silent thunder

I stood, staring at a trickle of water as it wound its way along the pavement and gutter of a parking lot. Picking up debris as it flowed and carried along with it, disregarded bits of paper and plastic, leaves, clumps of dirt, a few hapless ants and a healthy portion of dog turd, recently deposited with rather remarkable precision. It flowed along effortlessly, neutral to turd and flower alike, into the sewer and off to the ocean. Tao in motion. To me anyway, in that moment and now upon reflection... somewhat.

Yes! Both please, thank you. Simultaneous absorption/expulsion... contraction/expansion permisiveness/temperance saturation/distillation presence/emptiness being/awareness

game. set. match!

whoa

hmm... i sense that i could make a strong case that it's really the year of the EGG! every year...

He sure seems to be, looked into him a bit more. He's a local boy here... artist. I've been going to the Getty Museum for 16 years and never noticed that quote etched in sidewalk of the entrance into the garden. I likely would have continued to walk past it indefinitely except this time, I was lingering nearby and overheard an elderly chap reading it to his wife who couldn't make out the words. How intricately interwoven that her loss of sight should bring me a gift of wisdom, through her husband.

Nice! I'll share my reminder list I use when work is challenging me or I'm getting butt hurt... Don't take the place, the work, or the people personally. Cultivate enthusiasm. Show up early. Listen attentively. Give full effort.

Ever present Never twice the same Ever Changing Never less than whole ~Robert Irwin

This deeply resonates with me and a relatively recent realization of my process. Both Zhou Ting-Jue and Wang Li Ping talk about inertia and in the early stages... establishing and gathering inertia. There was an intial building period. Learning forms, perfecting forms, incredible attention to hand placement and breath depth and all manner of details and minutea... Zhou often says. "Practice every day. Miss one day is missing ten days" and I did that for some years... and then a point manifested and I became aware that from this point on and indeed for some time prior to this moment of realization, no matter what I did, or did not do, all I had done and whatever I would engage in from this point on... it would all be grist for the mill... nothing would be, or could be wasted. Inertia had been established and its presence manifested in all sorts of areas of my life... in silence or speaking, in motion or stillness, paying attention or zoning out... never is it possible to be disconnected from, or even a hairs width away from source. Tao is everpresent, yet indistinguishable. Impenetrable and utterly yielding. Looking back now, I seem to sense how the inertia was really there long before the word, probably all along, driving me into these teachers presence with the awareness that they were resonating with something deep inside of me, perhaps before childhood even... yet the work was and is still, irreplaceable as a means to crystallize the realization and the relationship with the inertia from the fog of pre-aware practice.

My son sleeps often out on one of our sofas in the living room instead of his room. So he wakes up while I'm setting up tea and such the other day, he opened his eyes, rolled over to look at me and said: "just be yourself... it's the only thing you're perfect at..."

Trees! Trees are constantly calling out to me and lensing mindfulness through me with their presence. From stately and majestic, to the jesterly and even the downright menacing... how I love them all. Bushes, shrubs and the clinging vines all state their gratitude as I exhale and pass by... I sense it. Awareness abides in their green and flowing breath. Ivy calls to me in a song of deep, abiding, sensual, cool awareness that opens the center and bids me breath deeper and saturate myself in the reality of vitality. Sweet Trees. Seeds. Sunshine and Water. Bless em, high five em and thank them for what they are and what they do, every time I walk by... Lean on em and climb them often. They listen and they sometimes talk... if I'm of a mind to listen

Deep love and abiding nourishing intentions from this Earth Rooster to all of you amazing Bums and those associated with your Bumness!

inculcation

you gotta love the bad people dad, they need it the most... my son in kindergarten

thanks for taking time to share with us Spotless. you are appreciated!

What a curious thing to say. Very curious. So you know what others understand and don't... powerful stuff indeed... and a big responsibility.

Much Love thursday!

It's simple for my mind to become primary and get deeply involved in the nuts and bolts of praxis, or the potential problems/solutions. Practice is a means to an end, not the goal. For me there are points where the practice is a hindrance. Wang Li Ping talks about sitting/practicing being primary and developing and this path will lead your inner teacher to emerge to you. At which point the inner teacher is primary and the practice is revealed as a means to an end, secondary. He stressed the importance of practice being for a minimum of two hours when I asked him directly. Four hours is best, after two hours, the inner teacher can come and this is good. He said.

Aw thank you! Man I needed that this morning. Awesome!

music is pervasive, saturating... subtley but deeply penetrating and expansive simultaneously... it's much like my experience of the Witness

My wife introduced me to Agnes Obel the other day. Wow! Her tone quality is like a crystal bell.

Really nicely put mate. Those words resonate very closely to my home. i like the water analogy. At first i try to observe what lies beneath a pool of water (mind) and all i see are ripples (actions). i try to clear away the ripples (work, discipline) and end up making more ripples and distortions. Though when my action inevitably ceases (the action of dao is a bellows) push and pull settle in balance and there will come moments of clarity and calm and glimpses of what lies beneath will come. eventually a moment arises and i am calm... and I realize i am looking into a clear, silent, calm pool of water (mind) and seeing the reflection (my perceptions/interpretations of the phenomena), this may be dazzling and overwhelming but this too passes and settles in balance (perhaps with more work, or simple realization), though at some point with a slight shift of my gaze, i see past my reflection and the reflection of phenomena and realize I am seeing through the water to what lies beneath (witness) always present but so easily clouded and hidden when ripples and action disturb and muddy the interaction. The hard part seems to me, in being calm water. Though as your teacher says, "first it'll seem very hard, until you learn how to do it. Then it becomes easy and you'll think back and exclaim "Is this how easy it was?!? Why didn't I get it more easily?" Eventually even when ripples are present, there is abiding awareness of what lies beneath and there is unity, even in the midst of perception and work and ... the rest of it. kinda sorta... edit to add one sentence for clarity ( ha, ripples leading to clarity? )

"absolute certainty is the realm of the arrogant, ignorant... of that, I'm absolutely certain." ~ Creighton Larson