Many blessings on National Navajo Code Talkers Day!
”When the war ended, other combatants were free to discuss their roles in the service and to receive recognition for their actions. But the Marines instructed us, the code talkers, to keep our accomplishments secret. We kept our own counsel, hiding our deeds from family, friends, and acquaintances. Our code was finally declassified in 1968, twenty-three years after the war’s end.
This book may be my story, bit it is written for all of these men.
May they and their loved ones walk in beauty.”
– quoted from the Dedication (“to the 420 World War II Navajo Marine code talkers”) in Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir By One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of WWII by Chester Nez with Judith Schiess Avila
My apologies for not posting the music before the practice. You can request an audio recording of Sunday’s practice via a comment below or (for a slightly faster reply) you can email me at myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Musical Note: This is the remix that includes compositions by Pulitzer Prize winner Raven Chacon. With the exception of the seventeenth track and the final track, all the music on the playlist features musicians and/or groups recognized by the Native American Music Awards (NAMA), which awards “Nammy’s” for styles of music associated with Native Americans and First Nations and to nominees who are Native American or when at least one member in a group or band is from a State for Federally recognized tribe. Most of the songs feature people who have been inducted into the Native American Music Awards Hall of Fame or have been awarded NAMA Lifetime Achievement Awards. Some songs simply won a Nammy (or two). To my knowledge, I only covered ten (maybe eleven) nations. I wanted to include “One World (We Are One)” – which is the result of a collaboration between Taboo, IllumiNative and Mag 7 – but the song was not available on Spotify.
”’I’m no hero,’ Chester Nez chuckles. ‘I just wanted to serve my country.’ I just wanted to serve my country. to appreciate that remark, you need to know a little modern Native American history. In Chester’s home state of New Mexico, Native Americans were still denied the vote when he volunteered as a Marine in World War II. Nevertheless, the military called upon Chester and fellow Navajos to devise a code that many analysts believe assured the United States’ defeat of Japan in the South Pacific.”
– quoted from the Prologue (by Judith Schiess Avila) to Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir By One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of WWII by Chester Nez with Judith Schiess Avila
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
“Hitchcock’s example of the MacGuffin emphasizes its impossible status: not only is the object that one [never has], but one cannot even isolate it as an idea. It remains necessarily empty, and yet functions as an engine for the Hitchcockian narrative. The emptiness of the MacGuffin as an object permits spectators to locate their satisfaction in the striving that it unleashes rather than identifying satisfaction with the discovery of its secret.”
– quoted from “The Empty Object” in “27. Hitchcock’s Ethics of Suspense: Psychoanalysis and the Devaluation of the Object” by Todd McGowan (as published in A Companion to Alfred Hitchcock, edited by Thomas Leitch and Leland Poague)
Please join me for a 90-minute virtual yoga practice on Zoom today (Saturday, August 13th) at 12:00 PM. Use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment below or by emailing myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Saturday’s playlist is available on YouTube and Spotify.
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
The following was originally posted August 10, 2020 (and re-posted with revisions in 2021).Class details and links have been updated for today’s practice.
“Every man is a valuable member of society, who by his observations, researches, and experiments, procures knowledge for men.”
– James Smithson (quoted from his notebook)
Insight, which can be viewed as “seeing something in a special way,” can be cultivated through observation. If you think about it in this way, then any knowledge and insight you can for yourself can also be useful to others. This is true when we observe anything in the world – including ourselves.
So, pick something. It could be your breath, it could be a certain way you’re feeling, it could be a sensation in or on your body, it could be a thought (or a series of thoughts) playing around your head, but pick one thing and then observe it. Observe it as you do “that 90-second thing.” Observe it as you walk on your way or move through your practice. Notice how things shift and change.
Of course, just the fact that you are bringing awareness to the something changes it and changes the way you move in relation to it. What if, however, you bring your awareness to your center? What if you observe how you move in relation to your center and then after a pose or a sequence of poses, you pause and observe the “something” that you picked at the beginning? This becomes a practice about cause and effect, and also a practice about orientation. The only question is: Where’s your center?
When you consider moving from you center, you have several from which you can choose. You can pick your physical center (top to bottom) which is your solar plexus, or your left to right physical center which is your spinal column. Alternately you could pick one of your energetic centers: heart chakra or the center axis defined in various traditions (which essentially corresponds to the area of your spine). Here we are consciously choosing a navigation point, but consider that even when we don’t consciously choose a center for observation or movement, these centers still serve as guiding points, constant lines of reference. When you pick one as your focus it becomes prime – and, just like a cornerstone, it gives you direction.
“When I have got some more observations of it I shall bee [sic] able to tell you how long it will last and where it will pass[. At] present I dare not pretend to that knowledge.”
– quoted from a letter to “to Crompton [for Newton]” dated “December 15th (1680)” by John Flamsteed, the first Astronomer Royal
The cornerstone for the Royal Observatory, Greenwich was laid today (August 10th) in 1675. It is the home of Greenwich Mean Time (0:00:00) and the Prime Meridian Line which is the primary constant dividing East and West. King Charles II established the observatory as well as the position of the Astronomer Royal who the king declared was “to apply himself with the most exact care and diligence to the rectifying of the tables of the motions of the heavens, and the places of the fixed stars, so as to find out the so much desired longitude of places for the perfecting of the art of navigation.”
