Please Understand Me

Good day. Mirëdita. نهارك سعيد  добър ден. Dobar dan.  Goddag.  Goedendag. Hyvää päivää Bonjour.  Guten Tag. Καλημέρα.  jó napot.  góðan daginn.  Buon giorno.  Labdien. добар ден.  Dzień dobry.  Bom dia. Bună ziua.  Buenos días.  God dag.  こんにちは.  안녕하세요.  สวัสดี.  xin chào buổi ngày.

For the past 6 past months I’ve been working in the Immersive Design Center at Raytheon Missile Systems designing in the world of stereoscopic three dimensions. We’ve been working in this environment across the North American continent passing our virtual designs back and forth between New Hampshire and Tucson; two very different parts of the country with two different cultures.  We’ve also been conversing across telephone, desktop and video teleconferencing, sharing desktops; sharing files.  So many ways to communicate, to refine our work, gain consensus, and converge on a focal point.  But why have so many ways to share ideas and communicate?  As RMS expands into global markets, our hope is that by providing visual clues (both two, three and higher dimensions) we can improve our communication and thus our relationships with our customers and the quality of our products. But communication is hard.  It takes one conversation at a time. Not only do we face language barriers; there are cultural, gestural, and social barriers.  

English is my second language.  I learned it at age 6 watching television with my friend Leticia.  My mother used to say, “Watch carefully how your teacher uses her lips to speak, so that you can sound like her.”  It took a long time and reading was even more difficult but now I can barely speak my mother’s language, Portuguese, and I miss it.  I think a lot about how I speak and always have had to focus on the words. I get much coaching around the way I talk and the usage of certain words; in particular, those words that people have called “self referential.”  Still I didn’t understand the problem. Why is it improper to use the word, “my?”  Well today, it hit me.  I finally realized why sometimes I’m misunderstood. On my way home from work, I called my mom and we talked about it.  I went online and to my books and started to look up my theory:

There are gender differences in language.  

When I use the word “my”, as in “my team”, “my family”, “my country”…  I use that word to represent membership, or belonging while working in a man’s world where “my” probably represents ownership.

So, I looked up the word in the dictionary.  This is what I found:

my  plural of my (Adjective)

Adjective 1.   Belonging to or associated with the speaker: "my name is John"; "my friend". 2.   Used with a name to refer to a member of the speaker's family.

Turns out there are others who have studied gender differences in language. This article by Nemati and Bayer (2007) cites, “From childhood males and females are different in many ways, both physiologically and psychologically.” There are also social differences between men and women. Two of the most significant theories on social differences between males and females are “difference theory” and “dominance theory”.

According to the “difference theory” men and women, even those within the same group, live in different or separate cultural worlds and, as a result, they promote different ways of speaking (Uchida, 1992). This theory is sometimes called “two-culture theory”. In simple terms, although men and women live in the same environment they establish different relations with society as if each belonged to a different environment and culture, the result of which is consequently reflected in the language of both genders as in other aspects of their lives. So in this theory, cross-gender communication is to be taken as cross-cultural or bi-cultural communication.

In “dominance theory”, men and women are believed to inhabit a cultural and linguistic world, where power and status are unequally distributed. In this theory, also called power-based theory, the focus is on male dominance and gender division.” There is evidence that although men and women might come from the same social class or culture and thus to the same speech community, they may use different linguistic forms. In fact, the linguistic forms used by women and men contrast to some extent in all speech communities. It was even found, Holmes (1993), in one culture of Amazonian Indians that the language difference is so extreme, males and females speak different languages.  In other areas, the variation is just in linguistic features. For example, in Portuguese you would say “obrigada” – thank you (female) if you are female and “obrigado” (male) if you are male.

Looking into this further, we discover that women tend to use the standard language more than men do and one researcher, Climate (1997), believes that females generally use speech to develop and maintain relationships. They use language to achieve intimacy. Tannen (1990) states that women speak and hear a language of connection and intimacy, while men speak and hear a language of status and independence.

