Wayfarer64

I sure am glad this has come up. I have had a few email trades with a friend about this. I think we should realize the historic perspective that for some 1400 years there has been an ongoing struggle between Islam and Christianity. Not much turning of cheeks in this thing either. The Crusades were full-on invasions that swept Jews, dark skinned Christians and Muslems under the swords of the onslaught. Apparently these armies had very little discipline to speak of and much blood lust and greed driving them on to The Holy Land. The sacking of Antioch was probably the most famous example of the willy-nilly nature many of these escapades had. Ransoms were traditionally demanded of any city or town - just not to get sacked. It really didn't matter much who lived in the town at all. It was a situation where one joined a Crusade to improve one's lot in life. Very few of these guys were in it for religious conviction but most put that justification onto their activities. "Why of course I am doing this raping and pillaging in the name of Christ!" What a travisty. And The Children's Crusade is one of the most horrific stories in all of history. And that shit happened before these hordes ever reached the Holy Land. Then they really went at it. Traditionally The jews faired as badly or worse than the Muslems in those days. Oy vey! So the fight was on! The Muslems took most of habitable and not so habitable North Africa, the Middle East of course and most of Spain, Sicily, and got deep into Indonesia and the Phillipines too. I'm not keeping this in chronological order because I can't remember it... but there was a lot of fighting for several centuries- El Cid and Sarradin, Gordon of Egypt and on to Ossama bin loose too long. LOTS of hate built up over the centuries. These wars were kept alive by the leadership on both sides who in most cases profited from them or used the conflicts to redirect unrest. This is still what is going on. Right now is one of those historical cross roads we see so much better with hind sight. But basically what changed everything for Islam is OIL. Man is there power in that crap! The bang for yer buck is huge in terms of actual generation of power and the bucks being made are on huge margins compared to many similar products. Most chemicals sell at tiny margins where a supplier sells fourteen barrels to make the profit on the fifteenth. Oil gives these greedy bastards up to 30% or more on the barrel in times of war. And look what we have now. Hezbolla- a client "state" of Iran which is a state largly supported by oil. and Hamas is a client "state" of Syria another nation supported by oil revenues... These proxy states are at war with Israel a client state of the USA, currently run by Saudi Arabia through G. W. Bush and his oil biz cronies. I believe this is quite true to no small extent. The Bush family and their pals at the Carlyle Group have been paid something like four billion $4,000,000,000, to help secure Saudi interests world wide. As prez he makes some what less. Where do his loyalties lie? The Saudies financed the 9/11 attacks but his administration goes after Iraq- at who's behest ... Surely not the families of the victims who had to fight so hard to get the 9/11 Commission even started and then years later the adminstration tried to black-out the 28 pages discribing how Saudi Arabia financed the hijackers! So for me the Jihad stems from arab leadership who want to keep oil prices up. Oil prices go down when more is found. Finding oil is no longer the thrust of the industry. Oil prices go up with huge profits when there is trouble in oil producing areas. The saddest part to me is how so many young men are given nothing to read but a version of the Koran for most of their early years, then they are taught spurious and misleading dogma that twists the teachings of The Prophet into hate mongering anti-Jewish and anti-US doctrines that promote activities prone to killing innocent strangers. Now we get to the real question of what is driving the Jihad. Is it jealousy of the "West" and its power and material glory ... or is it a rejection of the West and its power and material glory. Or maybe the question is more like - Craving power over the direction of the onset of the new one world society, (which looks very western this week), or rejecting it and trying to preserve an idealized version of past glories believed to exist within their society- ( if only it could manifest itself in a pure Islamic state)... I guess those questions are answered one person at a time. Another case of wonderful teachings being skewed for dark political purposes. What a freakin' world! For those of you who would rather watch a movie than read a book... "Why We Fight" is a good movie to see for a glimpse at the military industial complex's role in this shit. "On Native Soil" shows some of the US government's screw-ups that allowed 9/11 to go down-(but no mention of the blacked out 28 pages) "The smartest Guys in the Room" shows how the ENRON dibacle shaped up-which is energy related and relavent to this story of Bush family corruption too... As a Taoist I have no problem with physical force being applyed judisiously in any given situation. The use of terror is just plain wrong and always an act of cowards and fools who have little grasp of human nature or political realities. They are just to stupid and lazy to glean power through action and discourse that changes minds and hearts toward their way of thinking in a rational fashion. I think undermining the "schools" which are mind-control centers not mind-expanding forums -and the people who support these brain-washers (more Saudis) is our best tactic... The means to that end should include tommahawk missles and visiting dignataries who demand access and reach out to open the young minds being warped... Hoping I didn't stray too much from thread I exuant-

