Help needed for youths at risk

A writer in yesterday's forum page suggests that the government engages "at-risk" youths in sports or the arts. He quoted statistics on the increase of drug abusers in the Malay youths vs the decline in other races. He cited a possible cause being the increase in dysfunctional families and rising income inequality. He believes that engaging these youths intensively in either sports or arts will help not only to occupy their "unsupervised idle time" but give them a sense of achievement  in other area.

Having engaged with children and teenagers in a Children's home and a Girl's home for Malays I do agree with his views. The residents from the homes are from dysfunctional families, usually lagging in academic performance. Coupled with the desolate feelings of being abandoned they are at great risk of school failure and juvenile delinquency. During my initial engagement with them I was often taken aback by how far behind their English proficiency and mathematical skills were relative to their school cohort. What made things worse is the hidden anger and sadness within them which I feel consumes their inner energy resulting in listlessness and the inability to focus in school. In  a vicious cycle poor academic performance leads to low self esteem and greater vulnerability to delinquency and drug abuse.

Ironically, the Children's Home received many donations in kinds. Second hand pianos, electric organs, violins and all kinds of books lined the shelves. Unfortunately there are no volunteers to teach the kids to play these instruments. The Girl's Home on the other hand has the benefit of pro-Bono chefs, hair stylists and dancers who gave the girls lessons. The girls whom I engage often talk enthusiastically about these lessons. I guess they derive some sense of accomplishment from them. They however bemoaned the lack of volunteers who can teach them to sing.

Just last week I had a session with a 12 year old boy. As he entered the room it struck me that the boy has grown and is no longer the child I first met. Though his mannerism generally remained child like I noticed some teenager defiance, which could have arisen from the disappointment that his mother did not bring him home for a single weekend during the school holiday. It then struck me what a vulnerable position he is in and silently wish that things would turn out well for him.

Clearly a lot more needs to be done to help these children and teenagers.

The Bereaved and those with Hardened hearts

Caught the film ' Interstellar'.  The scene which affected me most was when Cooper, the pilot of the spacecraft rushed to watch the video recordings sent by his family after realizing he had lost 23 earth years when in actual fact he was only away from his spacecraft for 3 hours descending a wormhole in space to explore a planet. The video recordings showed his children growing into adults and his father aging, all wondering year after year when he will be returning to earth and if at all. There was very good acting when Cooper broke down grieving the years he missed out on his loved ones. His father had passed on too. The poignant scene brings out a sense of inevitability, the inability to control time fleeting past us and the feeling of being a helpless bystander in the lives of our loved ones. It also reminds me of the difficulty we will face when the time of our own departure arrives. Hence in Buddhism, when a person is dying, whilst surrounding him with love, his loved ones should give him permission and blessings to die so as to lessen his grasping and attachment.

Watching the news coverage on the carnage inflicted by Taleban terrorists in the Pakistani school massacre was heart wrenching. It is unimaginable how the grasping to a certain cause had hardened so much the hearts of the attackers to commit such a heinous crime against innocent children. The grief stricken faces of the victims' parents revealed the torment of their bereavement and brings to mind the sufferings from attachment. It would be  extremely difficult for the bereaved families to let go not only because the loss was sudden and unexpected but also its underlying brutal and cruel circumstances.

This incident, the Sydney cafe siege, the mindless sporadic killings of ordinary people everywhere leaves one feeling gloomy about our world. Yet we can only pray for the people who harbour such intense hatred in their hearts and for the bereaved that their pain can be eased.

 "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Good Life and Good Earth

Mingling with the crowd, dazzled by the Xmas decorations and walking from one Orchard Road mall to another I suddenly wonder whether there is another way to have economic growth and employment in our world without the need for consumer spending. I think of the excessive things an average family has at home, be it clothing, utensils, furniture, electrical appliances etc etc and at the great variety of brand and choices in every single  consumer product and how the limited world resources are depleted to feed this insatiable human desire of material needs. Just when I wonder whether some form of social awakening can allow our earth to heal and replenish I was confronted with the thought of high unemployment amongst youths in so many countries and how economic growth is vital to avoid a wasted generation. Is there another way out ie. economic growth without consumer spending?

