The person who had the biggest impact on my life was my second wife, Wendy Wright Contos. She had a 157 IQ, but never once acted as if she was better than me. She easily got angry at injustices and would, on occasion, lash out against the hypocrisy of politicians, while helping the underprivileged and the rights of women in a male-dominated society.  Continue reading
And like Buddy Holly once said: “That’ll be the day . . . that I die.”
Stress is here to stay, my friend, and all we can do is to accept it and use skillful means to control it.
Meditation is one of those means. I’ve been applying it for some five years now. I get a little better at it every day. I simply “don’t try,” nor “judge.” It ain’t easy. It takes practice.
Stress controls me until I meditate and choose like-minded friends
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I can’t seem to let go sometimes; a thought crops up from somewhere. I really don’t know where it resides. I “see” the thought somewhere on a monitor screen in my mind, I guess.
And then it dissipates. It goes way, that is, as long as I don’t grasp onto it, believing it is the most profound thought I have ever had.
Or, a thought will scare the hell out of me. It may even prevent me from sitting any longer.
I start to believe that the world is going to hell in a handbasket unless I take action right then to prevent a near-certain disaster from occurring in the immediate future.
These thoughts never come true, you know. (They never will, but they still try to repeat on me!)
Worry causes much of my stress. Dwelling on the past does too. I have Post-Traumatic Stress. (That’s PTSD but without the D for “Disorder.”) I got it from serving in Vietnam a long time ago. Fear crops up. But when the perceived fear is gone, I can’t get back to normal. The “stressors“don’t let me. They don’t seem to go away, and they take a toll on my body.
My symptoms include irritability, anxiety, and depression. Sometimes, I overeat or drink alcohol. Neither works. I found the only thing that does work is meditating. I also try to stay in touch with like-minded people. People who won’t criticize me. People I can open to, and not be afraid of being vulnerable with. People who are spiritual but not necessarily religious, if you know what I mean.
They help me deal with stress by simply allowing me into their lives. I resonate with them. I take on their cares and worries and try to provide compassion by just listening. Really listening — from the heart and not the head. I don’t need to talk about my problems. Somehow, those problems disappear. They vanish when I focus on someone other than myself and freely give loving kindness.
Stress? You’re out of my life for those brief shining moments. Meditating and mingling with those I truly care for can do that to stress.
I don’t have to die to experience it!
Neither do you, my friend.
A friend of mine is “into” Angels. “Suspend your disbelief,” he told me, explaining how belief in angels re-materialized into his life recently. I knew at that moment that the resistance he had spoken of was puffing out its chest and stepping between me and the computer screen where his words appeared.
(Written by Melanie Kriebel)
The Maiden of Athena to the Foolish Knight:
Is this not, yet another spiritual practice for you?
For me too.
When you touch that part of me that has never been touched, a dormant thing erupts.
I am observing this thing for the first time.
Did it exist inside of me or did you put it there when I wasn’t looking?
When I noticed it, it hid behind my ear. I tried to find it, put a name to it, and store it in a folder where everything is orderly and safe. It wouldn’t go.
It was quick like a fox, creeping down my left arm while I examined my right, hiding under my knee when I thought I felt it brush the side of my face.
I am barren without it, yet all the happier to have seen it, if only for such a brief time not long enough even to know what to call it.
— Melanie Kriebel 2013
Deborah loved with a love that was more than a love. Cupid’s arrow struck her just as a choir of angels sang and a special cherub played the most beautiful music in all the land over an ancient lyre, the same instrument that a shepherd boy named David once played to honor the God of the Psalms. 
She loved Fran with all her heart, her mind, and her soul. And she wanted to shout it out to the whole world that there was a love that would never end, never grow old, never die. She needn’t say a word, however. Her devotion and adoring demeanor spoke volumes to those of us meeting the lucky couple for the first time in Philadelphia, my City of Brotherly Love, on Friday night, the summer solstice.
Love shone all around Deborah when she spoke of Fran, and a well-disguised, shy girl from within her nearly blushed as her lover looked deep into her eyes to acknowledge an almost palpable affection. Light from a thousand stars sparkled from their mutual smile, their caressing eyes, their in-tune and synchronized hearts, which seemed to beat as one.
Taking her hand, Fran walked alongside this beauty of a woman, offering a silent prayer of gratitude and thanksgiving step by step through the long summer night, the longest night of the couple’s young lives. Too soon, they disappeared from view, leaving behind just a memory and an image of what any one of us would give a million dollars to have: the unconditional love of another human being, another man, another woman, even for but one moment of a gay, rich life.
