Robert Frost (1874–1963)
Fire and Ice
SOME say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To know that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
Heads up to this spectacular Antartic volcano explosion on Montagu island via Clive Thompson’s collison detection via scietech daily via nature.com.
The Dipper Mother, Qing Dynasty
Bamboo dipper, granite basin.
Crust of ice over inky reservoir.
Moon shimmers in the dipper
Until fullness drains away.Some people are like dippers. No matter what they try to gather up, it ends up flowing out again. For such people it is exceedingly difficult to accumulate anything in life.
If you are like the dipper, that is all the more reason to concentrate the resources that you have. Poverty of any kind need not be a deterrent if you know how to utilize the wealth you possess. You must embrace your fate, work with it, and take advantage of it.
Ultimately, we cannot truly grasp anything permanently in life. We are born naked, we die naked, and in point of fact we live naked. What we take to us — our clothes, our wealth, our relationships — are all external to us. They are easily taken away from us by bruising fate.
We try to internalize our experiences and our understanding. Even that can be taken away by stress, senility, poor memory, disorganized thinking, drugs, or shock. Truly, we are all dippers. The little that life offers us dribbles away.
Perhaps even the poorest of situations is rich, because all the futility of life leads us to embrace Tao. After all, it is bigger than all infinities and more subtle than the slightest wisp. To feel it requires great strength. To sense it requires a dragonfly’s delicacy. When you tire of trying to hold on to life, you will find the means to enter Tao.
“Hide your body in the Big Dipper” — Zen Proverb
I used to accumulate things, now I seem to be in the process of getting rid of a lot of them. Most of that resulted from the hassles of having to clean all the accumulated crap out of my mom’s house after she died. There were years and years of letters to go through, stacks of papers, lots of clothing, and all the accumulated things stashed in the attic from so many years in the same house. I saved a few things, dishes and pictures mostly, but most of it nobody really wanted to take.
We all have our stashes of treasures, but they mean little to others when we are gone, really. There isn’t much point to accumulating a lot of stuff that someone else will simply have to sort through later on. It’s not a good chore to leave your loved ones.
I’ve already told my kids when I get to that age I’ll go rent a small furnished apartment somewhere. My goals is to be healthy enough to spend a lot of time traveling. Well, after I tire of the golden retriever ranch, of course! I still don’t really know if my desire to have a whole ranch and raise golden retrievers as service dogs and to give away is just a pipe dream or not.
And speaking of giving away, if anyone wants this copy of the 365 Tao I’ve been using this last year, please let me know. I would be more than happy to send it to you, or trade for another book you are ready to part with. Just email me at donna at woodka dot com, or comment here and we can email to exchange addresses. I would love to know this slightly bent and much loved book is going to a good home! It’s been an inspiring way to get me to journal this year. And I thank all who read here for their presence, comments, and thoughts as they share my space. I hope some of what has flowed out from my dipper of thoughts has been useful to you along your path. Namaste.
August Macke, Donkey Rider
Dismount your donkey at the summit.
Some places in this world are very hard to climb, and people use animals. Each person can only ride one, and each animal might have a different name. The riders go up the trail in different orders, and they discuss their varying opinions about their experiences. They may even have conflicting opinions : One traveler may think the trip thrilling, another may find it terrifying, and a third may find it banal.
At the summit all the travelers stand in the same place. Each of them has the same chance to view the same vistas. The donkeys are put to rest and graze; they are not needed anymore.
We all travel the path of Tao. The donkeys are the various doctrines that each of us embraces. What does it matter which doctrine we embrace as long as it leads us to the summit? Your donkey might be a Zen donkey, mine might be a Tao donkey. There are Christian, Islamic, Jewish, and even Agnostic donkeys. All lead to the same place. Why poke fun at others over the name of their donkey? Aren’t you riding one yourself?
We should put aside both the donkeys and our interim experiences once we arrive at the summit. Whether we climbed in suffering or joy is immaterial; we are there. All religions have different names for the ways of getting to the holy summit. Once we reach the summit, we no longer need names, and we can experience all things directly.
“The entrance into Jerusalem has all the elements of the theatre of the absurd: the poor king; truth comes riding on a donkey; symbolic actions - even parading without a permit!” — David Kirk
“Do you think yourself wise? Then there’s a donkey inside your waistcoat”
– Charles H. Spurgeon
A lot of people, perhaps most, who would say their religion is an end in itself, not a means to achieve spiritual growth. This is pretty sad, in a way, since it means people stop growing spiritually and simply declare they “believe” in whatever their religion is. The problem comes in accepting a belief system unquestioningly, rather than seeing religion as a tool for spiritual growth and enlightenment.
I guess it’s really a question of whether you want to attain the top of the mountain and and enjoy the view, or if you just want to sit around worshipping your ass.
Keep track of the latest GOP scandals - can’t tell the plaayers in the GOP Culture of Corruption without a scorecard!
