xin heart mind

[dawei]

11 hours ago, Bindi said:

My understanding of the process is that the mind interferes with the xin, and for the xin to revert back to its original nature the mind and the xin need to be untangled. Perhaps the heart has its own consciousness, which is drowned out by our dominant head consciousness, and the work is to give back a sort of autonomy to the heart.

 

 

 

4 hours ago, OldDog said:

 

Yes, this is the direction I am leaning ... due, in no small part, to the link you provided on the Chinese model of cognition. While i don't always agree with some of the author's conclusions, these discussion have helped me to explore the potential for different meaning in key concepts, as I seek a better understanding.

 

I have always been uneasy with a mind centered notion of awareness. After all, most meditative traditions teach some form of letting mental activity go ... quieting the mind. But if that is accomplished then what is there left to attain awareness. The heart may qualify, but then what is the heart ... what role does it have in cognition. And are there other bodily aspects to cognition ... awareness. This is what I think the Neiye teaches ... a set of physical practices that are simple and direct without a lot of ornamentation to detract from the real goal.

 

Just an opinion.

 

 

 

 

The heart is the mind of the heart; the mind is heart of the mind.    They are co-joined for a reason in the word.

[OldDog]

49 minutes ago, dawei said:

They are co-joined for a reason in the word.

 

Each informs the other ... imho

[dawei]

29 minutes ago, OldDog said:

 

Each informs the other ... imho

 

[Bindi]

I don't think the mind informs the heart so much as overrides the heart when not aligned. Before being aligned it is the heart that needs to be cultivated, the mind merely needs to be silenced. It sounds like a power imbalance, the voice of the heart that is drowned out needs to be encouraged, and the powerful voice of the mind silenced.  

 

When aligned the heart and the head must of course synchronise, along with the lower dantian, that's the whole point of the endeavour. 

 

 

[Geof Nanto]

This is a good discussion that comprehensively covers the topic, in my opinion. My thanks to everyone who's contributed. To my mind, xin is one of those key Chinese terms that could well be left untranslated once a person gets a sense of it. Maybe even left as 心 .

 

To put into my words what's already been said, the sense I personally have of it is the totally of the me that perceives, or at least that part of that totality of which I’m conscious of.  And it's my whole being which perceives and 'thinks', as recognised by TCM. Thus xin is a complex mish-mash of cognition, not a unified whole. For me, a primary purpose of qigong and other methods of cultivation is to harmonise (unify) xin.  

 

I also added content on xin recently on the Neiye thread here. (And I very much like the comprehensive account of the meaning of xin in contemporary China that Bindi references in her OP. It mightn't be perfect but it's certainly worth reading.) 

 

 

Edited April 25, 2019 by Yueya

[liminal_luke]

Heart-mind interaction is a western science thing too -- neurocardiology.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurocardiology

[OldDog]

9 hours ago, Yueya said:

And it's my whole being which perceives and 'thinks', as recognised by TCM. Thus xin is a complex mish-mash of cognition, not a unified whole. For me, a primary purpose of qigong and other methods of cultivation is to harmonise (unify) xin.  

 

 

I tend to agree with the "whole being" notion ... and think the TCM connection is worth bringing to the foreground of discussion.  It's an overlooked source of understanding on this subject. Qigong is kind of a nod in the direction of the TCM. Would seem that the level of balance and harmonization achievable through qigong would be very helpful in developing the "whole being" notion.

 

Xin in many ways is metaphorical in that it represents at once many different aspects of what we are trying to get at ... trying to unify. So, yeah, I can accept that it may not be translatable. But Xin is also just a word ... and once you have the meaning you can forget the word ... or so we are told.

 

Perhaps Xin as a process can be thought of more as the equivalent of whole cognition.

 

 

[OldDog]

Still reading a paper (provided elsewhere by Bindi, I believe) on the Chinese model of cognition represented in the Neiye. Part of that analysis has to doing with how the Neiye considers preparations for making the heart-mind (xin) ready to receive the awareness of Dao.

 

In that explication there was ... what for me has become ...  a somewhat different way of viewing the meditative process. It is generally acknowledged that one needs to quieten the heart-mind of thoughts and emotions to achieve a state ready for awareness. These activities of the heart-mind become the focus of the quieting process. We are told to simply let them pass without attaching to them. What was new for me was the notion that such thoughts and emotions are the heart-minds way of responding to reality ... most typically the result of sensory input. Arguments about what reality is notwithstanding, the point was that heart-mind is responding. It would seem from this that the process of quieting the heart-mind is to a great extent one of addressing the response mechanism ... something not easy to do. In a practical sense, we try to achieve this quietened state by limiting sensory input. The argument then would seem to distinguish the stimuli from that which is responding and suggest the responding be the focus.

 

I never really thought of it this way ... but felt it was something worth reflecting on. Thought this was an interesting sidebar to the Xin discussion.

 

 

[Geof Nanto]

I like xin as a concept because I’ve always found it impossible to separate thinking and feeling. They’re intertwined. Both give meaning to my life, although for me, healthy functioning means keeping what I feel as primary; thinking is the interpreter. When thinking loses its grounding in feeling, intuition, sensation, emotion etc, and instead creates its own abstract world of concepts as the primary source of personal meaning, then it’s delusional.  

 

I also like it that xin references the whole organ / meridian qi flow system of human functioning. It doesn’t suffer from Western mind-body dualism. (But, as an aside because it’s a whole other topic in itself, I don’t agree with accounts, like in the OP referenced article, that state that the heart organ is the seat of xin. To me that’s a continuation of the false idea that the brain is the seat of the mind.)

