silent thunder

What remains unfed, soon whithers and falls away. Attention craves more.

Burned through God's Debris by Scott Adams last night. Clever, witty and at times quite deep. Didn't know the Dilbert Artist was such a deep well. Next up is Mindfulness. The Path to the Deathless by Ajahn Sumedho. Going into this one blind, found it while sifting through boxes of my wife's Buddhist collections for books to donate to our library.

I would not characterize it as wei wu wei. On reflection, I haven't seen an American, (or modern policitican anywhere) who to me embodies anything near the qualities of Wei Wu Wei. But I'm rather skewed against our Imperialist Machine from a foundational perspective. To me she's very purposely and calculatedtly maneuvering through the modern American political bog with obvious skill and experience, seemingly deftly... but I have almost no stomach for any of this in recent years. Modern American politics or as I call it, The Corporatocracy is a nauseating bog to me, in both its membership, intentions and process. Oligarchy doesn't begin to describe the depth of the sycophancy I perceive in the voting actions of our 'representatives' to corporate interests and self serving budget parasitism. It's really nauseating. I spent years utterly ignoring the news to great effect internally. Lately, with all the surreal behavior I try to poke my nose in briefly a couple times a week, but I sense another impending Media Fast approaching for me.

Love, love, love Bonsai! Up in Pasadena, bout an hour north of us... The Huntington Library has a Japanese Garden that is world class. Their Bonsai section has tripled over the years and is one of my favorite haunts, particularly on cloudy days this time of year in the cool non summer months. A few of my girlfriends...

fluidity of and within bone... intrinsic motion. breathing flow through the entirety of our 'structure'... aquatic breathing... i find this utterly mesmerizing. spine in fluid origin... bone is filled with fluid, it is connective tissue.

Hey friend. It was last year, early/mid December.

the portals to heaven and hell... seem to arise right here, within my awareness.

Right on! Whatever gets ya through the night... it's alright... it's alright.

I'm not poking my nose in much news these daze... but whenever I do... I'm gobsmacked by this fire fuck scenario. I read just now that California is sending 23 veteran firefighters to help and all I could think was... "now? you're sending them now? and a whole 23 of them!? why aren't their entire crews from multiple nations coming in to support?" I had assumed that other nations were already sending military and fire crews to aid. gobsmacked

That's a good point about simple tool versus systemic influence effect... rereading it reveals to me that the screwdriver analogy is an over-simplification. Much appreciate that, and much appreciate exploring this topic.

Sure, her sensitivity to sleep position has a bit of "backstory" to it i love puns... but I'll give the barest version of it here, since it relates to getting restful sleep and pillows: My wife fell down a long flight of stairs in our second apartment and fractured her spine in two places when she was 22-23. She fractured her Coccyx and T-7. She was found unresponsive, no pulse and revived, by me. Boy was she pissed at me when I brought her round... going from blissful mother light to agonizing pain. But I will keep this short. The T-7 fracture went undiagnosed for about 15 years. Weeks after the coccyx healed, she was still experiencing severe pain. Eventually she said "fuck this... I'm moving again" turned on a drumming cd of mine and began to dance through the pain to the drumming of the Burundi Tribe. I'll never forget that song, it played in our home for hours on end, for weeks on end. She danced into the pain, through the pain and eventually out the other side. She healed herself through what I now know as 'ecstatic dance'. She recovered fully and for about 15 years, lived pain free. When the pain began to return regularly later in life, she sought a chiropractor who revealed the old T-7 fracture that was causing the discomfort. She found daily dance and Hatha kept it at bay. Cut to now another 15 years later. Being over 50, if she sleeps on her side, without good support for her topside leg, the leg drops down, cocking her hips and taking spine out of a neutral position... which causes inflammation in the soft tissue aggravating the old T-7 site resulting in discomfort. After witnessing my springyness in rising each morning pain free, she began 'borrowing' my pillow for her knees, then her shoulder. Eventually she got her own support pillows and we have quite the pillow nest when we sleep... our cats regale our wisdom in this in their daily lounging on our persian pillow palace. It seems simple, but experience has shown us that it really makes a profound difference to sleep with the spine in a neutral position. We use an air-chamber mattress, so that the firmness may be adjusted on any given day, to suit requirements as they adjust. Mine is topped up to maximum every week, she varies her side to accomodate her needs. We're very happy with it, though recently I've considered getting one of the memory foam covers, as she slept so soundly on one, during one of our recent vacation stays.