Dear ***, I have more than a few links to Taoist sites on my website @- http://www.pdgart.com/lipnf.html just below the newest link (Tao Bums)- have fun - some other cool stuff there if a say so m'self...Wayfarer

I'm reavaluating just because I can. I am secure in my sense of self enogh to take a look at what has brought me here. As I wrote, I am pretty damn sure about this issue, but I am willing to jar the assumption of such a profound experience's validity... into non-complacency and delve into what makes the Dalai Lama such a force in the world and what direction that force is meant to take us. If the doctrine rings false and his holiness is being used to bring a seemingly dark aspect of what would be to my mind a twisted aspect of Buddhist thinking to the fore, I want to know for myself. I know in my heart that the compassionate nature of the experience I shared with the Dalai Lama was the strongest aspect I felt at that time and so I may remain unchanged by the quest to learn just what amount of faith and energy the Dalai Lama puts into furthering the anscient mythical motivations and how much he has transended those and found a "more palatible " calling for his yogic/tantric powers. I may never figure out how to find these things out to a certainty beyond my original certainty, but rest assured that paper does not undermine my original certainty. The Dalai Lama has a scientific curiosity that he speaks of often and his grounding in logical arguement and deliberation that is required of all Tibetan monks would also support this line of questioning in itself... I am not now a "follower" of the Dalai Lama in anything more than a tacit support and threads like this etc.... He bestowed a profound moment of shared humanity with me (and several others at the same time it would seem). I will never lose that connection to his transcendent abilities and gift. My scepticism is not new about the system he represents-And not with his affirmations of compassionate living. I realize that he was taken as a child and indoctrinated into a secluded society that had many obvious wierd qualities that could have been meant to use him as the smiley-face figure-head of a questionable doctrine and power-structure left over from centuries of feudal oppression. As was the norm world-wide and has changed most places as stated above... The old ways are being left behind in most societies as we become more globalized, much of that loss is very sad to me, some less so, some happily weeping for joy.

Cloud, I believe you are right. As I've put out here already... every religion I've studied has serious problems of conduct and myth-making or just plain lies and every other human foible... The history of Catholicism is a very good example... Constantine was looking to unite a faltering Roman Empire so he glorified this little know Jewish sect and made it the state religion. This because he had seen a vision of a cross in the sky-(which by the way will happen to anyone looking into the sun with bleary eyes)... I am a devout believer in the teachings of love and inner connectivity to god that Christ offered. Yet I also believe that he pretty much found lots of these ideas in Buddhism -which was some 5oo years old at that time. He being raised in a town on the silk road from Tibet, through China to Rome's impressive network of roads. And perhaps he was even an incarnation of a Tibetan Buddhist Lama as the story of the three wise men parallels the practice of seeking the reincarnated Lamas that comes to us even today. This is of course speculation but it makes some historical sense to me... Even with all their many faults, millions of people have found a way to express their connectivity to The God within themselves through the Catholic church, (and Tibetan Buddhism). What the Church has done since its rather awkward inception, (and here Paul and the other gospels start to play a part)... is usually nothing to brag about -as an institution supporting genocide and greed etc. etc. for centuries. It is in large part a shocking tale of woe. Only I believe it is due to the weaknesses of people not the strength of the teachings being found wanting. The most obvious case of this for me is in America today. I can say (as kindly as possible), that I have very serious doubts about most "born-again" reactionary bigots being enlightened. All of your thoughts on this hold water in my mind... and looking at the roots of any system is very important for those looking for answers to these deeper questions of "why am I here" and where is the meaning to be found in this life that often seems to arbitrary and cruel...And the baby/bathwater thing is on the table to ponder as well... How do we glean the Holy from the venal? I just think that knowing the faults is needed but should be used to put things in perspective rather than undermine the useful and transcendent aspects. If indeed the system of the Tibetan Buddhist practice and doctrine is based on a structure of misogyny and is leading to extremely questionable goals it should be exposed as that in truth. If however those factors are ancient left-overs from feudal economic structures and a patriarchal society (like most others world-wide have been), then I want to see them change freely into a more open structure. Please remember women's sufferage is also very recent in the USA, and when I was in Italy in 1976 women were seldom "let " outdoors without a male escort or watchful chaparone -(this is no longer the case). So true and operative tolerance of women's rights is a pretty new concept all over the world. And surely needs more work in the Islamic lands. This is very sad because it is plain that where the original structure was extremely pro-equal rights for women and was not anti-Jew. It later became extremely anti-equal rights for women and well, now it seems most Muslems just can't stand their Jewish brethren no more.... I only know of a few matriarchal social structures - the ancient Hebrew is more so than most and the Pre-Islamic society found in Ache -pronounced atch-eye (Sumatra) was matriarchal and still has strong remnants of that alive and well in some areas... So keep the faith. Little by little women will gain ground and bigotry, sexism, and all forms of predjudice will slip into the past. We faulty humans are trending toward the light most of the time.

