Belonging

October 17, 2025

A couple of days ago Laurie, our rural postal carrier, saw me in my driveway and drove out of her way to welcome me back to the neighborhood after my six year absence. Many neighbors have stopped to chat and tell me how glad they are that I have returned to my home of 34 years. It feels good to be welcomed back to a place where I belong.

Coincidentally several classmates have “friended” me on Facebook in the past week, thereby reminding me that I belong to the extended family of Acalanes High School.

All of this has got me thinking: what is/are my community(ies)?

My siblings and cousins are my biological family. My Wednesday hiking group is an exercise and social community, and my weekly meditation group on Zoom is a spiritual support group. But I don’t feel any sense of community with other 49er football fans or fellow graduates of UC Berkeley. And I don’t feel much loyalty these days to the Democratic party, although I do appreciate Franklin Roosevelt’s creation of Social Security and Lyndon Johnson’s establishment of Medicare.

Part of my issue with the Democratic party (and the Republicans too, for that matter) is their emphasis on divisive identity politics. The motto of the United States is E Pluribus Unum, or “out of many, one.” In other words, unity, togetherness. But the Democrats, with their well-intentioned desire to champion the underdogs, have all too often emphasized our differences – racial, gender, sexual orientation – rather than our common heritage as Americans. And on the far left of the political spectrum, especially at some universities, we are told simplistically that white people are oppressors and everyone else are the oppressed victims of the Eurocentric culture.

The far right is even worse, with its promotion of white supremacy and Christian nationalism.

So I prefer Mark Twain’s definition of patriotism: “Supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.”

The America I belong to is a great nation that has every right to be proud of its impressive social progress and freedoms, even though that progress and those freedoms are under attack today. But I believe that the land of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln is resilient and will survive and thrive in the long run.

I also believe that there is something bigger than my country to which I owe my allegiance and my appreciation: our planet. We do not all belong to the same country, and I don’t advocate open borders in this or any other nation, but we do belong to the same human race that lives on Gaia, or Mother Earth. That common home deserves our loyalty and our protection.

I’ll go one step further: I believe that we all belong to what the writer Eckhart Tolle and others have called the New Earth, or an awakened consciousness of oneness with each other, with nature, and with the Great Spirit, also known as The Force, Source Energy, God, Christ consciousness, Buddha’s enlightenment, or whatever name you want to give to the cosmic Love energy.

So even though I’m a short term pessimist, I remain a long term optimist because I believe that it is the destiny of the human race to evolve to an awareness of our shared divinity.

For now, I’m just grateful to be back home among my human, oak, redwood, and animal neighbors, where I belong.

Reaching for the Stars

September 2, 2025

Sometimes, in the midst of positive developments in one’s life, an unpleasant reality check occurs to remind one that disappointment and success can be two sides of the same coin. Yin and Yang, anyone?

A few days ago I was in the midst of a stressful weeklong move from my apartment of six years back to this cottage in rural Sonoma County where I had lived previously for 34 years. I was excited to come back to my little house in the country, not only because I love the beautiful neighborhood, but also because in my absence my landlady had significantly renovated the home into an elegant, light and airy refuge from the workaday world.

I rented a U-Haul truck and drove myself and two local laborers between the old apartment and the new/old home. Marcelo and Adolfo were strong, hard workers with almost no English, so I enjoyed using my Spanish for eight hours. I treated them well, praising their skill and appreciating their labor. They had neglected to bring their lunch, so with them still on the clock I drove them several miles to a store where they could get some food. And I paid them more than we had agreed upon.

After dropping them off at their local labor center I returned to my new home to begin unpacking. That’s when I noticed that my two iPads were gone.

I couldn’t prove that one or both guys took the devices. All I knew was that I had left them plugged into outlets at my old apartment, and I never unplugged and retrieved them. In the chaos of the move I had not noticed their absence. And now I realized my loss.

At first I blamed myself for being so trusting and naive. Then, after that self recrimination, I turned my anger toward Marcelo and Adolfo, though I wasn’t sure which one to resent.

What upset me more than the loss of a $500 iPad (the second one was old and of little value) was a sense of violation of my space and my trust in my fellow human beings. I had been respectful and verbally grateful to them, and now one of them had stabbed me in the back. But which one? In my head I debated the likelihood of each one as the potential criminal.

