning to this movement.

Yet is the small field of home, family, connections to others and our daily practices that provide the details of life. For fish and birds (and humans,) the essence of life is the interaction with their distinct environments. We are observers to the intricacies of the daily lives of Kenzo, Mitsu, Elisa and Gül, their relations with each other, and their connection to the illusive concept of home.

Kenzo may become a Zen priest but Dōgen´s words pop out of a sea captain, “How does the wind permeate everywhere?��; Elisa, Kenzo´s consort, “Can bird distinguish where they are in the sky? Do the measure distances or do they simply exist in the spacious air?��; Kenzo´s grandmother urges him to “Let go of your comparisons��; and most interactions with Mitsu, Kenzo´s same-sex partner are reminders to be aware of the moment and be present even in sickness and death.

�� When you ride in a boat and watch the shore, you might assume that the shore is moving. But when you keep your eyes closely on the boat, you can see that the boat moves.��

“When you sail out in a boat to the middle of an ocean where no land is in sight, and view the four directions, the ocean looks circular, and does not look any other way. But the ocean is neither round nor square; its features are infinite in variety. It is like a palace. It is like a jewel. It only looks circular as far as you can see at that time. All things are like this.��

For Dōgen, the ocean and water are metaphors for the ever-encompassing presence of Buddha-nature. Based on his writings, Dōgen´s own perilous journey across the sea to China and back appeared to be a life-changing event. As a person who had lived his life looking out on the ocean, all of his ideas of being a land-based person were challenged when confronted with a new viewpoints from the middle of the vast sea. Set in the 1920s and 30s before air travel was common, our world wanderers escape war and dire situations by steamships, start and end adventures on the water, and look out to sea from their lives on the land. Like Dōgen, the characters comment on the view from the sea compared to the view from the land, the nature of water and fish, the passage of time, the light of the moon reflecting on the water, the loneliness and the great expanse of the oceans. Kenzo even conducts a sesshin, full-day meditation sessions, on a steamship, using the water to guide his worrying thoughts.

“When you see forms or hear sounds, fully engaging body-and-mind, you intuit dharmas intimately.��

Such is the path for Kenzo. On his first day in Constantinople, he is surprised and moved by the beauty and enchantment of the muezzin call to daily prayer. He feels the call in his body and is astonished  as the men on the street drop to their knees in response. Later he encounters the Sufi mystics whirling around themselves in their attempt to liberate themselves from their body and in doing so to bring peace to all. The wind on the top of the Eifel Tower even brings a sense of greater connection to him. When a series of unexpected events dislodges Kenzo from his planned life, he is invited to sit and work with a Zen priest and his path in Way begins in earnest.

At Eiheiji Zen monastery, the home of Soto Zen founded Dōgen, Kenzo meets the Genjō ��ō���� for the first time.

“To study the buddha way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.��

His teacher uses the poetry of this phrase to talk to Kenzo about his relationships with others, Zazen and how to understand the workings of his mind. The body practices that he saw earlier in Constantinople prepare him for sitting, letting the mind drop off and finally name the ungraspable feeling he has had for so long.

The challenge to Kenzo and ourselves is to maintain this awareness through lives that experience love and joy, as well as loss and death, sickness, violence, racism, sexism, homophobia and the innumerable other harms that humans bring on each other.

Dōgen calls us to be in the world, to see its diversity and to experience its conditions.

“Though there are many features in the dusty world and the world beyond conditions, you see and understand only what your eye of practice can reach. In order to learn the nature of the myriad things, you must know that although they may look round or square, the other features of oceans and mountains are infinite in variety; whole worlds are there. It is so not only around you, but also directly beneath your feet, or in a drop of water.��

Our own calling requires us to respond to those conditions in the ways we can. This is the core of the novel. How do we take hold of the life we have, the life we were born into? Can we approach life with equanimity again and again? Can we recognize the harm we cause to ourselves and others as easily as we recognize the joy we bring? Kenzo, who uncovers the secrets of his family, a man trying to do the right thing, trying to be model to others, must constantly face the reality of not having the power to change the conditions in which he was born or the ability to change other people because he wants them to change. This quandary is most explicit in his vow to end all war, which remains strong even after he is arrested and the bombs from the German Blitz on London are falling on the city. And with all of this knowledge, he yearns to connect with Nina and leaves his writings to her with scant hope that she will see them.

“The wind of the Buddha’s house brings forth the gold of the earth and makes fragrant the cream of the long river.��

This last line of the Genjō ��ō���� is one of the most evocative and enigmatic. The river is our life, beginning its birth and constant renewal in the far past in a place we cannot remember. A river ends by joining the immensity of the seas, its water intermingling with the waters from every other source on earth. Just as a river changes its course due to subtle influences over time or due to massive upheavals of the earth or weather, so do we.

The life-path for Kenzo, his daughter Nina and all of the characters meander like the long river, coming from a source of ancestors, history and environment we never knew and going to an ocean that is undefinable in its great size and encompasses our being. The river banks contain our life story, yet routinely that story is interrupted as the river overflows and pushes against self- or society-imposed limitations. In the aftermath, the flow of our life is forever altered, our souls are fertilized by the earth supporting us and over time new pathways emerge to focus us. With the winds of Buddhism on our back we are pushed  forward to drop fear and to experience the transcendence and richness of the inter-connection with all.

Kintsugi is the Japanese art of fixing broken pottery using a gold sealant to repair the cracks. The end result is not to hide the cracks, but to accentuate them, to imbue the pottery with a new sense of beauty and utility. Applying the idea of Kintsugi to Dōgen´s words, the gold from the earth reveals the thick creamy richness of life´s experience and imperfections.

