Uber Dharma

The days speed by. My wrist heals. A boyfriend appears. Then it's time for a trip to California to visit my dad. The days pass quickly between meals, Chinese Checkers, video calls with doctors and financial advisors, visits to his bedridden lady friend, squirreling myself away to work, and escapes to yoga and walks with friends.

Last Thursday (two weeks after arriving) I woke in the dark and summoned an Uber to SFO. Just before dawn a car appeared in the horseshoe drive of my father's senior home. The other rider was a Moroccan woman returning home to Chicago. We talked about rain and cold and the driver chimed in saying it's never cold in his country.

Sorya, it turned out, is a 28-year old Buddhist monk from Cambodia who journeyed to the U.S. seeking work to support his parents, nephews, and nieces. Before immigrating, he spent 17 years in a monastery. It took him 5 years (and 5 tries) to get a visa. Besides driving he works in a casino and has no idea when he might return home.

I immediately stopped fretting about my own challenges. I remembered that everything in our path is the path. The Dharmakaya (body of truth) is all encompassing.

I marveled as Sorya shared the language skills he's acquired and practices in his new roles: Chinese and Thai while driving in San Francisco, and English at the casino. His sadness at missing family - combined with the energy generated from facing his fears to benefit others - woke me up. He didn't even know how to drive when he arrived. I wanted to weep and to cheer him on.

Today in "Sacred World," I read about fear. Author Jeremy Hayward says,

Fear is a message that something unknown is beckoning us...Without fear we would be forever stuck in our cocoon.

This is the razor's edge...the cliff from which we have to leap...No matter how long we have practiced and journeyed on the path of warriorship, fear is the stepping stone between the cocoon and the sacred world.

Hayward faced his own fear one day by standing on a narrow ledge and letting waves of anxiety and thoughts of jumping pulse through his body and subside. Sorya confronted his over and over by driving in places he didn't know - at night - getting lost and then finding his way.

I remembered frightening situations throughout my own life: traveling solo as a young woman, and an older one; encountering - and standing up to - those who would do me harm; presenting to groups large and small; phobias of flying, bridges, small spaces, and high places.

And I thought of a refrigerator magnet my mother gave me long ago:

Every day do something that scares you.

And I plan to do just that.