Damn straight.
I want the local news. I want to know what’s going on in my town today, and what’s on the agenda for tomorrow. I don’t give a frell about Ann Coulter’s opinion or George Will’s opinion and I could give a frack about the recycled WSJ bloviations as well. Spare me those odious filler trivia blocks.
I want to know what’s on the school lunch menu. I want to know what’s on the school board agenda. I want to know what the budget for the county’s road and bridges fund is buying. I want to know what the hours are at my local public library. I want to know what movies are showing in town and what time they start. I want to know what the phone numbers are for the food bank and what the city bus route map looks like, and if you could give me a decent weather forecast that would be a bonus. Put in the phone numbers for the school, and include the names and contact information for the paper’s editorial staff (not just circulation, advertising and the obit desk, thankyouverymuch). While you’re at it, run the names and district numbers, AT LEAST ONCE A WEEK, of my city councilmen, state legislators, and federal Congresscritters.
I want to have the legal notices in print big enough to read; save the effin’ agate for the blankety-blank stock closing notices, and put the girls’ high school basketball box scores in 10 point or better.
And *damn* your eyes, you editors and reporters and newsroom managers, if a man is shot dead in his front yard in my city and you get the call an hour before deadline, I want to know who he was and where he lived and why he was shot and what the police are doing, and whether I need to be on the lookout for the last vehicle seen in the vicinity — I do NOT want to have it swept under the rug as “oh, that’s just one nig– shooting another one.” If a woman reports a sexual assault, you keep your arrogant crack about “the hooker’s check bounced” up your own piehole and print the description of the suspect and the location of the attack so every other woman in town has a decent warning. It’s not your fracking job to bottle up the news because of the neighborhood where it happens or because your precious advertisers might be boycotted by some Self-Identified-Christian nutcase(s).
Your job is to report the news, and if you do your job right I should know as much about your personal politics and your financial aspirations as I know about the personal politics and financial aspirations of the tape in the videocassette: NOT ONE IOTA, because that’s not what the news is. What the news is is what’s happening, and whether you like what’s happening or not, whether your advertisers are thrilled with your coverage (particularly of them when they’re at fault) or not, doesn’t matter a bit. The news is the news, and your job is to report it. Report all of it that will fit, and don’t frell around with fillers and ‘features’ and canned editorials.
Write the truth. Challenge your readers to think for themselves, don’t spoon-feed them the corporate line. In the long run the world will be better for it and you will have helped.
REPRESENTING YOU WITH HONESTY AND INTEGRITY
I’m Francine Busby and I’m running for Congress to represent the people of California’s 50th congressional district with the honesty and integrity they deserve. I will start by demanding higher ethical standards from our representatives–we must restore public trust in Congress.
We need honesty and civility in Congress to resolve the issues that are important to all our families. I’ll work with both parties to make our families safe and secure, stop out of control deficit spending and make our families healthier. We will build a stronger America by focusing on values that unite us.
Working together, we will solve real problems for real people and make California a better place to live, work and raise a family.
Please send Francine some love….
Heh. Guess he got the message…but who, oh who, will get to replace him? Hmmm…
California Congressman Resigns After Admitting He Took Bribes - New York Times
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Rep. Randy ”Duke” Cunningham pleaded guilty Monday to conspiracy and tax charges and tearfully resigned from office, admitting he took $2.4 million in bribes to steer defense contracts to conspirators.
Cunningham, 63, entered pleas in U.S. District Court to charges of conspiracy to commit bribery, mail fraud and wire fraud, and tax evasion for underreporting his income in 2004.
Cunningham answered ”yes, Your Honor” when asked by U.S. District Judge Larry Burns if he had accepted bribes from someone in exchange for his performance of official duties.
Later, at a news conference, he wiped away tears as he announced his resignation.
”I can’t undo what I have done but I can atone,” he said.
Cunningham, an eight-term Republican congressman, had already announced in July that he would not seek re-election next year.
House Ethics rules say that any lawmaker convicted of a felony no longer should vote or participate in committee work. Under Republican caucus rules, Cunningham also would have lost his chairmanship of the House Intelligence subcommittee on terrorism and human intelligence.
The former Vietnam War flying ace was known on Capitol Hill for his interest in defense issues and his occasional temperamental outbursts.
After the hearing, Cunningham was taken away for fingerprinting and released on his own recognizance until a Feb. 27 sentencing hearing. He could receive up to 10 years in prison.
He also agreed to forfeit to the government his Rancho Santa Fe home, more than $1.8 million in cash and antiques and rugs.
In a statement, prosecutors said Cunningham admitted to receiving at least $2.4 million in bribes paid to him by several conspirators through a variety of methods, including checks totaling over $1 million, cash, rugs, antiques, furniture, yacht club fees and vacations.
