thelerner

Hmnn, here's a question: Do we stay in the boat and go with the stream or get out of the boat and make our way? Maybe find find that horse?

Yes(!)

Can The Pope, Cardinals Or Priests Do Yoga?Only if they're flexible .

I didn't see all of it but I liked what I saw. I think it shouldn't be used to convince people that all gurus are fake. I've talked to some pretty smart people who are in awe of their gurus, seeing them as god incarnates on the earth. Its not my path, but I think some gurus may be very advanced enlightened beings and those who tie themselves to them get a huge push along the path. That being said it can mine field with false and fallen gurus before you find your Guru mate.

Very true. I wonder if we all suffer at times from dark voices? Daydreams that stream through our minds fueled by our anxieties and pop media we've seen, countless hours of TV and movie violence, we thought we'd left behind but lurk in our subconscious whispering stories like old radio stations into our minds. Our minds can be so noisy we don't notice them, but once we start quieting our mind these stations become louder and clearer. If this is the case with you then Jetsun's right. Identify them as 'silly dark thoughts' and let them go by, neither repressing or feeding them.

So ooo helping others is a form of meekness and unawakenedness? Hmnn, do we ever help others or do we wait until reaching a high enough level of enlightenment before daring such a complex act? Are we so concerned with 'elevating mankind' that we can't stop to help an individual? Seems overly judgmental and very head heavy. Taking a simple act and creating long doctrinal beliefs about it. Keep it simple, you see someone who needs help; don't go through 2,000 years of history and analysis, just help, lend a hand. Don't worry about motives, rewards, history or theology, just help. Because its not about you <your motives and karma> its about a person in need; just help them. We don't have to be Mother Teresa, saints or enlightened. We don't have to make our whole lives revolve around charity, but we <imo as part of human society> have to do something. Little things can mean a lot in this world, a smile, a few dollars, a few focused minutes. Throughout the day see where you can help your family, your neighbors, your world. Such acts are not a Christian thing, its a human thing. <Using a Lao Tzu quote thats not from the TTC, but different era with different voice and philosophy doesn't make your example any stronger>

I leave such theories to the theoreticians arguing about absolutes this'es and perfect that'is. If someone needs help and you're in position to do it, then just do it. There's hunger in the world. Its in our power to volunteer at food pantries, give to an organization like Heifer, so do it. Find a cause, roll up your sleeves and work at it. Get out of your head, forget your philosophy books, deep contemplations and do some work to make the world a better place. Keep it simple, help other human beings when you can. Even if its mechanical, begrudging and totally imperfect; help other people. Should we wait til we're perfect Buddhas? I say no.

We have so many sub forums and pinned topics that I think, there are fewer topics on the first page. That's bad. Once a discussion gets to page 2, very often its ignored and dies no matter how worthwhile it is. With only 18 slots good topics are likely killed by trivial ones. I wonder if anything could be done? A religious subforum that collects all the separate 'religious' ones into a single <and includes Christianity>? Media thrown as subforum into books or vice versa. Or maybe just allowing more topics to show up on page 1. Dunno, random thoughts from someone who won't have to do any work. M.

For some of his stuff I was getting weird pop ups. Personally I'd love to see Immortals stuff in its own sub category, maybe in a Personal Discussion folder where his large collection would be easier to find for those interested.

yech, actually re-reading it I think I came off too harsh. I'm striving for peace but my nature is to wade into Tar Sands, often self righteously. No one really wins these fights, its just an exercise in who can insult the other most cleverly. Here once again, I got too personal, too fast. Even in my own Personal Discussion space I saw myself shooting from the hip using words like Luddite Paranoia on friends who were just commenting on microwave ovens. Still the most powerful argument is a mirror, going all Yin on there ass. In Sushil's case saying. What if you get your wish? A genie grants it but then says, we'll try it out on your country first. Vaporize 90% of the people, because you're a visionary I'll let you live, but beware, no medication, no tech or textiles. Clean waters going to be hard to find. People may end up killing for it. On the third hand, I understand his longing. The peaceful village away from industrial society, honoring the old ways. Its not just a dream, its out there. One of the lecturer's I was went to recently was Krishna Das the singer and he talked of the little pristine villages up in India's mountainous regions where people sang and kept the old ways. Yet, here he was back in the West. We all want to head for a Hobbit Shire, but in reality the best solution is bring it closer to us. We get closer every fruit tree we plant.