Sean & Cloud - Thank you both for your kindness. Seasoned yeah-I'm 52. I went from fully baked in high school and half baked in college to being many things in many places, and now after ten years of giving much of my energies as the primary care-giver for my dieing mom, [while trying to be a political entity (Green Party) & tenants rights advocate]... I want nothing more than to paint and jam with my blues cronies in NYC...or whereever. Basically go back to my life as an artist which I left behind for those ten years... I've had a pretty wonderful life but also had some real bad things go down - I ran into some neo-nazis in 1983 that had their fun and left me for dead. (this next part is not for the faint of heart) So I know something about the true nature of evil, as well as of light and grace. I know some people do not have a soul. I don't even think of them as "humans" they are not as senscient as many critters i've shared cognisense with... but they act talk and walk like they are real people. Only without compassion an open mind nor a soul to hold their spirit close they are just empty and HUNGRY to fill the emptyness, which usually leads to cruelty and imposing their wills on others. The scaryest thing of all is that they don't know what is wrong with themselves, to themselves they are what humanbeings are supposed to be...most of them is here- acting like a person with a spark of life wanting to be fulfilled, only without the inner guidence it is just willfull lusting for power over others and craving others to suffer with them in some way or other...This is also a way to power, because the blind craving for it gives them direction and purpose... The nazis exposed these traits for history to remember and for folks now and in the future to always be aware of as in beware! When I looked into Rudy Guliani's eyes as I told him of police corruption in the infamous 9th precinct of the lower East Side... It seemed as if he had no soul to stop my gaze going ever deeper into his eyes. And thats when I realized just how much the eyes of men and beasts ARE windows into the soul...or lack there of! (its back to the light from here-) Like I wrote before it has been in the eyes of dogs children and people content with their lives-no matter what - these are the places I have seen the brightest love-lights or spiritual light in the world. (and the Dalai Lama did once hit me with a serious intensity of this inner force - though his background check has been made some-what suspect to me here, I'm still pretty damn sure he's one of the good guys.) When Stevie Wonder and Ray Charles can do what they do/did to reach my soul then I think it is just that love-light or soul-light or spiritual light transformed into music to find a way out into the world. That joy can be and is everywhere inside of people with souls and will find its way out to be shared some how... I'm not sure I've stated these points that well but the dangers are real and the shared joys are real and staying aware and observing the nature of things and people can save your life and spirit some real pain.

OOh BabyBaby,,,what a moon. I hope lotsa Tao Bums caught at least a gander of it... Li po would be hittin' the plum wine tonight I betcha... Got me singin' the old Grateful Dead ditty Mountains of the Moon-my first favorite Dead song back in '68-9 or so, magical moment...but too tuff a tune to carry accopella (and me half loopy after two days of raw food, and very little of it)...So I went into Moon River - a much easier tune but a bit corny...Mmmm-corn...I don't think Ill last with the diet plan!

