Trust: What Does it Mean? How Can We Better Trust Ourselves?

Trust, such a common word. But such an important ingredient in a “good” life, a fulfilling life, a full life. But what is trust? What’s going on in ourselves and in our relationship with the world when we feel it? How do we even know it is what we feel?

In the introduction to poet David Whyte’s wonderful book, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words, author and poet Maria Popova observes that words are not artefacts, not our possessions, not things, not static, but alive and always evolving. They feed on us as we feed on them; as we use them, we are used by them. In his book, she says, Whyte repatriates us in the land of language and thus repatriates us in ourselves.

For example, take the word courage. It tempts us to imagine bravely facing opposing forces in a military or physical or maybe even a political battle. And above all, to be seen as doing so. To reap the rewards.

But the roots of the word reach back to old Norman French, to coeur, heart. Courage is what we feel and show when we live life, relate to our community, to friends, with heart. To seat our feelings and actions deeply in our body and world. It is a type of love. Courage, Whyte says, is what love looks like when we’re tested by the everyday necessities of being alive and respond with caring, with surprise, with belonging. We realize an awareness of vulnerability is a necessity in taking a step forward. On the inside, it might seem like confusion. Only from the outside, or looking back, does it appear like courage.

And it seems to me, trust shares a related etiology. According to the Encarta: World English Dictionary, its roots are in the Old Norse traust, meaning confidence, and treysta or trust. And even further, to an Indo-European base, meaning to be solid, which is the ancestor of the English true, tryst, and tree. An interesting grouping. The word is normally used to mean confidence in and reliance on the good qualities, fairness, truthfulness, honor or ability of someone or something. It assumes responsibility, caring, even hope, or giving credit to somebody or something. It’s part of being daring. And maybe, it includes a bit of the love expressed in courage.

It’s such a wonderful thing to say, “I trust you”. At some times and places, trust was signified by a handshake. Pre-COVID (and hopefully, post-COVID), we might hug. We might say, someone is trusting, or worthy of trust. Just recently, I realized so much of my life depends on trusting myself. Even meditation requires trust, in the process, in ourselves.

When a thought arises in meditation or elsewhere, or a fear, or insight, we might respond by feeling jumpy or excited; our belly, hands, or leg muscles might clench. We feel life speeding up. And we think we can’t afford to miss this thought, can’t afford not to respond. We must shift our attention to it, shift our life to possess it. A sort of FOMO, or fear of missing out. For example, we might feel that if we don’t write it down or act on the thought right then, we’ll miss out on an opportunity, or we’ll forget and lose it. We won’t reap some reward or avoid some future disaster.

Just the moment by itself then becomes not enough for us. Life itself becomes not enough….

*To read the whole article, go to The Good Men Project.

The Boy Who Thought He Was The Messiah

A story I wrote several years ago:

I was in the third grade when I first thought I might be the Messiah. This was back in the fifties and I was attending one of those elementary schools in Queens, New York that had no name, only a number, PS 46 or 192 or 238. It was the usual type of building, red brick with bars on the windows.

The thought came to me soon after an incident in the morning assembly. The principal, like usual, had walked onto the stage at eighty thirty a. m., flanked by two of the oldest teachers in the school, and told us all to bow our heads as he got ready to read us a prayer. This was before the Supreme Court had outlawed this sort of bowing in schools.

Seated in the audience, I remembered being told in Hebrew School that Jewish people do not bow their heads, at all, to anyone, except in G-d’s own house and to Him only. Bowing outside of G-d’s house would be to acknowledge a god other than the Almighty.

Back then I thought of Him in a very spatial way. He was The Man Upstairs, looking down on us all. And even though I had never met Him, at least not face-to-face, I clearly wanted no trouble with Him. Sure, I was very curious. I mean, He was quite a celebrity and I wanted to know all the details about Him, like what He looked like and if He held a grudge.

But none of the answers I was given made any sense. The adults that I talked with obviously knew no more about Him than I did. So, I wouldn’t bow my head. My unbowed head attracted attention. I was taken to the principal’s office and my parents were called.

I remember sitting outside his office. The halls were empty, as everyone else was still in the assembly. Despite the isolation, I felt safe, because wasn’t G-d who inhabits the heavens and created the universe larger than a principal who inhabits a dusty eight by ten office? The principal was physical, someone I could touch and see, but who could touch G-d? Who could see eternity? My math teacher couldn’t even define ‘eternity.’ And especially to the limited view of an eight year old, this principal could be defined quite easily.

As students and teachers began to crash through the halls to their classrooms, his secretary rushed me into the principal’s office. The move was so abrupt as to be almost violent, and I began to wonder what it was about my action that had brought this on.

For a moment I faced doubt. My knees began to shake. I felt I was walking a tightrope of mind, stretched between what I assumed to be Heaven and what I feared to be Hell.

