Hunting, Fishing, and Pick-Up Trucks

By Xolani Kacela

How Not To Be Bored
You're retired or getting ready to retire and don't know what to do next. Maybe you're retired and bored. You're constantly wondering how not to be bored for the rest of your life. This is the book for you!

"Hunting, Fishing, and Pick-Up Trucks" is the story that will inspire you to get busy living. Read how my wife and I learned something new together every year. That's the origin of this book. The story can save a marriage.

If you are figuring out how to deal with grief of a love one or how to deal with grief, loss, and death, the story "On Losing A Parent During the Pandemic" was written just for you. I lost my mother during Covid. This account might help your broken heart if you, too, you're your mother, your father, or someone who was like your mother or father during Covid. You'll learn how to deal with the loss.

How to Have Great Boundaries
Maybe you're wondering, "How to go from good to great ministry?" Or, you're a minister who's going through rough times in your church or congregation. The story, "Ministers Can't Do It All," is yours to keep and preach. This story shows how establishing good boundaries with others. Even if you're not a minister, you will benefit from reading this story by learning how to have great boundaries.

Be Free
These days, everyone wants to just "get along." Don't we? Who doesn't want to learn how to talk through race in these turbulent times? Do you want to talk on politics? Especially with your family. Here's the problem: everyone is scared to open their mouths and crack the ice.

"Freedom for All" shows how to work through difficult issues. Don't be that person who stands by silently watching a bully assert their views while that other family member gets clobbered. Learn how to be free.

You can learn how to ally with Latino people. They want to know you, too. They want you on their side. "Freedom For All" will help break down the barriers to peace and unity in the community. It will show you how to talk about race and how to talk about race and race privilege.

This book is full of new perspectives. It will help you see the world more openly. It might help you become a change maker in your own right. Take a peek inside and dare being changed.

Dare others around you to be great, too.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xolani Kacela
• Release date: Oct 18, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201098292

Xolani Kacela

Raised by an atheist father and a deeply religious mother, Reverend Xolani Kacela began early seeing the world through a lens of many faiths and beliefs. His broad experience helps him appeal to a wide audience, both secular and religious. He serves as minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, NM, and has been minister at four other Unitarian Universalist churches as well as the United Methodist Church. He grew up a member of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME). As Chaplain in the U.S. Air Force and Air National Guard, he served in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina, as well as in Guam and Iraq. He holds a Ph.D. in Pastoral Theology and Pastoral Counseling from Brite Divinity School. His many publications on spirituality, faith development, grief, and relationships include articles, “Being One with the Spirit: Mysticism of Howard Thurman,” “One Session is Enough: Counseling African American Families,” and “Mature Religious Experience in the Midst of Death and Dying”; his book chapters include “To Wake, To Rise: Meditations on Justice and Resilience” and “Art and Wholeness in Church Life.”  His blog, masteringyourownfaith.com with an audience of thousands, explores issues ranging from maximizing one’s potential to race and politics. He contributes to NPR and community radio in Las Cruces, NM, and newspapers and radio in the Southwest.  He believes that everyone has the foundations for living a great life, using their own faith convictions as the cornerstone.

Book preview

Foreword

I crafted the essays in this volume in two parts. The first part of this compilation manifested in 1996. They lay dormant in a large binder awaiting publication. They were first published in 2020 in a volume titled, It’s Your World. If the ideas presented in these pages seem outdated, it is because they are.

I was a different person then with a different perspective. I’ve broadened my views over the last 25 years, have experienced divorce and remarriage, earned two graduate degrees (M.Div. and Ph.D.), joined the U.S. Air Force as a chaplain, transitioned from being a United Methodist Church minister to a Unitarian Universalist clergy, lived in four states, visited numerous countries, learned Spanish, and grounded myself in a beautiful marriage.

The second part of the compilation reflect my contemporary ideas and observations. My intent here is simply to get them in the world and let them percolate. If you find the perspectives illuminating, please share your thoughts with me. You can post a review wherever you purchased the book or on my website’s blog.