The observatory has been used throughout its history as a basis for the measurement of timekeeping and mapping. At one time, the Prime Meridian was marked by a metal strip (of various materials), but has been marked with a green laser shining north across London since December 16, 1999. The first Astronomer Royal was John Flamsteed, whose observations and calculations where communicated to scientists like Sir Isaac Newton. Newton actually used comet observations and calculations of Flamsteed and Edmond Halley (who succeeded Flamsteed as Royal Astronomer) in order to prove certain theories in Newton’s Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica.
Although we may think of the Prime Meridian as 0⁰ 00’00, it is actually slightly East of center (0⁰ 00’00.417), which requires an adjustment on other lines of navigation in order to provide accurate geographical coordination. Discrepancies aside, even the original line would have been incredibly helpful to Ferdinand Magellan, who set sail today (August 10th) in 1519, with the intention of circumnavigating the globe. Magellan named the Pacific Ocean “peaceful sea” – even though it wasn’t peaceful or a sea – and the Strait of Magellan is named for him, as he used it to sail from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. After three years, a mutiny, a ship wreck, a ship defection, and a change of course for one ship, one of Magellan’s original ships completed the journey around the world. That ship, the Victoria, contained 18 of the original 270 seamen. Magellan, however, was not included in that number who completed the journey. He was killed in the Philippines (by a poisoned arrow) after involving himself in an indigenous land dispute.
“The profession of astronomy is limited for men, and must necessarily, under the most favourable circumstances, be still more so for women. At the present time there are less than half a dozen women in England who are following astronomy as a profession, and it is improbable that there will ever be employment for more than twenty, either at Greenwich or elsewhere.”
– Isabella Jane Clemes, one of four “Lady Computers” who started working at the Royal Observatory on April 14, 1890*
As you are navigating through your practice, you have the opportunity to explore your body and mind, as well as keep a catalog of all you encounter. In this way, your body and mind are like the Smithsonian Institution, which houses an observatory, 4 research centers, a publishing house, a national library, 16 museums, and the National Zoo. It is the largest museum, education, and research complex and it was established legislation the United States Congress passed today (August 10th) in 1846.
James Smithson was a British scientist who spent his life traveling and gathering information. He never married and indicated that if his nephew and heir died childless then Smithson’s estate should be used to establish an institution for “the increase and diffusion of knowledge.”
At the Smithsonian, you can find thousands of items related to nautical and astronomical observation, time keeping, and Magellan – including a number of navigation devices named for Magellan. Consider, for a moment, what you will find when you explore your own mind-body. Consider, also, how what you find increases your knowledge about yourself (and maybe the world).
“… it is in knowledge that man has found his greatness and his happiness, the high superiority which he holds over the other animals who inherit the earth with him, and, consequently, no ignorance is probably without loss to him, no error without evil, and that it is therefore preferable to urge unwarranted doubts, which can only occasion additional light to become elicited, then to risk by silence letting a question settle to fest, while any unsupported assumptions are involved in it.”
– James Smithson (quoted from his notebook)
Please join me today (Wednesday, August 10th) at 4:30 PM or 7:15 PM for a yoga practice on Zoom.Use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You will need to register for the 7:15 PM class if you have not already done so. Give yourself extra time to log in if you have not upgraded to Zoom 5.0. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment below or by emailing myra (at)ajoyfulpractice.com.
Wednesday’s playlist is available on YouTube and Spotify. [Look for “04192020 Noticing Things”]
NOTE: This is a 2-for-1 playlist. You can start with Track #1 or Track #14.
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
*NOTE: Isabella Jane Clemes, Alice Everett, Edith Mary Rix, and Harriet Maud Furniss all started working as “Lady Computers” at the Royal Observatory on April 14, 1890. They were joined by Annie Scott Dill Maunder (née Russell) and others in 1891. According to a study published in 2010, 667 women attended the International Astronomical Union (IAU)’s General Assembly in Rio de Janeiro in August 2009 – indicating that worldwide there were well over fifty-five times as many women in astronomy than Clemes ever imagined.
Errata 2022: The original post(s) contained a confusing description of the Prime Meridian Line.
Please join me today (Tuesday, August 9th) at 12:00 PM or 7:15 PM for a yoga practice on Zoom. You can use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment belowor (for a slightly faster reply) you can email me at myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Tuesday’s playlist is available on YouTube and Spotify. [Look for “08062022 Cause + Effect”]
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
Please join me for a 90-minute virtual yoga practice on Zoom today (Saturday, August 6th) at 12:00 PM. Use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment below or by emailing myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Saturday’s playlist is available on YouTube and Spotify.
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
A portion of the following was originally posted in 2020. Class details and links have been added.
“‘Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!’ cries she
With silent lips. ‘Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!’”
– from the poem “The New Colossus” by Emma Lazarus
Today (August 5th) in 1884, when the cornerstone of the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal was placed on a rainy Bedloe’s Island, it seemed impossible to complete the project meant to be a testament to freedom, friendship, and the spirit of the people. People in France provided the funds for the statue designed by the sculptor Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi (with scaffolding created by Gustave Eiffel), while people in the United States were meant to pay for the base and pedestal designed by Richard Morris Hunt. The only problem was that the Americans were short…about $100,000 short.