“The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass.��

Our family histories, the times we live in, the places we live, the work we do, the loves we had and lost, the joys and horrors that we have witnessed, our doubts, the things we are sure about, the moment-to-moment state of our health are reflected in our facial expressions, how we hold our shoulders, how we walk and sit, how our skin wrinkles. Our own Kintsugi-lined body is the body of humanity and our unique individual imperfections are merely reflections of all human imperfection. Just as our own life stories, written tales like Make the Dark Night Shine, and the Genjō ��ō���� are indivisible from each other.

��

All quotes come the Robert Aitkin and Kazuaki Tanahashi translation of the Genjō ��ō����.

Make the Dark Night Shine is available worldwide at your local bookseller or on-line. In the US, you can support local independent booksellers by buying online .

Everything changes. Continually. Always. Nothing is ever the same. This is the foundational teaching of Buddhism. We all know this. Yet our perceptions of how we change are often at odds with this teaching. People tend toward behaviors that attempt to hold on to conceptions of they think they are and what they determine is real for them. Honestly, we have to do this just to move around. Imagine what life would be like if we constantly saw everything around us anew each time. Yet we have to ask, what would it be like to approach your life acknowledging everything has changed and will change?

Some people seem more inclined toward shifting their connection to place and identity.  People who know me, think of me as someone who fearlessly takes grand leaps to new jobs, living in new places, throwing myself into new possibilities. For many years, I myself would describe my life changes as jumps off a cliff. Starting with imperceptible reactions and deep unspoken thoughts, add in some longing and desire and then one day off I go.

There is a Zen kōan, a teaching story that might describe my decision making. In 

“From the top of a pole one hundred feet high, how do you step forward?�� Another ancient master, Mumon, tells us, “One sitting at the top of a pole, one hundred feet high, even if he has attained it, has not yet been truly enlightened. He must step forward from the top of the pole one hundred feet high and manifest his whole body in the ten directions.��

My Zen practice has trained me to act in a just-do-it-now way for many things. Every morning, I get up as soon as the alarm rings. Just get up. No matter how I think I am feeling, every morning, I just sit. Later, when it is time, I just go to the skating rink or gym. And recently for my move to Berlin, just put things in order and go.

However stepping forward from a 100-foot pole?  Maybe not. If I have learned one thing, it is that I have a fear of heights. I discovered this in a ropes course-team building exercise a few years ago. With a belay rope securely around me, so that I could not fall unimpeded, I nimbly climbed up a twenty-foot pole. Easy-peasy I thought. Then I discovered that the top of the pole was not fixed but had a disk that could spin around. Despite the belay rope, my mind seized up, unable to stop thinking about falling off. I knew this was my mind at work and that I was safe, but I still could not move my legs up to attempt to stand on the top, even though I could do the same movement on the ground without thinking. Ten minutes, I managed to sit on the top, as standing was out of the question. After another ten minutes of attempted breathing and relaxation, I was as wound up and tight as I started. My mind would not let go. The last act of the exercise was to jump off the pole and try to grab a ring a few feet in front of me. Of course, the belay rope would safely bring me to the ground. After checking with the person a half a dozen times whether he really had me, I finally jumped. Once on the ground, I had some clarity…I certainly won’t do this again!

I had dramatically been face-to-face with my mind’s fixed point-of-view. I did not like what I saw. I created fear where there was safety. I froze in my steps when my natural limberness could have been my companion. While I never went back to the pole, on each of the other exercises high off the ground, I tried a different approach of acknowledging my fear and using my breathe to convert the fear into energy I could utilize.

Despite my own experience with poles, I am fascinated by the 100-foot pole. gives some commentary on the 100-foot pole that I would like to quote.

“So what is the hundred-foot pole? Well, put yourself there. It’s a hundred feet up. How is it there? From atop the hundred-foot pole how is it down here? Far away. It’s so far away you can’t hear the conversations; you can’t hear the cries. It’s so far away you can’t even see the people. It’s so high you can’t see a single thing. And so (Mumon) is saying on top of this pole he has gained entry, but this is not yet the real (thing). Now of course from down below that pole looks pretty sweet. The air is clear, there’s no noise. No problems…So from down here it looks pretty nice. This is the view from delusion to enlightenment. But enlightenment is not a place or thing, so the only view we can have is within our imagination, which is not enlightenment at all. Only by standing on the top of this pole can you know.

But why does Momon say “having arrived here you gain entry but this is not yet the real��? Momon is speaking about something very real within our practice and training of the buddhadharma. Is it liberation or is it escape? Are you withdrawing from the world or are you meeting the world? There is a long-held desire for escape, to withdraw and be done with it all, to avoid the difficulties. I imagine we’ve all had moments where we thought if we could just leave the world while we find a refuge, a heaven, an island, a cave, a something, a somewhere. But this is not buddhadharma. This is not practice. This is not even real.��

So while we emphasize meditation in our practice, this kōan is telling us we can’t sit still. If we are sitting in our satisfaction, our notions that we have arrived or not arrived, that we know what we are doing, or don’t know what we are doing, that we have something to teach others and/or our work is done or that we are worthless without anything to offer, our sitting is not real.

The only way to experience awakening, Mumon tells us, is to step forward and manifest our body.

