thelerner

SoG mentioned this site and I wanted to put it in here for later views. A free 72 hour online course on Permaculture, interconnecting gardening, recycling, building- creating Intelligent Holistic Systems.

Honor is a tricky thing. Much egoism is disguised as honor. As I've gotten older I'm more suspicious of actions done for one's honor.

To get more chill To get more juice To see more Think less Breath slower Intuit more Reduce mental and cultural filters Better health Better Flow Experience the nature of God.

Welcome aboard. I admire your aspirations, my niece spent 2 weeks last summer in Mexico working with a Mayan village, she found it very worthwhile. I hadn't realized Mayans were still around. You're opening up a kettle of worms with the question of who's dragon, who's snake. Like online reviews you tend to get many extremes either 4 star or 0. Personally I like Damo Mitchells work, I'm leery of Kostas's work, if no other reason the school of Mo Pai isn't teaching Westerners. The usual advice is find a teacher your resonate with, take a close look at there students too. Not easy with a book or through the internet or if your traveling abroad. Being in a primitive setting will give you a great opportunity for practice, whichever ones you pick. Ultimately, and particularly without a teacher, keep it simple. Foundational practices tend to be similar, ie work on breath, quiet the mind, develop the hara/dan tien. A standing practice and moving practice are ideal. Post these questions in the general section when you can and do use the search function the site has to look at similar topics. Personally I like Ajahn Brahms, his book Mindfulness, Bliss, and Beyond:A Meditator's Handbook, and you can find many good free audio dharma speeches of his online. I like Rawn Clark's Archaeous Series at Abardoncompanion.com a series of hermetic elemental practices that work very well with a standing practice.

I've got a book Diary of the Way. It looks at masters of 3 different arts. One is Lily Siou a Tai Chi master. In the interview she looks knowledgeable and fascinating. I think you wrote her name correctly. If its out there google should find it. Don't know if this link helps: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/936511.Lily_Siou

I found this very interesting. How introducing 70 wolves back into Yellow Stone Park after 70 years of absence, changed the eco system drastically, even to the point of changing rivers. Nice optimistic piece on how when nature is given a chance for balance does surprisingly well. kind of dove tails on how a huge disasters be it volcanic eruptions or even nuclear disasters can help the environment because mans presence tends to have such a negative effect. Remove man for a while, and nature .. finds a way.

Religious Taoism seems to hold a special place for luck, though perhaps that isn't the right word. In the world of Fu's there seems to be a special consideration towards Joss, what makes you lucky or takes it away. I've always considered myself lucky, born into a good family, healthy, given possibilities. I'm thinking about luck because yesterday I bought 3 lottery tickets. 2 for super powerball paying $400 million with odds to win 1 in 250 (or was it 175 mil) million. That much is too much, more likely to break a family apart then make living easier or more pleasurable. To much travel and you move away from those you love. Too much luxury and it becomes a new set point and anything less becomes an annoyance. The third ticket i bought was an instant ticket. I won $10, so up $5 in total.. so far. What role does luck play in life?

I have a lot of problems with the Bhagavad Gita for those reasons too. I can't help but wish the hero had said no to fighting his Uncle, had forbidden hunting/sacrificng the lions or tiger etc.,

Random recollection on 'luck' and/or its appearance. I collect old 'wheaties', pennies minted 1958 and older, so I always check my change for them, I have since I was a kid. Needless to say they're getting rarer to find in change, but a few weeks ago I got a nice 1929 penny. It traveled through time, unmolested and uncollected for 85 years to wind up in my change. My greatest find was in college. At bought candy and got 4 cents worth of change. All of them wheaties. I asked the woman to look in her penny slot to see if there were any more. She said 'They all are.' I gave her a buck and got them all, many of them were from the 40's with a few being '43 steel pennies. Not a financial windfall, most wheaties are worth a few pennies, but it makes for an enjoyable hunt. edit 2/24/14 my son just gave me a 'fake' quarter that wouldn't work in his schools vending machine. It's a real 1936 silver quarter. It shows its age, but its amazing to find these in the public. He doesn't know where he got it. Interestingly enough I'd just been looking at youtube on how to make quarters into rings. Its very simple and silver quarters come out quite beautifully, especially after polish.