Here’s to Deborah and Francesca. Two women in love. True Love among true lovers, if you have ever seen it in this or any other lifetime!
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They were a sight to see and to glorify when you need to recall what love could be, and is, all about. The purest emotion God created for His creatures to share with Him and with one another, sans color, creed, national origin, or sexual orientation. Love has always been color-blind and gender-neutral for the young and old, the sick and the well, the poor and the not-so-poor; even for a 64-year-old whose soul mate just turns out to be a 21-year-old.
Love has triumphed in our world. It’s exploded into space, signally all the many universes that Planet Earth will allow all love to flourish from whatever source or sex it manifests.
Today, I am Gay. Today, all of us are as Gay as we would like to be or not to be. That is the question the US Supreme Court answered in a shout to the entire world that all who love will never be prosecuted or persecuted for whom they choose to fall in love.
I feel elated and so happy for those who have hidden themselves for far too long. We, society, could not see until now that love is not confined to procreation. It can’t be regulated and legalized only to those wearing opposite types of clothes or having genital differences. Love arises in all of God’s children, no matter how dissimilar one person might be to you or to me.
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Fall for anyone you like. Fall in love again with someone you don’t even like but stay together for the sake of the children. It’s legal. It’s holy. It’s fun!
It’s as gay as gay can be, and it’s all free for you to be or not to be.
I’m so scared because I don’t know what to do, nor who to turn to. Flashes of insights, intuition, and a “knowing” that borders on the Psychic have arisen in me and I don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse.  Continue reading
On February 5th, 2012, a friend who calls herself, the Frugal Xpat, commented:
I didn’t respond to the comment until now, but I want to share how everyone could enjoy this exercise the Frugal Expat spoke of in Daily Meditation Desperately Needed. As she describes her life’s quest, she is on “An expat’s journey in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.” Continue reading
Shifting into cruise control, I let myself glide through many of life’s activities nowadays. I relax, take several deep breaths, and seek a place inside where there are no thoughts, no worries, and no frets.
I’ve already done all the heavy lifting. I planned the contours of my day, knowing when I could go on autopilot and when I needed to let the left hemisphere of my brain take over. You know, when I need to calculate, navigate, and/or investigate, I turn to the so-called “thinking” process. But I don’t let thoughts interrupt my breakfast while I eat.
I awake with no problem and shave, shower, and dress myself, making only minor decisions in these efforts, particularly choosing which clothes to put on. Who needs to think while running water, flossing teeth, or flushing a toilet?
After getting into the car and driving to my preplanned destination of work or play, I need not think of the future or the past, but just the moment in front of me. This is my time, not someone else’s time, who would use it as unwisely as I used to by daydreaming, recalling past events, or projecting a thousand possibilities of things that could happen in the future that I had absolutely no control over.
A soft calm spreads throughout my body. Stiff and sore parts start to loosen up and relax. I have no need or wish to be anywhere but where I am at the moment.
I seek this plane of awareness when I read intently or listen deeply. When I’m in this “zone,” I retain more from a book or article, and hear not only spoken words from a speaker, but more of the meaning someone is trying to say without words.
When I free myself of the noisy thoughts and outside interferences, I become more present for the environment I’ve chosen to focus on, be it reading or writing, laughing or crying, or simply standing or sitting while I wait to engage in my next series of “actions.” I am more “there” than ever before because I purposely “let go” of all that has little if anything to do with the “now.”
I focus better on the job, finding more clarity on what’s needed and what’s superfluous. There’s a great word for you, superfluous. How much of what we do, say, and think is just that? Superfluous. How easy life could be if we eliminated more and more of the unnecessary add-ons that we thought so important at one time, but discovered never added one iota to our overall well-being.
Breathing in, I am at home with myself. Breathing out, I am at home with you and all the love, compassion, and sense of equanimity that the best families could ever offer.
I send affection to motorists cut off by a speeding car that winds in and out of lanes. I feel for the driver who was never told by the operator of a car in front that that operator was going to turn, despite what appears to be working lights that turn on and off when you press the turn signal lever up or down.
My heart goes out to you who have observed the speed limit, inching no more than seven miles an hour over a 55-mph limit when someone in a pickup truck rides your tail even though the driver can simply pull into the open right lane and pass your car on the left.
