In the movie American Gangster, the drug lord Frank Lucas is undetected and pretty much undetectable. That was his strength and power. A key scene in the movie is when his wife buys him an expensive and ostentatious fur coat and insists he wear it in a very public setting – a prize fight. Instinctively, he resists but relents against his better judgment. This ends up costing him dearly as it now draws needless attention to himself and his business.
Recently, I also thought of the example of Princess Diana. How happy she was before marrying into the Royal Family is up for debate, but what isn’t is that by doing so made her not very much so and arguably caused her demise.
Most of the fields and places I’ve been in prized being seen. Many times at either great or any cost. Looking back, I realized how silly this strategy can be. Being hidden, at least until the right time not to be is a gift, a shield.
I taught my daughter about the 27 Club – the one you really don’t want to belong to – Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Jami Joplin, Jon Bonham, to name a few. Speculation aside of what causes that phenomenon, I’d venture that some falls on too much, too soon – as in fame and notoriety.
In NYC, the competition for schooling is abnormal. Kids apply for high school just as college applications. Frankly, this is supreme ridiculous and will likely have unintended negative consequences. Even and especially growth.
Rush anything or anyone and you’ll see, feel it.
Not to mention the pressure to be seen quickly, and more problematic- before one is ready to handle all of it – responsibility and weight. This also creates incentives to take short cuts, false paths, and rushed development.
I’ve looked at the board wrong for a long time.
Being hidden for the right season can be a good thing.
“Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow big and strong. It would do the world good if every person would compel himself to often be alone. Most of the world’s progress has come from such. To make the right choices in life, you have to get in touch with your soul. To do this, you need to experience solitude, which most people are afraid of, because in the silence, you hear the truth. The greatest men and women throughout history loved solitude. It defined them. It grounded them. It prepared them for their calling.” – Winston Churchill
So there’s this master swordsman – Musashi Miyamoto who was a ronin or masterless samurai. He fought in a good number of battles as a sword for hire. Already renowned and unbeaten in combat, he isn’t satisfied and decides to retreat into isolation at a forest to perfect his philosophy and technique of combat. This takes him two years. When he emerges, he is about as close to complete as a warrior as humanly possible.
He ends up unbeaten in battle over his lifetime and teaches countless others. The way he wins several fights is extremely clever and doesn’t always require force. Ultimately like the great Bruce Lee, who he influenced, he leaves behind writing chronicling his thoughts – The Book of Five Rings, up there with the other great works of strategic philosophical thought.
The key I think is the decision to choose solitude. Really not an easy thing to do. To forswear human contact, endure aloneness, and ti embrace all the benefits of doing so.
But essential and even necessary. How do you know your true voice when it is constantly competing with those of others and even being drowned out?
Much less the voice of a higher power.
Maybe that’s the real goal and gift in all this – learning to distinguish the signal from the noise.
Last night, one of our police officers was shot and killed while attempting to stop an armed robbery. The officer left behind a wife and two children. If his murderer is caught, he will be sentenced to death or spend a lot of time in prison. But no, that’s not where the story ends. Because in this state, as well as others, we never really hold people accountable for their crimes or do we enforce the sentences properly.
Although we have the third-largest death row in the US, we have only put one person to death in the past ten years or so. That person also volunteered to be executed. You see, because of the appeals process which affords convicted criminals multiple layers of review, the murderer will most likely die in prison or even get paroled. Our broken system gives criminals more rights than the victims of crime. Our city mourns the loss of one of its own today.
Two nights ago, an eighteen year-old high school student who was about to attend college was shot and killed near where I park my car. The student was working in the parking lot of a hospital to save up for tuition. He was also the only child of his parents, who ironically are police officers. I am starting to hate this city and it’s not because my job shows me the worst parts of human nature. At some point, we have to ask ourselves why our homicide rate is double that of other cities like New York, Chicago, and Boston. I really don’t know who to talk to about these things so I just write them here.
This past week, a four-year old girl was shot in a crossfire between likely drug-dealers in South Philadelphia. Although the street was crowded with people who witnessed the shooting, nobody has come forward to testify. I watched the interviews last night on the news and it was clear that everyone on the block was too afraid to report what they saw even with anonymous tiplines and witness relocation (although I can see how inconvenient this is).
On one of my flights to Chicago, I met a lady and her 13-year old son who sang in the American Boys Choir. I was previously unaware that this group existed, but it’s a famous group based out of a boarding school in Princeton, N.J, which performs all over the country, including at the Academy Awards. I did some research on this group though and found out that the school has been involved in sexual molestation. One of the victims is a famous law professor at Stanford who ultimately represented the others in court.