”He did the worst thing an elected official can do — he enriched himself through his position and violated the trust of those who put him there,” U.S. Attorney Carol Lam said. The statement did not identify the conspirators.
The case began when authorities started investigating whether Cunningham and his wife, Nancy, used the proceeds from the $1,675,000 sale to defense contractor Mitchell Wade to buy the $2.55 million mansion in Rancho Santa Fe. Wade put the Del Mar house back on the market and sold it after nearly a year for $975,000 — a loss of $700,000.
He drew little notice outside his San Diego-area district before the San Diego Union-Tribune reported last June that he’d sold the home to Wade.
Cunningham’s pleas came amid a series of GOP scandals. Rep. Tom DeLay of Texas had to step down as majority leader after he was indicted in a campaign finance case; a stock sale by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is being looked at by regulators; and Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff was indicted in the CIA leak case.
Resign, Cunningscam!
Print Story: Calif. Congressman Admits Taking Bribes on Yahoo! News
Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham pleaded guilty Monday to conspiracy and tax charges, admitting taking $2.4 million in bribes in a case that grew from an investigation into the sale of his home to a wide-ranging conspiracy involving payments in cash, vacations and antiques.
Cunningham, 63, entered pleas in U.S. District Court to charges of conspiracy to commit bribery, mail fraud and wire fraud, and tax evasion for underreporting his income in 2004.
Cunningham answered “yes, Your Honor” when asked by U.S. District Judge Larry Burns if he had accepted bribes from someone in exchange for his performance of official duties.
Cunningham, an eight-term Republican congressman, announced in July that he wouldn’t seek re-election next year. But it was not immediately clear whether he hoped to keep his seat for the remainder of the current term. He planned to address reporters at a news conference later in the morning.
House Ethics rules say that any lawmaker convicted of a felony no longer should vote or participate in committee work. Under Republican caucus rules, Cunningham also would lose his chairmanship of the House Intelligence subcommittee on terrorism and human intelligence.
The former Vietnam War flying ace is known on Capitol Hill for his interest in defense issues and his occasional temperamental outbursts.
After the hearing, Cunningham was taken away for fingerprinting. He will be released on his own recognizance until a Feb. 27 sentencing hearing. He could receive a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
He also agreed to forfeit to the government his Rancho Santa Fe home, more than $1.8 million in cash and antiques and rugs.
In a statement, prosecutors said Cunningham admitted to receiving at least $2.4 million in bribes paid to him by several conspirators through a variety of methods, including checks totaling over $1 million, cash, rugs, antiques, furniture, yacht club fees and vacations.
“He did the worst thing an elected official can do — he enriched himself through his position and violated the trust of those who put him there,” U.S. Attorney Carol Lam said. The statement did not identify the conspirators.
The case began when authorities started investigating whether Cunningham and his wife, Nancy, used the proceeds from the $1,675,000 sale to defense contractor Mitchell Wade to buy a $2.55 million mansion in ritzy Rancho Santa Fe. Wade put the Del Mar house back on the market and sold it after nearly a year for $975,000 — a loss of $700,000.
He drew little notice outside his San Diego-area district before the San Diego Union-Tribune reported last June that he’d sold the home to Wade.
Cunningham’s pleas came amid a series of GOP scandals. Rep. Tom DeLay of Texas had to step down as majority leader after he was indicted in a campaign finance case; a stock sale by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is being looked at by regulators; and Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff was indicted in the CIA leak case.
___
Handmade European Dovetail Markers by Richard Kell
“Measure twice, cut once,” said the old craftsman.
Only careful planning and patient skill make a dovetail.Early cabinetmakers were faced with the problem of joining two pieces of wood together at a right angle so that they would bear the stress not only of use but of the weather as well. Especially in places where the summers are hot and humid and the winters are dry and cold, a plank of wood might change its dimensions by a quarter- to a half-inch. Quite enough to make joints fall apart and drawers stick!
The dovetail joint holds because the two interlocked pieces of wood expand and contract at the same rate. The direction of the pull is against the locking of the joint. The byproduct of all this fine craft is a joint so precisely fitted that it is a thing of beauty in and of itself.
Cutting a dovetail joint is a demanding skill. The lines must be laid out with great care, and the cutting must be carefully done using a thin saw. The waste must be slowly trimmed away with a sharp chisel until both sides mate tightly. The making of a dovetail joint requires planning, skill, and patience.
Nowadays, cheap synthetic materials do not breathe with the seasons. That might reduce inconvenience, but it has also reduced the chance for another relationship to Tao. For when the cabinetmakers sought to build furniture that was compatible with the wood, the seasons, and their own ingenuity, they were perfectly in tune with Tao.
We seem to have lost so many of the old arts. My home has a lot of craftsman-style furniture, but they are not the real thing, they are copies. We’ve had to fix the chairs several times, which wouldn’t happen with a truly well-crafted chair. Unfortunately it’s difficult to justify spending what it takes to buy really fine craftsmanship, but I’m finally starting to get to the point in my life where I can afford it more easily.