Hunt’s design for the pedestal and base incorporated the eleven-point star foundation of the army fort (Fort Wood) which had been built in 1807 and abandoned during the Civil War. He always intended his design to be simple, so as not to take away from the statue itself, but raising money for his design turned out to be such a challenge that he scrapped twenty-five feet from the height of his original design. He also cut back on materials so that instead of the pedestal and base being constructed entirely out of granite, he had to make do with concrete walls covered with a granite-block face. His cost cutting measures still might not have been enough if a certain newspaper man hadn’t decided to tap into the spirit of the people and, in doing so, overcame what some viewed as an impossible obstacle. That newspaper man was Joseph Pulitzer and on March 16, 1885 he implored people in the United States to give what they could, even if it was a penny, in order to pay for the base and pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. Starting with an ad and a series of front page editorials, he was able to crowd fund over $100,000 in about 5 months.
“We must raise the money! The World is the people’s paper, and now it appeals to the people to come forward and raise the money. The $250,000 that the making of the Statue cost was paid in by the masses of the French people – by the working men, the tradesmen, the shop girls, the artisans – by all, irrespective of class or condition. Let us respond in like manner. Let us not wait for the millionaires to give us this money. It is not a gift from the millionaires of France to the millionaires of America, but a gift of the whole people of France to the whole people of America.
Take this appeal to yourself personally. It is meant for every reader of The World. Give something, however little. Send it to us. We will receive it and see that it is properly applied.”
– quoted from The New York World editorial by Joseph Pulitzer, 1885
Joseph Pulitzer offered people a six inch metal replica of Lady Liberty (described as a “perfect fac-simile”) if they donated a dollar to the “Pedestal Fund” established by Pulitzer’s paper the New York World and a twelve inch replica if they donated $5. While that may not seem like a lot today, keep in mind that this was after the Financial Panic of 1873 (which created a depression in the United States and Europe). Also, interest seemed to be in short supply since the United States was still trying to recover from the Civil War – which left many Americans desiring heroic public art rather than allegorical public art. But, Joseph Pulitzer had a way with words and there were a group of people – immigrants – who were inspired to donate specifically because of the symbolism of the statue. Ultimately, over 125,000 people donated – most donating a dollar or less. They not only donated to receive the replicas, they donated via auctions, lotteries, and boxing matches. They donated by depriving themselves of things they needed or things they wanted. Some kids donated by pooling their “circus” and candy money. Some adults donated what they would normally spend on drinks. At the end of the fundraising, Joseph Pulitzer printed every donor’s name in the New York World – regardless of how little or how much they donated.
The cornerstone is the first stone set in the foundation of a building or structure. All other stones are set in reference to the cornerstone; thereby making it the very foundation of the foundation. It determines the overall position of the structure and is often placed with a certain amount of pomp and circumstance. It is usually inscribed with the date of its placement and often includes a time capsule, which includes some clues as to what was important to the people who attended the ceremony. Such was the case with Lady Liberty’s pedestal cornerstone, which was placed over a square hole dug for a copper time capsule. The time capsule contained a number of articles, including the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States – both documents considered to be the cornerstones of the United States and the ultimate law of the land.
Although we don’t always think of it this way, one of the cornerstones of the legal system in a commonwealth is a bar. It might be wooden railing, it might be metal railing; however, historically, this bar separated those within the legal profession (specifically the judge and those who had business with the court) from everyone else. In particular, “everyone else” referred to law students whose aspirations were to “pass the bar” – meaning they would be on the other side of the symbolic railing. This symbolic railing is also used to refer to professional organizations, membership in which is sometimes required in order for an attorney to practice law in a particular jurisdiction. Let’s skip “state bars” for a second and just focus on “voluntary” bar associations – which, in the United States are private organizations which serve as social, educational, and lobbying organizations. Legal professionals can not only use these bar associations to network with other professionals and the general public (hence expanding their practice), they can also advocate for law reform. I place “voluntary” in quotes, because I’m not sure how possible it is to practice law in the United States without being a member of a “bar association” (not to be confused with a state bar).
Even if it’s possible to practice without being a member of a bar association – and I trust one of you lawyer yogis will educate me with a comment below – I imagine it would be quite challenging (maybe even impossible) to successfully practice. Especially, back when there was only one major bar association in the United States. And, especially back in the 1920’s when your race and gender prevented you from joining said association. Such was the plight of Gertrude Rush (née Durden), born today (August 5th) in 1880 in Navasota, Texas. Ms. Rush not only became the first African-American woman to be admitted to the Iowa (state) bar, for about 32 years she was (sometimes) the ONLY female attorney practicing in the state of Iowa (1918 – 1950). She placed a particular emphasis on women’s (legal) rights in estate cases and had a passion for religion, extensively studying the 240 women whose stories are featured in the Bible. Many within the local court referred to her as the “Sunday school lawyer.” She took over her husband’s law practice and, in 1921 (just a year after women’s right to vote was ratified by the United States Congress) she was elected the president of the Colored Bar Association; however, it was impossible for her to be admitted to the American Bar Association. She tried. So, did several other African-American lawyers. They tried because the ABA had one Black lawyer and was, therefore “integrated.” Eventually, however, they stopped trying to join an organization that didn’t want them and started their own organization.