Manifest our body. How do we manifest our body in the ten directions, which is to say everywhere? Mumon never tells us to jump off the pole, although that is how my mind interpreted his word. But if he wanted us to jump off, he would have told us that. In fact, he tell us to just step forward. As the pole is an illusion, we step into our practice to manifest our bodies. Read the text again, and instead of imagining yourself plunging down from this pole, imagine yourself walking forward, confidently, knowing the pole (fear) was never real in the first place. Our practice is not in our head.  As much as we love dharma talks, reading Buddhist texts, accumulating a library of masters of all stripes and inclinations sharing their wisdom, all that study at our desk or on top of a hundred-foot pole will not help us manifest our body. As humans, we become aware of the connection to all beings through the body.

Although I started this talk, saying that I make major decisions in my life by jumping off the cliff, there is a different Zen phrase that seems more applicable to me.

Eihei Dogen, the founder of Zen in Japan traveled in China in a search of the perfect practice. He was not satisfied until he was introduced to zazen. When he returned to Japan in 1227, one of the first tracts that he wrote was entitled  which we can translate to Recommending Zazen to All People.

In the early pages of the Fukanzazengi, there is this paragraph:

“You should stop searching for phrases and chasing after words. Take the backward step and turn the light inward. Your body-mind in itself will drop off and your original face will appear. If you want to attain just this (suchness), immediately practice just this (suchness).��

Those four simple words, Take the backward step, set my mind off in wonder.

Take the backward step is an invitation to practice.

Take the backward step is a practice all by itself.

Take the backward step is actually the ultimate experience of practice.

Dogen starts by saying stop searching for phrases and chasing after words. I think we understand that. Our mind, or at least my version of the mind is awhirl in thoughts, visions, words and ideas. Sitting in meditation gives me a chance to examine what is going on there and notice the mind activity that I take for granted. That said, do you understand how uniquely your mind works?

About a year ago, at the San Francisco Zen Center, suggested that instead of focusing on letting thoughts go, that we take some time instead to look at our thoughts to understand how we experience our thoughts. Like most people, until that day I had no notion of what my thoughts were like nor how they were manifested in my body/mind.  

I discovered that my thoughts are mini-movies that last for less than a few seconds. In that time, complete stories appear. While some may contain memories, most are new stories in themselves with familiar and unfamiliar parts. I believe that this is what I see in my dreams. Others have reported that thoughts are spoken words, colors or sounds and music.

Taking the backward step of looking at my thoughts, opened up new insight for me. I can see the direct connections between my mini-movies and my speaking and writing.  I am a person who can spontaneously stand up and give a talk with any written guidance. And when I write, stories come forth at a pace that I can transcribe and fully embellish. I think I am slowing down my mini-movies enough to delve into the deepness of what they really are. And like this dharma talk, there are always stories within stories.

As an invitation to practice, Dogen asks us to drop the words that we use to define us, the words that make us think that we know what we are doing and who are. By dropping our fixed choices, we open up new possibilities of experiencing what is now.

As a practice, we must continually take this backward step now and again now and again now. There is not just one backward step, but step after step. 

Let go. Leave yourself behind.

Let go, leave yourself behind.

Let go, leave yourself behind.

Ever the poet, Dogen’s next phrase is:

�� Your body-mind in itself will drop off and your original face will appear.��

It is not just our mind and thoughts we are now leaving but our body-mind itself is dropped. The brain and the body store experiences in behaviors, reservoirs of trauma and emotional pain, in movements or restrictions of movements, in our posture, in our gestures, in our facial expressions. My habitual movements and thoughts keep me occupied and hide my changing body. My experience of life becomes defined like an on-line profile that has not been updated for years, with the same photos pretending to be who we are now.

Your original face is how you are before all of these learned behaviors changed you, how you are before you existed, as you are as you manifest your body in ten-directions.

wrote,

��If we wake up out of a confining story of who we are and reconnect with our essential awareness, we’re taking the backward step. When our attention shifts from a narrow fixation on any object—sound, sensation, thought—and recognizes the awake space that holds everything, we’re taking the backward step. We come to this realization when there is nowhere else to step. No anything. We’ve relaxed back into the immensity and silence of awareness itself.��

So stop focusing on what is going through your mind, stop making fixed choices about your experience or who you are or who others are. Let these all go. Leave yourself behind. It is scary to let go of ourselves. What will we be if we let go and see our original face? Can we trust ourselves to do this?

Though I had been intrigued by Zen for many years, I was very leery of practicing Zen. I worried that it would change me into some else, that I might become indoctrinated into some cult, and worse of all, I would become this unmoored person, blithely floating around in some nirvana, always with a smile on my face. That was my fear of leaving myself behind. Fortunately, a non-Zen mentor pointed out the everything she saw in my life and actions suggested the opposite and that I would likely become more grounded through practice.

We can trust that we won’t disappear even though we are letting go. As long as we are alive, the body and the mind remain.

Stepping back is the ultimate experience of practice, where one can feel the freedom of being immersed in the lack of attachment.  The experience is almost always momentary, but that does not matter. It can be frustrating to experience glimpses of non-attachment or it can be a gift to experience glimpses of non-attachment. Your body-mind is the one making the choice. On the advice of my mentor, I decided to go for the gift possibility.

Can stepping backward and stepping forward exist simultaneously? Well of course, it can in the Zen world, where everything is a contradiction.

Stepping back for me is the first step of moving forward.

Stepping back gives us a chance to gain perspective about what we hold dear and what believe we are not willing to give up. Without reflection, we unknowingly cling to ways of acting that may not be response to current conditions. Our egos are trapped in a sense of privilege and deservingness. I worked hard so I should____ (fill in the blanks.) After all that I have done, I should be able to ____. I am in charge of my body, so I can _____.