However, the former school principal stated that the boys who were molested consented to the abuse. Then the school tried to shield itself from accountability by hiding under the law and attacking the credibility of the victims. The Catholic Church has also tried repeatedly using these methods. I also had a case recently with a guy who was sent to prison for ten years for raping a girl after stalking her. Barely a few weeks after his release, he committed the exact same crime. So yes, Virginia, there is a hell. It is a very special place for very special people.
When I was growing up in church, I was taught that Jesus was the sort of man that I was to emulate. But emulating Him never appealed to me and I understand why now. Many times, the portrayal of Jesus is too one-dimensional. No wonder that I never wanted to be like Jesus when there were better options like athletes, warriors, or some other biblical character that wasn’t quite as weakly portrayed.
But I am starting to see differently. The Jesus who I am learning about now is a more complete picture of what a man is intended to be. Tough and compassionate at the same time. Secure enough to cry and to hold children while courageous enough to look others in their eyes and to call them out when they were wrong. Wise enough to know what battles were worth fighting and shrewd enough to outmaneuver those who would trap him.
Most importantly, strong enough to die to himself and to carry the sins of the world on his shoulders. In modern times, this Jesus would have the humility to love the unlovable and have the integrity to knock down a bully who hurt others.
This Jesus embraced the full spectrum of emotions and qualities given to a man – not limited solely to the softer or harder sides of a man’s personality. This Jesus hung out with tough people, said difficult things, and did not repress his feelings. This Jesus challenged unjust authority and laws rather than meekly accepting things as the way they are. This Jesus wrestled with His Father yet submitted to His will.
This Jesus would also be honest with himself and embrace his sexuality rather than deny or repress it. Sexuality as a source of creativity, passion, and a unique quality of God’s design for human beings.
I asked several friends whether they thought there was a difference between fate and destiny. The answers I got back were telling and revealed a lot about how each thought. As for me, the words sound the same but I think they are different. I can’t place my finger on it exactly but intuitively I know destiny is something truly special, something great about it.
Destiny feels like threre’s an underlying current of grace, faith, and timing involved.
Maybe choice too.
Does it choose us or do we choose it?
I actually think there is a fair amount of will involved. Not so much free will but rather something closer to desire. The ability to will something into existence.
The more I wrote, I noticed things that occurred in the past that would play a role years or even decades later. It wasn’t just skills and knowledge but also people and events.
But yes, I think we choose our destinies. It’s not only in what we choose to do but also what we choose not to do. Something that many never figured out about me was it wasn’t what I said that told the truth but what I didn’t.
Borrowing from the Taoist priest in the Netflix series Marco Polo – in kung fu, one hand tells the truth and the other one lies. Even in basketball defense, the key really isn’t so much about keeping your eye on the ball but on your opponent’s waist. That is the real tell to where they intend to move.
A great destiny also requires pain. I wrote down a series of lessons for my kids and one of them is no cross, no crown. And also in the words of sage poet Bono – if you want to kiss the sky, better learn how to kneel.
I wrote this back when I was a law student 20 odd years ago in Indiana.
Death isn’t funny. Not one bit. I saw a lot of it, so please don’t take this one the wrong way.
A friend’s relative was dying and there was a last ditch effort to get a deathbed conversion. It failed. When I found out who the church sent to persuade him, I nearly burst out laughing and shook my head.
Jesus Christ.
That was a swear not who they sent.
They may have as well sent one of the ringwraiths from Lord of the Rings. He would have been more articulate and gentle. Instead, they sent this way too self-assured pastor without much life experience or empathy. I was thinking to myself – if heaven was filled with this, sign me up for purgatory (no – I’m not that stupid to go to the other place).
I made a good friend in Boston, a Jesuit priest. They put their money where their mouth is. Their training is more practical and involves real people in addition to book learning. Jesuit priests are assigned to some difficult places.
This is key.
Also in policing. I used to go to our Academy in Flushing. I don’t know who built this facility but it was classic NYPD. Brutalist, not that well thought out, ambitious without reality.
But it had some cute parts.
We had a training section where there’d be mock-ups of various city settings – bank, bodega, bus, subway, etc. The latter could also be found in the Brooklyn Children’s Museum.
In any case, these were used for scenario based training – to simulate real life situations. The instructors were good. I learned how to hide a gun in many areas of my body. Don’t ask.
Whether pastor, priest, police, it’s all the same – you’ve got to know how to handle reality.
Songs of Pain and Hope 