To find out more about my ongoing projects, please visit my website: revdrxk.com.

Xolani Kacela

Preface

One of the challenges a writer faces is finding a publisher who understands their work and is willing to take a risk with new talent. That said, the writer must find a way to break through masses. This work is my attempt to breakthrough on my own terms.

The writings here cover a variety of subject matter. The title piece arose from my love of being outdoors fishing and hunting. This is a relatively new passion, but one that I’ve embraced wholeheartedly. However, the focus piece tackles another issue very close to my heart and soul: equity and inclusion in U.S. society and culture. The work explores ways that Americans might dismantle the walls of systemic racism, white supremacy culture, and the various forms of oppression that prevent all Americans from achieving their dreams and fulfilling their promise.

I hope this book provides answers to the question of how do we create a sustainable and equitable society? I believe we must approach the task with our eyes wide open, with unbridled commitment, and most importantly, with intention. Change is never free, and it only comes when people purposefully make it happen.

My target audience is two-fold: persons searching for a freethinking perspective and a deeper understanding of complex issues, but not written in complex language, and persons who create and shape policy who are open to expanding their frame of reference to include a Black, Indigenous people, and people of color (BIPOC) voice.

Thanks to the many people who laid eyes on this work and helped it come alive: Vincent Bursey, Margaret Rabbitt Loring, Sam Wright, Jennie Lyn Hiott, Randy Harris, Michael Wingfield, and April Michelle Davis. I couldn’t do any of this work without the love and encouragement from my many colleagues and friends who nourish my spirit. I love you, all.

Part One

Recent Works

Chapter One

Hunting, fishing, and Pick-Up Trucks

Many believe Christopher Columbus discovered America in 1492, but evidence suggests indigenous peoples discovered the place 20,000 years prior, which makes Columbus very late to the game. ¹ While I empathize with old Chris, I discovered that being late to the game is a wonderful opportunity to grow and flourish. Late yeah, but at least I got there before the game was over.

It began when I started practicing yoga. I loved it so much I got certified as an instructor. But yoga is centuries old, so I was clearly late to the game. I felt like an imposter or a poser calling myself a teacher.

You see, I had a friend with a detective’s nose for the latest stuff. He lived on the bleeding edge and was downloading music before Napster had that iconic icon! With his foresight, I stayed ahead of the game. He died. I’ve been late to the game ever since.

Where is it written that living on the bleeding edge is prerequisite for a good life? It’s not. As Red said in the Shawshank Redemption, Get busy living or get busy dying. I decided to get busy living -- late to the game or not.

The first thing I discovered was fishing. Six years ago, while living in North Carolina, my wife and I won a one-day fishing trip. We’d never seriously fished before but thought it would be something fun. If we liked it, maybe we would have another joint hobby. Little did we know our guide was a fish whisperer.

We moved to Florida and fished all over the state, including the Keys. We’ve fished Puerto Rico, Hawaii, California, Alaska, Costa Rica, on and on. We now own a traveling rod case. Last year, we had a blast ice fishing! Someone said, Happiness sneaks in through a door you didn’t know you left open. Fishing has been an open door.

Evidence points to a significant benefit of learning something new late in life: it can get you out of a rut.² (Can?) During the pandemic, many people are feeling fidgety. Discover something new.

The second thing we discovered was hunting. We moved to New Mexico. The Rio Grande runs through here, but it’s often dry. We had to adapt to our new environment. So, we took up hunting.

I really feel late to the hunting game, an endeavor that outdates yoga. Developing skill in hunting requires persistence. According to Malcolm Gladwell in his book, Outliers, it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert at something. In hunting terms, that might mean 10,000 rounds. I’m well on my way.

Some of our liberal friends think we’ve lost it. I understand that given the gun violence in our nation. We take safety seriously and keep our weapons locked in a gun safe.