Your name suggests much feeling to me... a retreat from pain. Though I place no value judgement on it and it is just my innate response on your presence here. Retreat in the presence of severe pain is a path to healing in my experience. Isolation after trauima allows for assimilation and shift to occur in relative safety of the coccoon of withdrawal. Time without more trauma is to me the surest path to recovery. Withdrawal in this state, from contact with others and from our own emotional range is perfectly healthy and often I find in my own self... needed. My life has followed a path of Tao as I look back on it from age 50, in that my participation in life and my withdrawal from it work like a bellows. Periods of exuberant exploration and reaching out, exploring and discovering is followed by periods of withdrawal and isolation where what has been experienced is assimilated in solitude. Inevitably there comes an unfolding and reaching out again. A natural and healthful cycle that at times, was cause for concern, specifically for me, when I felt I'd been seculded and isolated for 'too long'. Experience has allowed me to have more faith that instinctually, life responds to intention and all unfolds as its nature dictates. You have set your intention and acted upon it and it will bear fruit. Allow this to unfold, while nurturing it, but don't necessarily feel the need to 'always be doing something to it'. I'm reminded of this in my own life, when I have an intention and then fret on it ceaselessly... like the farmer, who, tugging at the shoots of his crop in a desire to help them grow faster, harms their development. I no longer seek joy or happiness, but contentment. Happiness has been revealed to me as an unsustainable high, a matter of some mania, which requires investment to maintain. One that will inevitably fall under its own weight, or cease when the conditions of life that bring its state, alter... dropping one into the flip side of happy which is despair. Contentment I experience as not requiring upkeep and may be maintained indefinitely. By centering in awareness where acknowledgement of what is, is at it is and that it will change no matter if it is pleasant or not. I may act or not to influence this, and in this the unpleasant is rendered less unpleasant and in the midst of it, I still experience contentment. Water is water. As is our true nature. Though the water may be turbulent, or serene, the nature of water is unchanged. Emotions and thought attachment is like this for me... causing the water to appear smooth or choppy. If i identify with the form of the waves, i seem to readily identify as happy and/or despairing... like clouds in the sky... they may be wispy and white, or thunderous and black... yet the sky is unmarred by either. Our true nature is like this to me... like sky.

Sarvapriyananda puts it in words very effectively for me in the final two minutes, where he reveals the difference between experience and memory. When we are looking at a clock... what need is there to remember the clock? If I am doing that, I am doing something odd indeed. Whether the river is turbulent, or calm. The water is water.

Well said. Gnosis as a revelation to mind of the nature of our True Nature. As Sarvapriyananda reveals so succinctly in his answer above... "what you become, can never slip away from that reality." Even though mind may become focused on emotions and thoughts... the Nature of being abides foundationally. Awareness remains Awareness, no matter what localized awareness experiences. True Nature is like space... I may suffer from the notion that I have slipped away from it, but have I? It is always present. Buildings are built within space, but is the space diminished? And when the buildings (or forests, or mountains) eventually fall, through burning or decay... when the dust settles, is the space affected? Is it diminished? Whether I have emotions of non-serenity, or serenity... Atman is Atman. Is True Nature altered or affected by emotion? by thought? Whether the ocean is catostrophic storm, or smooth like glass... the nature of water is the same, even though its shape and form shift to perception wildly... the water it seems, is water.

There is a point, when one acquires a certain level of money, that money shifts in what it is a means to... it seems to shift its intrinsic value to me. I have several friends/acquaintences who are exceptionally wealthy, and my wife worked for years in Venture Capital. From my conversations with these folks, it seems there is a point where one becomes so wealthy that money is almost meaningless any longer as a commodity for acquiring stuff, and shifts instead into a commodity that allows them to wield influence. One example, I recently learned of through a paper my son worked on for his 8th grade social studies class. Bill and Melinda Gates have recently through their incalculable levels of wealth, funded research that resulted in a new testing method for Tuberculosis, (which I was shocked to find out is still epidemic in many parts of the world). Previously, results for testing TB required 4-8 weeks. The new testing method @98% accurate, yields results in several hours. This seems an example where money has shifted out of the sphere of acquiring things, into the realm of influencing life. The Koch brothers for instance, use their influence in ways that turn my stomach when I read of them... In the case of my wealthy acquaintences and friends, they use what to me are massive amounts of money to influence the lives of people and animals and nature in stunningly wonderful ways, and they don't bat an eye at it. As with all things, it seems a case by case situation and requires my individual judgement to determine if the influence is beneficial or harmful. Like any tool, money is neutral. How we wield the tool is where the seeming benefit/detraction exists. I can use a screwdriver and a hammer to fix a friend's faulty door, or to break into their shed and rob them. In the case of my wife's work associates in Venture Capital, one was a man with a beautiful heart and admirable character, who seemed to simply and effectively be chasing 'that next level of wealth' for security and a sense of accomplishment. The others in the firm mocked his 'softness' but kept him about for his adroit analysis and ability to perform in profit. The others in the firm (half dozen or so) were utterly predatory, dark-hearted individuals who no longer received a rush from even a major profit acquisition, but seemed to thrive instead off the adrenaline rush of 'how much can I influence/coerce folks into doing things they are uncomfortable with, through my presence and my money?'. It was this aspect of extreme wealth, that caused me much consternation when she announced she'd taken a job in that field. I'm much contented to be able to share that after years of cajoling that we would be fine without her working for this place, (she did it for the sense of security) my wife, an artist in spirit, resigned from that firm four years ago, walking away from a six figure salary, her retirement package and her stake in their investments. It cost us a definite, secure retirement in comfort... but that type of comfort, I have never found comforting in the least. Money is a convenient manner of transfering value from services to goods on the small level. On the grand scale, it's a means to influence societies. It's neither good nor bad to me. Money equals options in human society... but in the narual world, I'm reminded of its inherent meaninglessness/valuelessness when I'm hiking through the high desert and grow thirsty.