“…a very worn Bible is almost as prominent as the well-thumbed Iowa code on the desk of Mrs. Gertrude E. Rush.”
– quoted from “Iowa’s Only Negro Woman Lawyer Firmly on the Golden Rule” article about Gertrude Rush, located in Iowa Public Library (excerpt printed in Notable Black American Women, Book 2 by Jessie Carney Smith
Gertrude Rush was one of the founding members of the Negro Bar Association, which was incorporated on August 1, 1925 with 120 members (which was about 11 – 12% of the Black lawyers in the US at the time). Eventually renamed, the National Bar Association, the NBA ” addressed issues such as professional ethics, legal education, and uniform state laws, as well as questions concerning the civil rights movement in transportation discrimination, residential segregation, and voting rights.” The NBA supported civil rights groups by providing legal information, filing outside legal briefs (amicus curiae), and blocking federal court nominees who opposed racial equality. As a bar association, however, the NBA did not directly participate in civil rights activities. Instead, NBA members like Gertrude Rush and (eventual) Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall became members of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People).
It was as part of the NAACP’s legal team that Justice Marshall argued cases like Donald Gaines Murray in Murray v. Pearson, 169 Md. 478, 182 A. 590 (1936) and Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954). Raymond Pace Alexander founded the National Bar Journal (1941), which became a way for Black lawyers to challenge legal principles which conflicted with the interest of African-Americans. The Rev. W. Harold Flowers, a co-founder with Ms. Rush and a former president of the NBA (who would eventually be appointed as an associate justice of the state Court of Appeals), was the attorney whose motions in 1947 resulted in a reconfigured jury after he pointed out that the Arkansas court had not had a Black juror in 50 years. Additionally, the NBA established free legal clinics in 12 states, thereby creating the foundational cornerstone for the poverty law and legal clinics of today.
Gertrude Rush was also one of the organizers of the Charity League, which coordinated the hiring of a Black probation officer for the Des Moines Juvenile Court; created the Protection Home for Negro Girls, a shelter; and served on the boards of a host of other women’s organizations. She also served as a delegate to the Women’s Convention (WC), which was a political auxiliary to the National Baptist Convention (NBC).
“In 1919 Mrs. Gertrude Rush, a prominent black lawyer and [WC] delegate from a Baptist church in Des Moines, Iowa, posited that the vote would enable women to fight for better working conditions, higher wages, and greater opportunities in business. Through suffrage, Rush maintained, women could better regulate moral and sanitary conditions, end discrimination and lynch law, obtain better educational opportunities, and secure greater legal justice.”
– quoted from “Religion, Politics, and Gender: The Leadership of Nannie Helen Burroughs” by Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham (Chapter 8 of This Far By Faith: Readings in African-American Women’s Religious Biography, edited by Judith Weisenfeld & Richard Newman)
Please join me on Zoom (tonight), Friday, August 5, 2022, 7:15 PM – 8:20 PM (CST), for “The Impossible Cornerstones of Lady Liberty and Lady Justice” (a “restorative” practice featuring pawanmuktasana and gentle movement inspired by Somatic Yoga and Universal Yoga).
Use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment below or by emailing myra (at)ajoyfulpractice.com.
Prop wise, you will mostly need something that allows you to be comfortable when seated, prone, and/or supine. There may also be some kneeling. [NOTE: You can always practice without props or use “studio” props and/or “householder” props. Example of Commercial props: 1 – 2 blankets,2 – 3 blocks, a bolster, a strap, and an eye pillow. Example of Householder props: 1 – 2 blankets or bath towels, 2 – 3 books (similar in size), 2 standard pillows (or 1 body pillow), a belt/tie/sash, and a face towel.]
You may want extra layers (as your body may cool down during this practice). Having a wall, chair, sofa, or coffee table may be handy for this practice.
NOTE: If you interested in a more active practice related to this date, check out the “Lady Liberty” post and playlists from June 17th.
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
ERRATA: The original post listed the wrong year for the Statue of Liberty’s cornerstone placement.
“We have endeavoured above to employ only symmetrical figures, such as should not only be an aid to reasoning, through the sense of sight, but should also be to some extent elegant in themselves. But for purely theoretic purposes the rules of formation would be very simple. We should merely have to begin by drawing any closed figure, and then proceed to draw others in succession subject to the one condition that each is to intersect once, and once only, all the existing subdivisions produced by those which had gone before. There is no need here to exhibit such figures, as they would probably be distasteful to any but the mathematician, and he would see his way to drawing them readily enough for himself.”
– quoted from “Chapter II. Symbols of Classes and Operations.” in Symbolic Logic by John Venn Sc.D. ; F.R.S.
“This is what I heard,” that when the Buddha talked to the his disciples about the sutra “known as “‘The Diamond that Cuts through Illusion,’” he spoke figuratively and “did not have in mind any definite or arbitrary conception” or thought. Even when speaking of particles of dust, he said, “I am merely using these words as a figure of speech.” (DS 13) To me, using a figure a speech – a symbol, if you will – may prevent people from thinking that something is restricted to a particular person and/or situation and, therefore, does not apply to them and/or their situation. After all, a symbol can simultaneously mean anything and many things to one or more people.