Or worse, we accumulate the pains, the suffering, the bitterness that we have experienced and turn it in on ourselves. We cling to our suffering as much as we cling to desire.

As I reflect on my life, I see the connection between stepping back as I step forward.

Stepping back allows me to re-equilibrate my life. Thirty-three years ago, stepping back created a space for me to examine the relationship I was in, to see if it could be repaired. Working with a therapist who helped me experience my body and mind, allowed me to see the harm the relationship was causing to me. Stepping back allowed me to understand how my needs were not being met and how I contributed to making that happen. Stepping back allowed me to come out as a gay man.

A supervisor in a past job would caution me each time I excitedly wanted to jump forward with a new idea. He would tell me to step back and assess the situation fully before acting. He taught me to wait for the right moment to act, for the moment when real change can occur, when others can participate wholeheartedly, where I disappear and the group takes action together. In Buddhism, we call this right action.

Since my teenage years in the 1960s, I participated in what I considered the forefront of social change. I worked in non-profits or organizations that were trying to resolve social, economic and political injustices. I had a vision of a better world, that was shared by many. I was proud of living a life dedicated to change and my ego liked being recognized for that. I honestly thought my generation would solve the problems of injustice, human rights and environmental degradation.

Sadly, I have to admit, we did not completely succeed in our dreams.  When a vision becomes encrusted with frustration, bitterness and defeat, it disappears. We replace it with resignation, hopelessness or sarcasm. When our ego clamors for recognition, as it will, we lose our focus.

Only by stepping back, can I allow myself to look at the present moment. I can now see that the problems I was confronting in the world were rooted in centuries of history, in traumas upon traumas. My desire as a liberal cisgender white man to change the conditions, ignored how systematic racism, sexism, homophobia, and other isms molded how I saw these issues.

Stepping back now, I can see that my perspective was incomplete and what I saw was directly related to my ability/inability to see the world as it is at any present moment. I saw that I had fixed views, formed in my youth that were not in sync with the present conditions facing the world. Stepping back, I can see myself in the , which like the 100-foot pole has no end.

Stepping back, another generation steps forward.  When I step back, younger people that have the energy and vision I had in my youth, better ideas and the ability to recognize the world as it is now will step forward. People of color, women and trans and nonbinary folks and any others who have been excluded will move our causes forward.

For five years or so, I led the mediation at Queer Dharma. I was happy to share my love of Zen and mediation with others. However, in doing so, within this particular Zen Center, I had to live within the strictures and hierarchy which permitted me to lead mediation, but did not allow me to lead a discussion about mediation when we were finished. For a long time, I was fine with this restriction but eventually, I felt irritated when I sat in the group. Clearly, irritation is never a good way to teach mediation.

When I stepped back, I had the realization that my ego was clinging hard to the idea that I was the meditation guy in Queer Dharma, a role that gave me an identity and allowed me to participate in the true teaching of dharma. I had to drop this very ego to determine my true intent of living the dharma I trusted.

As I asked that question, during a time of recognition of white privilege and power, I realized that as long as I and other white people sat in these seats, others could not. I stepped back with a recommendation to open a space for someone of color to step in.

In my last job, stepping back during a difficult and heart-breaking time that exposed the hidden cracks of privilege and control within the organization, allowed me to let go of my identity as the leader and replace the fight to stay with the goal of creating a safe landing space for myself. Some saw this as a defeat; I saw it as taking the step forward, a step that several years later allowed me to contemplate a bigger move to Berlin and living life as a writer.

The hundred-foot pole is a metaphor for believing that there is a fixed place, an end goal of our practice journey. There is not such fixed place in life, except for maybe death. And perhaps even death is not a fixed place, but something we will discover when we die.

Taking the step backward allows one to prepare for the unknown. Stepping back allows me to examine my motives and lay bare the cravings of my ego for recognition, wanting everything to be about me.

Covid forced a step back that gave me more time each day. I love languages and began to study German, just to study German, without other plans. That step backward step, opened the door to getting a 3-year visa to stay in Berlin.

Sharpening my skates before I left San Francisco was a step back that allowed me to step on new ice in a new place with as solid footing as one can on a slippery surface.

Packing my bags for a long-term move to a place I had only briefly visited, was the backward step of deciding what was important for me to physically and spiritually carry with me a this time of my life.

Establishing a practice and relationships with sanghas in San Francisco and Belfast, was the backward step that allowed me to continue to practice in a new place, where I am Alan sitting, peering at a blank wall, never the same and always different as I carry my Alanness from place to place and from time to time.

Arriving in Berlin, the step backward is to experience this new place in its suchness, its Berlinness in 2021 in the midst of a worldwide pandemic.

And now it is time for me to step back again, this time as a guest teacher of this beautiful sangha which has enriched my life deeply in the last three years. Our sangha has learned from each teacher we have had over the twenty years of its existence. And we have had more teachers step back than we have had remain. What we be like if and had stayed with us for that period? We don’t know because they stepped back and allowed the sangha to grow and flourish as it found its collective feet and mind/body in the ten directions.

Being asked to be a guest teacher has been a great honor and that honor has shaped the person I am now. Honestly, my ego doesn’t want to step back from this role. It wants to figure out how it can continue. It wants to feel wanted and respected. I still want, want, want. My ego does not let go. But the super-power of stepping back allows me look at myself, forcing me to examine how I cling to my desires and let my ego run amok.

I don’t know what will happen next for me, but I trust in stepping back and seeing happens next. I also trust that stepping back from my version of life in San Francisco, with its familiar and fixed ways, will open this body/mind to what is next, and what is next and what is next.