I used to curse out those I believed were inconsiderate drivers. You know the aggressive types that always seemed to have more important business to attend to than you did. Too often, I’d let anger push me to the extreme, and I’d speed up to show ’em what a speedster they had met on the road. It was road rage, pure and simple. The more I focused on how I’d been insulted, the more the rage would become inflamed, causing me to see red and not care about the defensive driving skills I swore I would practice just a few minutes earlier when I was feeling more level-headed.
Then it dawned on me. I could feel compassion for the so-called reckless driver. I know what it is like to be in such a hurry. I’ve been there. I’d feel the world would come to an end should I miss an appointment, be late for a job, or fail in the impression I wanted to make by arriving early enough to greet someone.
I always had a reason to speed. There were so many important things I had to do, to finish, to check off that “to-do” list to feel my life was worthwhile, that I was accomplished, that I am accomplishing . . . something.
I try to understand how the person traveling in the car trapped himself or herself by his or her own expectations, the desires and attachments to concepts and ideas that were no more real than the make-believe “deadline” they have imposed on themselves. No, there has never been a line that we needed to reach to prevent someone from falling down dead.
We’ve created this illusion. We’ve invested much of our lives into reaching certain milestones, destinations, and goals. That is all well and good, until we enslave ourselves to becoming totally “outcome-focused.” How you get there doesn’t matter, just as long as you carry out that task wherever it might be. Too often, it doesn’t matter who we hurt or cut off on the road we have traveled.
The process itself, I have learned, is just as important as, if not more important than, crossing the finish line. We spend the greatest part of our lives in some sort of “process” to get something.
We are squandering away that time if we focus on nothing but the ending. Why not learn to enjoy the road while we’re riding? Enjoy the lay of the land, the smooth macadam where the tires roll on following a bumpy part of the highway. Breathe in the air, the scented smell of that green-tree air-freshener of mint or the dark brown one that smells like brand new leather seats.
Sip from your cup of hot coffee or cool water. Listen to music or the beautiful sounds of silence that help you to still the mind so that you can live through your senses now, not at the end of the road. It is in the moment that you can find true compassion. Seek it inside, and, if you’re lucky, you can pick it up as a hitch-hiker on a road less traveled.
While Neil Armstrong was taking a giant leap for all mankind, I had taken a small step toward adulthood one month after the moon landing, and I had no one to thank for it except my brother, who encouraged me to aim for the stars in becoming an Officer and a Gentleman in the Army of the United States of America.
I had weathered the worst six months of my life – worse even than my later combat duty in the Vietnam War – as I underwent the rigorous training in Officers’ Candidate School. We ran everywhere we went, and when we couldn’t run anymore, we’d run in place, waiting in line for chow outside the mess hall, or to use the latrine.
I was the second-youngest in a company of some 200 recruits – carrying a minimum rank of Specialist Five (E-5) – who learned tactics and survival skills and how to endure under the harshest conditions while developing leadership qualities. The youngest ones were targeted for even more physical and psychological drills because of our age.
The company commander once ordered me to do some 400 situps in a sleeping bag, relenting only after he got tired of counting, and I tore parts of my butt apart from sliding it back and forth against the ground so much. I’m surprised I didn’t tear a hole through the bag, but instead of forcing me out of the program, it encouraged me not to quit and to take whatever he was willing to dish out. At age 20, with nothing but a high school diploma, I earned the respect of several with college and graduate degrees who might have changed their minds about my leading troops.
Those of us who made it filed out of the auditorium at Fort Benning, Ga., having been addressed by some old, weathered colonel who appeared to be in his 70s and was still jumping out of airplanes – his latest count reaching more than 600 jumps! He looked a little crazy, “gung-ho crazy,” if you know what I mean. His eyes seemed permanently fixed wide open; he was jumpy and alert to the smallest sound or movement nearby. I would compare the hyperawareness and sensitivity I’d get from post-traumatic stress years later to his demeanor and makeup.
But on this day, August 22, 1969, my oldest brother had prepared a ceremony to take place outside the doors of the graduation hall. Dressed in his regular working uniform as an E-6 (Staff Sergeant), he carefully removed two metal bars from a cardboard box. We called them “butter bars,” the yellow metal bars symbolizing the rank of Second Lieutenant, the lowest rank in the Army’s officer corps.
So many things went through my mind as I stood at attention, looking straight ahead, hoping my dress-uniform hat was affixed properly. I didn’t want to be out of order in any way, shape, or form at this time in my life.
