Divine Purpose

"Strange is our situation here upon earth.  Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose.  We do know that we are here for others - above all for those upon whose smile and well-being our own happiness depends, and also for the countless unknown souls with whose fate we are connected by a bond of sympathy."

Belated Closure

Belated Closure

by Nate Bender

9/28/2014

In the early spring of 1978, when stationed in the Army at Fort Lewis Washington, I received a telephone call from my brother Reuben in Iowa informing me

that my father had died suddenly. 

Dad had eaten supper (the evening meal!), taken a shower and sat down in his living room recliner, only to be discovered in an expired condition by my mother. 

While he had recently celebrated his 74^th birthday and was showing signs of declining vitality, which I was not made aware before hand, the news was a shocker.  It marked the first death of a parent for me to experience. 

Attending dad’s funeral offered opportunities for renewals with family and long forgotten community members.  I also experienced an unsettling disconnect.  My father’s sudden death did not provide an opportunity to exchange thoughtful and thankful farewell wishes.

Returning to my Fort Lewis-based wife and son, and my work as a psychologist, my unsettled emotional state took on a more intense condition…my first, and only encounter with depression.  I found myself withdrawing from interpersonal contact, save for my professional duties.  I simply wanted to isolate myself to engage in solitary brooding.

Over a three-month period I was able to begin sharing my emotional distress, centered on regrets in my relationship with my father.  Once I was able to circle the underlying emotional material, my depression lifted, while leaving evidence for developing a more complete form of closure.

Over the next four tumultuous years surrounding marital and vocational change, thoughts of my father were ever-present, leaving a gnawing sense of incompletion. 

In the throes of my tumults, I became aware of something more for me to do.  I could write a letter to my father, as if he were yet alive.  I could express to him the positive impact he had on my life.  I could also express my own regrets and ask for his forgiveness.  And, I could write a letter from him to me, wherein feelings of gratitude and forgiveness could be shared.

This two-way letter exchange was created, leaving yet one more requirement for me to feel complete….to have closure around my father’s dying.  I took my then 8 year-old son and my two letters to the cemetery in which dad was buried.  My son and I sat at the foot of Dad’s head stone and I read the letters, evoking a huge emotional discharge.  I was now complete and my son was witness to the act!

Here is a poem I recently wrote about my father, titled ‘Big Erv:’

Cloistered in a rural Iowa community quite small,

from 1^st generation German immigrant parents, he did evolve.

Youngest of seven, the tallest he became,

reaching six feet and seven inches in all.

Formidable in stature his presence was marked,

accentuated by large, thick, grease-stained hands.

Disheveled in every-day attire, sans socks, cap askew, trouser-supporting suspenders,

and an ever-present cigar in the side of his mouth.

His wearing apparel held limited variety, marked by grey-blue work shirts and trousers,

and one double-breasted brown suit for formal….primarily church occasions.

Extroverted and sociable in personality he was,

connecting to old and new acquaintances with ease.

Gruff and opinionated in manner he could be,

masking a gentle and tender nature, awaiting opportunity.

Survivor of the Depression Years, thus miserly ways he embodied,

eschewing comfort and pleasure as marks of excess and frivolity.

His talents and abilities were varied and refined,

honed out of demands for survival and self-sufficiency.

Mechanically inclined, an auto mechanic he became,

earning a reputation for excellence both near and far.

His welding and metal works skills made recyclable material into works of art,

adding elegance and functionality to household accessories.

Man of the earth he was, thus a gardener extraordinaire he became,

marked by bountiful harvests and admirable layouts.

With a facile mind, it was only natural he develop his literacy,

even in an environment that demanded so little of its use.

Student of the Bible he proudly proclaimed,

offering interpretations even Martin Luther would applaud!

Curious about the larger world and political events,

he readily offered critiques both long and strong.

A dreamer he was, producing images of living in far away lands,

gleaned from Nat’l Geographic, and aborted by resource scarcities.

Most of all, Big Erv was my father, whose legacy and seeds his progeny hold close,

Anticipating transfer to the next generations.   Happy Every-day Father’s Day!

