Where is the Tenderness?

I underestimate. In 1989, I was 17 with a free period. I raced home from school wanting a snack, feeling powerful because I could drive home and go back to school in my 1984 four speed Ford Escort with a tape deck and windows you had to roll down. I had saved up the money the previous summer and was so proud to go to the dealership with my dad and buy a car. I also fancied myself a badass because it was a manual drive, a skill my dad thought was a requirement for life. The transmission was a little sticky and occasionally the car would stall. He taught me how to kick start it on a hill as long as there was a lot of room to get enough speed to start the car (and he was present). 

I parked the car at the top of our steep but short driveway to score said snack and get back to class. When I turned the key, nothing. After a brief moment of panic and horribly erroneous calculations I figured I could kick start the car myself and head back to school. The crushing foolishness and optimism of a teenager who thinks she knows everything. A little bit of knowledge and all that. I opened the driver’s side of the car, gave the two tons of metal a push and really thought I could get back in, kick start the car, put on the brakes and then reverse back up the driveway. As the door slammed, my hands held onto the window trying to slow the roll of the car as it careened to the garage, General Public blaring from my tape deck. The song Tenderness  wasn’t playing but the lyrics, my life’s like a button I can’t stop pushing it, screamed in my head. My life flashed before me, not because of fear, it should have been considering I could have been crushed. I was only thinking, my father is going to kill me. No one was home and after the loud bang a neighbor came out surveying the damage and said, “Oh my.” This was not helpful. Neither was my response. I called my father’s office and primed his assistant asking how he was and came up with a version of the story that laid blame on the emergency brake rather than my stupidity. He was furious, obviously. And because I was also blessed with a family with a sense of humor a few days later there was an article on the kitchen table. In our town a car had driven squarely into a house causing severe damage. A note read something to the effect, “Oneika, where were you?” It would be decades before I told the real story and while my dad was furious all over again, it’s a tale we still pull out regularly for a good laugh. 

I underestimate myself and simultaneously confront things that terrify me. This is because I know I have the support of forces seen and unseen. I think it’s a combination of unconditional friendliness I work to cultivate daily, the unflinching support of friends and comrades who are honest and loving, guides who wish me well, my family and the earth. I spent decades resisting these resources, these gifts  because I was operating under the assumption that somehow I had to do this thing, this life on my own, only asking for help once the car had crashed. I used to think of myself as untethered and in some ways I was, I think was probably looking for the practice of non-attachment but the teachings hadn’t yet found me. But a solid contemplative practice has shown me that’s not the case and in fact the longer I stayed in isolation especially in a crowd the further I strayed from my heart. Practice has shown me how to resource myself in challenging circumstances. Being a part of a sangha though has allowed me to acknowledge the beauty and power of community. I’ve given myself that tenderness. (Shout out to Ranking Roger, RIP).

I spent a week at Garrison Institute humbled and honored to be a part of Mind & Life Institute’s Contemplative Faculty and panel

Participant for the 2024 Summer Research Institute. The theme was Awakening Compassion in Times of Division: Breaking and Coming Together. I freely admit my intimidation at being surrounded by over a hundred academics and thought I am out of my depth and also I am fine. I was on a panel discussing what it was like to live compassion in action and discussed the complexities and struggles of working full-time as the mindfulness Coach at Rikers Island. In my many conversations with several participants over the course of the week I was overwhelmed by the passion and dedication from folks around the world; seekers, who want to see us come together. Surrounding me were also people I knew from the yoga and mindfulness world there and we had rich conversations about who we are and where we are going and most importantly, how to get there. 

The power of being seen by my people and I mean that specifically by folks that looked like me. Because that matters. In spaces that are predominantly and dominantly white, being held, matters. It was also wonderful to be held by members of a wider global community, to look past differences and center humanity. I had the most unexpected tender moment during a walking meditation. Arm in arm we walked the grounds of Garrison and I was fully aware of being present. Bedford Correctional was an hour away. I know women there. Lots of them. I let love flow from my heart, here I was outside, having this unspoken experience of intimacy with a stranger and so many women that I knew well weren’t far away living (if you can call it that) unfree. It can’t all happen today, it can’t all be fixed today. In this moment of reflection taking it all in, the enormity of the work that must be done at Rikers and so many other places around the world, confront insecurities in my heart, feeling supported by community and taking in the beauty of Garrison, New York, I was struck at the oneness of it all. I let myself be held by this person, this stranger. My feet were firmly rooted to the earth and my eyes taking in the exquisite return of summer. It wasn’t windy but I couldn’t help but think of Toni Morrison when she wrote of surrendering to the wind and riding it- because I felt I was riding hope and tears just flowed. This is my global neighborhood I thought. We are going to be okay. I am going to be okay. 

I have never though underestimated the power of my ability to start over and to look up. I suppose I have always been practicing even before I formalized it as such. Because I am here now,  in this moment looking up, moving forward, unsure, hopeful rooted in everything around me.