My oldest brother, six years my senior, was about to pin the bars on my shoulder, officially welcoming me to a world where I would become an officer and a gentleman. I did not know then what the designation by an Act of Congress would actually mean. That would come later in Vietnam, when I’d see mortar fire hit and wound half a squad I was leading; when a Viet Cong sniper would shoot and kill Lt. Vic Ellinger, one of only three lieutenants in our combat infantry company; or as two soldiers under another lieutenant’s command would forget where they had placed their claymore mine trip-wire and walk into it, killing themselves.
That was all in the future, along with the PTSD that would raise its ugly head some 25 years after the war. It wouldn’t be all bad, particularly right after being discharged, when this young veteran would use a sense of failure to achieve success in academics, getting degrees in journalism and history before finding his other life’s calling years later as a public defender trial lawyer after obtaining a Juris Doctor Degree.
I knew none of this as my brother George S. Contos fastened the metal bars to my uniform jacket, stepped back, and brought his right hand briskly to his forehead, saluting the superior officer that I had become.
Nothing in my life could compare to that shining moment.
Cleaning a pot can be very meaningful, particularly if you block out all thoughts and concentrate on nothing but you and the instrument that has helped provide you with so much nourishment. Continue reading
There’s something in it that resonates with me. In my private moments, I try my best to connect with it, but once I start to analyze it, it vanishes. Continue reading
There is a tradition in Eastern philosophies where you’re taught to view each person and other sentient being as if he, she – or it is your mother. I never knew how nurturing this could be until I allowed the child in me to reciprocate and bask in the most secure and loving place. Continue reading
Saying you’re sorry can be downright scary.
Particularly, if you’re not sure if the other party will accept your mea culpa even though it’s from the bottom of your heart.  Continue reading
Reality shifted on me the other day, and it helped me realize that I have more control than my “resifted” thoughts allowed me to see. Now, with a “time-control outlook,” I can try to change my world for the better.  Continue reading
Actively seek out someone in your church, synagogue or temple and befriend him so that what happened in Philadelphia last week never happens again.  Continue reading
Ever wonder what life was like for ancestors living fifty, a hundred or even 200 years ago?
How would you like to read a journal of some great, great, great-aunt forced to raise a family alone after her soldier husband had been killed in the Civil War? Like to see your great-grandfather dressed in Irish kilts speaking to you from the old country, or view a relative wearing a straw hat toasting you from America’s Roaring 20s? 
Well, I’d like to tell my offspring what life was really like at the end of the 20th Century and this new millennium as we kick off the Year 2012. We have the technology to share our thoughts and our knowledge if we simply take advantage of it.
You should be honest about difficulties you faced and how you learned to overcome them. Talk about the failures for them to truly appreciate the successes. Pull no punches, but don’t scare the hell out of their need toward risk-taking.
What I’m suggesting is journal writing with a twist. Why not tell your story in a webcast? Write about a subject you feel strongly about and video tape it (“Webcam” it!) Turn on the camera, look into its lens, and announce your intent to shake hands across time. Tell them what angers you about the world today, with the focus on making a buck at any cost.
Give them an earful of how the religions we grew up with failed us until finding spirituality inside and not in someone else’s building. Speak of how you still get a chill when hearing the national anthem played on baseball’s opening day.
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And smile as you discuss your first job, say, at age 15 working as a messenger boy traveling from one downtown business to another, walking instead of riding the bus to save a 20-cent token. Tell how you couldn’t cut it as a door-to-door sales rep of some product or other when discharged from the military and willing to work at anything to help pay your way through community college.
It’s all of whom we really are, and they can hear it straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak. Webcast yourself! Sit in front of a fireplace or a row of books and practice your presentation before making it. Entice a family member to ask your questions to get you started but
Now all I have to do is comb my hair, get comfortable, and find the confidence to practice what I preach. If I do, I’ll see you on U-tube or some other place in the not-too-distant future.
I can think of no worse place to be than in a church, a temple, or a synagogue when an unbidden and involuntary giggle would invade my psyche and take control of me. A “giggle” is too mild a word: uncontrollable laughter would rise to the level of guffaws and downright knee-slappers, right at the most somber parts of a religious service. Continue reading
Newton Le Roy Gingrich is a big-headed, brain-bloated bully who is best understood if you picture what kind of kid he might have been and remember why you disliked him and his sophomoric antics while growing up. Continue reading
I’ll take them in all shapes and sizes, the old and the young, the rich and the poor.
