Abandonment and Release

“Most people have a question they ask spiritual teachers over and over again, and this is mine: How can I put forth effort and also rest? [italics in original] I open Goldstein’s book to find an answer and come across this line: ‘Abandon those unwholesome states that have already arisen.’…To abandon does not mean in this context that the life in something disappears, but that you let it move on without you….If all management generates an abandoned area, [italics in original] then we know that release is just around the corner. We know that cannot manage all of our gardens, all of our bodies. We know they will abandon us, be released from us whether we like it or not.” Notes on Abandon, by Leora Fridman,p. 53, Tricycle, Fall 2016

This is where I am at: abandoning and being abandoned, looking forward to release.

Last night, I talked to a neighbor and told her I sold my house for 15k. I could tell she was not happy. I just killed her property value. But my house was on the market for over a year and she never asked what I would take for it. Her lack of enlightened self-interest just hurt her financial best interests. I am not angry with her. I actually feel bad for her. In this individualistic culture, people just don’t think long-term. I had decisions to make and I made them without a lot of support or resources. And it is just now dawning on people that my choices might impact their lives negatively. Oh well. It is so not my problem anymore.

Yesterday I bought a disposable phone I can put minutes on. I had problems getting it activated, so I took it back to Wal-Mart. Today it worked because it took more time than usual to get activated. On the way, I was nervous, but decided to abandon the fear. There it was, but if they didn’t get it to work or give me my money back, I would end up going to Verizon and just getting a new phone on my old line. The point is that I do not have a choice. I must be reachable while down in West Virginia looking for a place to live. I have to have a phone. Period. Regardless of my negative feelings or anything else. They got it working. Yea.

So I decided that I could treat myself by going to some locally-owned Lansing eatery one last time. And I realized that all my favorite local places had gone out of business years ago. I didn’t abandon Lansing; it abandoned me. So many times, we do not realize just how much things have changed until we wake up, look around, and say, “Oh my god. Where did everyone go?” Lansing isn’t even a shadow of what it used to be.

Things change. I only have so much time, energy, and money. I must prioritize. Things will be abandoned in the quest for sanity while I try to take care of Barry and myself. My philosophy has always been “If you’re not going to help, you don’t get a vote.” Is anyone listening?

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