I thought my question was miraculously answered when an article in yesterday's BT entitled "Low growth and the good life" caught my eyes. In it the question asked was "Is there a way of living with slower growth?" It then followed with this comment "The beginning of an answer is to recognise that economy should serve society, rather than the other way around. What this means is that the economy's social task is to provide the conditions in which people can lead good lives".

The article then borrowed Aristotle's concept of good life which encompasses the well being of both body and mind where health and material comfort satisfy the earlier and mind preoccupations with value, creativity, appreciation of beauty, intellectual curiosity and life's meaning the later. However  the growing loneliness and depression in developed countries "suggests that a materialistic-only philosophy is not in accord with human nature."

Sad to say the article ended in a clueless note. What a disappointment. It did mention the Green movement as a possible place to look for answers but also described the movement's futile efforts and ineffective suggestions amongst which is sharing work to solve unemployment.The article did however reminds that a "mindset that values the good life" is an essential starting point.

I guess my dream of a Good life and a Good Earth will remain just a dream for the time being.

Beware of disguised altruism

There is something about volunteer work that is sometimes tainted with self interest.

I was asked to try sandplay therapy with a few girls in a girls' home who are not responding to talk therapy and who are either difficult to manage or keep very much to themselves. The first few sessions were fine where the stories or symbols selected clearly reflected the problems the girls faced in their exterior world and some inner desires. However before they could go deeper and process their issues through sandplay therapy they declared they are bored with sandplay and treated the session like a free for all. They requested for art and craft and favours to download music etc.

This has caught me a bit by surprise because I didn't really have this problem working with children in  the children's home. Similarly I have gathered from books and videos that adults could unearth and process their issues through successive sandplay sessions, something which we too experienced whilst working with our partners attending the course. I had thought that the girls being older would be able to process better by verbalizing their issues through the symbols selected. Instead they expressed boredom after 2 to 3 sessions. It then dawns on me that unlike an adult who looked for therapy these girls were 'coerced' into therapy with no intention of helping themselves and sharing their deep issues with anyone.

So I played along bringing art and craft material, downloading and playing the songs which they requested and thinking to myself "what the hell am I doing here?" and "Am I actually a nanny or a therapist?" This is where self centredness sets in. Thoughts like " these sessions have no value for ME" started to surface. There wasn't anything concrete out of these sessions which I could document  in my case notes either. The image of myself more of an entertaining grandma than a professional therapist bothered me. "Am I deceiving myself that I am doing something worthwhile?"

Then my Buddhist training pulls me back to see how much self centredness is wrapped within these thoughts. Clearly I have to be wary of volunteering as disguised self interest.

So I continued as long as they want me to visit. It doesn't matter in what capacity I come. In one of the sessions I let my hair down closed my eyes and danced spontaneously to the hot music. I am sure I would made any "aunty" feel embarrassed for me. (Just like how I would sometimes feel at story telling sessions in front of the parents). The girl whom earlier on had thrown tantrum at the staff and who had come in hot and defiant eventually broke into smiles and laughter. I told her to join me and said it was fine to express our feelings through body movements. She didn't; but the wall between us has been torn down for she began to tell me and more about herself the following session onwards.

Giving Back- yet another angle

Giving back as described by Bernake is giving back to society what we have benefited including the good fortune to be born with intelligence, strong physiques, good look and in a privileged environment.