I just gave my sister-in-law and her husband a couple of paintings I did for them. Somehow it seems what I can do so easily and lightly, like my painting, is so difficult for others to do. No, I’m not a great artist, I just stopped being afraid to try and create something that others actually appreciate. It doesn’t matter to me that my art sells or not, it’s just fun for me and sometimes others appreciate it as well.
I think what is important in life is to create and to explore our capabilities. Some of us will become fine crafters and artists. Some of us may just make a bookshelf like the one that sits in my kitchen, created by my husband in high school woodshop. Where have all those woodshop classes gone? Why aren’t we teaching our kids these things anymore? Over the bookshelf hangs one of my paintings, of California poppies. A painting I did of sunflowers hangs on the other side of the kitchen. People are amazed when I tell them I painted these pictures! And yet, it’s not so difficult.
Whatever art or craft you wish to try, please do so. It is so rewarding to be able to surround yourself with things made by your own hand, those of friends and family, or other fine crafters you come to meet, like the silversmith I buy most of my jewelry from. And it is so much more rewarding than the cheap imitation things we see everywhere.
A coarse sieve catches little.
A fine mesh catches more.
If you want the subtle, be refined,
But prepare to deal with the coarse.The irony of spiritual living is that you become more sensitive and more subtle. Therefore, you become intolerant of the coarse. There is not much choice in this. If you want to catch the subtle things in life, then you must become refined yourself. But the coarser things will then accumulate all the more quickly. A coarse sieve in a rushing stream will hold back only debris and large rocks. A fine mesh will catch smaller things, but it will also retain the large.
Some people attempt to cope with this by becoming multilayered. They set up a series of screens to their personalities, from the coarse to the subtle so that they can deal with all that life has to offer. This is quite laudable from an ordinary point of view, but from the point of view of Tao, it is a great deal of bother.
What do we do? If we remain coarse, then only the coarse comes to us. If we become subtle, then we gain the refined but are plagued with the coarse as well. If we become multilayered, then we create a complexity that isolates us from Tao.
The solution lies in floating on the current of Tao, uniting with it. That way we no longer seek to hold or to reject.
“Trouble is a sieve through which we sift our acquaintances.
Those too big to pass through are our friends.”
– Arlene Francis
“They consider me to have sharp and penetrating vision because I see them through the mesh of a sieve.”
– Kahlil Gibran
“The wise ones fashioned speech with their thought, sifting it as grain is sifted through a sieve.” — Buddha
A sieve is a really interesting device. Sometimes you use them to keep things in, sometimes you use them to filter things out. If you’ve been keeping things in for too long, though, the sieve fills up and becomes rather useless, since it’s too full to do its job well. I think of my periods of quiet and meditation as the times when I “dump the sieve”, and let go of all the crap I’ve been collecting. Sometimes I do this with these postings, sometimes, it’s just quiet time or time spent in my garden, or yoga.
I think I’ve always had a pretty fine mesh, really. I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t very sensitive, very aware of and filtering pretty much everything that was going on around me through my own mesh of thought. I’ve known so many things about people, both refined and coarse things, that they didn’t think I knew, but since I don’t go spreading those things about, it’s rarely been a problem for me.
The times it has been a problem is when I have seen something coming into someone’s life and tried too hard to filter it out for them. These days I’ve realized I can’t be anyone else’s sieve, only my own. Everyone has to catch the things coming into their own life for themselves. Trying to rescue them rarely works, no matter how good our intentions are. The result of forcing your own sieve into someone else’s stream is typically only a rather sudden splashback that just makes you all wet. And the things you collect can be very difficult to dislodge from your filter when they get stuck. Then you have to have the sieve professionally cleaned, which is very expensive. Sometimes the mesh breaks and has to be repaired, which can take a long time.
And really, why collect all that stuff anyway? Indeed, it’s so much better just to enjoy the flow of the clear, cool current than to get caught up in the rocks and sand.
Wow, finally someone figures out that tax cuts can hurt the rich,too.
Sometimes, a Tax Cut for the Wealthy Can Hurt the Wealthy - New York Times
WHEN market forces cause income inequality to grow, public policy in most countries tends to push in the opposite direction. In the United States, however, we enact tax cuts for the wealthy and cut public services for the needy. Cynics explain this curious inversion by saying that the wealthy have captured the political process in Washington and are exploiting it to their own advantage.
This explanation makes sense, however, only if those in power have an extremely naïve understanding of their own interests. A careful reading of the evidence suggests that even the wealthy have been made worse off, on balance, by recent tax cuts. The private benefits of these cuts have been much smaller, and their indirect costs much larger, than many recipients appear to have anticipated.