This is just the tip of the iceberg in linguistic studies and gender differences, which has only been a field of study in the past century.  When you think of it, many things have changed for women in the past century and some have not.  There’s still a pay gap for women; the older the woman, the bigger the gap.  Career-minded women still have to make the hard choice of raising children or advancing your career.  Women make up 51% of the population but still live under male law, governed by an 80% male house of representative and 75% male senate. But…

Just this year, Tammy Baldwin made history as she became the first openly gay female politician elected to the U.S. Senate, joining the largest female representation in history.  President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act in 2009, amending the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Mae Jemison becomes the first woman of color to go into space in 1992. In 1981, Sandra Day O'Connor becomes the first woman appointed to the United States Supreme Court. Anna Mae McCabe Hays becomes the first woman general in the U.S. Army in 1970.  1961, President John F. Kennedy establishes the President's Commission on the Status of Women. 1955, Rosa Parks refuses to give up her seat to a white man on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. In 1942, the Women's Auxiliary Flying Squadron (WAFS) is formed. Amelia Earhart's solo Atlantic flight was in 1932. And only in 1920, did The 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution give women the right to vote. 

In January 2013, women will make up 22% of the workforce at RMS. The range varies greatly though depending upon the domain.  For Engineering, women often stand out as an obvious minority. Male speak is everywhere.

Once after five weeks in Brazil, I started thinking in Portuguese again, dreaming in it.  I still focused on my words carefully, how I sounded – not too ‘American’ – and how to put a sentence together but I actually longed to hear English again, similarly at work, I long to speak ‘woman’ and be understood. Perhaps, I’ll be a stranger in any language and secretly long for the quiet at home.  At least now I know why my speech is misunderstood at work.  So, if you hear a woman refer to ‘their team’ or ‘their program’ or ‘their department’, perhaps you might interpret it in a more generous manner:  that woman feels like they belong in your man’s world.

Adeus. Adios. Goodbye. Tchau e boa noite.

Somewhere in the Middle

"Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space lies our freedom and power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and freedom."  -Viktor Frankl

Depending upon who you talk to, there are many different types of 'space.' There's inner space and outer space, virtual space, personal space, physical space, office space and even spaced out.  The list goes on.  But how big is a space? How long?  What dimensions does it fill.  People read this quote by Frankl and think of an immediate stimulus and a response, as in conversation. We're a 'convenience', fast-food society. (Don't make me wait too long.) Surely, this quote applies there in the realm of day-to-day interaction. But what if that response doesn't arrive for a long time because the stimulus went out into the universe or vice-versa?  Well, we lose the connection between the two.  "Where did that come from? Outer Space?" 


Indeed.


And so it goes that I received a message from the universe.  "Silly universe, that wasn't a very nice message." You must be confused, or wrong, or maybe just ignorant, or 'spaced out.' I discounted that message. And doing so, got stuck... stuck somewhere in the middle... in that... SPACE.  Stuck for a long time surrounded by my stories.  "Oh, I did it again.  I fell in that hole in the sidewalk again" holding onto my attachments, ready to chew my arm off rather than be trapped in pain and suffering yet unwilling to let go of my iron-clad grip on my attachments.


My father wrote me a beautiful letter once; one of many, but in this one I remembered something special he said to me.  He said, "Maysa, what are you running from?  Why not change your perspective and find something to run toward?  The horizon is vast and beautiful."   So, this weekend with a little help from a friend, I ran toward something: practice, The Dharma. I needed to find refuge, sanctuary.


I found hope and loving kindness from Ajahn Anandabodhi whose gentle guidance, meditation, and lecture highlighted that dukkha (or suffering) always comes from our own firm grip on our attachments. I needed to focus on the present and turn into the suffering.  I said, "Like childbirth... the only way out is through."  And she reminded me that we all must look inward and do so with compassion.  


We meditated.  It was incredibly moving to be in a room filled with people (50 or more) all in silence, focusing on our inward breath and how we share that outward breath with each other.  I was overcome with gratitude.  It was a present. 