MiX'D TRiX FiNALE Your humble MC and Curator Jeffrey Cyphers Wright invites you to a reading and final closing party for MiX'D TRiX. Saturday, Sept. 30 2 to 3:30 poetry with Star Black Michael Carter Steve Dalachinksy Patrick Goldsmith David Hatchett Amy Hill Valery Oisteanu Yuko Otomo Ilka Scobie and JCW CLOSING PARTY, 3:30 to 4:30 at Tompkins Square Library Gallery East 10th Street between Ave A&B

I've been thinking about this thread and scanned the entire piece again to get a better read and It surely seems to be skewed and not taking the changes already having taken place for the Tibetans -as a culture and society amid great upheaval and a diaspora forcing them on the road through a brutal oppression So they are a few genaretions away from the olden ways at least in terms of settled and accepted culture... Sticking with what I've seen and felt for now.... that the old patriarchy has been uprooted to some degree is a very good thing and I believe it will remain an out-dated way in the future of Tibetan Buddhist teachings. Maybe praying for the poor bastards rather than attacking what is left of a once very interesting -if mightily flawed -culture, would bring those writers more merit!. Yet - If I ever find believable evidence of some of these charges I will change my tune "toot-sweet"... I abhor subjegation in any form for any reason. Be it from a Guru getting-over on followers , governments doing whatever they do, or even parents forcing demands on their young-uns....Authoritarianism pisses me off. I still say "Free Tibet!". let them go through their changes to "modernize" in whatever peace that they may yet be able to find.... With the Dalai Lama as their leader. STILL - The charges made are pretty heinous and I will keep digging to see if any water is held by them...when I get a chance!

The gallon will last me the week (2/3 regular 1/3 decaf) and there may be some left over. But it IS a habit for me and seems to be something I now need to get me started. I never drank coffee much until I was in my thirties, and I never drink more than two cups a day- always before noon and with milk & honey -or better for the taste-buds chocolate melted in the cup -half a hershey bar is perfect! It is an indulgence but it helps to get me through the day. I too am wary of coffee. It changes some people's moods for the worse and has made me edgey at times too...Copious amounts doesn't apply to me- my sister drinks five+ cups a day!!! That I also worry about for her sake... but thanks for the concern is could have seemed a problem. making a gallon in advance of the challange was probibly some sort of Linus-blanket for me to have handy...I can't let my energies fail this week. Even if I have to caffinate to stay at it...

Day two of raw food diet. I did make a huge pot of brown rice and also sun-brewed about a gallon of coffee. There has been milk & honey for the java and I am using up some (cooked) plum sauce I made with the rice... Man! are nuts expensive! I don't know if I can afford to eat this way for a week, I'll cut back on nuts and go with cereal- only I believe most cereals are cooked at some point, so that may not be a purest route to take...I'll read the boxes and find an answer...Or make my own granola... Juicing lots of veggies to concentrate the intake I'm not even gonna try to EAT only raw veggies for a week too much chewing I'll lose some of the fiber but enjoy the repast so much more. Anyway I am doing this to lose some weight and refresh my system more than anything else. I think I will also try a water fast in the middle of this - on Sunday. I have much too much to do to risk a melt down energy-lapse before then. This Durian thing is a real hoot to me... In South East Asia , some people will spend a week's wages on a single durian if they think its the one to top all others... Durians are not allowed in any of the hotels I ever stayed in in Asia -because of the smell! But yes if you find a great one it is pretty amazing- a combo of fruits and unknown flavors that is over-powering for the taste buds-and the taste changes and developes and it is a real trip! So- just get past the smell and heaven awaits. The smell was never so terrible to me, just very funky - not like chemical fumes-but maybe human fumes... so I tried it without too much problem... I am glad to hear one can eat the white part too - I didn't think it was edible! Mixing durian with ANYTHING would be unheard of to the folks who love them more than sex... I've not had one in twenty years but I may go for it again- there is an Asian food store just a half mile from here that keeps some in a fridge all the time. 99 cents a pound... Stay limber-wayfarer

Perhaps when I get back from NYC on Sunday I will add the water fast (but just for a day) to my on-going raw food challange. But I'll need to see how I hold up to this first challange - so far so what...! Its not so very different from my normal diet 'cept the rawness factor...(and I am eating A LOT of cooked brown rice ) so the intensity of a radical change may not be there...I'll get to the other thread to finish...

