Mark Foote

sip hot nettle soup panaeolus on the side civilization

I agree, Barb. I'm trying my best not to be retired, so I'm not here every day- but almost. When I am, it's such a good time. A long time now I have tried to write things I didn't know before I sat down to write, to let the writing channel some part of me, to express in words the relationships I feel in a way that is meaningful to me even if not to anyone else. I love to use only words that are necessary and sufficient, as they say in mathematics. Sometimes Tao Bums brings it out of me. The sincerity of everybody is the most striking thing about Tao Bums. People write from the heart, they lay their innermost beliefs on the line, they put intimate stuff on the page that no one can relate to and yet it's eerily familiar like we've all been there before. And collectively we know what to do with it, some times. Drew Hempel pointed out some stuff about Kurt Godel I'd never known, that meant a lot to me. A friend gifted me a copy of "Notices", the magazine of the American Mathematical Society; it's an issue about using computers to dot the i's and cross the t's and formally prove mathematical statements that have been rigorously proven, but only on the basis of other math already accepted. The first proof they formally vindicated was Godel's incompleteness theorem (the theorem says that you cannot put everything that is known in mathematics on an axiomatic basis; if you did, your axioms would also allow contradictions- and if your axioms didn't allow contradictions, you couldn't build everything that's known in mathematics from them). The Tao that can be put in words is not the true Tao.

four thousand haikus and yet- the feeling is strong red tablecloth, bright

I am very fortunate to have a handful of friends, including the woman who was my wife (back when), and the woman who I hope will be my wife in the near future. These things are precious, to look someone in the eye and laugh, and to look someone in the eye and cry; you could say that's why I'm a student of the way, I guess. It helps to get up on the tightrope, physically, so that I can recognize a fine line when I'm walking one. Oh to be sitting on the ground with my hands in the dirt with Tao Bums and friends, perhaps in Florida as I'd rather not have frost-bite as well as frozen turds on my hands. Ha ha, stick with it, Manitou!- er, that doesn't sound quite right...

waiting to be read first signs of spring, in the clouds last rays of sun, white

I'll be looking for it used, yeah, right. I did the exercises for about nine years too, then I just kind of dropped them last fall- not sure why. Now it's just occasional. I realize the value of standing in that regard, but it wears me out for the rest of the day- at least that's how it was in the Tai Chi class, which was a lot of standing. Not doing that much anymore, either. Dancing to rock 'n roll, that's about it- I probably like that too much. I should take up gardening... see if I can find infinite calm in the plants out in the yard (just teasin', but I hope I'll take it up!).

touching earth softly, then with a firmness and grace the cat moves fog-like

Hey, lifeforce, do you do the 16 (+ 1) exercises in the book that's your avatar? I still do, sometimes; my whole life, learning out of books; I think it's highly underrated by teachers in Eastern traditions. Manitou, I like your comments about Jesus. I got a copy of the Gospel of Thomas when I was in high school, and I always figured he was actually teaching his disciples something other than devotion- or trying to. One of my college professors was from the south of India, or at least his people were. He said that his people always believed that Thomas migrated with a caravan to where his people lived. They stoned him to death, way back when, and become Christians afterward- I guess. Then there's the tomb of Jesus, or what's purported to be the tomb of Jesus, in the Kashmir province of India. I leap to the assumption that Jesus didn't necessarily die on the cross, and that he and Thomas proceeded together to India, then separated. I read about the tomb of Jesus in Tim Ward's "Fleas on the Great Dragon"; I think Mr. Ward also put forward that the first references to Avalokitesvara are from about that time, and that the bodhisattva of compassion was originally depicted with stigmata. Sure can't find anything about that on the web, although the tomb of Jesus shows up. I did a lot of judo in high school and college, though I didn't get farther than a second brown; still, I think I owe my judo teacher more than I can say, for bearing with me and demonstrating some kind of mind/body connection. And for not telling me until years later that he and his senior students had a laugh at my expense, when I first came to class and showed them the hip throw I learned out of a book.

Many interesting and sincere contributions, on this thread! Vaj, on the subject of soul- I was writing to the father of my sweetheart the other day, in support of his decision to stay home with his pneumonia instead of entering the hospital, and I found these words: "There is, I think, an umbilical cord of greater being that acts quite palpably in us, and in which we can forget ourselves in the course of a movement of breath; hospitals tend to make that action of the greater part less palpable somehow, and in so doing they can make the peace of forgetting ourselves harder to find." I'm now rewriting this for possible submission to the blog of an outfit I'm working for, and I am thinking to rephrase it as: "There is, I think, an umbilical cord from the unconscious that acts quite palpably in us, through our sense of location. As we accept the stretch, activity and feeling this umbilical cord provides, we can forget ourselves, just in the course of a single movement of breath. When I forget myself in this way, I still have my presence of mind, and I bring that presence of mind to whatever choice I have to make in my daily life." I understand where you are coming from with dependent origination, and I know that you have had amazing experiences behind letting go, through dependent origination. I'm more comfortable with that than with the notion of soul, but I think as far as a working practice, it's the same. Ok, just a thought.