"Ahhhhh..." 


I've walked away from these past few days of silence crowded with thoughts, but constantly reminding myself to breath and be mindful of the moment... the air filling my lungs, belly rise, belly fall, surrounded by trees 1000 years old, the wind blowing slowly across my legs, the feel of the keys as I type, the fading light as the fog rolls in again.  The next step is to balance effort to remain longer in the present while working on becoming aware of what concepts I'm so attached.  They need to be released. Sometimes, awareness for the need of awareness is the next step.


So, I'm still stuck in the space in the middle, enjoying the freedom and possibilities there, not taking the stimulus personal, and trying to formulate my response. But at least I know that I'm "in the middle" and I can see a horizon now. That's a start. The universe won't get a response yet and it might be a while but... I'm working on it.  Knowing that:

"When we are no longer able to change a situation ... we are challenged to change ourselves."  -Viktor Frankl

Maysa-Maria K. G. Peterson Lach
Star Date: 18657.75

When everything's under change

somewhere to know where

chaos in time counts the steps

forward twice and back again

round and around swaying earthy

captured dancing, the dainty leaves

arose early by the lightest breeze

such lonely songs they sing

leading stone down the walk

somewhere before the trees

of green is the darkening hush

warm embraces linger thought

wondering the direction next

when flux and change takes all

confusing the rights left wrong

hidden answers to unasked questions

waiting the doors’ inevitable closing

slowing your breath to make small

while there exposed and trembling

your fragile heart lies wanting.

"Turn, turn, turn"

The world below,  in the dark,  is running past me from one city to the next.  Here in the box of this airplane, I can't see the hills, rivers, the houses, the people moving from place to place.  I also can't see the progression of the season even as we fly southwest over autumn's leaves and chill.

We're traveling backward in time from where the leaves were past their peak of color to where they bloom orange, red and on to where there is none.   I miss the turning of the leaves, trips to the pumpkin farm, a hayride and buying fresh pie and cider from the stand.  The children were little and they liked to see the scarecrows and run the haunted corn fields.

Now among the saguaro and ocotillo, the seasons are not as dramatic. Yet,  one morning while walking with my brother in Sabino Canyon, we turned to each other and said, "Can you feel it?"   Autumn was blooming.  There were no leaves to signal the transition but the light in canyon had changed.  It was warmer in color. The light hung lower, later in the sky.  A sense of melancholy hit us.

I don't know where he went but I was back in Pennsylvania in our woods in Waverly waiting for a big yellow bus to come and swallow up my children - off to school.  Skipping around in time, I visited Northridge, Chase Street, and  the smell of high school books and how the light entered my window.  Followed by East Stroudsburg and off to college, the house where my parents lived was over 70 years old, brick with a big yard - no fences to keep you in.

We talked about this, my brother and I.  Something about the fall always takes you back to your past.  Perhaps, it's the sudden chill and the anticipation of snow and bare trees...  Or maybe it's the falling leaves.  But now living in Tucson, it can't be either.  It's something in a dream from the corners of your mind that haunts you.

I got to see the colors in Pittsburgh this week.  I thought about my children...  homemade Halloween costumes, pumpkin pie, laughter rising up from the piles of leaving - dancing, and big Thanksgiving dinners.   My children are mostly grown now, but they'll be home for Thanksgiving.  And soon, I will be a gramma and another generation shall rise.  Outside in the darkness as I fly home,  the mountains and valleys pass, the view transforms.  I can't see it but I know the leaves turn, turn, turn...  Just as I know, for everything there is a season ...

A Sign a Day

-maysa peterson

a sign a day

sometimes unseen

hides and shines

flowers in her

hair, yellow bright

and how to smile

until it hurts

joy raise a note

some deep, throaty

some airy and bright

almond scented

steeping tea wisps

green past

the window pane

green passed

a sign a day

so thin, so pale

for waiting what

already given rests

past the green

past the blue

passing beside you

just listen.