The third thing we discovered was a truck. Fishing and hunting require proper transportation, so we broke down and bought a pickup. Now, my wife would rather drive the Canyon than her Tesla.

According to Statista, 17 million light vehicles were sold in the U.S. in 2019, of which 12.2 million were light trucks.³ If we’re one-in-a-million among those in game of pickups, there are eleven more just like us!

Some might say that all of this is trivial; it means nothing at all. But, lifelong learning is the way to go. Brain scientists point to new experiences as key to human fulfilment and one’s sense of purpose.⁴

During the pandemic, I discovered a few more things: I published an eBook, learned WordPress, and then graphic design. As a Unitarian Universalist minister, I discovered Zoom worship.

Being late to the game isn’t a hard mindset to overcome after all. Like Brooks, another Shawshank character, said, It’s Easy peasy, McGreasy. You only need to go out there and get beasy.

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1 https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/10/a-brief-history-of-everyone-who-ever-lived/537942/

2 https://www.nextavenue.org/learning-skill-later-in-life/

3 https://www.statista.com/statistics/199974/us-car-sales-since-1951/

4 https://www.dictionary.com/browse/lifelong-learning

Chapter Two

On Losing a parent During the Pandemic

Since the Coronavirus struck, it seems we’re living in a semi-dystopian world. Adding in the crisis of leadership equates to a collective sense of lost living standards, national identity, and hope for the future. We’re still far removed from the dire conditions people experience due to dictatorships, poor geography, and abysmal gross domestic product. It’s bad, but gratitude can persist amidst this pandemic.

Gratitude requires grit. The news of a New York City hospital medical director dying by suicide, the millions of displaced workers, and the endless lines of cars awaiting food donations is heart-breaking. The Financial Times reported 73% of Americans’ incomes were hit by the pandemic.⁵

On top of all of that, my mother died two weeks ago. She was 96 and slipped into the next realm peacefully and painlessly. My wife and I were on the cell with my sister, who was in the room with my mother.

When my sister pronounced the death, I felt peace and gratitude. I’d already worked through my anticipatory grief. I felt very little sorrow or sadness. The loss liberated me in a sense. Unconsciously, I felt free to be me, a person who is rarely anxious, even under pressure.

How you respond to loss is largely a result of conditioning. With maturity, lots of spiritual practice and personal work, I’ve learned to resist conditioned behavior, social pressure and choose, otherwise. I chose gratitude.

Having a parent live almost 100 years feels like a gift from an overly generous universe. Mom was a gift to my family and her community. Why not choose to celebrate that gift as joyously as I can?

Gratitude requires continuous practice. When you practice gratitude for the small things, that lends itself to living into gratitude when the big things hit you. Gratitude increases with understanding of the serenity prayer, which encourages us to accept things we cannot change.

During the pandemic, there is an abundance of change happening to and around us, which we usually can change. But now, we cannot. Such powerlessness translates into loss—lost relationships, jobs and paychecks, freedom, and the sense of self-determination. Some of that will return, but when and at what cost?

Uncertainty generates the sense of ambiguous loss. The term ambiguous loss was coined by the therapist, Pauline Boss, during the early 80s. It usually applies to family dynamics, but I find it applicable in our current crisis. You feel ambiguous loss when you perceive something physically absent as psychologically present or something physically present as psychologically absent. In both cases, you know something is missing in the system.

In the Covid-19 environment, everything seems ambiguous. Whether it is the lacking medical testing, confusion over stimulus checks, the broken unemployment application systems, sheer madness about opening the economy, certainty is missing everywhere you turn. We don’t even know the efficacy of face masks, anymore.

I couldn’t attend mom’s burial due to travel restrictions. Yet, I found myself fully capable of accepting her death without anxiety.

During my 20s, I consciously decided to stop asking myself, What would Mama do or say?, when I faced challenging decisions. I began relying on my own wisdom and experience as the path to independence and becoming a fully functioning adult.