Conversely, there comes a time when someone like John Venn, born today in 1834, “must obviously have some means of making it clear to myself and to others which things are x and which are not, which are y and which are not.” This is a point he makes repeatedly in Chapter 2 of Symbolic Logic, which breaks down the means and purpose of Venn diagrams. Since I’m a fan of such diagrams, here’s an excerpt from my 2020 post about some “impossible people” born on August 4th*:
“If you create sets based on the biographies of Maria Mitchell and Rabbi Regina Jonas, you might think that to make my ‘impossible list’ someone would have to be a woman who was the first woman to do something in a profession normally associated with men. You might even think that that someone had to be virtually unknown to the masses. But, then you have to addJames Baldwin into the mix. Now, with the third set, you can broaden the definition to include any human who does something outside of society’s expectations – especially, if their achievements make it possible for others to follow in their footsteps and/or do something previously viewed as impossible.
I have heard that it is impossible to make a Venn diagram out of four circles – and I’ll admit that I probably wouldn’t do a very good job of explaining (mathematically) why it is considered impossible – but you can use ellipses. So, when you add in the fact that John Venn was a suffragist who also encouraged woman to run for office, you might think he makes my list. But, he doesn’t. Neither does Percy Bysshe Shelley, who was born today in 1792. Instead, today’s ‘impossible people’ are a musician, a president, and a duchess.”
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
### BE WONDERFULLY, FEARLESSLY, HOPEFULLY IMPOSSIBLE ###
The following was originally posted in 2020. Class details and links have been updated.
“Here there is a role reversal of what was related in bSotah – instead of the woman [Queen Salome Alexandra] being “nameless” now she is named and cunningly tries to get around the rabbinic prohibition, while the male character, her son, is unnamed and plays no role in the matter in dispute.”
– commentary on bShabbat (16b – 14b) in doctoral thesis entitled “Queen Alexandra: The Anamoly of a Sovereign Jewish Queen in the Second Temple Period” by Etka Liebowitz, PhD
There was a time when being a female (non-nun) member of the clergy would have been considered impossible. But, imagine for a moment, someone who was not only the first woman to be ordained in their religion, but to receive the highest orders during a time when it was hard to even be a male member of your religion. Allow me to introduce you to (or re-acquaint you with) Rabbi Regina Jonas ([‘re-ghee-na yo-nas]). Born today in 1902, Rabbi Jonas was not only the first woman to be ordained as a rabbi; she was ordained in Berlin in 1935. In other words, she became the first woman to be named as a Jewish teacher during the height of Nazi Germany.
Throughout history, you can find plenty of women who fulfilled rabbinical duties. They did not, however, hold the title. These women, like Beruryah (Rebbetzin Meir), Yalta, the Hasmonean queen Salome Alexandra (also known as Alexandra of Jerusalem), and the daughters and granddaughters of the great Talmud scholar Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzachaki), are found in the Talmud and would have been studied by Rabbi Jonas and other women who studied at the Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin, the Jūdisch-Theologisches Seminar in Breslau, and other theology schools that admitted women. Unlike her female peers, however, Rabbi Jonas didn’t just want the academic teacher’s degree; she wanted the title and the responsibilities. And this desire was something that she felt and expressed from a very young age.
“If I am to confess what drove me, as a woman, to become a rabbi, two things come to mind. My belief in God’s calling and my love of my fellow man. God has bestowed on each one of us special skills and vocations without stopping to ask about our gender. This means each one of us, whether man or woman, has a duty to create and work in accordance with those God-given skills.”
– quoted from the doctoral thesis entitled “May a woman hold rabbinic office?” by Rabbi Regina Jonas
Rabbi Regina Jonas had a passion for Jewish history, the Bible, and the Hebrew language; a passion that was remembered even by her high school friends and supported by Orthodox rabbis like Isidor Bleichrode, Delix Singerman, and Max Weyl (who officiated at the synagogue the Jonas family attended). When she decided to pursue her degree and also the title, Rabbi Jonas wrote and submitted a final theses, which was a requirement for ordination. Her final theses topic, which was based on Biblical, Talmudic, and rabbinical sources, was near and dear to her heart: “May a woman hold rabbinic office?”
While halakhic literature did not specifically with ordination, she combined halakhic theory related to women’s issues with a modern attitude about women’s roles. She did not, however, use a Reform movement argument. Instead, Rabbi Jonas wanted to establish gender equality within the (and as a) continuity of tradition – and, in doing so, established herself as independent of both the reform movement and Orthodoxy. She also included in her argument very specific gender qualities and expectations centered around Zeni’ut (“Modesty”), which she viewed as being essential to someone’s role as a rabbi. Interestingly, some of her thesis is very much consistent with the ideas Hannah Crocker expressed in 1818.
Rabbi Jonas concluded that yes, a woman could be a rabbi according to halachic sources. She went even further by saying that female rabbis were a “cultural necessity, in part because of so-called female qualities like compassion, interpersonal skills, and psychological intuition. Her final thesis, which was supervised by Eduard Baneth, renowned professor of Talmud at the Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin, was submitted in June 1930. Unfortunately, Rabbi Baneth died soon after her submission and his successor was not willing to ordain women. Ironically, a leader in the Reform movement, Rabbi Leo Baeck, also rejected her submission.
“Almost nothing halakhically but prejudice and lack of familiarity stand against women holding rabbinic office.”
