After 6 1/2 decades of life, countless philosophical/psychological/spiritual pursuits, a list of failures and mistakes so flagrant the ability to blush has almost disappeared, graduate school in anthropology, 4 decades as executive with Fortune 10 company, complete breakdown of family and death of a child, drunkard with cliche but dedicated 19 years of harrowing “12 step” sobriety, three startup businesses, cancer, on and on …

I have come to believe almost anything that can be said, or written, or artistically rendered about the paradox between leaving comfort zones with awareness and accepting challenge with associated best next right action juxtapositional with contemplation, retreat, peace and acceptance is not only an understatement but also inherently a tiny fragment of understated truth.

If we took all the reasonable insights we have and actually did them and lived them, multiplied that by a thousand and purified it to distilled truth … the whole of it would be a drop of known in an ocean of unknown. That doesn’t mean my view is that exploration, observation and discourse should be discouraged. On the contrary, I read this article and loudly clapped applause.

It does mean in the midst of all kinds of consciousness (much unconscious and probably cultural) not to mention genetics, mental illness, vicissitudes of varying forms of intelligence and experience and the unlikely chance that we have arrived at an ultimate level of development and insight — that we probably need to extend to ourselves and all around us healthy doses of mercy, grace and compassion.

Shall we be uncomfortable? How can we with any logic consider ourselves moral or stable as long as any among us are hungry, physically threatened, cold or sick without medical attention — regardless of where or of what circumstances? I uncomfortably work to walk toward solution in that all too non-abstract circumstance. We have not learned how to be uncomfortable about caring for each other or usually even ourselves.