Last week was my parents’ 66th wedding anniversary.  Were it not for that momentous occasion, I would of course not be here.

My parents were married for 41 years, until the day dad died.  Then my mother was a widow for another 21 years, until the day she died. She never considered even looking at another man in her life.  She was totally devoted to him, to her family.  By all accounts, a successful marriage producing 7 mostly functional children.

Was she happy?  Was he happy?  How did they start out of the gate?  What were their dreams?  What did they think of those dreams by the time it all ended?

It’s interesting to note that out of 7 children, 5 ended up in divorce at one point or another in our marriages.  Quite a statistic.  Of course, one family does not make a trend but the known statistics are astounding.  By-and-large, marriage has been and remains an institution in crisis.  It may work well for a  number of people, but clearly it doesn’t for many others.

Stephanie Coontz wrote another of my favorite and most influential books, “Marriage – A History“.  See a reference and her talk on the topic in the Resources page.  The central thesis in her book is that marriage was traditionally a strategic alliance in order to bring extended families together in order to cooperate.  Marriage for love is a novel idea which puts us on a path for unreasonable expectations.  We demand too much of marriage.  We expect too much from our spouses.

Part of the trouble is that we don’t really live much in extended families, villages or tribes any more.  Our standard modern social unit is the nuclear family: mom, dad and 2 kids.  We have become more and more dependent on those small units.

Growing up, I was sold a Middle Class Morality ideal to marry my other half orange, my soul mate, and be set for life.  By the time I was 25 and had gotten engaged for the first time, I thought I was clearly on the right path to a happy life.

We humans have become enormously successful as a species not because of our strength, our intelligence or our speed.  The main contributor leading to our utter and nefarious domination of the planet is our ability to cooperate.  The strongest, most intelligent, quickest person on earth will never be able to get a rocket to the moon by him/herself.  Neither can a single nuclear family.  While a team of smart folks with potbellies chain smoking Marlboros did it in the 1960s.  Teamwork.

What does that have to do with marriage?  Well, everything.

The traditional view of marriage today is still “I do, and from now on you’re the only person with whom I will experience love/passion/sex/parenthood and I will also share most of my free time, my money, my space with you”.  Wow.  I’m even now feeling pressured and overwhelmed as I write it.

During a spiritual retreat, for several days a very dear group of friends and I discussed the definition and nature of marriage or marital partnership in a modern context.  These ideas are very much aligned with those discussions although I will not publicly recognize them because that would violate the anonymity I want, wouldn’t it?  Our conclusion, which I think is a great aha, was that marriage is defined by the specific collection of resources we decide to share with our partner, which ultimately we don’t share with others.  And therein lies the trouble.  When we consciously draw those boundaries of exclusivity, we set ourselves expectations and responsibilities.

Ultimately, every relationship is defined by the same parameters, call it friendship, parenting, work or even the most mundane casual interaction.  Every relationship is defined by the resources we decide to share with others.  Marriage is the intersection of the resources both partners decide to share of their mutual lives.

So marriage is a living, breathing institution but it never ceases to be the intersection of what’s going on in two individual lives.  And in each one of those individual lives, each person remains independently responsible for him/herself.  My wife is not and should not be responsible for any aspect of my happiness.  My own happiness is my own quest to the extent I decide to pursue it.  To the extent that my partner and I intersect and share resources to align with our individual quests, beautiful.

By all accounts, I have led a very blessed and protected life.  I have family, a great job, friends, money, health.  Yet I have struggled enormously with depression and self-esteem.  I’ve already discussed the origins of that in my Bristlecone Project post.  But the way that depression would typically come to light would be in the context of how loved, seen and appreciated (or not) I felt in my relationships.  That was a good excuse for polyamory: not only was I taking responsibility for my own sexual satisfaction but also for my emotional connection and fulfillment.

I am now emotionally better than I have ever been before.  Actually, writing this blog is quite therapeutic.  It’s been several years of introspection and exploration from which the grand conclusion is that I could not continue to be a wounded little boy looking for love and recognition but rather I am a responsible and powerful adult with free will and significant leeway to steer the direction of my daily life.  My palette has a lot of different colors I can apply to the canvass of my life on a daily basis.