Then the principal entered. He tried to look angry and severe but it was too difficult a job for him. Confusion seemed more appropriate. “How could this eight year old boy,” he must have been thinking, “defy my authority, defy my whole idea of what should be happening, defy my whole notion of God?” He didn’t realize that we were talking of two different deities, his and mine. His, I could defy quite easily. But not mine, not the Almighty, Blessed Be He. He was Christian and I was Jewish and I would not let my religion be placed second to any other.

I must admit that the whole incident might have arisen from my looking around for something to act up about. You know how life is; it just goes by, day by day, and we read about exciting and courageous deeds that other people do but we don’t see them, not often, not first hand. And to live one? To live a heroic moment, to live as the Hero of G-d—how could I give up the opportunity?

That was what I thought I was doing—I was acting like the Hero of G-d. The principal had said, “Bow your head,” and I thought, “This prayer is not a Jewish prayer, so why bow my head?” And I realized, “This is it.” This is my chance to stand up next to my G-d, who had been wronged throughout much of history. The G-d who was mistakenly blamed for the death of Christ and who the Nazis had attempted to exterminate. This G-d I would not abandon. So, I proudly kept my head up and one of the teachers—all I can remember is that it was a female teacher—told me to lower my head and I said, “No, “ and she said, “Come with me,” and I went.

When my parents entered the office I didn’t know what to expect. Of course, they, too, were Jewish. The principal, seated behind his desk with us facing him, had my father and me sit in children’s chairs. There was only one other adult sized chair and my mother got that one. And the principal asked me why I wouldn’t bow my head, and I told him of G-d’s commandment. I told him I was Jewish and the prayer he had used was not a Jewish prayer. He said that the prayer was non-denominational, whatever that meant.

And my parents—I wasn’t sure of their response. I feared they’d feel ashamed or afraid. My father had been called all the way from work and he hadn’t even been told on the phone what had gone on. All he knew was that I had supposedly committed some awful act. The principal then gave his side of the story and I waited anxiously for my parent’s response. Would they be angry with me? Would they be meek before this thief of G-d? Then my father, I will never forget his response because for some reason I never expected it—my father said that I was right. I had done the right thing. He agreed with me against the authority. It was one of those moments that you want to live over and over. I jumped up, laughing, and what could the principal do in the face of this family unity but let us all go.

In the aftermath, I guess I expected that my parents would then share with me their own stories of being picked out for being Jewish. However, despite my new heroic status, this did not occur. Sure, I could feel something of what they felt. For some reason they wanted to hide their religion. It wasn’t until almost fifteen years later that my mother told me that all through my early school years, whenever she rode the local bus, she had been forced by the stares and comments of our Catholic neighbors to ride at the back of the bus, where none of them would sit. She told me about disturbing phone calls and there were other things she would never verbalize. She hardly felt like a hero before anybody.

To tell the truth, I didn’t feel like a hero for very long. I didn’t want to feel different because of my religion or any reason.

One day, soon after the incident in the morning assembly, I was lying on my bed at home, staring up at the eggshell colored ceiling. And I began to ask myself all these questions. In the past, when I thought of my Jewishness, I thought of Passover and the miraculous escape from Egypt. But on this day, I thought of the none-escape, of Nazis Germany and the Holocaust, and a gigantic hole opened up in me, a tremendous longing. How could this be?

I had trouble understanding any injustice, my brother getting away with hitting me, the bullies in the schoolyard, homeless people on the street—but this? Maybe this explains my nightmares about those years. If G-d could save the ancient Hebrews from the Egyptians, then where was He when the Nazis tried to exterminate the Chosen People? Had they, we, sinned so awfully, so disastrously, that G-d was punishing us? I had heard that He could be vengeful, but wasn’t this taking vengeance a bit too far? And to allow hatred to win over good for so long, I couldn’t accept that. What did you do, Oh Lord? Have You seen too much? Have You run away and left us to correct the mistakes that You yourself had made? Are we now ugly before Thee?

How could I possibly think of myself as a hero before G-d? How could my act or any act correct this hurt that is so deep even the earth itself must have felt it?

And then I knew—someone had to come and save the world. I mean, it was clear to even my eight-year-old eyes that the world needed help. Someone had to do it. The fact that all of us had a hand in the problems of the world was not something I could then grasp. One person was needed, and if not me, who? Was not this the only way to be a hero, to be the Messiah? Was this what I had to be?

Then I thought about my dog. You know how the mind can jump around and make unusual juxtapositions? This idea just came out of nowhere—or so it seemed. I remembered that when I was walking my dog, a beautiful Irish setter, I felt closest to G-d. That might sound funny, but truth is like that; it’s funny sometimes.

Anyway, I usually walked my dog in the woods that bordered the golf course that was only a block from my home. At some point in the walk the dog and I would take off and run as fast as we could. As we ran together I would feel this sense of freedom, joy and companionship. The wind, the pull of the leash, the letting go, was all that I felt.

