Practice

A personal practice is simply that: A personal daily attempt to live my informed understanding of being a healthy and ethical person. Nobody else can prescribe in detail what this means for me. I certainly cannot prescribe what it means for anyone else. 

This daily journal of reflections on my own practice is part of my humanist practice. I resolved to write a daily essay about, or from, my practice seven years ago. Sharing it on the Web is part of my method of practice. Living with a light on my practice in this form sustains me in it. That is what this is. It is not intended as a polemic, a sermon or a guidebook for anyone else. It is a revelation of the mind of one struggling human brain.

Practice offers more questions than answers. It is frustrating in that way. The inevitable awareness of fallibility and failure which accompanies any honest humanist practice is the grist of the mill of an evolving human consciousness. This is not the symbolic humility of sack cloth and ashes. This is living with an acute sense of vulnerability and limitations while continuing the attempt to become a better person in relation to the world. 

Practice often entails saying "No". Denying the self those things which its mindless instincts crave. Denying others time and energy which would diminish or impair my own practice. Saying "No" to some things enables saying "Yes" to those things which are crucial to maintaining my practice. As a humanist, I realize that I am firstly human. I live within the limits of time, space and my own capacity. 

There is much written and presented in media about Mother Theresa, the Catholic saint. The popular misconception of her is that she was selfless and blissfully beneficent. However, this was not seem to be the case at all. It was her determined dedication to her practice which made her exemplary throughout her long life. She got her job done, as she saw it within her framework of values. My understanding of what I have read about her tells me that anyone who got in the way of her practice was soon left in the dust. This can be seen throughout human history. Those who have made the greatest advancements for humankind have been relentless practitioners, often excluding much of what is considered "normal" from their lives in favor of their practices, whether those were scientific or philosophical.

"Can't we all just get along?" can rapidly become "Let's all be the same!".  Social media enable this phenomenon just as clearly as they have enabled communication leading to revolution. Having a clear commitment to a personal practice does not facilitate conformity in any way. Internal mental skepticism is an intrinsic function of having a practice. That skepticism translates to external relationships. The great leap of the person with a commitment to a personal practice is remaining open and loving to others, while listening to the skeptical mind. This is especially true of my humanist practice, based in the belief in universal human rights, non-violence and personally responsible environmentalism.