Let It Be A Dance

Let It Be A Dance

by Ric Masten

Let it be a dance we do.

May I have this dance with you?

Through the good times and bad times, too,

Let it be a dance.

Let a dancing song be heard.

Play the music, say the words,

And fill the sky with sailing birds.

Let it be a dance we do.

May I have this dance with you?

Through the good times and bad times, too,

Let it be a dance.

Everybody turn and spin,

Let your body learn to bend,

And, like a willow with the wind.

Let it be a dance we do.

May I have this dance with you?

Through the good times and bad times, too,

Let it be a dance.

Morning star comes out at night,

Without the dark there is no light,

If morning’s wrong, then nothing’s right.

Let it be a dance we do.

May I have this dance with you?

Through the good times and bad times, too,

Let it be a dance.

Happy Marriage

The Recipe For A Happy Marriage – Five Ingredients

18 Mar 2014

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What’s the recipe for a happy marriage? Here are five important ingredients, from yogi and mystic, Sadhguru, that go into making a sweet, joyful and nourishing relationship with your spouse.

#1 Take Two “Heartfuls” of Love

The English expression, “Falling in love,” is significant because you don’t rise in love, you don’t fly in love, you don’t walk in love, you don’t stand in love. You fall in love, because something of who you are has to go. It essentially means someone else has become far more important than yourself. Only if you don’t think too much of yourself, you can be in love. When what you consider as “me” falls, a deep experience of love can happen within you.

#2 Add a Liberal Dose of Understanding

The closer the relationship with someone is, the more effort you should make to understand them. Someone becomes closer and dearer to you only as you understand them better. If they understand you, they enjoy the closeness of the relationship. If you understand them better, then you enjoy the closeness. If you are expecting the other to understand and comply with you all the time while you don’t understand the limitations, possibilities, needs and capabilities of that person, then conflict is all that will happen.

In everyone, there are some positive and some negative aspects. If you embrace all this in your understanding, you can make the relationship the way you want it. If you leave it to their understanding, it will become accidental. If they are very magnanimous, things will happen well for you. If not, the relationship will break up. It is not that the other person is totally bereft of understanding. With your understanding you can create situations where the other person would be able to understand you better.

#3 Work On It A Little

A marriage is not an absolute thing that you can do once and forget. It is an active partnership. Two separate people have chosen to come together for a common purpose and build a life together, live joyfully and multiply their wellbeing. Two human beings weaving their lives into one has a certain beauty.

In Indian culture, a marriage was renewed once a year just to remind you why you came together. It is a fresh marriage again on that day. Otherwise, you think you have been stuck in this forever. No. You came together consciously, and you have to conduct it consciously too.

#4 Warm It Up With Some Joy

If relationships have to be really beautiful, it is very important that a human being turns inward and looks at himself in a very deep way before he looks at someone else. If you become a source of joy by yourself and your relationships are about sharing your joy, you would have wonderful relationships with anyone. Is there anyone in the world who would have any problem with you if you are going there to share your joy with them? No. If you want to experience the profoundness of being with another human being, your marriage should never be about you – it should always be about the other person. If both of you think like this, your marriage will not be an arrangement, it will be a union.

#5 Offer It To Each Other

If your marriage is just a bundle of expectations about how to extracthappiness out of someone who should make heaven for you, you will be disappointed. They say marriages are made in heaven. They say that because most people created a hell out of their marriage! If your relationship is about extracting something out of someone, it does not matter how much you manage, there will be constant trouble. But if your relationship was an offering to the other person, then everything would be fantastic.

Editor’s Note: We hope this recipe for a happy marriage serves all the married couples well!

Conquering my Nicotine Addiction

Conquering My Nicotine Addiction

By Nate Bender

8/28/14

Smoking of cigars, pipes and cigarettes were every day parts of my formative years in rural Iowa.  Virtually all men, and in my youthful view all real men, seemed to smoke one or more of the three nicotine-laced items.  I have no memory of ever witnessing women or girls smoking, as it would have no doubt been deemed unladylike behavior!