Am I “cured”?  Of course, there is no such thing.  The content of our character, of our deepest emotional reactions to the world that surrounds us, never really leaves us.  But I can recognize my feelings once they surface and take charge of the situation.  I can exercise my behavioral muscles to come out the best way I can.  Those behavioral muscles involve being more social, keeping a wider network of connections I can call my own very special “tribe” who collaborate with me to support our mutual goals in daily life.  Then there’s meditation of course.

So dear readers, the critical message I want to leave with you today is, give your partners a break.  Each of you is responsible for yourself.  Create your own “tribe” you can rely on to achieve your goals, your fulfillment, your happiness.  Doctor Conde’s mission in life is to create the happiest, most fulfilled Doctor Conde I can create every day.   That way I can share what I have and be more giving and less needy.   Do what it takes for you to be happy.

Coming back to resources and marriage, let’s do the following thought experiment.  First, we have to recognize that nobody is available to us all the time.  So if I don’t see my wife during the day and she’s busy with her chores, her work, the kids, she’s not available to me.  Neither am I available to her if I’m in a meeting.  So let’s think about being away from our partners.  Imagine a whole day when you have no contact with your partner.  Now, think about the moment you see him/her again.  You get to share again, share time, space, feelings.  So now that you have visualized separation and reunion, I ask you, what difference did it make if while you were not with your partner, he/she was busy at work, laying down doing nothing, or having sex with someone else?  After all, when you saw him/her again, he/she was exactly the same person regardless of what he/she was doing while he/she was away from you.

We are conditioned to believe that what our partners share with others is relevant to us, when in reality all that matters in our relationships is the collection of resources that our partners in their generosity actually do share with us.

The world owes us nothing.  We are not entitled.  We are responsible for ourselves and what we share is a gift and a blessing.

Chopra and Oprah do 21-day meditation series, which are actually 22 days (what’s up with that???).

Doctor Conde brings you his series of 31 musical meditations.  If you’re as anal as I am, you can align them to each day of the month!!  You can find it in my “Musical Meditations” page.

The purpose of meditation is to quiet the mind, to reach perfect stillness.  We all know that’s extremely hard.  So the next best thing is to focus our mind on a single thing.  The most common form of meditation is mantra meditation, which involves the repetition of a sound or phrase (out loud or in the mind only).  The most common mantra meditation sound is “om” which is generally understood to represent god, the soul, infinity.

You can listen to these meditations anywhere you want and under any circumstance; they’re music after all.  But, they’re really intended to be “meditations”.  That means that it’s best to hear them in “silence” while “in stillness”.

To meditate, first get into a meditation position and be prepared to stay there for the duration of mediation.  Meditation position can be standing, sitting, kneeling or laying down.  While most meditations are preferably done in stillness, it may be appropriate to walk, run or swim during meditation.

Also, meditation doesn’t have to be done alone.  Meditating together with a partner or a group is an incredibly intimate and bonding experience.  Meditating with touching bodies is perfectly ok.

Meditation position does involve getting “grounded”.  If you’re standing, stand with both feet planted on the ground; if you’re sitting, sit with both feet planted flat or knees on the ground.  If you’re laying down, your heels should be touching the ground/bed/couch.

One of the most common meditation positions is the lotus, locking feet inside the thighs.  If you do this, make sure your knees are touching the ground.  For people like me who are not flexible enough for the lotus, sitting on tall pillows such as meditation zafus with knees to the ground works great.

Close your eyes to meditate, imagine a ray of golden light 6 inches above your crown and imagine you inhale it through your crown as your lungs fill up with air.  Imagine that ray of light flows in a ripple to every corner of your body, like a wave.  Then exhale.  Repeat 3 times. Then breath normally during the rest of meditation.  Start the music.

Allow yourself to feel during meditation, but don’t analyze it.  Focus on the music, your body, your feelings.  Don’t fight your thoughts, let them happen, but let them go, let them pass through.  Focus on the music.

When the music ends, open your eyes, come back to the room, breath deep 3 times and move.

These musical selections are mostly classical and many are adagios and andantes of 2nd or 3rd movements from well-known pieces.  They are pieces I love.  They move me, from cradling tender soft to the frenetic.  It’s not a coincidence that the last one is Ravel’s Bolero, which is the epitome of a crescendo and a final release.  Quite orgasmic.