– quoted from the doctoral thesis entitled “May a woman hold rabbinic office?” by Rabbi Regina Jonas
Despite the fact that her professors were not willing to ordain her, she received a “good” grade for her thesis and graduated as a religious teacher. She then began teaching religion at several girls’ schools in Berlin. At this same time, however, anti-Semitism created an increased need for Jewish teachers and religious education. Rabbi Max Dienemann, executive director of Liberaler Rabbinerveband (Conference of Liberal Rabbis) agreed to ordain Rabbi Jonas on behalf of the conference and, within two years, she began to serve the official community as “pastoral-rabbinic counselor.” She particularly ministered to those in the Jewish Hospital, those who were considering emigrating, and people economically affected by “Kristallnacht.” As more and more rabbis were imprisoned by the Nazis or fled the persecution, she began to lecture to various groups, preach in liberal synagogues and lead some Havdalah (“weekday”) services in the Neue Synagogue, the flagship of German Jewry. At one point, during the winter of 1940 – 1941, the Germany Jewry organization established by the Nazis actually sent her to cities that no longer had rabbis. Even when she was forced to work in a factory, she continued her ministry.
On November 2, 1942, Rabbi Jonas was compelled to fill out a declaration form where she listed her property, including all of her books. Two days later, all of her property was confiscated by the Nazis. The next day, she and her mother were arrested. They were deported November 6th, to Theresienstadt concentration camp, where she continued to preach and counsel. The psychoanalyst Viktor Frankl asked her to help him with crisis intervention, including meeting and assessing new arrivals and helping to prevent suicide attempts. On October 12, 1944, at the age of 42, Rabbi Jonas and her mother were deported to Auschwitz, where they were killed.
“Since I saw that her heart is with God and Israel, and that she dedicates her soul to her goal, and that she fears God, and that she passed the examination in matters of religious law, I herewith certify that she is qualified to answer questions of religious law and entitled to hold the rabbinic office. And may God protect her and guide her on all her ways.”
– quoted from the Diploma of Ordination for Rabbi Regina Jonas (approved by Rabbi Max Dienemann)
None of the male religious leaders who survived the Holocaust spoke of Rabbi Regina Jonas. However, a copy of her thesis, her teaching certificate, her rabbinical diploma, personal documents, and two photos have been preserved at the Centrum Judaicum in Berlin. Included in those personal documents were letters of gratitude from refugees she had counseled (and whose families she continued to counsel in Germany). There is also a list of 24 sermons and lectures she delivered, along with notes for at least one full sermon. In the Footsteps of Regina Jonas is a documentary about her life and legacy, which features rabbis like Gesa Ederberg, who celebrated the 75th anniversary of Rabbi Jonas’s ordination with a Havdalah service – the very type of weekday service Rabbi Jonas led in Berlin.
“God has placed abilities and callings in our hearts without regard to gender. If you look at things this way, one takes woman and man for what they are: human beings.”
– quoted from a 1938 news article by Rabbi Regina Jonas
Please join me today (Wednesday, August 3rd) at 4:30 PM or 7:15 PM for a yoga practice on Zoom.Use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You will need to register for the 7:15 PM class if you have not already done so. Give yourself extra time to log in if you have not upgraded to Zoom 5.0. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment below or by emailing myra (at)ajoyfulpractice.com.
Wednesday’s playlist is available on YouTube and Spotify. [Look for “08032022 Always Answering the Impossible Call”]
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
“This also, then, leads on to the idea of whether or not the brain ever does big jumps – or does it only ever do small steps? And the answer is that the brain only ever does small steps. I can only get from here to the other side of the room by passing through the space in between. I can’t teleport myself to the other side. Right? Similarly, your brain can only ever make small steps in its ideas. So, whenever you’re in a moment, it can only actually shift itself to the next most likely possible. And the next and most likely possible is determined by its assumptions. We call it ‘the space of possibility.’ Right. You can’t do just anything. Some things are just impossible for you in terms of your perception or in terms of your conception of the world. What’s possible is based on your history.”
– quoted from the 2017 Big Think video entitled, “The Neuroscience of Creativity, Perception, and Confirmation Bias by Beau Lotto
My idea to spend part of August focusing on “impossible people” – and by that I mean people who do things others believe to be impossible – started long before I had ever heard of neuroscientist Beau Lotto or his work with the Lab of Misfits. In some ways it started with an awareness of certain people’s lives and accomplishments and a curiosity about how they got from A (“impossible”) to Z (“possible”). I mean, on some level I knew about “the space of possibility” and I definitely understood the theory that we live in the past. It is, after all, the science of samskāras (“mental impressions”) and vasanas (the “dwelling places” of habits). I also understood the power of imagination and visualization; often referenced the idea that an epiphany (“striking appearance” or “manifestation”) happens because the mind-intellect is prepared for the revelation; and frequently highlighted how we can be like Emily Dickinson and “dwell in Possibility.”
All of that is backed up by Western science and the Yoga Philosophy. As Dr. Lotto pointed out in his book Deviate: The Science of Seeing Differently, and also in many of his talks and lectures, “We don’t see reality – we only see what was useful to see in the past. But the nature of the brain’s delusional past is this: The past that determines how you see isn’t just constituted by your lived perceptions but by your imagined ones as well. As such, you can influence what you see in the future just by thinking.” And that’s what I hadn’t really used as a point of focus: why some people’s imaginations allow them to think differently and know the baby steps that, to the rest of us, look like giant leaps.