Cold-brewing yes or more like Sun brewing (but there has been litle sun here of late.).. I am trying a "raw-food diet challange" that started on a different thread here at TaoBums...Water, fruit,nuts,veggies, (I am also eating cooked brown rice to keep me sated). The rest of this belongs on the other thread perhaps- 7day challange-

Hey Maybe I read you wrong as being cynical about my advice to relax and enjoy life rather than strive for some higher experience... When for me being in the moment is the highest experience I need. I do not seek power over my body nor my spirit only the unity of them in a harmonic hum of livin'...Sometimes the not doing works as well as the striving- I meant no judgement, I meant to be funny and lighten up the thread again as it has been pretty light hearted. Buy hey if purging works for you now thats something I have used with some success too. Yet that too has a down side... a dear friend of mine nearly died from a purging meant to rid him of a huge intestinal worm. The worm left his ematiated body but the process nearly killed him. Everything in its place and time my friend... One of my favorite travel tales is about I guy I met In Guatamala who was fed up with stories of purging and colonic irrigation, he went on a hilarious rant about it at a cantina in Chichicastanango... Generally, taking in food and drugs and making love is a bit more comforting and raises one's inner-being more than purging or colonic irrigation etc... Often I would rather be funny than right- I hope it isn't a very big problem. I do take the addiction to chocolate seriously but the humor found in human folly is always going to bubble up to my surface and annoy some people - So I appologize for any umbrage raised.

Hi there Cloud- Yogic skills are not so very hard to train for with some people- but the ethics may never enter their concsiousness... it is a tool to make money or gain power. By the by - The final chapter of the guru maharaji was that he pissed off his mom - the real power within the organization- because he wanted to marry a western woman. She told him "Go to your room you can no longer be God!!!" And she made his brother the new head-honcho for a while...By then my friends who had brought me to Texas had wised-up but had also given up much of their material wealth in the belief of ... what ? maybe a new life I guess a new way of being...Sad & funny too. & yes the link is about the "two-new-car-garagee I came to deplore...Lord of the Universe yikes! I am not sure that anyone born flesh and blood can maintain a perfect state of hyper-consciousness or enlightenment all the time. And it may be that the springing back into lower states of being actually brings some of these gurus to a very low place indeed. If they get lazy at that point and remain mired in base personal motivations-look out, getout and grab anyone you care about when the cosmic shit hits the kharmic fan it aint pretty and people lose their way in a big way. Being flung from ones "life" path into the wild world of inner turmoil is a sort of hell...Souls can be lost. And the empty shells look human but they are just empty husks with very dark appitites-like demons I guess. Very dangerous. Seeking can be a real rat-race! Spiritual questing has taken a large part of my life's time and energy. I am not sure there is a teacher for me. But so far its the children, dogs and simple (poor and happy) folks who have offered me the purest love and most open hearted access to themselves and thus our shared reality... An open aware mind expanding through time and space has got to be a pretty special thing on any scale of being. I look for that in teachers and myself, I find it in meditation, painting, playing musiv, love-making and LSD etc... That moment with the Dalai Lama still seems like the real thing to me but I will apply my sceptical reasonable powers of deduction and scientific yearning to analize what it was I experienced. as promissed ...(but I am pretty sure that paper is not a fair assessment of the growth from feudal Tibet into the more modern and changing Tibetan diaspora)...The world is changing the Dalai aLama as much if not more than he is changing the world... But thats a different thread - That is another reason I think of the middle way as the way for me. There's no huge leap of cosmic glee and base angst to swing through. I hope to obtain a nice steady groove that keeps me on my toes and aware of the incredible beauty and joy any moment can offer -not some grandiose transcendent flip into a new state of being. This life is all the blessing and grace I seek. If I can just see it around me & within me...Sometimes this happens. So ok-This life and this world are amazing just as they are day to day. & I think that is what I need to grasp more often from within myself. So, I have seen how these guys can be of low charracter and able to project a "high" state of awareness into the susceptible minds of seekers. But where is the sense of playful honesty (good humor) and open-minded inclusion of all life in our sense of being... One with All...The compassionate connectedness without a "gimme" attached? Making the effort may just be enough to grant us the grace to get through and remain happy with whatever we have... Pretty unAmerican huh? But wanting more enlightenment is not so very different from wanting more chocolate, sometimes a little is enough to see us through...and the imbalance of overdoing and jonesing lays us lower than when we started.... sorry I gotta make these shorter huh? not this time! I just read through some of that web site the little ck-scker is still at it! I can not believe he still has a following-very troubling to me & don't see my friends names on the ex-premie roll-call but I'm pretty sure they got out... Been a long time since '73...Down Many paths.With no thought of that little imp 'til now! Like Knosses says in "Been Down so long it looks like up to me"- Beware the monkey demon!

