Let me be brief, as there is a hurricane coming and I have lots to do.

But I really need to say this:

Over the last two days, I have heard many politicians and emergency officials on the East Coast reminding us to be "smart" or "cautious."  But I wish that one of them would also remind us to be kind.

Maybe that would be stepping outside the bounds of conventional politics—straying into a more spiritual kind of leadership. Maybe, in preparing for a disaster, kindness just isn't as important as smarts. But still, I feel the need to hear someone remind us about its value.

Of course, health and safety depends on many very practical factors, such as how well we have prepared and how effective the emergency services are in our area. But I expect that much of our experience of a natural disaster also depends on whether we have taken the opportunity to experience a moment of kindness with a stranger.

Let me back up a step.

On Thursday evening, my family and I were evacuated from Cape May, the first place in the Northeast to face a mandatory evacuation. When we heard the order, we had only a ¼ tank of gas, and there were already long lines at gas stations. Nonetheless, we had to join the bumper-to-bumper traffic getting off the Cape, with no sense of when or if we would get gas, or how far up the coast the traffic (or panic) would continue.

I noticed how easily tempers could flare in such a situation, even three days before the hurricane was due to hit. Once we did find a gas station with supplies and a reasonable line, two vehicles—a car and a huge RV--actually cut in line. The RV actually put itself in a position that made it impossible for even those people who already had gas to leave. This astounding and inconsiderate action caused other drivers to become quite angry, not surprisingly, and a shouting match ensued.

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Since writing One-Moment Meditation, I have met many people who were, at first, incredulous at my proposition that you can meditate in just a moment.

Many people assume that meditation takes a lot of time. Others think of meditation as an endurance test--the longer you can sit still, at peace, the more spiritual you are. Many people believe that the amount of time you spend in meditation has to "add up" before you "get it."

The unfortunate consequence of all this is that many people try to meditate and give up, or just don't try at all.

But time and time again, in seminars and workshops, I have taught people that it really is possible to make a make a meaningful change in their state of mind quickly--i.e. to meditate in a minute or less. Once they realize this, meditation suddenly becomes accessible. They realize that they can meditate for a moment whenever they need to, whether they are in waiting rooms, in traffic, in board rooms, or in between bites. They stop postponing peacefulness.

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For several years, I have been working intermittently on writing a new version of The Heart Sutra, one of the most important texts in Zen Buddhism. I was interested in doing this primarily because the version of the sutra that I am accustomed to chanting mentions the word "pain" twice, and that bothered me. I assumed that itwas a mistranslation of dukkha (better translated as suffering or dissatisfaction) but wanted to find out more.

When my mother died suddenly, this past May, and my family planned a "participatory" funeral service on the beach, I decided that I would finish my new version and read it at that service. I found that working on this text was deeply soothing, which I now believe is its intent.  And when I read this text at the service, as we stood in a small circle around the urn that contained my mother's ashes, it felt just right. The urn was made of pink salt, and the sutra seemed particularly appropriate to that moment at which people are suffering the insubstantiability of form, the impermanence of life. 

You can download it here ... or keep reading ...

The Heart Sutra

Adapted for my mother, Florence Boroson
on the occasion of her funeral, May 30, 2011

(from the literal translation by Edward Conze)

The Lord Avalokita
(who hears the cries of the world) [i]
Looked down from on high,
And while practicing the Perfection of Wisdom,
Clearly saw that everything is empty—
Nothing solid, nothing permanent,
Nothing separate from anything else,[ii]
And in that moment, everything was okay.[iii]

Speaking to the monk, Shariputra, she put it this way:

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For National Stress Awareness Month, I wrote two articles here about how we pick up stress from others and pass it on--what I called "stresscalation." I argued that we have an ethical obligation to stop our own role in this stresscalation.

But could we also play a role in stopping the stresscalation that we find around us?

While pondering this, I remembered a much-loved picture book from my childhood, A Fly Went By, by Mike McClintock. This simple story not only illustrates how stress can be contagious--it also shows us a state of mind that can help us stop the stresscalation.  

A Fly Went By begins on a sunny, summer morning. A young boy relaxes in a rowboat, at the edge of a lake. Without a care in his mind, he remarks:

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