If I were going to pinpoint a single starting point for my change in focus, it would be around July 31, 2016. It was the Feast Day of Saint Ignatius of Loyola and the eve of the anniversary of the birth of Miss Maria Mitchell (and Mr. Herman Melville), and while listening to Justin Timberlake (ostensibly) quote Muhammad Ali to a bunch of teens, I thought, “What combination of things in someone’s past makes their will and determination so strong? What makes someone recognize that “Impossible is just a word…?”
“Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary.
Impossible is nothing.”
– quoted from a 2004 Adidas ad campaign written by Aimee Lehto (with final tag line credited to Boyd Croyner), often attributed to Muhammad Ali
A version of the following was originally posted as “A Brother’s Love” on August 2, 2020.
“Given the conditions in this country to be a black writer was impossible. When I was young, people thought you were not so much wicked as sick, they gave up on you. My father didn’t think it was possible—he thought I’d get killed, get murdered. He said I was contesting the white man’s definitions, which was quite right.”
– James Baldwin, quoted from the interview “James Baldwin, The Art of Fiction No. 78” by Jordan Elgrably (printed in The Paris Review, Issue 91, Spring 1984)
Born today in Harlem, New York, in 1924, the author James Baldwin was – by his own words – an impossible person. His life (and career) were, in so many ways, shaped by a combination of history and opinions. First, there was the history of the United States. Then there were the opinions of his stepfather David Baldwin (who he referred to as his father) regarding life in general plus his stepfather’s opinion of how the world would view him, how the world actually viewed him, and his own ideas about what was possible – or, what was necessary. He spent the ages of 14 – 17 following his father’s footsteps into the ministry and then, when his father died, he took a giant leap. He said, “Those were three years [preaching] which probably turned me to writing.”
Leaping into writing was not Mr. Baldwin’s only leap. He leapt across the pond to Paris, France, twice, even as his writing challenged Western society’s conceptions about race, class, gender, and sexuality. His essays, novels, and plays include Giovanni’s Room, Notes of a Native Son, The Fire Next Time, If Beale Street Could Talk (which was recently made into a movie) and the unfinished manuscript Remember This House (which was adapted to create the 2016 Academy Award-nominated documentary I Am Not Your Negro). Mr. Baldwin first went to Paris with $40 and not a lick of French. He was 24 years old, coming to grips with his sexuality, and escaping what he viewed – what he had witnessed – was a death sentence at the hands of American society.
“Not so metaphorically. Looking for a place to live. Looking for a job. You begin to doubt your judgment, you begin to doubt everything. You become imprecise. And that’s when you’re beginning to go under. You’ve been beaten, and it’s been deliberate. The whole society has decided to make you nothing. And they don’t even know they’re doing it.”
– James Baldwin, quoted from the interview “James Baldwin, The Art of Fiction No. 78” by Jordan Elgrably (printed in The Paris Review, Issue 91, Spring 1984)
From Paris, he was able to not only gain perspective about his experiences of being Black in America (and of being Black and Gay in America), but also to offer those experience back to the United States – in the form of a literary mirror. In words that very much echo Miss Maria Mitchell’s words, he said wanted to see himself, and be seen as, more than “merely a Negro; or, merely a Negro writer.”
In his late 30’s/early 40’s, Mr. Baldwin briefly returned to the United States and physically participated in the Civil Rights Movement and Gay Liberation Movement that he had (from Paris) helped to literally inspire. He became friends with Langston Hughes, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Medgar Evers, Lorraine Hansberry, Nikki Giovanni, and Nina Simone (who he and Mr. Hughes convinced to become active in the Civil Rights Movement). He worked with Drs. Kenneth and Mamie Clark, as well as Lena Horne and Miss Hansberry, to discuss the importance of civil rights legislation with President John F. Kennedy.
His friendships, however, were not only with Black artists and activists. He worked with his childhood friend Richard Avedon, marched with Marlon Brando and Charlton Heston, collaborated with Margaret Mead and Sol Stein, and also knew Rip Torn, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Dorothea Tanning. In fact, to read a biography or autobiography of James Baldwin is to read a Who’s Who of activism and artistry in the 20th century. But, you don’t have to settle for a reading a measly biography. If you can get your hands on the 1,884 pages of documents compiled by the FBI, you would be in for quite a treat.
Yes, you read that correctly. For a little over a decade, the FBI collected nearly two thousand pages worth of documents on a man that many Americans may not realize helped convince President Kennedy to send federal troops to defend the civil rights activists marching from Selma to Montgomery. True, it’s not the well-over 17,000 pages they compiled on Martin Luther King (not including the wire-tap documents). Here, however, is some perspective: the FBI only collected 276 pages on authors like Richard Wright (Native Son) and 110 pages on authors like Truman Capote (In Cold Blood) and Henry Miller (Tropic of Cancer). Additionally, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover showed a particular interest in Mr. Baldwin and actually worked with agents to figure out ways they could ban Mr. Baldwin’s 1962 novel Another Country.