Yes whatever works for you at the moment and using all of your being to experience the full life you are offered and blessed with every moment...Pleasures most naturally encluded. Read some Li Po - he's translated into English- to catch the wine groove on paper if you can't stomach the real thing. Puritanical self denial is not always a way to find purity. sometimes it justs makes you grumpy self-rightious and poor company...The most narrow-minded folks I have ever met - were sure that they had found all the answers. Open-minds are usually not cynical. whatever indeed. I laugh with the moon in your general direction.

Tonight's sure was! Even in central NJ! I walked due east with the sun going down and the moon seemed very very big and a real beauty to linger with...Very special. Tomorrow's full moon is around 2.45 or so in the afternoon a good time to put into action your plans from the new moon two weeks ago... Many of my friends believe in planning projects around the moon's cycles so I pay some attention to them and often do set things in motion at propitious times... Moon turn the tides...in our brains too...

My pleasures can enjoy me all they want to. It only seems fair don't it? I recently read that a few oz's of dark chocolat and one /two glasses of red wine every day are very good for us older folks- anti-oxidents is the thing to that. Everything in moderation even moderation heh... And yes no booz for diabetics period! And no chocalate for dogs! and yada yada it seems sometimes that everything is bad for us in one way or another. Relax you are only young once -(a life time) so hey enjoy the run while ya can. Aging isn't as easy as it looks. But the alternative is lousy! And good health is very prescious indeed...But a life without expeiences is a blank page... I drink a half gallon of filtered water every day and eat as much fruit as I want -I'm actually trying a new diet as stated on another thread (and I still drink coffee in the am -but it is now cold instead of hot)...I gave myself some wiggle-room! So try many ways to eat healthfully... and find the one that works for you- this may be a combo of systems or whatever ...don't rush it ;don't sweat it; and don't worry! Your stressing is the worst thing for you bar none! My pleasures can enjoy me all they want to. It only seems fair don't it? I recently read that a few oz's of dark chocolat and one /two glasses of red wine every day are very good for us older folks- anti-oxidents is the thing to that. Everything in moderation even moderation heh... And yes no booz for diabetics period! And no chocalate for dogs! and yada yada it seems sometimes that everything is bad for us in one way or another. Relax you are only young once -(a life time) so hey enjoy the run while ya can. Aging isn't as easy as it looks. But the alternative is lousy! And good health is very prescious indeed...But a life without expeiences is a blank page... I drink a half gallon of filtered water every day and eat as much fruit as I want -I'm actually trying a new diet as stated on another thread (and I still drink coffee in the am -but it is now cold instead of hot)...I gave myself some wiggle-room! So try many ways to eat healthfully... and find the one that works for you- this may be a combo of systems or whatever ...don't rush it ;don't sweat it; and don't worry! Your stressing is the worst thing for you bar none!

as in - Any Port in a storm? I guess a dryer wine would make a better change for the situation being addressed-(blood sugar) as port can be pretty sweet stuff... And a dry port offers a ship no harbor(sorry... puns make me happy)

I would try wine, Seriously - a good mid-range red from France around $10 a bottle...it may ease yr blood - sugar levels down more than jones ya with a drastic drop...- And less seriously ... even if it doesn't work perfectly you will enjoy the change of pace remember- " candy is dandy but liquer is quicker" AND...You can always write poems to the moon and your own reflection -like Li Po . I think if it works for the French with their heavy diet of canard avec beurre and such - well it can't hurt a choco-holic... Good luck!!! I worry 'bout blood sugar too... Fear of Diabetic mayhem etc...