On the benefit side, tax cuts have led the wealthy to buy larger houses, in the seemingly plausible expectation that doing so would make them happier. As economists increasingly recognize, however, well-being depends less on how much people consume in absolute terms than on the social context in which consumption occurs. Compelling evidence suggests that for the wealthy in particular, when everyone’s house grows larger, the primary effect is merely to redefine what qualifies as an acceptable dwelling.
So, although the recent tax cuts have enabled the wealthy to buy more and bigger things, these purchases appear to have had little impact. As the economist Richard Layard has written, “In a poor country, a man proves to his wife that he loves her by giving her a rose, but in a rich country, he must give a dozen roses.”
On the cost side of the ledger, the federal budget deficits created by the recent tax cuts have had serious consequences, even for the wealthy. These deficits will exceed $300 billion for each of the next six years, according to projections by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. The most widely reported consequences of the deficits have been cuts in government programs that serve the nation’s poorest families. And since the wealthy are well represented in our political system, their favored programs may seem safe from the budget ax. Wealthy families have further insulated themselves by living in gated communities and sending their children to private schools. Yet such steps go only so far.
For example, deficits have led to cuts in federal financing for basic scientific research, even as the United States’ share of global patents granted continues to decline. Such cuts threaten the very basis of our long-term economic prosperity. As Senator Pete Domenici, Republican of New Mexico, said: “We thought we’d keep the high-end jobs, and others would take the low-end jobs. We’re now on track to a second-rate economy and a second-rate country.”
Large deficits also threaten our public health. Thus, despite the increasing threat from micro-organisms like E. coli 0157, the government inspects beef processing plants at only a quarter the rate it did in the early 1980’s. Poor people have died from eating contaminated beef but so have rich people.
Citing revenue shortfalls, the nation postpones maintenance of its streets and highways, even though doing so means having to spend two to five times as much on repairs in the long run. In the short run, bad roads cause thousands of accidents each year, many of them fatal. Poor people die in these accidents but so do rich people. When a pothole destroys a tire and wheel, replacements cost only $63 for a Ford Escort but $1,569 for a Porsche 911.
Well worth a read :
TomDispatch - Tomgram: Jonathan Schell, Welcome to Camp Quagmire
“Most important, in the political arena, the United States is weak, precisely because in the contemporary world military force no longer translates easily into political rule. ‘Covenants, without the sword, are but words,’ Hobbes said. Since then, the world has learned that swords without covenants are but empty bloodshed. The Romans in ancient times were able to convert military victories into lasting political power. The United States today cannot. In the political arena, the lesson of the world revolt — that winning military victories may sometimes be easy but building political institutions in foreign lands is hard, often impossible — still obtains. The nation so keenly interested in ‘regime change’ has small interest in ‘nation-building’ and less capacity to carry it out. The United States is mistrusted, often hated, around the world. If it embarks on a plan of imperial domination, it will be hated still more. Can cruise missiles build nations? Does power still flow from the barrel of a gun — or from a B-2 bomber? Can the world in the twenty-first century really be ruled from 35,000 feet? Modern peoples have the will to resist and the means to do so. Imperialism without politics is a naive imperialism. In our time, force can win a battle or two but politics is destiny.”
All mystical traditions are one.
They are the seed of all religions.Tao. Zen. Tantra. Yoga. Kabbalah. Sufi. Mystic Christianity. Shamanism. And so many more secretly treasured by their adherents. These all share the same mystical sense of communion with the divine. Meditation is not something peculiar to one culture.
All cultures know a mystical core that emphasizes continuing refinement, meditation, and unification with the greater cosmos. I call that greater order Tao. They call it by different names. What does it matter what people call it? When they discovered what was holy, they uttered different sounds according to their history and culture, but they all discovered the same thing. There is only one divine source in life.
For generations, mystics of all traditions have plunged into Tao. When they meet on the unutterable levels, they know without words that they have reached the same core of spirituality. No matter where in the world you are, there are traditions with the purity to lead you to Tao.
“The mystical life is the centre of all that I do and all that I think and all that I write. . . .” — William Butler Yeats
“This overcoming of all the usual barriers between the individual and the Absolute is the great mystic achievement. In mystic states we both become one with the Absolute and we become aware of our oneness. This is the everlasting and triumphant mystical tradition, hardly altered by differences of clime or creed.” — William James
“We follow the mystics. They know where they are going. They, too, go astray, but when they go astray they do so in a way that is mystical, dark, and mysterious.” — Ryszard Kapuscinski
“The greatest religious problem today is how to be both a mystic and a militant; in other words how to combine the search for an expansion of inner awareness with effective social action, and how to feel one’s true identity in both” — Ursula K. LeGuin
“The people fancy they hate poetry, and they are all poets and mystics.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
“What does mysticism really mean? It means the way to attain knowledge. It’s close to philosophy, except in philosophy you go horizontally while in mysticism you go vertically.” — Elie Wiesel
“The new meaning of soul is creativity and mysticism. These will become the foundation of the new psychological type and with him or her will come the new civilization.” — Otto Rank
The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named is not the eternal name.