Sometimes when I listen to these, I feel the urge to listen to the whole piece.  I have provided links to the music mostly in iTunes.  All of these would be fabulous additions to anyone’s lifetime collection.

Enjoy the music my dear readers!!!  Remember, you can provide comments directly on the page or contact me individually.

There is no greater gift than the gift of music.  I share it with those I love.

So what do Eric Clapton and Jean-Luc Ponty have in common?  Who the hell is Jean-Luc Ponty any way?  Let’s just start by saying that both feature breathtaking guitar solos.

A very dear friend has dedicated a good portion of his life to researching, unearthing and interpreting Spanish and Latin American renaissance and baroque music.  It is quite a treat.  Ethereal sounds transport you to what feels like a bustling court dance, or an aching heart in love, or a reflection on monastic life.

I don’t get new music very often.  Mostly, I buy things that I hear in concert for the first time and I really like.  I used to catch up a little sooner when I listened to the radio, but that’s not one of my usual channels any more.

One day as I was walking to my office, I had this gut wrenching feeling that I had already heard all the music I was ever going to hear in my life.  Since I’m so comfortable in repetition, it occurred to me that I could very well never have the initiative to find something new on my own.

My friend has a vast collection of probably 40,000 records, of which he selected 5,000 as his core listenings, things that should be on any music lover’s bucket list.  In an act of incredible generosity, he shared his list with me.

It took me literally 4 years to go through his core collection.  While I cannot in good faith say that I heard it in full, I did sample every record on the list of 5,000.  Many made it to my collection and in full disclosure to the record industry, I ended up buying everything that I kept.

Among the delicacies I discovered, two stood out prominently: Eric Clapton’s “461 Ocean Boulevard” in its special edition coupled with “Live at Hammersmith”, and Jean-Luc Ponty.  Links to these in the Resource page.

I had heard Clapton of course and admired his rendition of “Tears in Heaven” enormously.  More than once, has brought tears to my eyes.  But “Live at Hammersmith” is just a masterpiece.  He’s obviously not the greatest singer in the world but he transmits feeling from the bottom of his soul like very few do.  What a delicious pairing with Yvonne Elliman’s voice.  Can’t say which of the songs is my favorite.  To start it all, “Smile” is such a simple heart warming song, brings a little light to my heart every time; and then the “Let it Rain” end has transported me to the point of almost losing my stop on my train more than once.  That’s what I like to describe as musical orgasm.

I love clean, distinguishable, traceable musical sounds.  It’s all too common for guitars to jumble up in raw power.  Clapton and George Terry do a superb job of letting every note come out just right, singing to each other, harmonizing, respecting each other’s flow.  I could not stop listening to this for weeks last year.

And then there’s Jean-Luc Ponty.  Had never heard of him until my friend’s introduction.  What incredible sound and energy.  Perfect for a morning wake-me-up.  What a fabulous way to extract new life from a violin.  And how masterfully combined with modern sounds.  What guitar riffs on “Is Once Enough” from the “Aurora” album.

Ponty’s music has its delightful atonal stretches.  Key transpositions in just the right places to make you say “huh?” but then smile because it sounded just right, like the start of the violin solo in “Infinite Pursuit”  from the “Fables” album.

Ponty has become quite popular at home.  My little one has a very eclectic taste and approves of jazz selections often while my older one is too engrossed in mainstream.  But Ponty will make both of them move and shake.

Thank you my dear friend for your beautiful gift to last a lifetime.

It’s hard being a parent.  I was never really prepared for it and I’m still not.  But we muddle through the best we can.

My wife is traveling so I toggle between Mr. Mom or Sgt. Dad.  I love both my daughters very dearly.  Try to relate to them in a balanced way, giving them enough independence yet setting limits and giving them guidance.  I’m sure they disagree.  I get angry maybe too often.

A 10-th grade boy asked my 9-th grade daughter out to dinner last night.  Although it was Sunday, it was not a school night.  So Mr. Mom decided to let her be.  But I agonized over it.  When she came back, I decided to tell her how difficult the decision had been for me and why.

