Spirit versus School - Spirit vs Work - Spirit vs Everything External - Conforming To Worldly Expectations As Spiritual Death - An Unending Struggle - Dropping Courses At U.H. - Spirit's Incessant Demands - Shall I Be Homeless And Wearing A Loincloth, Or Is A Compromise Possible?

Transcription from tape #8 for July 2, 1993.

Tape Transcriptions - Tape #8

The ages-old dilemma: Follow the money or follow the Divine. You cannot serve two Gods. There is no rest or peace in death. You must do what is right. Living righteously is a spiritual battle that rages continuously.

beginning of tape #8 (date unknown, continuation from end of tape #7) (tape #8 ends 7/15/1993)

The reason why this is so difficult to achieve clarity here is that there are negatives -- big ones -- on either side. You know, what I fear is that, I mean, yeah I know I can give in to the spirit. I know what the spirit wants. Spirit wants less demands upon me, less responsibilities, less tethers to a world that I disapprove of. My fear is a couple of things. One is, you know, if I give in to this, there's a real material cost, because I won't be at the top of the pay scale. I'm already earning little as it is. I need every couple of thousand I can get. But the thought of taking classes this summer, and next summer, and the summer after just kills me. Kills me. So it's a pyrrhic victory. You know, the thing is, if I give in, now, where will I draw the line? I mean, because ultimately sometimes I think you take the spirit far enough and all I want to do is to be wearing a loincloth in the forest. I mean, as far as things I don't want to deal with, going to school -- I mean, taking these classes -- is just the tip of the iceberg. I think I've rationalized this out enough. This is not an un-premeditated thing. I mean, my spirit is speaking very clearly to me right now that it doesn't want to take these classes -- being in those air conditioned environments, sitting still for those hours, cannot handle. (Sigh) (Pause) I ask the question, I mean, "To what extent am I going to allow pay scale -- this external creation -- to dictate my life?" I mean, if they had a pay scale that went on, you know, and included like ten years' worth of improvement -- like it went up ten more classifications -- would I just continue to waste my summers away like that, or do I draw the line, like I feel right now? I don't know. I've got to take a stand on this.

1993.7.2. Friday. (tape #8, continued)

(later) (I'm startled at how depressed I am today. It scares me to think of what "following my spirit" will lead me to do. I think I look forward to teaching this upcoming year. But even that I'm not sure. My will to perform in the world seems to be waning and losing vigor. All I want to do is implode upon myself. I don't want to go to school. I don't want to bear much responsibility. I just want to be happy and free. (sigh)

(sigh) Today is the second of July, Friday. (sigh) I want to drop my classes today. I'm filled with such mixed feelings, and all I can say is that I've been overeating today. I feel miserable right now. It's like I've given up on the system of things, but I'm yet without a connection to the spirit. So, it's that terrible in-between. I wish I had been able to do both. You know, both go to school, get this advanced pay, and maintain my spiritual growth. But it seems like the further I go along the less willing my spirit is to compromise. I'm very fearful that it is going to speak to me as clearly as it did recently, about the upcoming school year, and tell me that I can't do it. But, I mean, as far as school goes, I am so, like, beyond the suffering point. What I mean is, I was fed up with UH two years ago. I felt that my first year I had learned enough to be placed initially in the classroom. So these past two years have just been like scraping my wound even deeper. I mean, it's funny, my mind, I had had it up to here, I just couldn't handle it any more. I forced myself to take like 30 or 40 more units. And now that I don't have to, it's as if (sigh), I mean, it's unspeakable to think of taking any more. I'm only two classes away from this next pay scale. It might as well be two thousand classes. I'm not going to take anymore. I will not sit in the classroom and passively learn. I want to generate from what I already have. It's the principle of the thing. I'm trying to close the gap. I'm not going to let anything wedge itself in between me and the spirit anymore. I guess the only drawback is that I will have a couple of thousand less a year, but so be it.

(later) I just had the most unmistakably odd feeling when I sat in these classes this week. It was like I was a bull moose, just standing there, trying to move, and having ten, you know, animals, creatures, people, shoving at me from behind trying to get me to move, and like the "bull moose" is my mind, and like the professor and the students and all their discussions, it could have been a hurricane. It just couldn't engage my mind. My mind was just not interested. To take notes was such a dry, stale...umm, it was a process, totally devoid of life or inspiration for me. I just didn't care. What galled me was that it was voluntary. That was it... Every second I spend in that classroom is just, uhh... I'm really hurt right now. I really can't resolve it. Staring at the (yawning) thousands of dollars of difference each year is going to be, uhh, it's going to be a source of aggravation for me.