Welcome aboard Verv! I am also new to The Tao Bums site and have already found many interesting things to read and think about. I am wonderfully amazed at how people from all over the world can now come together so easily! The www is a great boon to mankind indeed!- See ya 'round - Wayfarer

It seems that there is USUALLY a deep flaw in religions, or cults-in their founders and their followers, just because of the all too human element of ego manifestation... Greed, l ust, power mongering, creep into the scenerio... Christ has the legacy of the Catholic Church to sully his teachings-(Nobody expected the Spanish Inquisition).. Buddha himself may have become something of a parasite in the waning days of his life and is said to have died from over-eating! Yet the teachings that came through each of them can be used by anyone to improve their state of consciousness. Teachings are also changed like in a game of post-office...Mohammed was not anti-Jew, but his modern followers usually are. The more modern gurus mentioned here, are not well known to me, but I did have experience with the Guru Maharaji (I later dubbed him "Two new car garagee")- in the '70s... A truelly bizarre experience -when I was kindly taken to the Astro-dome in Texas for a gathering of the guru's followers. (this to avoid the end of the world predicted by the Guru- the astro-dome would some-how be left standing from which his followers would emerge unscathed)... I over-heard some of his staff say that because the parking-lot seemed so empty they would set-aside a huge swath of it for the parking of alien (ET) ships to land. It would be anounced that they were coming but would remain invisible so as not to bring the US airforce etc... Then they had several cars re-parked in front of the main gate so that the press would believe that there was a larger gathering...Which was their real aim in the first place. But now they had their folowers believing aliens had come to pay tribute to the Guru. Oh what a web we weave - Most had already given him all of their wealth. yet the main thrust of the Guru's speach was about giving up attachment to possessions-by selling them and giving the proceeds to him! It was a circus and felt more like a sales-pitch than a lesson in transcendence. But my friends who had brought me swore his meditation techniques brought them a white-light experience and great bliss. This similar to what I had experienced in the Dalai Lama's presense, so who was I to argue? (My experience with the Dalai Lama has also been brought to question on another thread here on TB)... So in all, I guess we must find our way to enlightenment as if crossing a mine field...These threads may be helping us to question ALL imparted wisdom as suspect, & that too may be a false path towards cynicism...As Cloud points out above... So with feet firmly planted we learn to soar and by looking inward, we find what is out there... Making the best of the moments we have still seems like a good plan to me...

A very cool thing to know for today! It reminds me that my father claimed he had talked with Kerouac many times at a bar in the Village, (NYC)-Twas The Kettle of Fish where he bought me my first beer (in a bar) when I was 15 or so... (He knew I'd taken a few "trips" by then -& he had also - we had talked about the experience) - so what the hell was a beer... Anyway all my pops would say was that Kerouac was a great story teller... I figured he had been too drunk to remember much. Or maybe he had lied to impress me...My father Stuart was a very troubled drunken lout most of the time who treated his kids like shit, but that was a great moment we shared nonetheless... I also saw Kerouac on the Johnny Carson show in the early sixties before I knew who he was...Still I always remembered the guy in a lumber-jack shirt obviously drunk and pretty obnoxious to Carson et al... I read just about everything he wrote except the first book-"the town & the country" or some such I just couldn't dig it after reading most of his other stuff first. Several years later I met Allen Ginsberg a few times through his moms' best friends' grand kid, who was coincedentally the nephew of Man Ray -the lower East side Jewish comunity was pretty tight I guess... and also through a student of his, years later who now has given me a poetry reading in NYC this week... So thats my free-form bop prosidy 'bout Jack Kerouac... Letting the words flow like a jazz riff without much time or judgment to pause into...( I did go back for the typos) NO ONE could/can do it as well as he did- even if Capote called it "typing" -not writing... I for one love the books he wrote. That he became a fat right-wing drunken mess is just plain sad.

size=3] The Tao Bums was recommended to me by Paul over at The Golden Lantern, a site where I have found friends and information. I hope the connections we make here further our shared growth and questing... Many thanks to Sean for his help in getting me aboard and on our way together... Every moment a new beginning...Even if a bit bumpy to begin with, perserverence wins out once more... So hello One & All!- Pat