I mostly worry about safety.  Hate their taste for roaming the streets.  Alcohol is at the top of my list of foes.  And then, there’s teenage driving.  I unfortunately know the statistics and the stories too well.  I’ve given them Uber accounts so they will never have to get in a car just because there’s no alternative transportation.

But I realize they are independent individuals who have their own lives, their own characters.  I don’t own them.  I am just another character in the story of their lives, maybe a critical one, but clearly not their boss or their master.

My wife and I have discussed lifestyle and messaging a few times but have punted to the future arguing that they’re still too young.  I’m uncomfortable with that even though this blog remains unknown to them.  One day very likely they will get a chance to read old dad’s writings.  I fear they may hate me for it, but then, I am who I am regardless of who thinks what about me.

I am very clear that I will not be a hypocrite and peddle Middle Class Morality to them and I will let them make their own choices.  I will certainly not peddle polyamory to them either.  The same has been true about religion.  They were both baptized Catholic but that’s where we stopped.  Never did their first communion although they know the story of Jesus for the most part as literature on par with other ancient writings.  I do promote in them the idea of spiritual life and the existence of a reality beyond our 5 senses that connects us to all life in the universe.  I think they like that and gives them some comfort.

My 11-year old loves games.  Beyond our dog, I think her second favorite thing in the world is her iPad.  This weekend, we had many rounds of Truth or Dare (from the iPhone), from which she mostly likes to do truths.  When I was chosen to disclose the three wishes I would ask the genie in the bottle, decided to taunt her a little by choosing one of them to be having my favorite jazz singer as my girlfriend.  For several years, we’ve joked about that since we used to see her pretty much every Sunday. Later that night during another round of truth or dare, she explicitly utilized a question to ask me if I had cheated on Mommy.  I decided to answer that I have my girlfriends but Mommy knows about it so it’s not really cheating, is it?

Recently my 14-year old had a boyfriend with whom she wanted to break up.  Even though she’s a quiet one, she actually came to talk to me about it.  Doesn’t happen often.  We had a chance to talk about her view of relationships and have to say I was delighted to hear her say that she thinks she’s too young to be in any form of committed relationship.  I applauded and agreed with her.  Was a great chance to talk about the nature of relationships.

She criticizes me quite a bit because of my inclination to go to the same restaurants over and over again.  I have my lineup of about 10 places I frequent very regularly.  Sometimes I will order the same thing at the same place.  She cannot stand going to the same place 3 Sundays in a row. It was a perfect opportunity to embed the idea of polyamory.  I reminded her of our arguments over restaurants and asked her to imagine herself at 35, after having been married for 5 years.  I suggested to her that there’s a lot of commonality between sex and food and our attitudes towards them.  So I asked to her to imagine sex and marriage like eating at the same restaurant every day and ordering the same dish every time.  I think that got her attention.  I also reminded her of the many times we have had the conversation about feelings vs. actions and words.  I closed by telling her that at that juncture in her life she will remember her old dad telling her that her feelings will just come, that cute guy at the office will look more and more appealing,  and she will need to decide what to do rationally, painting the canvass of her life with red or blue, her choice.

I agonize over this.  It’s not easy being a parent.  They know the old dad is not your standard dad at the club who plays golf and munches on hamburgers.  I am the mostly vegetarian one who doesn’t drink any alcohol, doesn’t have a lot of friends at the club and has an altar with feathers and crystals in the basement…

What a romantic idea.  The shadows of dim blue light piercing through the curtains, the intimacy and stillness, the sheer potential of creating anew from the ashes of the night before.

But in practice, it almost never works out.  My body is typically not very alert and responsive unless I am carrying around energy from the night before.  And then there’s the structuring of time first thing in the morning (stage 1 – quick email check, stage 2 – stretch the joints and muscles, stage 3 – shower, stage 4 – breakfast with/without family, stage 5 – dash to the train/pool).

Many days I do schedule myself an extra 15 minutes to meditate, either to a Chopra/Oprah series or my own timed musical selections.  I’ll post some of those at some point.  It’s a perfect moment for sharing and connecting with my wife, hit the reset button and enter the “field of pure potentiality” as Chopra likes to call it.  One of the perplexing benefits of deep meditation is that once we hit the “zero point”, we can be whatever we want the next instant.  We can literally program our subconscious to whatever direction we want.  If I entered into meditation angry or fearful, I can come out however I want to be if I have gone deep and still enough.

Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jetha wrote a provocative, insightful, thoroughly researched book by this title.  You’ll find a link in the “Resources” tab along with a link to Christopher’s TED Talk.  Among many other books, “Sex at Dawn” has been very influential in my thinking.  Maybe a good backwards rationalization tool.

So let’s get it out there.  Here’s my Dirty Little Secret No. 2: I loooove women.  I love their looks, their smell, their company, their voice, their words, their touch, their demeanor, their style, their character.  My life has been surrounded by women for a long time, at home, at work, my hobbies, my quests.  It’s no accident.  It’s not that I am not at ease among men.  I have several very good male friends but they all go back a long time.  I haven’t really made any new close male friends in over 10 years even though I  interact with men in business all the time.  But over the last 10-15 years I have met wonderful women who have become my friends and filled many spaces in my mind, my heart and my spirit.

I have and have had several very close relationships with women.  For starters, I have a beautiful, loving, evolving and growing relationship with my wife.  Hasn’t always been easy and we’ve been at the edge of the precipice many times.  But after almost 18 years, we still share and enjoy many spaces of our lives.  I love and admire her for accepting me exactly the way I am and letting me be.  It’s not an easy feat.

The universe has blessed me with very close friends who have been part of my daily tribe for many stretches of my life.  As a very close friend of mine says, we float down the river of life; sometimes we travel together for a stretch, hold hands and support each other, but we never know at what bend in that river we will follow separate paths.

I consider myself a sexual and emotional “omnivore”.  I fully believe  that the quest for diversity is in our genes, our nature.  We are animals first and foremost.  No matter how elevated and special we want to feel above all else in nature, we are squarely part of it.  Pure monogamy left our family tree 30 million years ago.  Our species is stronger with greater genetic diversity.  We’re better off accepting who we are first, then we can decide how we behave.  First feel, then talk and do.  It’s a choice like painting the canvas of life with red paint or blue paint, but with conscience.

During my first marriage, I was fully monogamous for its full 5 years.  In my second and current marriage, I was also fully monogamous for the first 5 years.  That’s not to say that I wasn’t tempted.  On the contrary, temptation has always been there.

After one angry night of bad sex at home, which was probably my own fault any way, I made the decision that my sexual fulfillment was going to be my responsibility, not my wife’s.  I won’t go too deep into the nature of relationships and responsibility yet, will save that for a later post.  So if there were things that were not working out, if she and I were not on the same page, then it was up to me to get what I needed.  I hinted at what I meant but didn’t quite make it explicit to her.  And so started my first affair a few months later.  And a clean break with Middle Class Morality.  An affair that lasted 10 years.

I don’t embrace the idea of one-night-stands.  I have relationships, friendship, love, with other women, which sometimes also involves passion and sex.  I have befriended wonderful, passionate, loving, thoughtful women.  When we’re on the same page, when the love flows and our expectations match, it’s what I would imagine heaven would be like if it does exist.  But then the river of life keeps flowing, things change, we change, and sometimes we get off the same page.  I’ve been told and I have said “I can’t do this any more”.  Sometimes we have been able to stay friends, sometimes it’s not possible.

I have been through the whole range of emotions, from the warm glow of  connection to deep down head over heels in love.  I have also discovered what I thought was not possible a few years ago: to deeply and emotionally relate to and love a woman without actually having sex.  Every relationship is different.  It has all been worth it.  I have received many blessings of love, passion, self discovery and emotional support.

So the question you might ask yourself dear reader is, what does this do to my marriage and my wife?  Of course, I would love for her to write her own impressions but won’t push her to do that too hard.

I have been told that, like many women, my wife is a victim because her choices are awful: stay in a bad marriage or break up and struggle.  I have been told that I brainwashed my wife.

She’s a beautiful, loving, caring, lively, fun, intelligent woman.  She did not know I had other sexual relationships for 9 years.  Intuitively, I felt she wouldn’t mind it but I was scared to approach it.  I hinted for a couple of years but she didn’t catch on.  Maybe she didn’t want to catch on.  We commented on “Sex at Dawn” with friends, her parents, her brother, but she never asked the question.  I struggled with the secrecy.  Often I would think about Dostoyevski’s “Crime and Punishment”.

