When They Come For You: Equal Rights
More than 15 years ago I was asked to sit on a contentious committee at San Francisco State University that was given the task of recommending curricular changes that would sensitize students to cultural differences. Suggestions were brought to the committee at its first meeting by faculty members. Ethnic Studies faculty made proposals for including what they believed were fundamental concepts...
Read MoreWhen You Can’t Let Go
Whenever I hear about the importance of letting go of the past, I think about a conversation I had with my mother more than thirty years ago. She emigrated to the United States from Poland when she was six years old, just before the rise of Hitler. Her memories of Poland and the indignities she suffered as a child because she was Jewish, would resurface whenever there was a discussion about...
Read MoreWant Enlightenment? Think Less, Do more
When I gave a workshop on change at a well-known retreat center, one participant told me that this was the tenth week-long workshop he attended in the past five years. “Why so many?” I asked. “I’m looking to find meaning in my life.” What I wanted to say was “why not stop looking and do something instead?” Trying to be compassionate, I nodded as if I understood, but didn’t. We...
Read MoreOpening the Soul’s Door:Caregiving
EARLY PRAISE FOR LEANING INTO SHARP POINTS “Stan Goldberg brings wisdom and personal experience as a caregiver and hospice volunteer to this compassionate and honest guide to providing care for one who is chronically or terminally ill. Written from the perspective of both the caregiver and the one who is receiving the care, it is a sensitive, rich, and often compelling resource.” – Andy...
Read MoreReflections From New York, September 18th, 2001
“Daddy, please come,” my daughter said on September 11th from New York City. Together, we watched the towers fall. Me, from the safety of my San Francisco home. She, from an office building in Rockefeller Plaza wondering if her friend survived.
Read MoreIt’s Not Our Fault
When Christians in the Middle Ages extolled the virtue of holy missions and heard that Crusaders killed innocent Muslims, they cried out “It’s not our fault.” When Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer murdered 1500 unarmed Indians, members of the House of Parliament, who had called them “children,” said It’s not our fault. When the people of Weimer who cursed the...
Read MorePlaying for Relatives: Understanding Buchenwald
I thought about my father’s family tree as I drove from Prague to Weimer. Thirty-three relatives had died in Auschwitz, three had been liberated from Dachau, but nothing was written about Buchenwald, the concentration camp I would visit the next day, November 11th, 2010. It was Veterans Day in the United States and Armistice Day in Europe. I stood just inside the entrance and looked at the sign...
Read MoreI’m in Shock! But It’s Nothing Personal
It was the type of conversation we’ve all heard, and then thought, “I’d never do that!” In a small restaurant north of San Francisco, I heard a woman loudly complaining to a friend about the ingratitude of a relative. “I just don’t understand it,” the woman said. “I tried to be helpful. You know, her husband is in critical condition, and she just about bit my head off when I...
Read More10 Suggestions for Living: Advice from a Tibetan Hermit and My Mother
In the 19th century, the hermit Patrul Rinpoche wrote, Be like a cow. Eat, defecate, and sleep. Everything else is none of your business. After almost 200 years, this easily understood philosophy of life has evolved into complex (and sometimes bizarre) thoughts, bloated by want-to-be gurus, espoused by television personalities, and shrouded in mysterious words such as “presence,”...
Read MoreBecoming Something Different
In Tibetan Buddhism the word “bardo” refers to a transition or a gap between the completion of one situation and the beginning of another. That gap can occur between life and death, ignorance and understanding, or in the case of speech-language pathology, between who we were and what we are becoming.
Read MoreThe Power of Ritual
It's easy to dismiss rituals as just the historical trappings of ancient religions. Something very beautiful, but having little relevance to our contemporary lives. Nothing can be further from the truth.
Read MoreSearching For Healing
There is an old story told of a young monk seeking enlightenment. He would sit meditating for long periods of time, waiting for it to engulf him. A teacher, watching him for weeks, sat down next to him and grabbed a piece of broken pottery. Without looking at the student or saying anything, he placed the chard in his lap and began rubbing it with a filthy cloth.
Read MoreReinvent Yourself: 12 Principles of Change
She died on Christmas day of a massive heart attack. Looking at a shelf in her apartment, I saw fifteen self-help books on diet and exercise. With that much information, I couldn’t understand how it happened. As I read, I found each offered general philosophies and broad ideas, none provided specifics necessary for my mother to save her life.
Read MoreImages of New York
The 6 Train stops at Lexington to refrains of Ava Maria and pristine pictures of the missing reappear on graffetied walls always smiling, sometimes with friends, but mostly with children
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