____________________________

It All Falls Together

Fall comes in on tip toes
morning draped in cooler blue
a known edginess that always
raises memories of past
lunch pails and notebooks
college hallways and sidewalks
the turn of a leaf dancing and
how the colors change suddenly
like a meloncholic blanket
warming the sleeping dreams
into next year's opportunities.

Cleaning House

I have found myself in such a state of endless 'things to do' - between the children, the new husband, parents, siblings, work and all the politics there, community outreach, adovacy, volunteering for one thing or another... I kept busy.  There was always something else to do. The list grew even as items were checked off.  In the lull of a moment, I might even seek out other 'things to do' to fill that space.  I was overloaded, anxious, irritable and fighting the current, keeping busy as a diversion.

Oh sure, intellectually I could see what needed to be done, but the gap between mind and heart was too far to jump.  What if I fell, failing to reach the other side?  "There's no help for me," I thought.  It kept me stuck.

It was the simple act of agreeing and beginning to clean house and simplify my world that was the turning point.  So I agreed to my coach that I would clean a room a week, 13 rooms that would take me to Christmas to lean out. I started with an easy one: my bathroom.

It's amazing how sometimes after taking that tiny first step, other things can happen.  That gap closes and things become possible.  Getting rid of some things, created room for others. Curious replacements like, a weekend free of worry, a smile, a new possibility, a new hope, and songs with the wind in your hair.  I can't wait to see what opportunities arise after I clean and simplify the gargage. 

The Zen Buddhists have a story:
Two Buddhist monks were walking along a path when they came to a shallow, muddy river. A woman in a beautiful dress waited there, not wishing to cross for fear of ruining her beautiful dress. One of the monks lifted her onto his shoulders – something that he was absolutely not supposed to do – and carried her to the other side, where he set her down (dress intact) and proceeded along the path with his fellow monk. After a few hours, the second monk, unable to continue keeping quiet about what he understood as a violation of the code by which they lived, asked his companion, “Why did you pick that woman up and carry her across the river?” The first monk replied, “Are you still carrying her? I put her down hours ago.”

Letting go is another way of cleaning house.  It makes room for other things.

Hello World!

When I went to college, I studied computer science.  And whenever you were learning a new programming language, you always started by writing a "Hello World" program. It's a simple program that teaches you how to make the computer speak to the world - input and output.  It's your entrance into the new environment through a new means of communication. I want my 'communicating out' party into Blogger to be a positive one, so I want to "create my day" like Dr. Joe Dispenza says:

"I wake up in the morning and I consciously create my day the way I want it to happen. Now sometimes, because my mind is examining all the things that I need to get done, it takes me a little bit to settle down and get to the point of where I'm actually intentionally creating my day. But here's the thing: When I create my day and out of nowhere little things happen that are so unexplainable, I know that they are the process or the result of my creation. And the more I do that, the more I build a neural net in my brain that I accept that that's possible. (This) gives me the power and the incentive to do it the next day.

"So if we're consciously designing our destiny, and if we're consciously from a spiritual standpoint throwing in with the idea that our thoughts can affect our reality or affect our life -- because reality equals life -- then I have this little pact that I have when I create my day. I say, 'I'm taking this time to create my day and I'm infecting the quantum field. Now if (it) is in fact the observer's watching me the whole time that I'm doing this and there is a spiritual aspect to myself, then show me a sign today that you paid attention to any one of these things that I created, and bring them in a way that I won't expect, so I'm as surprised at my ability to be able to experience these things. And make it so that I have no doubt that it's come from you,' ..."

So "What we think, we become." - Zen quote

And... "Don't seek, don't search, don't ask, don't knock, don't demand - relax. If you relax, it comes. If you relax, it is there. If you relax, you start vibrating with it." -  Osho

That's the meaning of Thanksgiving... Thanks for the gifts that have already been given. You just need to awaken to see/receive them.

Today will be a day about compassion. And being new to Blogger, from a compassionate heart:

"Hello World"