One day, I decided to tell her.  I was terrified.  Didn’t know what the outcome would be.  I explained as lovingly as I could that it wasn’t her fault and it wasn’t an indication that I didn’t love or desire her.  I told her it was simply something I needed to do for myself, for my sanity, to be true to myself.  I told her she was absolutely in her right to end the marriage right then and there and I would support her financially.  But she decided to stay saying she believed I am a good man.

I am sure it was not easy for her.  She said the fairy tale had ended and a model had been broken.  Her view of marriage would never be the same.  But applauded my candor and courage in telling her.  She was not interested in who, where, how and I wasn’t about to tell her either.  What she was interested in was what level of commitment I had for her and our daughters.

The reality is that I was bitter person, often angry and critical, particularly with those closest to me.  When the parallel relationships started, I mellowed down.  I became more attentive and focused at home.  I was less demanding and expected less at home.  I literally became more loving and more giving.

I now believe that love and sex are expansive resources.  In economics 101, we are taught that the “economic problem” is scarcity of resources: if I use a resource somewhere then there’s less of it to be used elsewhere.  That is absolutely true of money, time and space but is absolutely not true with respect to spirit, love and sex.  I have found out that the more I love, the more capacity I have to love.  The more sex I have, the more sex I want and can have (within limits of course – it’s been a long time since I was able to ejaculate 6 times in 1 day).  But of course one of the secrets is to stay present wherever and with whomever I am and not escaping to another reality.

My marriage has never been better, not even as newlyweds.  Our sex is better than ever.  It’s not perfect of course and we both have to exercise acceptance and tolerance.  But it’s honest, transparent and real.  I have offered her that I will try monogamy if that’s important to her, but she has told me she would rather I stay happy and true to myself.  It’s a great display of love.

So if polyamorous life seems so rosy, then why is it not the norm?  “Sex at Dawn” does a pretty good job of reviewing this.  I will also recommend further reading when we talk more about marriage itself.

There are three core problems with having multiple partners:

First and probably the most prevalent problem is that multiple partners tends to take the form of cheating, lying.  A woman can ask her partner “are you having an affair?” and he can very easily look at her straight in the eye and say “no, you’re crazy”.  I’ve seen it happen many times, just weeks or months before the evidence comes out to light.  We do that because we think we can get away with it.  But in the long run, it’s a very poor strategy.  In the world of spirit, everything is known and with sufficient sensitivity, anyone can figure it out.  I don’t condone lying and I am profusely sorry for myself that I lived with the anxiety of “the secret” for 9 years.

Second, Middle Class Morality teaches us the folly that our partners are “ours”.  We officialize it when we say “I do, ’til death do us part”.  While I believe stable relationships are wonderful, enriching and beautiful, nobody is ours and we remain independent individuals even in the tightest of marriages.  Even at the moment of simultaneous orgasm, we remain individuals experiencing life through our own lens.  Pretending that someone is ours is selfish, insecure, possessive and purely an expression of ego.  We need to define ourselves by our own words, feelings and actions and not depend on what anyone else thinks or does to us.

Third, Middle Class Morality makes us place the responsibility for our lifetime fulfillment in our partner’s hands.  Pure monogamy says “I will only experience sex/love/passion with you, so you better live up to my expectations”.  We know the reality of how most marriages work long term.  More on that later as well.  If our partner shares sex/love/food/time/space with someone else maybe that doesn’t say anything about us or our inadequacies.  It simply says we’re human and we like diversity.  When we wake up and take responsibility for ourselves and not define ourselves by our partner, we will live more consciously and less by the frailty of our egos.

I know I have touched on very sensitive topics and I know many out there will strongly disagree and maybe even condemn me.  My words may also be liberating and resonate as true to others.  I invite sincere, enriching dialogue.

Today is the first day of the rest of my life and the second half could very well be different than the first 19,000 days.

Why can’t we be addicted to the stuff that’s good for us?  Why don’t we compulsively eat lettuce rather than ice cream?