Perhaps Director Hoover was concerned about the fact that James Baldwin started the novel while living in Greenwich Village and continued as he moved back to Paris and then back to the States again, before ultimately finishing the book in Istanbul, Turkey. Perhaps he was concerned about the novels depictions of bisexuality, interracial relationships, and extramarital affairs. It’s just as likely that J. Edgar Hoover was concerned about James Baldwin’s persistent efforts to depict a deep, abiding, almost Divine, brotherly love; a universal experience of grace and growth that would make more things possible for more people. Whatever the FBI Director’s objections might have been, the report of the Justice Department’s General Crimes Section “concluded that the book contains literary merit and may be of value to students of psychology and social behavior.”
“The occurrence of an event is not the same thing as knowing what it is that one has lived through. Most people had not lived — nor could it, for that matter, be said that they had died– through any of their terrible events. They had simply been stunned by the hammer. They passed their lives thereafter in a kind of limbo of denied and unexamined pain. The great question that faced him this morning was whether or not he had ever, really, been present at his life.”
– quoted from Another Country by James Baldwin
“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”
– quoted from The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin
When so many of his friends, who were also the leaders of the Civil Rights Movement, were killed, Mr. Baldwin made his second leap back to Paris. Again, it was a leap made out of fear and the basic desire to survive. His grief, anger, horror, and disappointment are all on full display in later works like If Beale Street Could Talk, Just Above My Head, and the 1985 non-fiction book Evidence of Things Not Seen (about the Atlanta child murders). Yet, until his dying day he wrote about love and hope – even using a portion of the Epistle to the Hebrews, from the Christian New Testament, as the title of his book about the Atlanta child murders.
Another place where you can see Mr. Baldwin’s devotion to love, life, and humanity is in the words of his friends; people, who actually knew him, were inspired by him, and some of whom called him Jim or Jimmy. When he died in 1987, Maya Angelou wrote a tribute for The New York Times, entitled “James Baldwin: His Voice Remembered; Life In His Language.” In addition to describing how Mr. Baldwin introduced her to his family as his mother’s newest daughter, she explained that he “opened the [unusual] door” and encouraged her to tell her story.
“Well, the season was always Christmas with you there and, like one aspect of that scenario, you did not neglect to bring at least three gifts. You gave me a language to dwell in, a gift so perfect it seems my own invention….
The second gift was your courage, which you let us share: the courage of one who would go as a stranger in the village and transform the distances between people into intimacy with the whole world; courage to understand that experience in ways that made it a personal revelation for each of us…. Yours was the courage to live life in and from its belly as well as beyond its edges, to see and say what was, to recognize and identify evil, but never fear or stand in awe of it….
The third gift was hard to fathom and even harder to accept. It was your tenderness – a tenderness so delicate that I thought it could not last, but last it did and envelop me it did. In the midst of anger it tapped me lightly like the child in Tish’s womb…. Yours was a tenderness, of vulnerability, that asked everything, expected everything and, like the world’s own Merlin, provided us with the ways and means to deliver. I suppose that was why I was always a bit better behaved around you, smarter, more capable, wanting to be worth the love you lavished, and wanting to be steady enough to bear while it broke your heart, wanting to be generous enough to join your smile with one of my own, and reckless enough to jump on in that laugh you laughed. Because our joy and our laughter were not only all right, they were necessary.”
– quoted from “James Baldwin: His Voice Remembered; Life In His Language” by Maya Angelou (printed in The New York Times Book Review December 20, 1987)
Please join me today (Tuesday, August 2nd) at 12:00 PM or 7:15 PM for a yoga practice on Zoom. You can use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment belowor (for a slightly faster reply) you can email me at myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Tuesday’s playlist is available onYouTube and Spotify. [Look for “Langston’s Theme for Jimmy 2022”]
NOTE: In 2020, I had to cancel some of this week’s practices and, therefore, did not post the variation of my “Langston Hughes” playlist that I normally use on this date. However, I did encouraged people to practice (with those aforementioned gifts and especially the second and third gifts – with courage and tenderness that has you lifting the corners of your mouth up to your ears and laughing out loud). Last year, today fell on a Monday and so, again, I did not post a playlist.
While I have now posted a variation of what I’ve used in the past, you are still welcome to use my “Selma to Montgomery” playlist, which is available on YouTube and Spotify or, as I mentioned in 2020, you could grab some Nina Simone, Lena Horne, Harry Belafonte (“Merci Bon Dieu” comes to mind, of course), Sammy Davis, Jr., and Joan Baez – and then mix in some of the jazz from today’s playlist.
“I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.”
“Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word love here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being or a state of grace – not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth….Love is a growing up.”
– James Baldwin
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
Please join me today (Tuesday, August 2nd) at 12:00 PM or 7:15 PM for a yoga practice on Zoom. You can use the link from the “Class Schedules” calendar if you run into any problems checking into the class. You can request an audio recording of this practice via a comment belowor (for a slightly faster reply) you can email me at myra (at) ajoyfulpractice.com.
Tuesday’s playlist is available onYouTube and Spotify. [Look for “Langston’s Theme for Jimmy 2022”]
In the spirit of generosity (“dana”), the Zoom classes, recordings, and blog posts are freely given and freely received. If you are able to support these teachings, please do so as your heart moves you. (NOTE: You can donate even if you are “attending” a practice that is not designated as a “Common Ground Meditation Center” practice, or you can purchase class(es). Donations are tax deductible; class purchases are not necessarily deductible.)
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A Joyful Practice 