(later, hiking) All I came out here to do was to get my foot in the door, to get a decent income and to do my art and spiritual work. And so I am looking at a lot of other things I can do to limit the amount of interference from things I don't like. One is though I'm on the brink of earning a masters degree, I want to drop the program. Does this stuff haunt you? I don't know. It all depends on your perspective. I'll have to see if I've been awarded my professional diploma. I think the State's going to issue me a professional certificate. If that's the case, there's no reason to get the masters degree other than paying continued homage to the system, and that's something I don't want to do. I want to give minimal homage, minimal. But it scares me. I mean, already in one day I'm dropping my aim to get to the top of the pay scale, at least for the foreseeable future, although I might use one of my books to earn some credits for that from some mail order school. Twenty-six, to be exact, is how many units I'd need. A thousand-page book ought to earn that, I hope. Umm, so one day I'm dropping my slavish submission to the pay scale and the aim to get the masters degree, which is something that would assist my leaving the country or moving to another state. So be it. I won't have it.

(still hiking, birds singing) Umm, I'm afraid because I'm questioning the strength of the foundation I've created in terms of my presence in the world, and the strength of that to carry me through in rough spiritual moments. And, umm, ideally what I'd have is just two days a week, eight hours a day, working as a cashier. I'd earn at most $400 per month. I could swing that if I had another income source, like from a book that I wrote.

I'm starting to draw lines now. It scares me, because, like I said before, if you take spiritual insight to the extreme, you find poverty, homelessness, and madness. It's a constant battle that requires slicing off portions of your insight. It's an unending struggle to maintain a relatively evenhanded grip on this world. There is so much that is taken for granted -- so much that is done in this world -- that is at odds with -- or falls very sharply from -- the insights that spirit gives you. So I'm afraid of how much I will see. I am weary of having to deny spirit so much just to keep a job or be minimally well-adjusted. My willingness to be a sacrificial lamb -- to participate in this perpetual blood- or spirit-letting -- around here is growing paper-thin. Meaning, among other things, that I am no longer willing to submit to get this degree. I'm giving up on the almighty dollar. These are very significant decisions of mine.

But if writing is my goal -- in terms of my worldly expression of this insight -- then I need to be in for the long haul. I need to have a solid base. I may need to hang in there for ten years more. This is different from the program I had originally set out, which was to write a bunch of stuff and then publish it. But if I can use this art as a means of lifting me out somewhat from the confinements of this world, then I think I'd like to do that. I think anyone would. To be a slave just to my own insight.

(still hiking) Maybe I could publish the first one, and have some sort of alias for it, like I said before, "Singing Mountain" or something, and have the proceeds go into some sort of nonprofit account, and draw an income from it that would allow me to stop working full-time as a teacher, and perhaps supplement my income stream with a couple of days per week cashiering at Down To Earth. That's two days per week, four hours per day, at $8 per hour, or about $3000 per year. I think this might be a realistic expectation if the book sells reasonably well. Maybe I could draw an income of $15,000 from it, which would then put me at $18,000. Hopefully by then I'd have paid off most of my debt, and I could just quit teaching. I'm looking at being out of teaching within ten years hopefully. It's not because I despise the system. The system's alright. Well, I have a lot of problems with it. It takes too much out of you. (sarcastic laughter) You're in the green zone at first, and then by March you hit the red zone. Or maybe it's the red zone by January and by April the black zone. The Black Zone is where you've forgotten that you're suffering. That's what I hate. (heavy breathing, still hiking) It's where your inner dialectic is basically crunched, pulverized from the onslaught of external expectations, et cetera.

So, that's my goal. Fuck! (spitting as I hike) Two days, eight hours a week at a grocery store as my Zen, as my meditation in terms of social presence. And writing the rest of the time, and grokking, with the support of my passive income source. So, basically, I could be realizing a great deal more of myself, much sooner, if I do that. I think this is a realistic goal. The only questions are whether I could make $15,000 or say $20,000 a year, and what kind of negative (and positive) exposure I would get. I want my anonymity to be pretty intact. The public has such a tendency to elevate and revile people. It's just not healthy for someone to have to go through that. There's a great deal of suffering involved. It's unnatural.

Well, I think this is healthy. I just need some time to work out the details, to ensure its feasibility. The problem has been that for the last couple of years I've been operating, necessarily -- or partly necessarily -- as if my job and my education were the reality, and my writing, my spirit, were the dream. What I am changing to, switching over to, in my 28th year, is where spirit and art and dream are the reality -- and my work, my profession is the dream. I think I have a lot of battles to wage in the future, like taking every one of my sick leaves off, et cetera. (pause) I'm just scared by the discrepancy. I mean at work you're called upon to have such a this-worldly focus, I mean, to the point of extinction of the spirit. Really, this is what a full-on career does to you. I'm afraid that work will become such a focus for me that these spiritual and creative impulses within me will die. These internal and external needs are on a collision course. This inner work -- these inner needs -- have become so profound. I have a need to get it all clear and on paper. I know how much this means to me. The way my spirit just welled up and told me to drop my classes yesterday was remarkable. I mean, I was just incapacitated. You know, I'm not even picturing myself being in the education system for 40 years. It's going to be 10 years, max. If all goes okay I'm looking very forward to breathing life into my life. My life is like a glowing ember, and I want to create a fire -- a regular conflagration. I have so many books -- stacks and boxes of books and materials -- and if I could start clarifying that and turn the tide such that the amount processed exceeds the amount taken in, that will be a major turning point. It will be just a matter of time before I get it all written down. So I want to get rid of all that stuff, and clarify my life. The thing is, I would definitely take a two-day-a-week cashier job -- I definitely would. The problem is my consumption needs -- the manner in which I've been addicted to them -- is just so great. I can't afford at this point, the way I'm currently thinking, I cannot afford that. I would love to work just eight hours a week. I'd love it. I guess I just have more dues to pay.