Even before my high school years I was drawn to smoking.  It sounds gross now to think of having done it, I even resorted to retrieving cigarette butts off the roadways and smoking what was left. 

Once I even sneaked a fresh cigarette out of an open pack left on a nearby farmer’s table.  Okay, I stole it!

When I was around 10 years of age, I was caught stealing a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes from one of the three small grocery stores in our town.  The resulting whipping from my father left an enduring mark on my psyche and rear end!  I was wrought with humiliation which was compounded by sibling taunts about being a “thief.” 

Working on farms in my teen years offered revenue to afford buying my own cigarettes, often via paying an adult to be the front-runner, when I was not of legal age.  This tactic was also employed in procuring beer!  My-oh-my, it’s no wonder I was so guilt-ridden during all of my developmental years!  Here I thought it was purely the spin-off of Lutheran Church guilt indoctrinations!

At home I had daily exposures to the fine art of rolling-your-own cigarettes.  Dad had his can of Prince Albert tobacco and paper thins in his front shirt pockets, requiring ready access to the art of making fresh cigarettes.  These shirt pockets could also be found to hold one or more cigars.

Annually, we journeyed to Parker, South Dakota for a week’s visit with Grandma and Grandpa Langrehr and other relatives in the area.  Grandpa was a pipe smoker and being witness to the steps he employed to launch his smoking captured my attention.  The aroma was also captivating.

During the summer I turned 14 (remember, I was already an adult-size 6’4”) I was invited to play on the Westgate town fast-pitch softball team.  Virtually all of the adults on the team smoked, making for easy ‘mooching’ of cigarettes, along with post-game beer consumption. 

Hay bailing work held special times for me.  The money, usually at a penny-a-bail rate, was good and smoking held special pleasure operating in the great out doors.  Lunchtime offerings of a cold beer enhanced this adult-level indulgence!

At no time was I ever admonished by my parents or other adults to not smoke, thus smoking became part of my life throughout my high school years and into college and beyond.

In 1963 when I joined the Peace Corps training experience at the University Minnesota smoking took on an expanded experience….an introduction to pipe smoking.  Even though Grandpa Langrehr’s pipe smoking enamored me, some of my fellow volunteers took it to another level.  Special blends of tobacco and specially crafted pipes created an exotic atmosphere for smoking, leading to my first pipe purchases and its array of accessories.

In 1968 I was drafted into the Army, where pay was low, resources limited and tobacco was subsidized and cheap.  $1.50 bought a carton of cigarettes, and break-time ‘light’em up if ya got im’ directives made smoking a welcome relief from the drudgeries of training.  Never did smoking hold greater appeal!

During my Army Clinical Psychology internship in 1976, one of the requirements was for interns to conduct stop-smoking support groups for military and dependent personnel.  Here I was leading a group to stop smoking and I was secretly smoking on the side lines….cognitive dissonance in the full force, I do say!

I want to fast forward now to 1983.  I’m 40 years old, recently divorced custodial parent of a seven year old son, newly self-employed and scraping by financially as well.  I’m now on a three pack-a-day protocol of smoking, using it as a stress releaser of sorts.  These were tenuous times for me. 

One evening a hand touched my shoulder while sitting in our living room smoking a cigarette.  The hand was that of my seven-year-old son, Jonathan.  He tapped my shoulder and very earnestly told me he did not want me to die!

This was a very powerful wakeup call.  At that very moment I extinguished the lit cigarette in my hand and placed the entire surrounding stockpile into the trash.  More than 30 years later I can now declare I’ve been totally tobacco clean for the duration.  From three-packs a day to none, without a trace of regret or desire!  Thank you, thank you, my beloved son!

A final note: in an effort to reinforce my seceding from smoking efforts I started to contribute the monthly amount I was spending on cigarettes into a savings account for my son’s future college education.  When he left for college in 1994 the account had generated more than $5,000!

This is my story and I’ll stand by its merits!