If it wasn’t for women, I — and a lot of guys I know — wouldn’t even be here! Continue reading
Am I un-American or anti-religious when I tell you something I’ve been trying to say for years, but have been afraid of hurting your feelings?
Thank God for Buddhism.
What’s that you say?
I can’t have one in, and of, the other?
Are you telling this red-blooded American veteran that I cannot follow the teachings of the Buddha and still believe in the God of Abraham? Continue reading
Don’t divide your attention with someone who’s not even in the same room as us. We’re communing, you and I, exchanging ideas or simply “hanging out” with each other, coming together because we have so many things in common. Don’t let someone else interrupt what we’re doing together. Continue reading
My best friend died before I could tell him how much he meant to me.
Not a week goes by, that I don’t think of him or see him in my dreams. And if there is one thing I’d want to say to some new friend I might make in this life, it is that I truly treasure your “being there” for me. Continue reading
On this Veterans Day, 11-11-11, what would you tell yourself if you could go back in time and greet that young man recently returned home from the war?
When I read the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators were unfocused and without a coherent message, I took a closer look at them in Philadelphia, and discovered some were disheveled street persons looking for handouts, and one was a graduate school political science major spouting Marxist teaching.
The greatest protest of our generation is seeking change in all shapes and sizes. You can see it in the signs the demonstrators carry, writing the letters out really big with magic markers so that passersby need not squint to get the messages.
There is not just one message, but many, which all have one thing in common: a belief that our world can do better for all and not just the few, the ninety-nine percent making $55,000 a year (per family) or less, as opposed to the one percent controlling some 40 percent of the wealth in the United States of America.
They don’t want your money, Mr. Entrepreneur, only your attention for a moral and ethical way of life that takes into consideration more than the Almighty Dollar.  Continue reading
It’s so wonderful to welcome you to visit. You return when I least expect you, embracing me and bringing peace and calm just when I still myself and end needless thoughts.
Are any thoughts actually needed when I go within? I need but seek a quiet moment with no thought save the intent to be free of the past and the future, thus ensuring I will rest “In the Now.”
It’s not based on my part alone. I find that I need the inspiration that others give me. You, who give your love so easily by opening your heart, unafraid of any consequences, allowing me to touch your soul and be one with you. Yes, I become one with you when the truth from the Source touches me as I hoped it would while writing from the depths of my inner being. It is then that I feel the kinship, the brotherhood with men and women alike.
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I seep into your arms, feeling the comfort that you offer. It is palpable, this feeling that arises. It is like a warm, fully lined coat, puffed up with weather-protected soft materials wrapped around me. I feel totally protected. Like a baby in a car seat with padding upon padding to ward off any harm.
I approach this level of consciousness by remaining perfectly still, freezing my body and then my mind. I sit with my eyes closed, taking in the sounds of a pet bird, motorists driving outside my home, and the ticking of a nearby clock.
It’s as close to heaven as I could ever imagine one could reach. I have no wants and no desires. I simply “am.”
Uh oh. I feel a slight pain in one leg, so I crossed over the other. Do I dare try to relieve this suffering by breaking the stillness? Can I remain in this state by easing my leg into a more comfortable position?
There, my leg is straightened out. I send my concentrated awareness to that part of the body that signaled the discomfort. I feel a warmth spread over that area. It is soothing. It blends in with the focus I still keep in this moment. I am still “In the Moment.” My peaceful calm has not been destroyed but simply adjusted. I need not fear slow, methodical actions to curtail my new, higher level of consciousness.
Should I experiment? Open my eyes and try to do something mundane? Ok, Michael, pay the bill. You can’t get any more mundane than that. You’re writing the check, placing it in an envelope. You’ve just used the left hemisphere of your brain; now let’s scoot back to the right side.
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There, you have it. Peace and calm are still here. You worked mindfully, just like the Vietnamese Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, said you would.
Someone now asks you a question. You answer from what feels like a different world inside of you. You answer a second and third question, undisturbed and completely surprised that you can continue your feelings of love and happiness despite a break in your “meditative” posture. No, you don’t need to keep your eyes closed or to stay seated on a mat to be mindfully engaged with the world.
You just have to do it. Do these actions mindfully.
If you could only sell it to the world, we’d all live in peace and harmony. Hell, why don’t you just give it away freely?
Contoveros 