From Paleo to Raw, what I've noticed is when people stop or limit grains, sugars and processed food they get very good results. I was reading a Raw Vegan book and Paleo at the same time. Both presented anecdotal and lab evidence to back up there claims of providing superior health. What they had in common was stopping or limiting those 3-sugars, grains <maybe they're biologically the same inside the body, both inflammatants> and processed foods.

Hmnn, I'd say No. Scale plays into these things. The weight of a grain of sand and the weight of the buildings might be relatively the same in comparison to the extreme mass of the entire earth, ie both inconsequential. I mean the collapse of two buildings is like an ant jumping vs a person jumping versus the energy of a earthquake. From the Net '8.0 is 6,270,000 tons, and 9.0 is 99,000,000 tons of TNT. As you can imagine, 99 million tons of TNT is enough to destroy just about anything, and is the equivalent of about 25,000 nuclear bombs' or the a hurricane which is reportedly 'In fact, during its life cycle a hurricane can expend as much energy as 10,000 nuclear bombs!<from Nasa>'. Ofcourse never believe such round numbers. Still you get the idea. Nature releases powers way beyond our puny imaginings. Earth's rotational spin dwarfs all human energy production. The Moon slows Earth's rotation, but even with all its mass, its only a tiny bit, hardly measurable each year. Strangely 9/11 played into our global weather. After the attacks, the U.S. government temporarily grounded every plane in the nation (including crop dusters and those little planes that tow ad banners -- no, that is not a joke). Inbound flights that were already in the air were rerouted to other countries, and some airports stayed closed until as late as October, because as we all know, terrorists have only ever killed people in airplanes. The problem with that is, unbeknownst to most, contrails (those white vapor trails that form out of airplane exhaust) act as mirrors, reflecting heat away from the Earth's surface. Those thousands and thousands of vapor trails have actually had a cooling effect that has counteracted global warming to some extent for years -- each airborne plane is sort of like Captain Planet zipping around with a UV shield tied to his boots. With so many planes grounded all at once, the atmosphere suddenly found itself without the mirror it had grown accustomed to over the past half century, and the temperature in the United States increased by 2 degrees in just three days. That may not sound like much, but consider this: Global warming typically only causes about a 0.5-degree increase every year. Grounding all of the planes caused a 2-degree increase, 400 percent of the average annual rate, in three goddamned days.

WRONGGG. I have some doubts about you being honest or a child and your quote about seeing adults who pretend to know everything is WRONG. We're a discussion forum and it gets tedious to put IMO (In My Opinion) after every line. But, we realize the forum is about diverse people, most of the time with some experience, some of the time with much practice <ie teachers> who are discussing what they know. Occasionally we're visited by trolls though. Add something valuable or get in your laugh and go away.

Who doesn't matter. What he believes doesn't matter. To me what matters is his practice, and how much time he's spent on the mat in the past and in daily practice. Otherwise he's guilty of what he complains about; another theoretician spouting his own pet theories. I give extra credit for known lineages. Tells me what a man thinks and I know nothing. Tell me what he does and I have a pretty good picture.

Personally I think of it as a metaphor, one that's not just useful but vital. I don't think you'll find a Qi'O'Meter or satisfactory scientific explanation but..you'll know it, when you experience it.(!) Intention/focused will/life energy. Within metaphors are maps, and maps lead to learning and power. Be careful about discarding things because they don't fit a certain paradigm.

They look pretty legit to me. For the 30 minutes I watched they weren't after press or adulation. They were on a very hard path and filled with holy craziness.

Afterwards the air is electrically charged and unusually clean and fresh. A few breaths of it and the threatening darkness was worthwhile for its later gift.

Go into the woods or mountains with mental/social problems and you're just taking them with you, dulling them a bit, but they're still there waiting and projecting. Going into the wilderness can certainly soothe our souls, but to stay there long term we need to reach a point of purity in our daily 'city' life. To me purity is about flow. Losing our hang ups, desires and obsessions, opening the heart and getting the big perspective.

Its nice to have the garden in the front lawn, and can be as easy as laying out good 40# bags of dirt in a row over the grass, putting a slit in the bottom and growing from the top the first year. Second year just remove the bags. Put a border around it and you just have to worry about some grass as weeds. Simple, cheap and quick, thank you Mother Earth Magazine. We now have 3 people on my block using there front lawns. Past couple of years I've thought in terms of gazpacho gardens, ie sweet cherry tomatoes, hot peppers, zucchini and cucumber. When you start getting sick of them you can put'em in the blender and make a tasty pitcher that's a refreshing change from all those salads. Herbs and marigolds around the border.