(later, laying in bed, sighing) Well this is so exhausting. I'll have a vacation this summer. I'll be studying for my comps, although the reasons for my dropping those classes will persist. Who knows what will happen? What I'm saying is that I think no matter where you're at, the spirit is going to leap out -- especially in this world -- is going to leap out and cause you to just freak, because there's so much that's wrong. Because of that I just need to keep a grip on it. I think I need to be meticulous in my addressing the rules and governances of the current system. The way I'm thinking right now is that I want to get the masters degree and I want to go to Class VII -- the way people normally do it. Those are two main biggies of sticking with the system. That means basically that next year, next summer, the summer after, and the summer after that, basically the next four summers I will spend taking two classes at UH -- 24 more units, plus this fall's three, that will bring me up to 97 which is what I need. So (yawning) it will be utter hell, but that's life, and I'd rather be having my spirit scream within the context of an embedded social situation than be screaming without it -- because it's going to scream anyway, you know, amidst the turmoil of my rejection of, uh, the system of things. So this past Friday [?] they dropped all those classes. It's another feather in my hat -- another episode for my self-righteous, spontaneous spirit. But it makes me feel more grounded to know that -- especially in taking these additional classes, and the masters degree -- will result in more security, more money. I mean the masters will allow me to go somewhere else. The extra units will give me, you know, more clothing and food during the year -- so you just might as well do it. And then (yawning), if I get around to it (more yawning), I'll write those books, but then I'll write them all, like I was going to say before, I'm going to write them all before I publish them, because I don't want that notoriety and pressure early on my life.

(pause) As to whether it will be possible for me to achieve a spiritual disposition while enmeshed in the educational system I can't say. I hope so, but maybe not. I don't know. I think that's okay with me, as long as I continue to ground, and meditate, and spend time by myself, and as long as my time is somehow fruitfully spent.

[later; next day(s)?] Temporarily at least I have decided to -- to the extent that I can -- to make a will power presidential override of my spiritual yearnings. What I mean is that I am going to take this world more seriously. My world would be falling apart if I didn't. You know, all of these things that I've built and done, and purchased and procured. [They need serious consideration.] I am going to try to get this masters degree, though it is a very difficult test; and I'll continue to take these classes for the next couple of years until I get class VII, and I'll go class VII on time. (sigh, birds chirping) Umm, so, I think the idea is that it is too scary for me not to take this world seriously. I mean, I have to. It's my survival. I'm just afraid if I don't take the master's exam, and blow off that, and blow off Class VII -- I mean, where do I stand? I mean, I could use the extra money -- that would be nice. And then also, it would mean that I could write these books and not have to publish them or do anything with them, just keep them. Umm, and I guess my hope is that to the extent my spirit can have a focus on this world, that it will start lifting me, start imbuing my world, rather than me trying to leave the world in order to find spirit, I'll just be obstinately focused on the here-and-now and, uhh, spirit will just have to find me there. Spirit will have to enlighten me to the extent that it can within this focus that I have. I don't expect a radical release; but it ought to make for a good time because I still expect to, uhmm, spend a lot of time by myself pursuing as much health and spiritual growth as possible, but, I guess, only to the extent that it compliments my life. (big sigh) I don't like this idea, you know, when Spirit tells you to fucking up and leave. It doesn't work. It's not really helping me out too much right now.

(pause, speaking low, laying down?) I guess my rationale for trying to submit to this masters, this comprehensive exam, and the rest of this stuff, is that, despite my suffering, I've been making progress here. I know I have a lot more progress that I can make; but in order to provide the strongest foundation for it, I need to continue to stay focused on reality as social convention defines it: you know, making more money, getting the degree, et cetera. But even within that I am drawing a few lines. I think it's pretty clear to me that I don't want to get a doctorate, at least not in education; and uhh (yawning), it's clear to me that, you know, this is the kind of work I want to do, so I'm not going to be climbing the pay scale in another industry [or line of work]; but as a teacher [I suppose] if there were ten more pay levels I could climb with more coursework, I'd probably do that, you know, because that's what success or reality for me would be defined as. I'd be very hard pressed in the private sector situation of a large bureaucracy, however, where there is just a continuous upward movement over the course of twenty years, where you never get to a point where you can relax -- where you can say that you accomplished what you set out to accomplish -- because there would always be more to be gained and learned and earned.

(later, voice stronger, hiking) I was reading about a sumo wrestler practice in which the sumo wrestler, when he is on a winning streak, neither shaves nor washes his hair. He just puts his hair in a bun or something and leaves it there, I guess, for weeks. Anyways, the message was definitely that leaving the hair in its natural state, uncut, is a sign of strength. It's when he loses, that's when he shaves, and washes and cuts his hair. Very interesting.

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