The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth.
The named is the mother of ten thousand things.
Ever desireless, one can see the mystery.
Ever desiring, one can see the manifestations.
These two spring from the same source but differ in name;
this appears as darkness.
Darkness within darkness.
The gate to all mystery.
– Tao Te Ching, 1
Mysticism can get a pretty bad rap, if people don’t really understand it. To me, what I gain from the Tao is a conscious awareness of life, of what is going on around me, of what is going on inside of me. It gives me a greater control over what I choose to react to or ignore, and a greater understanding of what is really important in life. I gain the ability to appreciate the beauty of a single leaf or flower, yet not lose sight of the entire plant, even its roots in the soil. It is a connection to the feeling of life itself, not only what it means to me, but to any thing that is alive, plant or animal or person, and how we relate to each other.
I’ve gained patience and calmness, a detachment from expectation and results and an awareness of process, how things happen rather than merely what happens. I’ve learned to attend to small matters before they become large problems. I’ve learned to not merely accept what happens but to affect the way things happen. I’ve learned how to increase my own awareness and begin to advance the awareness of others as well. It’s not about all the things people associate with mysticism - it is about getting to the heart of yourself and from there, being able to get to the heart of anything or anyone. You end up not beling capable of being fooled or tricked by anyone, even yourself, because you have met and conquered the ultimate trickster. You know the trickster will win the final meeting, but until then, you’ve got him beat.
So what’s the secret? That there is no secret - this is what is - as long as we believe it should be this way. When we begin to believe something else, things change. “It is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.” What mysticism teaches is that if you are unhappy with how things are, you must change yourself - “be the change you want to see in the world.” The connection with the divine is the realization that you are the divine - that you control your own fate. This is a dangerous position since others can no longer control you, and society is based on controlling the actions of others. See why mystical traditions are put down by society?
If I can figure out how to get out of this press conference….
Tiles of carnelian, lapis, and jade,
The muralist sets his picture
One centimeter at a time.
Every piece alone is precious;
Together they make a priceless whole.Not far from where I grew up, there was a muralist whose specialty was mosaic. He accepted commissions from all over the world and also collaborated with a number of famous artists on their murals and sculptures. He had bins and buckets full of all sorts of fascinating tiles. Some were red, blue, and yellow glass. Others were elaborately glazed ceramic. A few were stones like lapis, turquoise, malachite, and obsidian. Some were even mirrored with gold and silver, and these would shine out first whenever he would wash away the grout.
God may be in the details, but it is also important to know the big picture.
That is where the muralist is such a great example. He knew what the big picture had to be, and yet he had enough concentration to piece together enormous tableaus out of tiny square centimeters. That is knowing both the small and the big. Follow his example and you will never be petty; yet you will not lose sight of the relationship between the microcosmic and the macrocosmic.
“There are very few human beings who receive the truth, complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic.” — Anais Nin
“Each of us puts in one little stone, and then you get a great mosaic at the end.” — Alice Paul
“We’ll rebuild, of course, … But what made New Orleans is the polyglot, the tapestry, the mosaic, the gumbo. So the French Quarter gets most of the attention, but the Quarter feeds from the arteries of the neighborhoods.”
– Marc Morial
There are so many of us who are focused on that one little tile of our own lives. We don’t see how we fit with the other pieces around us, forming a much larger picture. We think the little pieces aren’t as important as we are, the much larger, richer pieces, but if we stepped back and looked at the whole picture, we would know that if the smallest piece falls out of place the picture becomes lesser for it. The mosaic of our society is large and rich, and all the pieces need to be firmly secured for the entire picture to work.
Being able to see and understand the relationship between things has been a really useful skill for me in all parts of my life. I see the whole picture as well as the pieces, and I have a fairly good understanding of how they work together.
In my work as a quality engineer, I’ve seen how important it is to pay attention to the smallest details, to catch and correct small problems before they develop into larger ones that are very expensive to repair, or can even completely disrupt the system.
In our society today, there are a number of very disturbing trends - the inequitable distribution of wealth, the enormous levels of debt we are piling up in terms of private, corporate and government debt, the huge sums of money we are spending on our military and the attempts to gut the support programs for the neediest among us. These are all very troubling and disturbing trends. Economically, there will probably be a crisis within the next few years, and those who are not prepared to face it will be the worst off. I wonder at those who want to cut off those lines of support, how they can think that hurting those in our society who can least afford it is a good thing, while giving tax cuts to those who don’t need them. It’s like polishing the prettiest tiles in the mosaic while the other pieces fall out - and the whole picture is less for it. Eventually, with the other pieces gone, those rich pretty tiles fall as well.
The Romans of the Decadence, Thomas Couture
Powdered concubine dressed in rich silks –
Feet bound, body soft, lips slack –
Views lotuses through binoculars.