While I maintained a steady love and concern for my mother, I relied less on her and reported few day-to-day life events and heard few of hers. In recent years, I’ve experienced my mother as a figure-head. She reared and prepared me well for the world, then released me to fly like an eagle with wings.

For the last 36 years, I have lived physically and psychologically apart from my mother. Therein lies the real loss. But she lives on unconsciously within me as a source of love, joy and inspiration.

I always carry with me a source of gratitude for the way she loved me. There is nothing ambiguous about that. Gratitude and loss can co-exist.

I believe that sense of duality is possible for the masses. It requires constant practice. Once prepared, no virus or pandemic can take that away from you.

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5 Fedor, Lauren and Christine Zhang, Income of 73% in US hit by coronavirus outbreak, Financial Times, April 7 2020, https://www.ft.com/content/7a7233a3-160a-41be-8d63-40f64e041e57, accessed May 1, 2020.

Chapter Three

What the Biden Stimulus Teaches Us About living Wages

Many businesses are seeing staff shortages as they reopen. It is not unusual to find your favorite restaurant closed earlier than normal business hours because they are short on staff. I’ve seen a few handwritten signs that blame workers for not showing up.

I’d beg to differ.

The lack of staff causes longer waits, (often in your car) fewer tables served, and hot tempers. Wait staff and customers quickly blame stay-at-home workers who prefer government relief rather than return to their jobs.

Again, I beg to differ.

Don’t blame workers for doing the right thing. Consider the real issue: many companies won’t pay living wages. The federal minimum wage for tipped workers is $2.13 per hour.

Instead of paying decent wages, food service companies pay their front-line workers substandard wages and expect tips to make up the difference. The slow return to work furthers the case that workers deserve to earn a living wage.

Perhaps, the hybrid pay model sustained people 30 years ago. However, base pay and tip income have failed to keep pace with inflation. If it did, foodservice workers would return to work rather than stay at home and collect unemployment.

Few people are proud to live off of government handouts.

When I served the Unitarian Universalist church in Durham, NC, our social justice team was deeply involved in the Fight for $15 campaign. We lobbied for a $15 minimum wage. I stood with protestors outside fast-food restaurants and crowed in when they opened to bring attention to unjust wages.

I invited a protestor to tell his story during worship. He described his gruelling work schedule, which included overtime and holding down three jobs. None of his jobs afforded him health insurance, so he worried about falling ill because of his stress and fatigue.

President Biden attempted to make living wages a new normal in his 2021 stimulus package. He failed to gain Republican support. Many conservatives cited the price tag. Their pushback shows their need for a class in macro-economics.

Living wages scale and produce a huge impact because Americans will spend more on basic needs. Their spending stimulates all sectors of our economy.

At the Unitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, we live our values and support our staff with living wages and salaries. We also provide benefits so our staff can care for themselves and support their families. Anything less would break our covenant to care for each other with love, compassion, and justice.

The time has come for religious leaders to double down on their faith commitments. People of faith continue to struggle through the pandemic. With the Delta variant running wild and vaccination hesitancy rampant, there is no end in sight to the pandemic.

Church leaders must make their staff’s wellbeing a priority. Pay living wages. Such commitment models love, compassion, and justice in the fight for fair pay.

Restaurants and other hospitality companies must also pay their workers living wages.

Customers must show patience. The next time you dine out, show your servers some love. Consider using your wait time to do a spiritual discipline: breathe, meditate, and practice gratitude.

Chapter Four

Ministers, You can't Do It All

People in Walla Walla, Washington are not trying to intentionally infect themselves with Covid-19 as initially reported. Nor are clergypersons who respond to crises as a result of Covid-19. But, clergypersons who overcommit themselves to ministry work during the Coronavirus pandemic will find themselves less effective and more prone to depression.

Many clergypersons’ call to ministry is connected to their personal need to help others, especially during times of crisis. The noted pastoral psychologist, Margaret Kornfeld, argued that ministers "often have an insatiable internal system that requires them to give to others in order to fill an inner