I recall the first time I read the full excerpt of this particular meeting between John Blofeld and Tseng Lao-weng, @rene posted it here some years back. It struck me like a bolt of lightning from a clear blue sky. It resounded in mind and its ripples catalyzed major shift in Awareness/awareness for me. Tseng through experience, and John, through adroit translation, was able to convey to me in words, concepts that had been simmering through my mind for years without ever quite solidifying until I read them in this account. The book the quote stems from is The Secret and Sublime, which is a written account of Blofeld's extensive travels seeking out audiences with reclusive Taoist Sages across China in the early 1900's.

Thanks for the update on the civil suit Cathy. All those close to the situation were relieved when the courts upheld justice against Jeff and this type of abusive behavior. I'm posting to say I recently reconnected with the woman involved in the case, the one Jeff abused and threatened. I did not bring up the case or the past, just connected and we shared space for a time. She seems well adjusted, vital and thriving. Peace to All.

I'm reminded of John Blofeld reiterating Tseng Lao-weng describing Tao as it relates to form, mind and our nature.

Thanks for sharing. He speaks in such clear simplicity. Really appreciate him. Our True Nature is never absent; the sky may be occluded by clouds, but is never absent. When we break up space with form (buildings, bodies, forests, planets and stars) we do not break up space with that form. Form arises within space. Space is constant, form is rising and diminishing. Space is. Space accomodates form within its essence. Space by its nature accomodates form. Form does not 'break space up'. For without space, what would/could exist in form? and The difference between memory and experience. True Nature is like space and is experiential. True nature abides of itself. Form, idea, memory, identity arise and diminish within True Nature. True Nature is unmarred by the arising and passing of form.

Actually I've brought her over in recent years, she's now up to four, including a body pillow between knees and feet. It's seemed to aid in her no longer waking regularly with lower back pain due to cocked hips. As for bunting boards, they're no impediment, be they pillow or plywood! Neither were her Tank Commander Father, nor her Prim German Mother, nor were the cramped backseat of our Ford Escort, or the pine needles 35 feet up in my favorite pine tree. When the rut is on with us, nothing seemed to get in our way... for long. Fact is, my Viking sperm stormed through our birth control like it wasn't there when our son was ready to manifest. true story.

Strong topic. One I've spent considerable time with over the decades, revisiting it as my life has shifted from living hand to mouth, to building an established career with some money in savings, to approaching and preparing for retirement with a diversified stock portfolio and retirement accounts. The path i followed when meditating on money, inevitably led me away from money as the focus (it always seemed more a springboard) toward the deeper question of 'what has intrinsic value?'. What is valuable? Or what determines value in living? Health and Safety have supreme value to me. Family and Community. Flowing rivers of clean water, filled with fish and stones. Expansive forests teeming with life. These are so valuable as to be 'beyond valuable'. And it may be a completely personal thing. My answer may not fulfill anyone else's notion and I'd not expect it to, nor would I try to convince anyone. Money in itself is an idea. A collective agreement of intended value assigned to paper and metal coins (and recently to numbers in a banking computer system). From where is real value derived? The answer, for me, has never been from money. But that may just be me. Money to me, equals options in society, not necessarily value though. Money seems a means or method of transmitting value. It seems a means of equivalency, yet where is the determination arising from at what value money possesses? We refer to it as currency (which works for me as it implies flow). I'm reminded of a quote about hoarding money... "Unused wealth, may as well not exist, it is functionally useless". For money to be effective, it must flow. It's value as I see it lies in and derives entirely from the collective social perception of its value... the social contract and agreement we all affirm daily when we use it to purchase that which has actual, functional value, and when we spend our effort and time to acquire some of it, to then be able to trade it for what has actual, functional value. Food is valuable. I cannot eat money, in any of its forms, but posession of money gives me the option to go trade for good food at the store and I cannot build a home out of money, but I may trade money for supplies to build it myself, or to entice another to build it for me. I took my young son to a deli one afternoon where we ordered two awesomely huge sub sandwiches, chips, juice and a cookie for lunch one day. When we got in the car to drive to the park and enjoy it, I first held up the bag of food booty and proclaimed. "All this yummy in exchange for one piece of paper!" "Isn't it interesting?" I added. "I traded the woman who made our lunch one piece of paper and in return she gave us all this food and three pieces of paper and some coins in return. That is amazing to me. We can't eat the money... well I guess we could eat the paper, we could physically manage it, but it wouldn't taste good and wouldn't give us nutrition, would it?" he shook his head. "Food keeps us healthy and vital. Water keeps us alive and thriving. Money is kind of valuable because we can exchange it for what is really valuable. Money holds value only because humans all agree it is. Money derives its value from our minds little guy." "now let's go to the park and enjoy the value of some shady trees while we eat our booty."

sincere heart kind heart quiet heart