Maybe we do get addicted to the good stuff after all…

I looove Indian food.  Have to have it 3-4 times a week.  I think it’s the turmeric, masala, curry, etc. that create some addictive dependency.  Maybe their flavors trigger oxytocin.  It’s great to love Indian food in NY given the fantastic choices we have.

The top of my list is squarely occupied by Tamarind.  The beautiful decor and always impecable service, including Mr. Walia himself who is always at hand to give you a smile and make sure everything’s perfect, give you a spa-like feel every time.  The design of their lunch menu is unique.  I go there for the experience, the balance.  Even though I can do a buffet, carefully, I love seeing a well put together plate, with correct allocations of nutrients, colors and flavors.  Their idea of a “vegetable of the day” gives it a twinge of homeyness within the impeccable upscale atmosphere.  Just a little portion of something unexpected and delicious to go right in the middle of your plate.

My number 2 is Junoon.  Their dinner menu has improved a lot and their lunch is just great.  Very nouvelle cuisine and artsy, a little pretentious but delicious.  It’s my typical Monday at noon hangout.  Junoon does a great thali with a lot of flavor and balance, presented in a crescent moon tray with an elegant plate in the middle for you to serve yourself.  Sometimes I feel tempted to pickup the little individual dishes and spoon the goodies directly into my mouth but for the most part I’ll serve my plate and eat with style.

I try to stay vegetarian even though I don’t always succeed.  But Indian, I almost always stay strict.  Vegetarianism vs. omnivorism is a topic for another day.  At these places I feel a little bit like Norm at Cheers.  It pays off to be a regular and tip well.  I never worry about whether or not the contents of my plate are all food or also include extraneous substances such as bodily fluids.

My body chemistry and my mood are definitely altered by Indian food and by thinking about Indian food.  No different than getting excited by Pinot Noir and rack of lamb at Piccola Venezia way back when.  Given my very addictive tendencies, craving Indian is a good thing.

I’m also addicted to walking and swimming.  I intellectually and emotionally crave it enough that I will get up at 5am on a Saturday to get a good lane at the pool.  Maybe it’s more oxytocin.

Cheers to getting addicted to the foods, activities, places and people that enhance our lives.

I am in my paternal family’s doghouse – again.  I’m getting the silent treatment from my siblings, the modern version of ancient ostracism.  My big sin?  I’m a rabble rouser,  troublemaker.  I dare touch topics that shouldn’t be talked about in polite society.  This time, it was The Bristlecone Project.

Middle class morality is not about being or thinking but rather about pretending.  I came from a seemingly perfect family: the successful dad, the committed loving mom, the brilliant siblings, the ever present and nurturing extended family of grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins, the beautiful dogs.  Yet, among many other flavors of disfunction, sexual abuse was rampant in the family.  Maybe for generations.  Centuries?  Millenia?  Who knows.

We humans exercise horrible sexual misconduct.  Why?  We’ll get into that in later posts, but not today.  The crude reality is that 40% of women and 15% of men are sexually abused at least once in their life, a large proportion by people they know.  It’s such heinous treachery, particularly when it comes from someone close whom you trust.  Maybe there’s something similar in other forms of domestic violence (e.g., “maybe it was my fault he hit me”).  In sexual abuse, what if you actually physically enjoy it?  What if you believe you had a chance to stop it and you didn’t?  What if you were expecting someone to protect you and they didn’t?  It’s not to hard to make the leap from sexual abuse to profound and persistent low self esteem.

I don’t consider myself a survivor.  I don’t like that tricky euphemism. My life was never in danger.  I am a victim.  And I say that not to arouse your pity but rather to use correct terminology.  I was harmed by events in my childhood.  The argument with my siblings is somewhat about whether or not it happened and more profoundly about whether it was “abuse” or mere “child’s play”.  It doesn’t really matter.  What matters is the aftermath and what it means to a life.

For over 30 years, I did not think about it.  Left it totally outside my repertoire.  But then one day it started haunting me and I started putting 2-and-2 together.  Why a successful professional at the pinnacle of my career felt so infinitesimal in the context of my paternal family surroundings?  Why the recurring depression?  Why the difficulty in trusting and believing in others’ good faith?  Why the anxiety to find female motherly love?  Why the sex drive?