But after 24 hours of guilt and censure, I realized that in the grand scheme of things my loss wasn’t that great. Other people have suffered from serious health problems, the death of people close to them, messy divorces, or loss of their homes, and I’m bitter about a thief stealing an electronic device? So I said to myself, “Lighten up, Dave. You have excellent health, a lovely home, and enough money, and other than this incident, your move went quite well. These guys have far less than you do, and even though there was no excuse for what one (both?) of them did, let go of your outrage, forgive him/them, and reach for (what Nichiren Buddhists call) a higher life condition.” So eventually, after much grumbling and self pity, I did.

And for the next three nights I walked a short distance from my front door and gazed in wonder at the Milky Way, with the stars framed by redwoods, oaks, and apple trees, as I listened to the music of the crickets and marveled at my incredible good fortune.

Today, after writing all of the above, on a whim I called my next door neighbor at my former residence and asked him to check my empty old apartment to see if by any chance I had left my iPads there.

I had. Marcelo and Adolfo had not ripped me off. I had imagined the most negative scenario, and in my mind had falsely accused two innocent men.

Oops.

Maybe reaching for the stars sometimes means reaching within to forgive oneself for assuming the worst about others.

A Dialogue of Self and Soul

March 6, 2025

I don’t normally choose to reveal too much in these blog pages about my rich inner life, in part because I’m a private man, and in part because I’m not sure how much my readers want to know about my spiritual pursuits.

But there are great changes underway in this country and on this planet, so perhaps in response to these events it’s time for me to give you a glimpse into my inner world.

For several years now I’ve been writing a daily journal, inspired by the book Writing Down Your Soul by Janet Conner. These morning pages as I call them are an opportunity for me to vent my frustrations, record my successes and failures, express my appreciation, and ask questions of my higher self.

I’m not always relaxed enough or open enough to receive answers to my questions. Or maybe I just need to learn to listen better to my intuition when it speaks to me. But sometimes, something – soul, buddha nature, God, whatever – is able to get past my defenses, past my opinions, past my mind chatter, to touch my heart. Sometimes these messages come through dreams, sometimes through meditation or chanting, and sometimes through my morning pages.

This week I came across what I wrote the morning of May 9, 2022:

Dear Soul,

What‘s on your mind? I wonder if you and I have anything significant to contribute to others, to society, to the planet during these crazy political and ecological times, or whether we will just mark time until I die? I’d prefer the former, but I’m willing to accept the latter if that is our soul’s destiny/choice/karma. It’s hard to be a bystander in this time of upheaval, but maybe our job is to work on ourself and be an example, rather than preach to people in my writings. So here I am, Soul – thy will be done. What’s on your mind? Do you have any preferences, any words of wisdom, any guidance?

Dear David,

Of course we have preferences. We prefer that you and I and we work together in whatever course of action or inaction that we choose… Yes, I hear your doubts, Dave – you just thought that I was being wishy washy and non committal. But what would you have me do – make predictions about the future? Or tell you what to do next? All you and I can ever really do is be aligned with each other and with the god Force in each moment, and then make choices based upon our alignment and our intuition.

There are many larger forces at work here and now on this planet, and Putin is just one manifestation of a dying order, as is Trump. Something greater is emerging on Planet Earth, and Trump and Putin and Xi and their countries will have to adapt to changing realities in the evolving collective human consciousness. Yes, the coming months and years will get ugly at times, but your job Dave is to remain aligned with the Greater Good and not let yourself be swayed by the cheap dramas being perpetrated by ignorant fools. Just keep being centered on your [Buddhist practice and your soul] and you will play a constructive role in your remaining time on the physical plane. We love and appreciate you, Dave, and we haven’t forgotten you. Keep up the good work – we see what you’re “up” to, and we approve with heart – heartily approve.

Love, Jacob

In reviewing that writing session, it now seems to me that the first paragraph directed to me was from my soul, and then the second paragraph shifted to a message from Jacob, one of my spirit guides with whom I have been consciously communicating off and on since 1988.

I don’t know if Jacob is my guardian angel or an ascended master or a buddha from another dimension, but whoever he is, he’s a wise and loving consciousness who offers kindness and encouragement when I need it. Such wisdom is available to each of us, but first we have to ask, and then we need to listen to the answers in whatever form they come to us.

In these times of turmoil I like to recall an excerpt from A Dialogue of Self and Soul by my favorite poet, W.B. Yeats:

When such as I cast out remorse,

So great a sweetness flows into the breast.

We must laugh and we must sing,

We are blessed by everything,

And everything we look upon is blessed.