There is nothing else I need to know.

This is blog is based on a talk given to the San Francisco LGBTQ Sangha on 6 December 2021. You can listen to the talk

The cover image: Copyright: ©MemoryMan �� stock.adobe.com

“When individuals in our society speak or act out of hatred against a whole group of people based solely on superficial appearance, it is a reflection of the mental state of our whole society. We don’t escape because we are not the ones hating. The challenges of race, sexuality, and gender are the very things that the spiritual path to awakening requires us to tend to as aspirants to peace.��

Gautama Buddha’s early teachings offered the Way to all members of his society, including women and members of various castes and social classes. The Bodhisattva vow “My intention is to awaken with (or save) all beings�� is the earliest manifestation of Engaged Buddhism. These teachings, especially through the modern interpretation of Thich Nhat Hanh, remind us the practice of Buddhism occurs through every day actions and in facing the issues of everyday life. Whereas sweeping floors, cooking rice and chopping wood are part of the daily life of monastics, for the rest of us, our opportunities of engaging our practice come from the environment in which we live.

Zenju Earthlyn Manuel is a self-described African-American, lesbian, disabled Zen priest living in Oakland, California. When I came across the paragraph from book, cited above, I was struck by its wisdom and clarity. Not only does her vision provide us with one of the best explanations of Engaged Buddhism, but she opened my eyes to how discrimination and exclusion can be dharma gates to compassion, enlightenment and social change.

Any identity, such as sexual orientation, place of birth, ethnicity, race, gender, and class, can provide pathways to awakening. While my queer male cisgender identity is at the forefront, I recognize that my upbringing in a Ukrainian immigrant family, my parent’s working-class background and the opportunities I have had as a white person in the US have also shaped me. As Buddhists, we understand that humans will have a sense of self-identity, while we are inter-connected with all beings. Our delusion comes from believing the story that each of us is completely separate from others.

It is common to view inter-connection as existing only when we perceive it as good or beneficial to us. However, any friction that arises between individuals or groups of people is also part of inter-connection. Zenju’s observation is key—when hate occurs, we are all part of the hate as much as the hater or one who is hated. This was not easy for me to accept. I blamed others for problems that arose and used my Buddhist practice as a shield to say I was not involved. By disavowing those I do not like, did not understand and who seemed to be fundamentally different, I was denying inter-connection.

So how can we engage with hate and discrimination?

The first step to awakening as an engaged Buddhist asks us to step back and view our world as clearly as we are able by dispassionately viewing the causes and conditions that confront us. By reading about and listening to the experiences of people with different identities than mine, such as women, those of different racial and ethnic backgrounds or gender identities, I began to see the world from multiple perspectives. I could begin to acknowledge how views shaped by my experience as a white cisgender, gay man were incomplete.

The next step in practice is to understand our role in the creation of our reality. Even though I am gay, I have contributed to homophobia by not speaking up and by adopting heteronormative behaviors so I could fit in at school, work or just walking down the street. I unconsciously accepted stereotypes based on ethnicity or characteristics of people from different parts of the world. And I discovered the privileges I have in society as a white cisgender male that others do not.

Seeing and experiencing is but one step on the path. I am self-aware enough not to want to hate and create separation, but how can I, along with others, assure that our actions are creating the society we say we want? Some theories of social change assert that an individual needs to change before society can change, while others place the focus on group efforts leading to individual changes. Buddhism supports both theories. I have made it part of my practice to seek out and learn from others whose voices have been marginalized, so that I can be an ally and join them in their struggle for human rights. And in the last year I have participated in vigils and demonstrations against the rise of violence against Blacks and Asians in the U.S and advocated for legal and policy changes.

The Bodhisattva vow asks us to accept awakening only when all beings are included. This seemingly impossible vow acknowledges our inter-connection through our distinct identities. We commit ourselves to this practice without end. Over our lifetimes, how we do this and what this means will change. As  Buddhists we know that everything changes. Our solutions to hate in the 2020’s must be quite different than those used to meet the conditions of the 1920s.

Engaging in Buddhism over the Rainbow makes our vows explicit. As queer people, we experience inter-connection daily in its positive and negative forms. We enter the dharma gates that open from our individual and collective experiences and through those gates discover the next one and the next one as we confront our delusions and recognize our own collective awakening.  

This post is a translation of my article, “Queer-Dharma als engagierter Buddhismus�� published in Ursache \ Wirkung, Special Edition #1, (Buddhism Under the Rainbow), August 2021 .

The other day, after I warmed up, I entered the center rink to practice my spins. My sit spin is my favorite. My body memory usually takes over as I turn on my left leg and my right leg moves ever so precisely around the side until it is in front of me, as I sink down and my arms pull in. There is a delicious moment when I am centered and my body is in the right place when I pull in a little tighter and my speed increases until the rink around becomes a blur.

Yet on this day, little of that happened. I could not coordinate the movements. The more I tried, the worse it got. Frustrated I tried harder, but just as in practice, pushing harder, does not necessarily achieve much. Defeated, I tried to move on. This happens frequently, and soon enough, often in the same session, I recover what I lost. But what I noticed this time was my mind at work, questioning what was going on.

And the questions were not neutral or analytic. The questions were about my very being. Why did I think I could accomplish anything? Why was I deluding myself that I could even skate? Quickly they morphed into judgment. You are a laughingstock and never will be good at this. You should give up now. Everyone knows how bad you are.

This descent into self-judgment, despair and shame only took seconds and honestly only lasted for seconds. Normally I would not have even noticed these thoughts. Yet this time, I realized that this type of brief shaming self-doubt was often there, waiting for the right moment to insinuate itself. It was a moment of practice awareness.