I now believe they were all related.  The first time I talked to a therapist about it, her prophetic words were “forget about getting any support from your paternal family; they don’t have a coping mechanism and their reaction will be disbelief; you will be alienated”.  I don’t blame them.  These are very uncomfortable truths.  I know my experience and was also told about many others, which I would have probably preferred not to know.  They each have to chase their own ghosts like I’ve chased mine.

As Eckhart Tolle writes, it’s foolish to want to change our past.  What’s happened will always be part of my reality.  I am also aware that my history resulted in particular emotional and mental wiring that I cannot change.  We are not responsible for what we feel.  It just is and it just comes.  But we are absolutely responsible for what we do and say.  I may not be able to avoid waves of depression but I can avoid the situations that will take me there and I can find the tools to exit unscathed.  I can exercise emotional, mental and attitudinal “muscles” that will counterbalance my destructive tendencies.  Tool no. 1 by far: meditation.

For a while, I expected support from my siblings and apologies from the perpetrators, but neither ever came.  I now know that’s ok.  I cannot define myself by the way others behave or what they believe.  I will only define myself by what I chose, do and say.  The beauty of life is that I get to define myself every day.  More and more often now I chose just not to engage my siblings.  It’s ok to to elect with whom I share my time, my energy, my love.  No relationship is obligatory.

Well, this has been Dirty Little Secret No. 1.  With that out of the way, I can now move on to more interesting, fun, challenging, uplifting, loving topics.  It came out first because without it and without dealing with it, it’s unlikely I would have put myself on a path of self discovery and personal growth.

Here’s to life.

During the holidays, my younger daughter asked us to have several family movie nights.  I love those and really don’t do them often enough.

For one of those nights, I picked “My Fair Lady”.  It’s a movie I cherished since the first time a saw it at 5-6 years of age.  The music is beautiful, catchy and masterfully executed.  The general atmosphere of the movie, in spite of its obviously chauvinistic overtones dressed up as humor (I still can’t believe the last scene), is upbeat and loving.  Generates tender feelings in my heart.

Alfred P. Doolittle cannot afford middle class morality.  Neither can I.  Not because my economics forbid it but rather because somewhere along the way, it just got dropped, became irrelevant and got substituted with something else.

I’d like to think I live a “conscious life”.  Therefore, my actions are meant to be reflective of a moral/ethical compass of some sort.  My first awakening came in 1992, a few months after marrying my first wife.  Regardless of the circumstances, whether justified or not, a conflict led me to think about divorce.  I didn’t do it then.  Heavily in my mind weighed the idea that I had married at church in the eyes of God and my fellow Christians and divorce was not acceptable, period.  Middle class morality.  It then took me 2 years between 1994 and 1996 to actually make a decision, which I did with all of its heavy consequences.  I pause for a second to send my ex-wife a loving ray of light wherever she may be.

Divorce is quite a departure from middle class morality, at least as was known for a long time, because it is “proof” that any relationship is expendable.  If once we’ve decided to leave that whom we’ve promised to stay with forever, then anyone else is fair game.  Heavy stuff.

I ponder now whether I have built a set of philosophic beliefs that justify the actions I have already taken, or my actions are guided by those philosophic beliefs acting as a moral compass?  Are we  massively engaged in backwards rationalization?

Over the coming posts, I will shape the framework of my philosophic beliefs.  Not original.  Picking pieces from here and there.  I will also provide references to books that have been significant influence.  It will be a journey unveiling the make up of a life.

Quite a departure from middle class morality.  Maybe it’s a ray of light against the desperation of sensing that “something is wrong with me” and “I don’t belong in the world as I know it”.

Stay tuned.

Today is a good day to be alive.  After having traveled my valley of darkness for a few days, I find myself content and elevating the energy around me.

Music obsesses me sometimes.  Reminds me of my younger daughter seeing the same movie over and over again.  I am enthralled with the piano concertos by Rachmaninoff.  After having seen the boy genius Danil Trifonov play nos. 2 and 3 at Lincoln Center, I have been playing all four of them several times a week.  A little tinge of movie magic enveloped in total evocation of the romantic heart.

Thank you Sergei for having gifted us such beautiful music.