As an individual you can't save everyone, maybe you can't save anyone but you can help that one kid and that mother and child a bit. Give someone 'on the ground' who's trustworthy (hard but they're out there) a hundred or five hundred dollars to help them. Have them dole it out in which ever way seems wisest to them, not to us cause we don't fully understand the dynamics of there situation- (and keep a cut for there trouble) whether its for food, transportation or transportation the hell out of there. I'm a monthly donor to http://www.heifer.org/ , not much, just a flock of chickens a month. Hopefully for some families that's enough to lift them out of dire poverty (into regular poverty? still a step up), the eggs from 10 or 12 birds. Maybe its just a way a first world person soothes his conscience but I think such giving, that pays dividends beyond food for a day or week may be part of a solution.

Well F. You .

Screw wisdom. Like I'm going to 'teach' them anything. As if I had any experience with there world. Better to ask 'How can I help?' and spend the next minute 55 seconds listening closely. Getting a little deeper. Maybe in both cases I honestly couldn't help. I don't speak the language, I'm alien. My time would be better spent finding someone who understands the problem and can intelligently distribute needed resources. Frankly giving money to the right person who's 'on the ground' and experienced would help far more then words or my sympathetic presence.

Its not to hard for a magician to fool a scientist. Matter of fact, they're easy because they focus so intently on one object. Much harder to fool another magician because they understand that nothing should be taken for granted, especially what is solid and empty and they understand fully the art of distraction. I was just looking at a metal that dissolves at 88 degrees. Apparently it used by many illusionists who make metal objects disappear without a trace. Because of many obviously shown fakes, I don't think Geller is a good example of a person with powers. #6. Uri Geller Is Exposed on the Johnny Carson ShowRichard Nelson/Photos.comContrary to what you might assume, the people most hostile to claims of supernatural powers are magicians. That's why nowadays they usually prefer the term "illusionist" -- they want to be clear from the outset that what they're doing is a trick. But then, every so often, one of them will hit the big time by claiming that they have genuine magic powers. Such is the case with Uri Geller, who in the '70s was basically the Sith Lord of illusionists. And millions of people believed him. "Let the naivete flow through you." If you're too young to remember, Geller found fame with mind-reading tricks and, more famously, mind-powered spoon bending. Swearing that he had actual psychic powers, he used a bunch of sleight-of-hand tricks already well-known to magicians to apparently bend spoons with his thoughts. Of course, any magicians with a moral compass knew exactly what he was doing and made it their mission to take the weasel down. The result was one of the most tense and cringe-worthy appearances in talk show history (in a medium loaded with them): When Uri Geller was booked to appear on The Tonight Show, host Johnny Carson (a former magician himself) was understandably skeptical about Geller's claims and had called up professional illusionist and psychic head-stomper James Randi to ask how the tricks might really be done. As Randi explained, the easiest way to bend a spoon with your mind would be to spend a few minutes before the show bending the spoon back and forth with your hand until the metal is so weak that it just falls limp when you hold it up to the camera. With this in mind, Carson surprised Geller on the show by presenting a table full of assorted spoons and knickknacks, rather than letting him bring his own props, and gave Geller free reign to pick whatever trick he wanted to perform. You can watch Geller slowly descend into panic mode, knowing that his trick won't work and millions are watching.' He thought it would be a canned, no-sweat interview, like he was on [network you hate]. 'It just gets harder to watch as it goes. Carson looks on, annoyed, as Geller tries to stall by ineffectually waving his hands over the table while he works out how the hell he's going to get out of this one. For the first time, he found himself genuinely trying to call on a higher power. After a series of the most incredibly awkward silences you will ever witness on a television broadcast, Geller eventually squirms out of the segment by claiming that he's just not feeling strong enough tonight. Geller spent the rest of his career trying to sue James Randi over the humiliation, and after consistently losing his legal battles, he eventually quietly admitted that he was nothing more than an entertainer and not a wizard who could wield the powers of black magic. No shit? Read more: http://www.cracked.com/article_20566_the-6-most-humiliating-public-failures-by-celebrity-psychics.html#ixzz2tibcqwVT