As I was doing research on the origin of certain words for my novel , I discovered something that struck me as curious Linguists have proposed the existence of an ancient language that can be traced back to 4500-2500 BCE called Proto-Indo-European, which is the origin of most European and Indian languages, including Pali the language of Buddha. Many words, such as mother, father, numbers from 1 to 10 and various animals from wolves to oxen can be recognized across hundreds of current and now extinct different languages.

One word stood out for me—shame. originated in PIE as skem-, from kem- “to cover�� (as in covering one’s head or face in an expression of shame). I found it fascinating that along with words for family members, counting, agriculture and hunting, our ancient Neolithic ancestors needed a word to express a feeling that seems to be deeply baked into human existence.

The difference between shame and guilt () is that guilt is an admission that one did something bad or wrong. As there are actions or activities that can be examined, guilt is related to behavior. The noted researcher Brené Brown said, “With guilt, I can say, ‘I am sorry I made a mistake.�� Shame says ‘I am bad. Sorry, I am a mistake.’��

As , a Zen teacher from Minnesota, said, “Shame damages a person’s image of themselves in ways that no other emotion can, causing you to feel flawed, inferior, worthless, even unlovable.�� In its worst excesses, I have experienced shame as self-brutalizing hate, looking in a mirror and seeing nothing to love, an empty void into which I am endlessly falling. I feel the pressure of the world pushing down on me, punishing me, judging me. I feel an unworthiness so profound that it cannot be revealed. While shame may be attached to an action, it is a self-judgement that ignores the action itself and says my very being is awful and unredeemable.

Left unrecognized, shame has been correlated with depression, addiction, and suicide. Unrecognized shame can also lead one to be defensive and attack and blame others for the same things that cause us shame. Unrecognized shame does not let us have difficult discussions around race and privilege.

For shame to exist, we must be part of a family (whether it be of origin or choice) or some other group of people that has perceived commonality. Shame needs the comparison to others and emerges from feelings of judgement that one does not meet the stated or unstated norms of a group. Norms can be generated by religion, family, culture, background, education, and class and are overlain by norms held in a society about race, gender, and ethnicity. There are powerful forces around otherness, who belongs and who does not, that can keep any of us from being comfortable in our own skin.

Looking just at gendered norms of our society here in the US, we can see what we are up against. I mentioned Brené Brown a minute ago. She is researcher who has studied shame and vulnerability. Her on those topics are worth a look.

According to a that Brown quotes, to conform to female norms in the US, a woman must be nice, thin, modest and use available resources for appearance. With a focus solely on outward appearances, the implication is that anything else (which is everything else) a woman does, breaks norms.

According to the same study, for US men to conform to male norms, a man must control his emotions, put work first, pursue status and be violent. Traditionally, the norms of religion, education and legal systems have reinforced these standards and support the subjugation of women by men.

These norms are devastating, spirit-killing and indefensible. Public shaming is designed to keep one alone and isolated. Queer people challenge most of these gender-norms, especially those of us that challenge the concept of gender and gender identity. Despite our challenges, we can’t help but feel the brutality of these norms when we do not fit or match up. As queer people, I think I can safely say that shame has been a too common experience in our lives and our development. Growing up and living in societies, communities and families where our very thoughts and feelings do not conform to external norms, our recognition of our differentness easily converts into shame as we are told to behave in ways contrary to our being.  

Shame can show up in a number of ways. This categorization I am about to give is my own, not based on any science, but I hope you find it useful.

Childhood or Developmental Shame: All societies, cultures and families prioritize certain norms around conduct and judge individuals based on them. Conscious attention to norms and shaming by authority figures in one’s life is designed to keep us in line with the expected behaviors of the group. As children we are dependent on others and powerless to control of our circumstances. In addition, children commonly believe their actions are the cause of good or bad things happening in their lives. It is not unusual for children to feel fault for their parents�� martial problems or illnesses in their families.  Add in punishing gods or verbal and physical threats for being different and the process of internalizing shame in implanted in our bodies and mind.

Not only do we blame ourselves for things out of our control, but we also begin to notice what is expected of us and how our imperfections make us fall short. Our internal processing results in feeling shame for not living up to what is expected, being unable to live up to expectations or of being by nature unaligned with these expectations. We react in secrecy, silence and self-judgement as we hide (remember kem—to cover) who we are consciously or unconsciously.

Incident-based shame: Specific occurrences in our lives may cause us to be overcome by shame based on our experiences of developmental shame. How I left one of my jobs fits into that category. After a very successful six years as head of a non-profit, my last six months fell into chaos with a new Board President that undermined me in every way possible, staff that felt threatened by that instability and turned on me and my inability to manage all of this. I started to lose sleep, I was anxious and although I complained about the situation to my friends, I never talked to anyone about the deep-seated feelings of powerlessness and shame whose story was that I was incompetent and always brought about bad things in my life and others. I judged myself harshly and without restraint. In the end, my dream of leaving with appreciation and acknowledgement went down the drain with part of my ego. Although I was able to take care of myself, I felt that the story I told to others about my departure was concocted and not completely true. The months-long process that the Board of Directors undertook to approve my departure did not allow me to publicly acknowledge what was going on, leaving staff to assume the worst by my silence and reinforced the secrecy, silence and judgment I felt.

Momentary shame:  Finally, there are those brief momentary judgments we make when we blame our beingness as the problem and surrender to defeatism. I started this talk with an example of how momentary shame pops up.