A dragonfly alights on her motionless fan.How do you know when your own life verges on decadence?
Certainly when the force of form becomes more important that the force of substance. When etiquette and morals become more important that understanding and righteousness. When procedure becomes more important than creativity. When gratifying your lust becomes more important than giving to others. When patriotism becomes more important than measured governing and enlightened treatment of other nations. When the act of eating becomes more important than considerations of nutrition. When the opera becomes more important than helping the poor and homeless. When one’s own comfort becomes more important than the suffering of loved ones. When ambition becomes more important than benevolence. When prestige becomes more important than charity. When the academy becomes more important than the streets. When loud expression becomes more important than listening to others. When outrageousness becomes more important than communication. When connoisseurship becomes more important than simple acts. When style becomes more important than function. When books become more important than teachers. When expediency becomes more important than the elderly.
When you smell these things happening, you are not far from decadence.
“America may be unique in being a country which has leapt from barbarism to decadence without touching civilization.”– John O’Hara
“As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying it. Words are to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests.” — Gore Vidal
“The decadent international but individualistic capitalism in the hands of which we found ourselves after the war is not a success. It is not intelligent. It is not beautiful. It is not just. It is not virtuous. And it doesn’t deliver the goods.” — John Maynard Keynes
Our local MoveOn.org group and some of the DFA folks got together on Wednesday to organize a protest against the Republican plan to cut medical benefits for the poor and elderly:
Local activists held a protest Wednesday in front of the 50th Congressional District offices of U.S. Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, as part of a nationwide push by a political group called Moveon.org to pressure conservative leaders in Congress to drop proposed cuts to social programs for the poor.
As several speakers addressed a group of about 20 people on what they called Republicans “Reverse Robin Hood economics”, listeners waved signs emblazoned with slogans like: “Where’s the compassion; Resign, scram Cunningham; Stop GOP attack on poor Americans.”
The Republican response was pretty typical:
San Diego County Republican Party Chairman Ron Nehring called Democrats’ efforts to paint conservatives as helping the rich and hurting the poor, “just a political game on the part of liberal Democrats who have never met a spending program they didn’t like.
“I have read this sort of stuff before —- it’s called Karl Marx,” Nehring continued. “The Republicans in Congress are working to cut spending by $50 billion in a $2.5 trillion budget; that is not a lot of money as a percent of overall federal spending.”
I guess corporate welfare and tax cuts for people who don’t really need them are more important to Republicans than making sure that the poor and elderly are cared for. I guess spending billions to develop useless weapons systems is more important than making sure people get the medical care they need. Are we a decadent nation, or what? Well, at least those of us who vote Republican certainly are.
The Great Wall,1998, by Limin Jiang Huang
Be self-sufficient but not isolated.
When the king of China closed the borders,
Centuries of stagnation and decadence began.All the philosophy of Tao is intended to lead to self-sufficiency. Whatever one needs to do in life, one should be able to do on one’s own. Whether one is trapped in the wilderness or whether one is dealing with a social gathering requiring etiquette and grace, one should be able to cope with aplomb and ease.
Being self-sufficient is not the same as being isolated. This is a very important point. When the king of China closed the borders, the country was self-sufficient enough to enjoy the isolation very well. The entire nation withdrew into a magic contentment. But eventually an inbred society developed. Stagnation and decay set in.
The same problems can arise in people who are so self-sufficient that they fail to engage life fully. Either they will implode from the sheer weight of their own decadence and stagnation, or they will explode once the outside world confronts them with something they cannot comprehend.
Those who follow Tao roam the world. They may avail themselves of the temporary advantages of withdrawal and intense self-cultivation, but they do not become permanently isolated. They flow with the Tao, are with all things, and therefore avoid decadence.
Deng Ming Tao, 365 Tao
“Happiness belongs to the self-sufficient” — Aristotle
“If you will discipline yourself to make your mind self-sufficient you will thereby be least vulnerable to injury from the outside.”
– Critias of Athens
“Interdependence is and ought to be as much the ideal of man as self-sufficiency. Man is a social being.” — Mahatma Gandhi
“The consuming desire of most human beings is deliberately to plant their whole life in the hands of some other person. I would describe this method of searching for happiness as immature. Development of character consists solely in moving toward self-sufficiency.” — Quentin Crisp
“Let’s face it. In most of life we really are interdependent. We need each other. Staunch independence is an illusion, but heavy dependence isn’t healthy, either. The only position of long-term strength is interdependence: win/win.” — Greg Anderson
“In the progress of personality, first comes a declaration of independence, then a recognition of interdependence.”
– Henry Van Dyke
“Solitude vivifies; isolation kills” — Joseph Roux
“Life’s errors cry for the merciful beauty that can modulate their isolation into a harmony with the whole.” — Rabindranath Tagore
I’m very self-sufficient, and really have to be careful not to isolate myself. But I know the difference between self-sufficiency, which feels really good to me, and isolation, which feels intensely wrong. I went through a period of feeling isolated, when I had to be with someone else in order to even feel ok. That was a very uncomfortable feeling I hope I never experience again.
