Oppositional and Defiant

It is best to be yourself, imperial, plain and true. - Robert Browning in the Zen Calendar (February 3, 2009)

Day 35. Glorious, warm sunshine. It's about damn time. I took a whompin long walk this afternoon, and rediscovered how demanding it is to be self-ambulatory. It felt rigorous to be a biped, rather than astride two wheels. I'll probably stick to cycling.

While sitting last night, I was like an indignant, petulant child. I plunked down on my cushion like a two-year-old sent to time out. If there had been anyone to listen, my inner toddler would have said sulkily, "I don't wanna. And you can't make me." What a brat. I didn't want to bow, or sit up straight, or maintain a proper mudra. I decided to simply go with it. It wasn't long before my Buddha smile tugged at the corners of my mouth, and I got really tickled over myself. Indulging those feelings began to crack me up.

Like all true children of an alcoholic, I have never been young. If someone were to conduct a formal intake interview with me, it would be apparent that I had reached most significant maturational milestones by the age of 11, which was when I began to earn my own money. I was the quintessential Hero child. I'm not particularly proud of this distinction, and I've done a fairly thorough job of processing it on my analyst's couch. My point is that my zazen cushion may be the first and only place I've ever manifested anything remotely childlike. Not that adults can't be indignant and petulant, too.

In my profession, there is actually a diagnosis called "Oppositional Defiant Disorder." It's usually applied to kids, although I've had some former bosses who met the criteria. I suspect it is a diagnosis applied most commonly to spunky, creative, independent-thinking little individuals by therapists who were potty-trained too rigidly. I like to think that an eight-year-old Meryl Streep, and Bruce Springsteen for most of his life, might have been misdiagnosed with Oppositional Defiant Disorder. I didn't have the luxury of opposing much. It was far too dangerous to contradict my dad.

This may be a horse crap pile of rationalization, but I believe there are definitely times and places where there is an imperative to oppose and defy. I'm really glad Rosa Parks did her stint of it. And Joseph Campbell, Carl Sagen, and Madame Curie to name a few others. I'm not exactly sure what triggered my petulance last night, but the moment I indulged it, watched it, and (mildly!) celebrated it, the petulance kind of ebbed out of me. Interestingly, it was replaced by a sense of amusement and exhilaration. I don't have to be "good" all of the time. Inevitably, there will be occasions when I can't be profound, or witty, or insightful, or even mildly interesting on my blog. And times when, despite my most sincere efforts, I don't sit up very straight, forget to count my breaths, and for 20 solid minutes think of nothing other than, "When is the timer going off? Is it over yet? Is it over yet? Is it over yet? I want to stretch. I want to read. I want to sleep."

My first instinct upon witnessing a crack in my Inner Repsonsible Adult was that all hell would break loose, the world as we know it would come to an end, and (another) shift of the earth's axis would result. Spoken like a Poster Child for Adult Children of Alcoholics. I braced myself for the disapproval and rejection of Buddha, God, my former therapist, friends, family and entire reading audience. I noticed that none of these catastrophic consequences occurred. I just kept sitting on my cushion. My breath went on breathing in and out. Twenty minutes passed. I had nothing to show for it, other than a wicked little smile and the indention my buttocks left on my sofa cushion. And a tiny bit of unclinching - mostly of my superego but perhaps some other body parts as well.

That felt really good.

Gassho,
CycleBuddhaDoc