Who could perform like that? Anyone I guess. Its a movie, its choreographed. Probably any professional dancer, male, female, child could get those moves down and act it out. Real fights don't look like those. That was good action choreography for a film, but those moves shouldn't be taken seriously. The whole I'll run up wall, spin, get behind sequence is best left to the Jedi. As is taking dozens of hard punches to the head, shrugging them off and not breathing hard or slowing down. There are dojo's and you can watch matches. Its particularly interesting to watch black belt and higher testing done, and in my experience, those movies are not what higher level people do when sparring or fighting. You won't see it in the MMA which needs to be streamlined and effective and you don't see sequences like those in real Kung Fu dojo's unless they're actively choreographed. imo

Depends on the teacher and the school. They vary so widely even within the same art that you can't make generalizations. I've seen spiritual boxing and cut throat vicious Aikido. The instructors sets the path. Even in the MMA I've seen examples of graciousness and spirituality. Not predominant because its a money sport, but its there.

Test 52. What is Tao? A. Heaven B. Earth C. The World D. A Path E. None of the Above

Don't eat much, maybe a few small cans a year. As a kid, tuna fish sandwiches were served weekly. For better or worse my kids aren't into it, and i'd always buy dolphin safe stuff.

I can understand karma as cause and effect, yet I believe in accidents. There are times when dominoes fall in the way they shouldn't and actions don't have an equal and opposite reaction. Luck plays a role. And if you plant a mango seed the result is simply nothing; it doesn't germinate, no future tree. Random factors collide Entropy and apathy slow systems History and events are not as neat as karma would explain.

I think dream work offers the most bang for the buck. A Siddhi/psychic power that is learnable. I'd suggest we set up a Dreamwork thread in the PPF section. Preferably something starting with the letter A or 1 so it'd be on top and easy to find. It might be interesting to see how and if it evolves. For my part I'd keep it simple. A thread going over one book with one practice to be worked on. In the past I've gone overboard on theory and studying. Keeping it simple, not worrying to much about theory, but concentrating on one thing with group support would be my ideal. Maybe call it A Dream Workshop- To Lucidity and Beyond!

There's a free book on OBE's. I was thinking it'd be fun to go through it with a group. The book The Phase free at obe4u.com. Not that I believe I have much chance at it, but you never know. If people are interested let me know.

Different, yet.. what mechanism applies Karma? Who/What remembers the past, plots out the consequences and waits for the proper time?

The last can of tuna I bought didn't have the Dolphin Safe label, but it did have a picture of a man holding a gun to a dolphin's head. I figure I'd better buy it, otherwise, the dolphin might get it. Like Rara I value a dolphin's life more then a tuna's. Big smart brain, cares for its young, social mammal, has been known to save drowning humans, cute too- can't discount that. Not only wouldn't I eat them, I actively dislike things that cause them harm. I've always thought seeing dolphins in the wild is a little magical. They're like unicorns, except no horn, or legs or hooves, hmmnn nor fur .. Other then that.

Anyone know of a map site we could use for putting location pins into? edit> Thats strange I went to go to the site and got an error code. I just did it again and it worked! its up and working. There I am, swimming a mile out in Lake Michigan just north of Chicago

In the past I've met up with other bums at seminars, which has been great. I wonder if we pinned the tao bums Google map it'd be easier for people find out that they lived near each other and get together. Coincidentally, I just found out a TB who's in my area and we've corresponded and we'll see if we can get together for coffee.

I forgot sperm sample. Really, not being overly impressed by powers, I don't care so much about proof of them. Other then frowning at those who think they have to fake them, which I suspect both frauds and occasionally people with real powers do because its not something you can always pull out of your hat. Most powers I've seen demonstrated over the internet are easily done with 3 cent match or the power of a kid blowing out a birthday candle. So inconsequential it doesn't really matter one way or another. That being said, there are masters, even plain old teachers who have wah.. presence, you look in there eye, how they speak, how they sit and I don't need parlor type tricks to know I'm with someone of learning and presence.