A few days ago a friend sent out an email saying that he'd closed his blog down. I wrote back asking why. He wrote back that he felt that his posts were too negative, that he didn't have anything to offer folks. I wrote something back - something about my own blog and how part of the reason I'd stopped blogging was along the same lines. And he wrote back with the url for a secret password protected blog with a single post. I read it and the first thought was: wow, what a great post. So full of truth and life, really upfront about the struggle of waking up, casting off the self, the tricky foxes that live in the mind. The second thought was: wow, if he had posted that for the internet masses they would have savaged him. Because over the past six years I've posted oh so very many similar pieces, and if I had a dime for every negative, mean-spirited, passive aggressive, gum-flappy or simply flat out nasty comment or email I've received I'd be buying a 1000-acre compound deep in the woods and hiring a personal gourmet vegetarian chef.
Does this itself sound mean? Judgmental? Harshly unspiritual? It isn't. It's simply honest, which is what this blog has always been about. Always. But the internet is the great clearinghouse for the screaming chimps. Behind the electronic screen and the anonymity it brings, the chimp is unleashed, and the bile, it flows. On one level, you feel sorry for them. But after a while, it's just annoying, then finally, boring.
It's like walking down the street, and a stranger comes up to you. Their face is a little familiar, but you don't really know them. You say hi, smile. And they say:
You know, those shoes you're wearing are really ugly. I would never wear such shoes. The heels on them are going to give you corns and bunions and hammer toes and a hunch back and halitosis. So take them off! Take them off right now! Because I ended up with halitosis from wearing heels like that and I really wish I hadn't worn them, even if it did mean that I felt that they made my calves look pretty on that date with Horace Van Pelt. You know it's really stupid to wear heels like that. And besides, I saw the same pair on someone on the "worst dressed list" so you really laid an egg when you whipped out your wallet, huh? And by the way, your hair looked way better when I saw you at the grocery store last week . . . Hey, would you like to go get a cup of coffee? I'd love to tell you about my colon problems and the sadness from my failed marriages and the betrayal from my so-called friends and how I'm a writer though I never actually sit down and write anything. No? You don't want to go have coffee with me? Are you kidding me? You mean, horrible, nasty person! You suck! You suck! You suck! {reaches into purse and hurls wads of used kleenex at you, then stalks off, cell phone clicked open, calling everyone they know to tell them what a mean, horrible, nasty person you are}.
Of course, most of the emails and comments are lovely or supportive or gentle or warmly shared or contain invites to tropical sanctuaries or are full of insight or provide proof that someone out there really really Gets It. Which is why it's taken me this long to get to the place where I take the action I'm now taking. It's not about shutting the blog down. That wouldn't feel true. It's about closing the comments. And stating that at the first whiff of negative and/or mean-spiritedness and/or passive aggressiveness, I'm going to delete without reading the emails that come in. I've been doing the latter for a couple of years now, but to state it right out here on the old blog makes it all clear and upfront and makes plain to the bullet-headed, wackadoo screaming chimps, the mute button on their sad howls has been pressed.
The internet is an awesome place, and I believe in it, believe in the freedom of speech it provides, the global access folks have to one another because of it. Look at what's happening in China, in Iran because of the net. But at this stage of evolution, most folks can't handle free speech, don't know what to do with it, can't handle the responsibility of it. And so they use it to celebrate the damage of their ego, to punch as many folks as they can access in hopes it'll make them not feel so weak and powerless in their lives, to try and suppress anyone who dares to step away from the pack that they hate and yet will defend to the death, to validate their own life choices no matter that those choices have led them to a place that feels neither free nor awake.
There is a screaming, bullet-headed, wackadoo chimp that lives inside of me, too. And I've been fortunate enough, have worked so dang hard to shut it down, keep it from poisoning the folks around me. Sometimes this means that I stay away from folks these days, because if that's what it takes in this space of my living, I'll dang skippy do it. And the chimp may still scream, but I don't unleash it on others. I don't leave f*cked up comments on people's websites, don't send hateful, arrogant emails.
With one exception. Ever so often, someone will catch me in a vulnerable space. I'll have been up half the night dreaming about The Hoon, waking up repeatedly, crying. Or I'll come home from a savage day in cubicleland where folks have told me that they have lost their homes and are living in their car and are totally broke and haven't eaten in two days, and they call me from the emergency room because they've committed themselves and I'm the only person in their world who they can think of will listen to them, and all I can feel is how f*cked up the world is, how hateful and sad and mean and unfair. Or I'll have eaten something with fat in it and the digestive enzymes won't help and I spend an hour yakking my brains out. And I'll turn on my computer and there it will be: that goddang chimp screaming about how ugly they think my shoes are. And in the moment, the screaming chimp that still lives inside of me feels justified, and I shoot off a f*ck you. And I instantly regret it, because all it means is that the screaming chimp on the other end will fire off an even more hateful collection of words, and the screaming chimps, they will still be screaming. And once again I'll turn away from the screamer inside of me, refuse to let it take action, but the pattern has been set in motion. The screaming chimp that initiated the contact will continue to send screams for many many weeks, which because of the delete button, are more like tiny squeaks, but I have to face the fact that I let the screamer in me out, and that means that the self scored another few minutes of life, and that, yes that, is unacceptable.
Somewhere down the line, when the screaming chimp inside of me is only an echo, I'll open the comments back up. Maybe. I'll answer more emails. Maybe. Or maybe not. Who knows? If we're lucky and aware and willing, we know the next step and have the courage and spine and huevos to take it. This is my next step. And I salute you, fellow oak, compadre in the boat next to me, human being on their own trek in the deep dark woods, if you feel to keep swaying in the wind or paddling or crawling alongside me for a bit.
And so this blog morphs again. But without the input of the folks who still come here, the salty and the sweet, the screamers and the singers, the folks who have surrendered to the Almighty Yes and the folks who still think that really, their screaming chimp is actually kinda cute and smart and funny and helpful. I keep writing to this blog because I somehow feel that it's important to leave breadcrumbs. Maybe it's just for me, to empty the knowledge of where this step is, or that one. Or maybe it's the last vestiges of self, spasming on the floor. Or maybe it's something I haven't thought of, don't know about, won't get til later. But I do know this: I'll keep writing, and it will shift to reflect the new changes inside, because for now, it's what's true for for this being that goes by the name of Katherine and Kate and Kathy and Kat and DatingGod.
And so I say:
Death to the screaming chimps! Long live the Nothing! All hail the Great Laughing Whatever!
May this post find you deep inside your own awakening, and may surrender rule this great land . . .