I really wanted to join a Zen monastery back in the seventies, but I couldn't sit the lotus, couldn't sit half-lotus without pain and numbness either. A teacher I respected said, "take your time with the lotus". So I did. Now I sit the lotus for 40 or 50 minutes in the morning, and it feels pretty natural; no pain, although there's often a little numbness in the top foot when I uncork it. I expected the lotus would change my posture, which has always driven Zen and Tai Chi teachers to correct my alignment; I don't know that it will. I always expected when I mastered the lotus, I could lead a more normal life, have more balance between work and home and contribute more to my society. Hasn't happened yet. But I think I have more feeling in what I do, in general. Enlightenment is a lofty ambition; being a Taoist adept or an internal arts master is a lofty ambition. I realize that I only want to see the lotus come West; if I can do it, anybody can do it, but evidently I will have to consider my ambition to be lofty too, 'cause I haven't yet found a way that's straightforward for people to learn it. And I do think that some sort of crisis of spirit is necessary, and the connection with breath is almost like hypnosis if not hypnosis and opens all kinds of pandora's box stuff, and I'm still trying to explain that to myself- but that's why I'm on this thread! My own crisis just revolved around trying to get down to what was really necessary to me to survive; I couldn't see a way to make a positive contribution with my life, early on, so I tried giving things up until my survival seemed to dictate what I kept. And that turned out to be positive, and I kept going with what I had, and where I was. The great camp-out, mostly indoors, I think fortunately. Love you all!-

(I meant to say, welcome back, MudLotus!) hold pillow woman soft curves tucked in comforters rest my head and sleep

awaiting the dawn cat in the crook of my arm soon asleep again

peace and beauty still nothing to be said, nothing peace and beauty moves

a true listener sits in the tree here at night calling out my mind

I think it was the first patriarch of Zen in China who said that the first principle is in everyone. The more I feel that my hard work has allowed me to achieve something, the more I see that everyone else in the world is already manifesting the same thing, effortlessly. As to the recession: When the Tao is lost, there is goodness. When goodness is lost, there is morality. When morality is lost, there is ritual. Ritual is the husk of true faith, the beginning of chaos. what's a mother to do!

brings much happiness to all sentient beings- rain, after dry summer

Bernanke said the Great Recession (now) was actually worse than the Great Depression, and by that I suppose he meant that if we didn't have FDR's social safety nets in place, it would have literally been worse than the depression on the streets of the U.S. of A. What can I say, I think it's pretty obvious that lack of regulation (the goose gets the whole back yard) didn't work well; if it's not obvious, explain how it was that with the whole back yard, all but one of the major American banks was ready to fold (I believe Bernanke said that too).

Aint I rough enough, ooh baby Aint I tough enough Aint I rich enough Ooh! Ooh! Please That about sums up your position, I think, Non; my girl, she likes wimps that cry over dog-food commercials, so I got lucky there... p.s.- that's not her in the photo.

Apparently eugenics was very big in the U.S. in the 'thirties, the Nazis weren't the only ones looking to improve the race. This afternoon in a bookstore I picked up "IBM and the Holocaust", very disturbing account of the history of how the Nazis were able to assemble the lists and organize the operation of the Holocaust; IBM punch-card sorting machines, customized for the purpose. Now the pendulum swings backwards, the internet age produces situations like that in Egypt. Where repression is the norm, however, communication on the internet can be dangerous to one's health. The age of information, and the age of misinformation; read an article in the S.F. Chronicle not too long ago about how stroke victims can tell when someone is lying, they are 60% accurate as opposed to the usual 50%. The example the article gave to make it clear was a doctor's account of a roomful of stroke victims watching Ronald Reagan, and how the room kept bursting into laughter at inappropriate moments.

"A legend in his or her own mind", as opposed to "a legend in his or her own time"; that's why I think it's safer to assume that we are talking to ourselves when we post (and pretty much all the time), and shoot to write or say something we didn't know before. Ah- gah-gah gah! Or something we barely know, feel and have to search for the exact words to express. If nothing else, it's a great exercise. Speaking of exact words to express, what is: thanks, ya old Maa'-kheru!

I'm thinking there is one group of primates that doesn't show the aggressive behaviour of chimps, and especially male chimps- and if I remember rightly, that group of primates makes love all the time, they're polyamorous. Only a little off-topic. Words and images can remind us of subtle aspects of the way our minds and bodies coordinate in response to things. If the words and images become a way of holding onto a particular coordination, and we ignore what we feel, then we feel threatened by whatever doesn't agree with us. It's impossible to argue words and images with someone who ignores feelings, they are physically dependent on their beliefs, as it were; it's only possible to inspire feeling, as we ourselves experience feeling in our lives.

tumbleweed rolls by wind parches the old clapboard night, a thousand stars

Hopefully Coleman Barks is alright with my quoting his translation here- I went looking for something else, found this which I like very much: RUMI - We Are Three by Coleman Barks Recognize that you imagination and your thinking and your sense-perception are reed canes that children cut and pretend are horsies. The Knowing of mystic Lovers is different. The empirical, sensory, sciences are like a donkey loaded with books, or like the makeup woman's makeup. It washes off. But if you lift the baggage rightly, it will give you joy. Don't carry your knowledge-load for some selfish reason. Deny your desires and willfulness, and a real mount may appear under you. Don't be satisfied with the name of HU, with just words about it. Experience That Drunkenness. From books and words come fantasy, and sometimes, from fantasy comes UNION.

flakes of crust, white plate vanilla ice cream puddles waiting on coffee