If shame is so in-bred into humans, what does Buddhism say about it? Strangely, there seems very little. However, Buddha does give us some guidance for dealing with our mind. In the Buddha gives his son, Rahula, three steps for reflecting bodily actions, verbal actions, and mental actions (thoughts and emotions) are to be done.

First:

“Whenever you want to do a mental action, you should reflect on it: ‘This mental action I want to do �� would it lead to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both? Would it be an unskillful mental action, with painful consequences, painful results?�� If, on reflection, you know that it would lead to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both; it would be an unskillful mental action with painful consequences, painful results, then any mental action of that sort is absolutely unfit for you to do. But if on reflection you know that it would not cause affliction�� it would be a skillful mental action with pleasant consequences, pleasant results, then any mental action of that sort is fit for you to do.

Next:

“While you are doing a mental action, you should reflect on it: ‘This mental action I am doing �� is it leading to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both? Is it an unskillful mental action, with painful consequences, painful results?�� If, on reflection, you know that it is leading to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both�� you should give it up. But if on reflection you know that it is not�� you may continue with it.

And the final step:

“Having done a mental action, you should reflect on it: ‘This mental action I have done �� did it lead to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both? Was it an unskillful mental action, with painful consequences, painful results?�� If, on reflection, you know that it led to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both; ��(����) it was an unskillful mental action with painful consequences, painful results, then you (will) feel distressed, ashamed, and disgusted. Feeling distressed, ashamed, and disgusted with it, (will help) you exercise restraint in the future.��

He repeats the same sequence of reflections for bodily and verbal actions.

Note the Buddha always asks does this lead to self-affliction before he asks if it results in harm to others. We need to reflect on what affect thoughts and emotion, speech, and physical actions have on ourselves. Through this reflection we can determine if we are skillful. He first reminds us to reflect in three steps, as we consider something, as we do it and after we do it. What makes this teaching powerful to me is the inclusion of mental actions—the formation of emotions and feelings.

Buddha provides us a way to see our shame and to work through it. I hear Buddha asking us to examine the actions that cause our own self-afflictions. He specifically calls out distress, disgust and shame as signs to when we are being unskillful. So how do we go about examining the shame we carry in our bodies and what can we do about it.

We can start through love and compassion for ourselves. Self-compassion is the heart of all compassion. Many people find it useful to chant the or the Dalai Lama’s

Every day, think as you wake up,

Today I am fortunate to have woken up

I am alive, I have a precious human life,

I am not going to waste it,

I am going to use

All my energies to develop myself,

To expand my heart out to others,

To achieve enlighenment for

The benefit of all beings,

I am going to have kind

Thoughts twords others,

I am not going to get angry,

Or think badly about others,

I am going to benefit Others

As much as I can.

~The XIV Dalai Lama

One way to become more aware of how shame affects you is to keep a shame diary for a week. Note down any time you hear or feel yourself in despair, no matter how momentary. What negative feelings are arising? Then ask yourself what happened just before this feeling, what triggered this feeling? Is there a story that arises about this feeling? Note these all down. Determine where in your body does this negative feeling sit. Next ask yourself, are there things that you could have done differently? Finally, notice if asking these questions changes the feeling or its place in the body.

By paying attention in this way for a week, you can see when shame pops up into your life. and identify any patterns. I was surprised in the last week, as I have been thinking about shame, how often attached to minor difficulties or challenges, momentary shame pops up, along with a default response of giving up and despair. When I became aware of the feelings, I could acknowledge them, react to them and let them go. Even when I did this, I would sometimes still notice how some unloved part of myself wanted to linger and not let go.

As I stated earlier, forgiveness and self-love are keys to healing shame. A therapist, I was seeing, once mentioned that he read of Buddhist priests who spent a year forgiving themselves.

With that mention, I started my own practice of doing the same. I began with one of my earliest memories. At the age of about three, I remembered falling down the cellar stairs after I tried wearing my father’s work boots. In the original story I carried with me, I am clumsy and I am uncoordinated and I am stupid for hurting myself. Notice the harshness of these self-judgements. In my sitting, after the memory and some feelings arose, I focused the story on a different element—how I wanted to experience my father’s boots, how the boots smelled and what they felt like in my little hands. I wanted to be like my father, a man I emulated, and felt a power in putting these boots on my tiny feet. Then unexpectedly I tripped down the stairs because the shoes were so big. I was not ready to be him. I was a child and children try things that are sometimes dangerous. In the next step, I forgave myself for not knowing better, at that age, how to be safer. I also forgave myself for wanting to feel my father’s shoes and feel connected to him not knowing at the time that his family history never taught him how to be emotionally connected to his children.

Each day I sat, I created a five-to-ten-minute period to let my thoughts drift back to hurtful memories. I tried to look at these memories as a compassionate being and rewrite them as I could see them now. I always ended a session with forgiveness and by sending love into my own heart.

What I learned from this year-long practice was how much hurt I was carrying with me. Very often, I was hurt by situations in my family or in school or other parts of my life that were out of my influence or control. I carried with me a powerlessness from those experiences that could be re-invoked by other incidents in my life. By recognizing the powerlessness, I was able to let go of the story that I caused the situation and create a more nuanced story of being stuck in a place where I had few or no options. And now, I still remember some of these stories, but they have been neutralized and no longer carry the charge of shame and humiliation.

Along the way, I also forgave others that might have caused my suffering, like the teacher who held up my art project and said to the class, “this is not how you draw Abraham Lincoln.�� As I saw repeated patterns of suffering, I repeatedly had to forgive my father, whose drinking on the weekends made me tiptoe around him, fearful of incurring his wrath, and ruing the times when his own shame and anger were physically taken out on me. I gained agency through this process of examining memories, re-writing them and forgiving all involved, most of all, forgiving myself.