I was getting over irritated by life. A vacation helped immensely. Not always possible, but taking a break from modern societies loud 24/7 noise is doable. Stop watching TV, newspapers, magazines as well as gossipy distracting computer sites like Youtube and even the bums for a while. Use the extra time for meditation, reflection, listening to a wise persons dharma talks. If you can't greet things in a natural quiet calm mood the next best thing is to re-frame, ie creating a story where the annoying person is a nice one; a friend who's in need, doing their best under a bad circumstance. On allergies, I just learned to use a neti pot. It has made a real difference in my congestion providing a method of nasal cleaning thats hard to get otherwise. It took me 2 days to 'get it', but once you do its pretty fast.

No.. I am probably over reacting and owe White Wolf an apology. Sometimes topics take on a life of there own, mutate and spread like memes. Four or five topics on Homosexuality, increasing negative. More and more topics seemed- not racist, but increasingly moving into darker territory. My anger isn't at one person or single topic as much as at the Bums feeling less comfortable, like it was devolving into a nastier place. Again I acknowledge the irony of injecting such high level negativity myself. Its probably a toss up on whether anything good comes out of this. It's not civility I'm looking for, puck no. I'm hoping for a lessening of nasty generalizations aimed at any group. Its hard, the line is fuzzy and I haven't been a role model for tolerance, but I'll end with this: Say your truth and walk away. Think twice before insulting a whole group, generalizations are always usually wrong and one persons intellectual musing is another's perceived personal insult. <yes that card>

Actually I edited it out<mostly> while you were posting. Bad taste, a bit raw but obviously in this case I view it as acceptable. WE are not saying it, I am. Let me be clear- Damn right I think White Wolf is a bigot. Yes, YES I DO. Thank you for that opening, he may be a swell guy in many other ways, but to me he is a clearly prejudiced individual who repeatedly tries to convince other people of his negative views against a minority. I didn't write such in the past because personal insults are against the boards policy, will hurt feelings and lead nowhere, but as long as you bring it up. yup. You have intellectual neutrality because you and your friends aren't going to be beaten up, denied a home or job because of sexual oriented discrimination. You may be fine w/ repeated negative comments against groups because you're under no danger a madman w/ a machine gun will burst into your community center killing woman and children. No rocks or fire bombs are going to thrown at your Church of worship. Words do have power and unfortunately his 'truth' are another's hateful rhetoric that have wreaked murder and pain. You find 'Motherfucking Scum' objectionable, I understand and you have a point. But I lack your neutrality because I've seen where repeated negative stereotypes lead and there comes a time to step away from civility, call hate speech, hate speech inorder to acknowledge the damage done by Active Bigots. I'm not calling for political correctness, I'm stating my right to forcefully answer to insults to my group and others. Which is ultimately bad because thats not what this board is meant for. Those who have a problem with gays, jews, christians, there are many sites that cater to you. You know, the ones you've pulled all your quotes from.

My point and ire is at what I'll call Active Bigots <more descriptive then M*th&% FK&*%NG S*&KM>. We all have prejudices and in conversation they'll come out. And that's a good thing because it gives us a chance to learn from each other. The Active Bigots have a dark repeated agenda; it may be to convince the site that-'Homosexuality is dirty and immoral' or 'Jews are Evil' or more politically correct 'Christianity is the root of all Evil'. If it pops up once or twice its some ones view, we can take it or leave it. When its repeated often and in unlikely topics it's the mark of a nasty racist. I don't like it and think it degrades the board. Probably the best answer is to post positive topics, ironic since too often I do the opposite with inflammatory language. My poor defense being I generally leave 'the crap' alone, and that what you read is a mild distillation of what I originally put down.

They're calling this hit a coincidence on a day when a large mother asteroid is coming extremely close to us. Here's info on the meteor that hit Russia. I fucking love science 5 hours ago A large meteor has crashed into Russia's Ural mountains, injuring hundreds of people. The resulting shockwave blew out windows and rocked buildings. Fortunately, no large fragments hit populated areas. It seems that the meteor itself burned up in the lower atmosphere, causing it to shatter into fragments. A 6m crater has been found at a lake near Chebarkul, where a large fragment is thought to have impacted. Videos have been posted online, you can watch one of them here: http://bit.ly/Wuszna <amazing video, how could you not have apocalyptic thoughts if you saw it live> More info: http://bbc.in/YjG0FG Note: this is not the asteroid projected to pass by Earth later today. That will still be passing us by and there is no chance of an impact. This meteor was much, much smaller. Here's live info from Nasa on the big one: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/ Later on this year we may have a comet in our skies so bright it will outshine the moon. http://www.astronomynow.com/news/n1209/25comet/ I like it when the sky gets interesting .