Recently I gathered a new concept about "Giving back" from a podcast talk. Giving back takes on a new meaning when viewed as giving back all that we are. "All that we are?" What are we in the first place? Here is my own interpretation or how I feel about it. I guess basically we are given a form, sensations, thoughts and consciousness, something we inherit from the universe. Giving back is intrinsically returning this being to the universe, this borrowed self. When you think along these lines, it gives you a sense that "it's not all about me" and helps loosen the grasp on your identity. Everything about 'me' begins to shed some significance. It can be quite liberating. It also makes you feel the urge to do something nurturing.

Giving back for me is more like reconnecting as if I want to suffuse myself with the largeness. Working and engaging with children helps me achieve this in some small ways. Being with nature is another. Small ways but they do bring joy.

Changing scene in Hokkaido

Visited Hokkaido during the second week of November. First thing the local tour guide commented was about the time we chose to visit as the last autumn leaves have fallen and the snow has yet to come. Despite the barren trees, the grayish landscape can actually be quite beautiful in its own way. I would have enjoyed the scenery more had I not googled (marveling at the stunningly colourful fields in summer and the brilliant lights during the snow festival in winter) and blamed myself continuously for not doing more research on the best time to visit. This is a typical example of not enjoying the moment fully, clouded by the thought of missing on something better, in simple word 'greed'.

Then out of the blue, just 2 days before the tour ended, the weather took pity on us and delighted us with some light drifting snow flakes. That night it turned into a heavy snowfall and I watched in bewilderment from the hotel window the grounds and the cars gathering layers after layers of snow. The next day as we retraced the route we had travelled before, the sceneries had changed overnight into miles and miles of white landscape, a far cry from the yellowish brown fields the day before. A thick blanket of white covered the horizon. Snow was everywhere leading right up to the doorway of houses. I wondered about people living in temperate countries, how they need to adapt to waking up in the morning to find they could not get out of their house, and how they need to react accordingly.

As miles and miles of whiteness rolled before my eyes I felt the meaning of change at another level, its unpredictability, its suddenness and how it can be beyond control. It is similar with life I guess. One needs to be prepared and have the shovel ready to clear the snow when it blocks the doorway.

Working with Fears

Heard this podcast on working with fears. A saying mentioned therein which I thought worthy of deeper understanding is "as long as you imagine yourself to be something tangible and solid, a thing amongst things, you seem short lived and vulnerable and you will be anxious to survive. But when you know yourself to be beyond space and time you will be afraid no longer".

Though I may not fully comprehend, what holds true for me is the feeling that the tighter one holds onto a solid self, the more fears one has to overcome. This is becauses there will be much to protect and uphold and much fears of losing.

Having said that it is precisely this primal survival instinct that kept humans alive for generations. Without the fight or flight instincts the human species would long have been wiped out. In today's world however the majority of people are rarely in physical danger; yet people all over are plagued by fear and anxieties. This arises largely from how one views oneself amongst others, basically there is a lot of judging.

The talk then suggested ways to work with fears which include:

1. Trying to feel into something larger or sensing the truth of our belonging or that oceaness. 
There are several ways to do this, direct ways to calm our nerves. One is through sensing the connection with the earth like feeling the weight of our feet on the ground or the sense of gravity. Another way is through our breadth; where with each slow in breadth we feel our body and with each out breadth we feel our way into something larger. We can also touch our nervous heart or belly spreading warmth over the nervous body.

2. Remembering Love
Recall and remember the loving energy of someone or visualise any source of loving connection. This can be your mother or grandma, a deity or spiritual figure or even nature. It is important to show gestures of kindness to oneself through say a simple warm touch of the hand or heart or words of kindness for oneself.

3. Having sensed that oceaness or largeness, contact the waves
After feeling the space and the connectedness into something larger we then meet the fear. With a more stable and collected self, feel the fear in our body. Take notice of the part in our body that hurts or is constricted. Take deep breadths as we watch the fear. In the largeness of things and the loving sense of belonging even though the fear is still present it does not seem so intimidating and is more manageable. A simile given is like putting dye in a lake instead of dye in a basin of water.

I think these are good suggestions to be put into practice and acquire as habits.
-