Pietro

Let's say that is a conditio sine qua non for me (and maybe not only for me although I am the only one standing on this) to feel really part of the site, and not just a user. Before we were hosted by HealingTaoUsa. I don't want to feel that we are hosted again. Before we had Michael advertisments on the side that would pay for the site. Now we have Google advertisment on the top. Before James would dictate what was in and what was out. And after 7 years I have to say he wasn't that bad. He was very relaxed, and was ok with most craziness. Now Sean might do the same. So, let me ask you, what had REALLY changed? At the cost of being extremely unpopular let me ask? Are we really in charge of this site? The more I go on the more I feel that power should be decentralised. And the first form of power is information, and transparency. How much money is this site making. Are the advertisments helping. We are all paying for this flickring, is it actually giving something? If nobody knows about it, no one can take or suggest changes. You see, I was expecting this to be OUR site. Where decisions were taken collectively, and then implemented. In short, are we the TAO BUMS, or is this Sean private place. There is nothing wrong with Sean, or James, or Joshua, or Brad, or Linus or Jimmy, but I have had enough of 'benevolent dictators'. Eventually there is always the point in which the benevolent dictator makes the wrong decision, and then the only solution is to start a new site. And always all the data is lost. And we are back at square one. I want to know, I want to know because without knowledge is not possible to make informed decisions. While I want that we make decisions together. Not me, not him, not you. But we. Me, and you, and him, and everybody else. And, Deo Gratias, Sean does not seem to have a problem with that, nor does he seem offended by it.

That is really great, thank you. Makes me much more confortable, I have been willing to ask for it for ages. Pietro

Actually, following the same spirit, I would appreciate if there was a page on this very site stating: The cost of the site ... The money received by donations ... The money received by advertisments ... And the number of extra hours by Sean for hacking beside what he is happy to contribute for free. I know it is a pain in the ass, as it requires to be updated at least once a month, yet I think it would make everybody more prone to donating when the needs arises. Surely me (:oops: ). As well as giving a sensation that this site is more a collctive effort than a personal gift. Just my thoughts, Pietro

Fine by me.

I tried to make some searches on site, and I discovered that google is not indexing the pages inside this site. Look: http://www.google.com/search?q=site:www.ta...taobums.com+sex I was looking for the link to the site that claimed that castaneda was a scam. I still haven't found it. P.

Never met a mental block that can't be dissolved with enough vaseline. Let us know how does it go.

No doubt on the wave and continuous. But BIG doubt that you can have it with no likeage I'd love to hear Max position on this. :shrug:

Are you sure it was shakespeare? Can you provide a reference?

i well hope so

It is true. I cannot find any peace. I think the system structure is growing magnificently. Now we need to integrate the various instruments, and decide, observe, what get's cooked and where. Wiki and forum are not in competition but are relatively complementary. With forum fast cooking some material and wiki slow coking and cristalising solutions. I think we need a last element (good thing the lending library, I suspect it might not be really useful for us poor europeans, but still locally is a great idea). But what's more, we now have 3 people who have strated describing their practice and I know others are thinking of adding their experience too (I for one). I think that both forum and wiki are not the right tool to have blogs. Maybe wiki are slightly better (as wiki give extra tools), but essentially is always better to have a tool that has been developed just for a job, to do that particular job. So I think that as a last step in setting up the stage we should now install a blog. There are a number of blogs around. A good comparison can be found here. Most of those software perimt to have MANY blogs from MANY authors on the same site. That is EXACTLY what we need. Then different practttioners can keep their blog over here. Once we have that too I think we can finally relax structure wise, and start to work on the content. Just my thoughts, and looking for yours, Pietro

Thanks Sean I really appreciate. The mediawiki is by far the best one, and teaching. Unfortunately at the moment I am in a big conference, so I have little time to discuss. But it seems that the site progress much better when I keep quite... mumble, mumble, mumble

Sorry but I cannot use the site. The pages are too wide and don't fit in my 800*600 laptop screen. P.

works perfect for me now. Thank you very much. Pietro

I learned a bit of Xing Yi from one of my teachers Frank Allen from NYC. Xing Yi tends to build up the ego. The philosopy behind it is: "My Will Be Done!" Totally the opposite of most spiritual systems. I was (well) advised by Frank Allen never, ever, ever, for no reason, to mix Xing Yi with chastity practice. Each is edgy, but both would push anybody beyond the edge, and make of him "a blood thirsty assassin". One builds the ego, the second let you tap on enormous amount of jing. Knowing you and your practice I must advise you NOT to practice it while following the current regime. With love, Pietro

Just out of curiosity, are you practicing primordial chi kung? If you do, do you still feel this way just after you have practiced it?