Perhaps that’s why now I enjoy my self-sufficiency so much. I like that I don’t need to have someone else around me to make me feel complete, that I no longer long for a particular person and desire them so much that I end up screwing up my life and relationships. It’s really good to be free of all that. But when others need me, I try really hard to be there for them, because I understand what that denial and rejection can feel like. Gandhi was right - interdependence is the ideal. We need to be there for others, and sometimes, we need others there for us. Building great walls doesn’t just keep others out- it also locks you inside.
Shunyam Thul (Peter F. Schaden)
Chopsticks made from bamboo –
Too poor to afford silverware.
Tender bamboo shoots for food –
Too poor to afford meat.Why were people of old so integrated with their surroundings? Because the objects that they used, the food that they ate, and the activities that they engaged in were straight from their surroundings. They used sticks made from bamboo as eating implements. They used vines to make baskets. They used gourds as vessels. For food, they grew plants, domesticated animals, and caught fish and game. Their social structure was built around the cycles of the sun, moon, and stars. Newborn babies were washed with the waters of the nearest stream. The dead were buried in the same earth that provided sustenance.
Now our food is imported from distant places and elaborately processed. We have no idea where objects we purchase come from, thinking that their presence and convenience is all that is necessary. We have means of transport that can bring us to places faster than our minds can adjust. We abuse our wealth and use it to insulate ourselves from our surroundings.
That’s why being of modest means is not necessarily bad. When one is poor, one is forced to use what is at hand. It is Tao that brings us these things. The closer we can be to the earth and to nature, the more integrated with life we shall be. Followers of Tao never complain about feeling alienated from life : They have no choice. Their every action keeps them synchronized with the movement of Tao.
“Have compassion for all beings, rich and poor alike; each has their suffering. Some suffer too much, others too little.” — Buddha
“Who, being loved, is poor?” — Oscar Wilde
“Ghetto-dwellers are the great fantasists. There was an extraordinary vibrancy there, an imaginative life. When you are that poor, all you’ve got left is your belief in the imagination.” — Ben Okri
“If thou live according to nature, thou wilt never be poor; if according to the opinions of the world, thou wilt never be rich.” — Seneca
“But I, being poor, have only my dreams. I have spread my dreams under your feet; tread softly, because you tread on my dreams.”
– William Butler Yeats
“If you’re in trouble, or hurt or need — go to the poor people. They’re the only ones that’ll help — the only ones.” — John Steinbeck
When the Tao is present in the universe,
The horses haul manure.
When the Tao is absent from the universe,
War horses are bred outside the city.There is no greater sin than desire,
No greater curse than discontent,
No greater misfortune than wanting something for oneself.
Therefore he who knows that enough is enough will always have enough.– Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 46
When we didn’t have a lot of money, and were getting pretty far into debt actually, I learned to make do with what I had, to shop for things on sale, and to stretch a dollar as far as it could go. We were living on one income then while I cared for the kids when they were little and went to school part time to get my MBA. I grew a garden so we had fresh veggies. I still garden, but don’t worry so much about getting the veggies - the dogs typically eat the tomatoes and whatever else they like, and I don’t have to worry about it now.
I’m slowly learning to care a lot more about where my food comes from and try to buy locally when I can. There is a farmer’s market on Saturdays that I should go to more often, I think. I shop a lot at the local stores, and try to avoid the big chains as much as I can. I notice myself staying closer ot home these days, not needing to go other places to amuse myself.
It’s nice to have the luxury of not having to worry about money. Sure, we could live in a bigger place or drive fancier cars, but we would be paying a lot more for those choices. By learning to make do and live small, and know that isn’t a bad thing, we now have the luxury of time, extra money to do what we like and support good causes, and the joy of knowing what things in life are really important, and what things are just the product of a consumer society that never knows when enough is enough.
You are one of life’s enjoyers, determined to get the most you can out of your brief spell on Earth. Probably what first attracted you to atheism was the prospect of liberation from the Ten Commandments, few of which are compatible with a life of pleasure. You play hard and work quite hard, have a strong sense of loyalty and a relaxed but consistent approach to your philosophy.
You can’t see the point of abstract principles and probably wouldn’t lay down your life for a concept though you might for a friend. Something of a champagne humanist, you admire George Bernard Shaw for his cheerful agnosticism and pursuit of sensual rewards and your Hollywood hero is Marlon Brando, who was beautiful, irascible and aimed for goodness in his own tortured way.
Sometimes you might be tempted to allow your own pleasures to take precedence over your ethics. But everyone is striving for that elusive balance between the good and the happy life. You’d probably open another bottle and say there’s no contest.