And when we stopped, with nothing on my mind but finding a nice place for my dog to shit, a sense of quiet would settle over me. The world would stop. Any tension that I carried, especially on my face, would melt away like butter left out of the refrigerator on a hot day, and a new face, one that I hardly knew, would take its place. I’d have what could only be described as a sense of gratitude. And in that gratitude, I thought, was a communion with the G-d of the Chosen People. In that moment I was not forsaken.

As I lay in my bed, an eight-year-old boy lying in bed staring up at an eggshell colored ceiling, I wondered if that communion that I had felt signified that I was the one. That I, sometime in my life, would unconditionally and without doubt be touched by G-d’s hand. And the weight of the world would be mine.

Of course, my shoulders have been slumped ever since. And even now, over sixty years later—even though it’s clear to me that no one could ever be the hero I once expected myself to be—I still wonder if G-d, in that unconditional way, would (or did) ever touch

This story was originally published by Heart And Humanity magazine.

Overcoming A Fear of Awareness

In these times, how much awareness can you allow yourself? Too much awareness can feel alarming.

Recently, a friend told me mindfulness does not work for him. He has asthma and the last thing he wants to do is focus on his breath. Asthma can be so frightening and painful. But focusing on the breath is only one possible point of focus for mindfulness practice. There is a whole universe to focus on.

You can focus on something that is easy or enjoyable for you to think about, like the feel of your hands resting in your lap, or your butt touching the chair as you sit in it, or your feet resting on the floor. Or noticing whatever sensation is arising in your body or thought in your mind. You can focus on an image of your favorite tree or what it means to have a favorite or to be favored. You can focus on an image of a clear and open sky or what it feels like to have an open mind. You can focus on what arises in you when you think of a particular person, or what happens inside you when you are in love.

Instead of focusing on awareness of the breath, for example, you might examine your response to simply being aware in that particular moment. What is the quality of your awareness now? Is it jittery or calm, tired or deep? When you have painful memories, you not only fear the object remembered—you fear the feeling that accompanies the memory. You fear fear. Whatever it is that has caused pain in the past is not the primary cause of your suffering. The response to the memory is the primary cause. So make your response your focal point.

Fear is both an emotion that can save your life or turn you away from it. It can shake you, but a shaken being either opens its eyes wider or closes them, depending on how vigorous the vibration and how you interpret it.

When anything is too frightening or difficult to focus on, you can shift your focus to analyzing the components of the emotion. You then shift your mind from being fearful to being analytical. Notice where in your body you feel what you feel. Notice if any sensations or thoughts arise. Notice how the feelings come and go. Certain thoughts might increase the fear, while others, or the absence of thought, might quiet the fear.

When you think you can’t do something, and fear or self-doubt is doing the thinking instead of more rational appraisal, practice how to shift from “I can’t,” or “I am not open to this,” to being open. Bring up in your mind the sense of “I can,” and the sense of open observation. Ask yourself: Was there ever a time that I felt I could overcome any obstacle? Was there ever a time that I openly examined some object, person, or idea? What did it feel like to openly observe or think about something? Or: What does it mean, and what does it feel like, to be courageous and able to face whatever arises in your life?

Mindfulness means clear observation, or moment-by-moment awareness of whatever arises for you. It is about letting things be whatever they are so you can know whatever is there. It is to treat your own thoughts, perceptions and feelings as valuable sources of learning. Thus, to say mindfulness does not work for you is to say observation does not work for you, or knowing your own mind or world does not work for you.

A Mindfulness Practice:

Sit up in a chair in a comfortable and stable position, in a place that feels safe for you. Close your eyes now or in a minute or so, or let your eyes rest on the floor a few feet in front of you. Place your attention on your feet resting on the floor. Feel how heavy or light your feet feel, how hot or cold. You might sense your feet gently expanding, and then contracting, pressing against your shoes or socks, then letting go, relaxing, just resting where they are.

And then let come to mind an image or memory of a courageous action, maybe one of your own, or one you witnessed or read about. What was the courageous act? Who did it? What made it courageous?

Think about what courage means to you. Does courage have to be dramatic, like in some movies? Or can it be something simple, like sticking up for someone, speaking out, or doing something you never did before?

What does it feel like to be courageous? Imagine feeling courageous. Imagine feeling that you could face whatever it is that arises in your life. Just sit for a moment with the feeling of courage.

You can practice this exercise on your own or with others. You can record yourself slowly reading the above as a script and then play it back for yourself. If you’re a teacher or a parent, after researching and practicing this and other mindfulness techniques on an ongoing basis, you can lead your students or children in the practice.

This exercise is a simple form of mindfulness combined with inquiry. It can help you be more aware of your thoughts and feelings, of how your mind works, and how to more deeply engage with and enjoy the world. I hope it works for you.