Sometimes you come out with something that you feel is deep, but somehow it doesn't reach the ear, as you expceted it to be. Bad thing having expectations, and my aunt would have added "bad also to have ham in your ear". Amen. I wish it was so! My thought stream is generally quite pointless, and does not lead anywhere. That did lead somwhere, and wasn't just casual, but was the fruit of me trying to brak through a mental problem. If you were proficient in math as you are with computer I would show you that the problem "what is the best stable attitude of the mind to have merit simply does not have a solution". This does not mean that you should not act, just that it makes no sense to BASE your action on a mental reason, since non mental reason, in this context, will be stable. Do it, but do it because you feel so. Do it if and only if you would have done it independently if you get something out of it or nothing. Let me rephrase it: Would you help the guy if you were not to get nothing? Would you also help him if you were to get something? If wou answered yes to both the question how could the movement of the mind have any effect on your action. They are just a wheel not having an effect on your action. And this is stable. I am sorry, I thought it was obvious. I answered to that before. That and the raw meat, for which I thank you. Best of luck with your ghosts, Pietro

Only if you stop thinking half way. If you want to follow the reasoning line you need to think all the way. internal dialogue: Look, this guy needs some food. I should be giving some. Hey wait, then I am giving because I want to have merit. But then I will not accumulate any merit. I better keep my bread. But he is hungry. Here, let me just give him because he is hungry, even if I will not get any points for it. Ha! But now I am doing for him, so I AM getting points. So I am doing it for both reasons. But the desire for credit is enough to pollute the possibility to get any credit for it. You see, logically it has no solution, or we can say it has no digital (0|1) solution. You might think that it has a fuzzy solution, something like I get half of the points. But even that is wrong, because even a small desire to have credit will just pollute the whole thing. SO there is NO way to get any credit. Thus you are free from this nighmer of credit (you are not going to get any in any case) and you can happily give the bread that you feel. Thus getting back your points. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. No, I personally don't.

Max, com'on. That's circular thinking of the worse kind: "This is hard. Part of it being hard is that most people don't see this as a problem. Instead of convincing you on independent basis that this is a problem (which would be an acceptable way of acting) I claim that it is just self evident if your virtue is high enough. My virtue is high enough. The proove is in the fact that I see this as a problem (amd back we are at the starting point)." Methinks quite a lot since the a chinese festivity is designed just for that. No, I think there is a strong risk in this becoming just another mental masturbation, like playing the "I will one day become immortal if I just move this into that, that into this, and then turn around 5 times". It's rituals, and the mind gets fed with rituals, while the Spirit gets fed up with them and the spirits are immaginarily fed.

I think the whole point have been twisted beyond believe and recognition. If you help anyone, because of you want to get merit there is no merit in that. And you can as well feed your lust on internet. The only things that makes sense is to help out of your true nature. Now when you help out of your true nature this pretty much dictates what you will help. There are things that naturally resonate with you, and things for which you cannot REALLY give a fuck. Some people go a great length to help animals, some people, children, ghosts, squirrels, and sheeps. (Giving relieve to horny human males are generally quite low on the list, but I did met a girl who made love with a guy because he was in a wheel chair and just needed it, she was amazingly beautiful both inside and outside). Q. to Plato :?: : isn't it that feeding ghosts is just simpler, because is harder to recognise that our help will most of the time not make great changes? I mean, to give some bread to one person on the street is something. To work really hard to get one person out of the street until he gets back his sense of dignity and stands on his two feets is a complete other matter. Somehow with ghosts is often hard to get the reality test that says, ok you have ended your working with this spirit. So you can illude yourself that you did so much. P.

I haven't looked yet at php wiki. Tikiwiki looks too much like tikiwiki. That is, you can only have 3 columns. I would endorse using the good old mediawiki. yes, it has database, but is fast, reliable, everybody knows how to use it (is the one used in wikipedia) and when people go to a mediawiki page they tend to consider the site more serious. As an addendum it support latex formulas, that might be good for our Russian member. BTW anybody has the email of jernej? Pietro

And there is nothing I can do about it. The good news is that since many people got fucked up, it is more possible that whoever has the power to restore it, tries harder. The bad news is that is he doesn't we are al fucked up. We did lost some entries, and surely mbanu will find out the address to restore some of them. I do agree with you that a) we need a wiki to store and sort the less transient posts from the absolute bullshit we need a BETTER wiki than that. In particular: b.1) one that does not have some intrinsec morality (i.e. no hard core posts, etc) b.2) one that is just ours b.3) one that is easier to use, and does not fuck up so easily b.4) one that can be used at full potentiality with no extra costs. Seedwiki was a good start, but now we need to go forward. If we can recover some of the posts, good. If not good too, we'll start from scratch. Pietro

I might be wrong, but I have the sensation that this reflect who actually pays for a crime, more than who actually commits it. Beside it says nothing of Polish people. They are the real master minds :twisted: , and are never caught. Which only proves how smart they are.