I did not keep a diary of this process because I did not need or want to keep a written reminder of the suffering in my life, big and small. At the end, I felt cleansed in many ways, although the years since have added any number of new insults to my well-being. But practice now allows me to hold onto hurts less firmly at the start or when discovered, to let them go.

Ironically, while shame can only occur by being in relation to others, the aloneness and isolation that shame evokes, causes us to lose our connection to all beings. As the ego monstrously takes over, it pushes away the very thing that nourishes us. The antidote to the secrecy, silence and judgment of shame, is vulnerability, openness and compassion. Shame cannot exist if we can hold onto our interconnection with all beings.

In the Zen morning service, we acknowledge the suffering in our lives in order to free it from continuing. By acknowledging my shame, I have the chance of liberating myself and others from its grip.

Our chant starts: “All my ancient, twisted karma�� all the experiences I have had good and bad, filtered through the experiences of family, friends, community and society.

“From beginningless greed, hate and delusion.�� All suffering begins from these three poisons. Delusion occurs when we do not acknowledge the impermanence of our ego. From delusion, greed and hate grow as we try to protect the ego at all costs.

“Born through body, speech and mind�� we interact with our fellow beings through what we do, what we say, what we think.

“I now fully avow��- I will acknowledge and reflect in my daily life these influences, and how I affect others and myself as live in the Buddha’s path.

“All my ancient, twisted karma, From beginningless greed, hate and delusion. Born through body, speech and mind, I now fully avow��

Thank you.

One consistent aspect of Covid has been that simple answers and clear-cut pathways are not part of this virus. Even with vaccinations, we are back to assessing the risks and the ethical considerations of intimacy and connecting sexually.

Let’s look at what we know. Two weeks after the second vaccine injection, the disease prevention efficacy is extremely high. This efficacy lasts at least for a few months and as time goes on, we will find out how long-lasting it is. Medical experts say that those vaccinated still can possibly contract Covid, but that the disease should be non-life threatening and manageable. It is also potentially possible to be a non-symptomatic carrier of Covid. There are a number of variants of Covid circulating and the efficacy of the current vaccines are being tested against them. For these reasons, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is recommending not to change our public behaviors of wearing face masks and maintaining social distance. We still need to do our part to stem the spread in the community.

Some queer folks have invested time and energy into pods or partners and have imposed their own guidelines for Covid-related safety behaviors within the group. Others have chosen celibacy. The common thread is that we are survivors of this pandemic and have successfully negotiated the obstacles over the last year to maintain our health. We have all learned to differentiate public from private behaviors. Now the vaccine is offering new opportunities.

Although they do not directly address sex, the latest say that small groups of people who are inoculated can get together relatively safely. This creates the possibility for greater intimacy and sexual adventure again. For many of us who previously assessed the risks, and decided to have sex as safely as possible, the door opens further.

The lowest risk exists in interactions with folks who are vaccinated. If you know your potential sex partners well, trusting their status should be easy. But for others, should you ask to see their vaccination card? That may be a reasonable idea, but knowing that anything can be counterfeited, it may not be foolproof and one should always chat before acting on desires. At this moment, older members of our community have access to inoculations, as well as essential workers and teachers. So it may be a time to check in with an elder, Daddy or essential worker for a safer sex partner.

With an HIV analogy from U=U (undetectable = untransmissible), any risk among people that have been vaccinated, should be extremely low. Until we know more, there remains a possibility of catching or spreading Covid, but little chance of dying from it.

The risk factor is greater for an unvaccinated person having sex with someone who has been vaccinated. The possibility that a vaccinated person can still carry the virus must be considered. Using the same precautions for unvaccinated partners will reduce this risk.

The highest risks remain unchanged between unvaccinated persons. Conversation around risk, mitigating behavior, testing and self-quarantining are still the way to assess and decide on what you may feel comfortable in doing together.

In all cases, we need to talk frankly with our potential sex partners and be aware of other risk factors, including others in their life who may not be inoculated yet. Some vaccinated people are waiting until other members of their household get their shots before they indulge. We are making decisions not only about ourselves, but our close relationships and the broader community.

This last year has been hard on queer folks and for some without partners or access to a pod, it has been extremely isolating. We have been warned not to touch people and to give each other space when meeting in public or private areas. And since kissing and hugging even were forbidden, it might take a while to feel safe around intimacy. Remember this as you begin to interact again. Your potential partner or partners may react with caution and throw up unexpected emotional barriers. Take the time to check in with each other and take it at the pace that you all are comfortable. Sirs, take care of your boys as they serve you.

With years of discrimination and stigma focused on HIV status, there is some concern that we might have to relive some versions of that fight again. We have to remember that our present situation is different than HIV/AIDS. As , “People are not positive or negative. Tests are…remember that we are often doing our best under difficult circumstances to keep ourselves and others as safe as we can. When it comes to COVID-19, we are all in this together.��

Unlike HIV/AIDS, any division regarding vaccination status will be temporary. In this early stage, many people are not yet eligible, but by June, most people should have access to vaccinations. Over the next three months, as more and more people are inoculated, many of these considerations will start to fade. Potentially we can look forward to larger gatherings again, like the Folsom Street Fair, as well as the reopening of bars, clubs and sex venues. Hopefully then, we will be able to look back at this year as the year we survived and transformed our community once again.

This article was slightly modified based from the original published in the . Crowd Photo taken by Steven Underhill