 

When I said this has been a comprehensive discussion about xin I meant it. But that doesn’t mean we’ve pinned it down. I consider that to be impossible, like it’s impossible to know what ‘mind’ is.  We can explore Chinese usage of xin and try to elucidate what xin means for them and us as a concept, as we have done here. That’s complex enough. But for me at least, what it refers to in myself, beyond being able to expand on Descartes and say, “I think and feel therefore I am”, remains elusive. 

 

And I like it that Chinese thought never dwelled on searching for the ultimate nature of things. Rather they were interested in the process of life. Hence, the Neiye for instance, is about techniques of xin (xinshu 心術). Daoist cultivation in general is about harmonising one’s life with the flow of Dao. And, as to my personal cultivation, what I do know is that my participation on DaoBums has helped harmonise my xin. It’s a Daoist thing to be unaffected through having a calm xin. I’m still very much affected by many things, though far less so than I was before I started yoga, qigong, meditation etc. And less so than I was a few years ago when I first arrived on DaoBums. Some of that may be simply desensitising, but I know within myself that this lively forum with its mixture of wisdom and folly, of healthy and toxic attitudes, has helped me become more conscious of these traits with myself. And that awareness, through some mysterious alchemy, has changed me for the better. 
 

[Geof Nanto]

On 26/04/2019 at 12:17 AM, OldDog said:

What was new for me was the notion that such thoughts and emotions are the heart-minds way of responding to reality ... most typically the result of sensory input. Arguments about what reality is notwithstanding, the point was that heart-mind is responding. It would seem from this that the process of quieting the heart-mind is to a great extent one of addressing the response mechanism ... something not easy to do. In a practical sense, we try to achieve this quietened state by limiting sensory input. The argument then would seem to distinguish the stimuli from that which is responding and suggest the responding be the focus.

 

I'm not sure I understand fully what you mean, but I wont let that stop me adding my reply!

 

This can lead into the trap of quietism. I live in a semi-wilderness environment and the primal stillness here, especially at night, is vital for me. It’s a sacred stillness, pregnant with ineffable meaning.  Yet cultivation solely in such a quiet place is weak. I find I also need opposition / difficulty for me to develop true inner calmness. Jung said a person doesn’t get enlightened by sitting on a mountain top; enlightenment requires full engagement with life. I need to slowly work through and thereby take the energy out of those traits within me that prevent a calm xin. Hence I engage in discussions on this forum.  DaoBums has many good qualities, but stillness is definitely not one of them. By some mysterious alchemical process involving myriad ingredients,  I slowly I begin to feel that primal stillness within my core.

[dawei]

On 4/25/2019 at 10:17 AM, OldDog said:

In a practical sense, we try to achieve this quietened state by limiting sensory input. The argument then would seem to distinguish the stimuli from that which is responding and suggest the responding be the focus

 

If there is no input then there is no response... so how can one focus on limiting an input and then claim a response to focus on? 

[OldDog]

4 hours ago, Yueya said:

I'm not sure I understand fully what you mean ....

 

Me either. I am not declaring something as a matter of fact. Just exploring different possible understandings of the Neiye text ... trying to see what fits.

 

The main point of the Neiye is that of laying out the conditions of practice that allow for the Dao to be experienced. It talks about the conditiins ... not so much the methods. There are references made to quieting the heart-mind of thought and emotions. How might that be done ... by dealing with the sources of input or dealing with the source of response ... or even both. By considering the later, I felt that it helped (me) break away from the usual notions of mind and effort needed to set the right conditions.Those notions were not fitting into my evolving sense of xin as a holistic process.The notion that the heart-mind's usual state is to respond suggests perhaps it's just not all about external stimuli being the impediment ... it is, at least in part, the response itself.

 

5 hours ago, dawei said:

If there is no input then there is no response...

While that may be true ... it may also be true that if there is no response then the normal distractions do not disturb. It is not unlike the problem Zen meditators encounter where the effort spent on eliminating distractions can be also be a distraction. 

 

Admittedly, I am still working my way through this but it seems to be fitting into the picture better thsn my orevious understanding of what is needed to experience Dao. The Neiye has been a great challenge for such a small text.

[Bindi]

5 hours ago, Yueya said:

I like xin as a concept because I’ve always found it impossible to separate thinking and feeling. They’re intertwined.

 

If we could apply the concept of yin and yang to feeling and thinking respectively, this might be a model for the way in which they should ideally intertwine - both entirely definable individually, but each flowing into the other.  

 

5 hours ago, Yueya said:

Both give meaning to my life, although for me, healthy functioning means keeping what I feel as primary; thinking is the interpreter. When thinking loses its grounding in feeling, intuition, sensation, emotion etc, and instead creates its own abstract world of concepts as the primary source of personal meaning, then it’s delusional.  

 

I also like it that xin references the whole organ / meridian qi flow system of human functioning. It doesn’t suffer from Western mind-body dualism. (But, as an aside because it’s a whole other topic in itself, I don’t agree with accounts, like in the OP referenced article, that state that the heart organ is the seat of xin. To me that’s a continuation of the false idea that the brain is the seat of the mind.)

 

And yet there are divisions in Chinese thought, yin and yang/true yin and true yang, the three dantians and jing qi and shen,  I find these divisions meaningful, and important on the way to 'wholeness'.

 

5 hours ago, Yueya said:

When I said this has been a comprehensive discussion about xin I meant it. But that doesn’t mean we’ve pinned it down. I consider that to be impossible, like it’s impossible to know what ‘mind’ is.  We can explore Chinese usage of xin and try to elucidate what xin means for them and us as a concept, as we have done here. That’s complex enough. But for me at least, what it refers to in myself, beyond being able to expand on Descartes and say, “I think and feel therefore I am”, remains elusive. 

 

And I like it that Chinese thought never dwelled on searching for the ultimate nature of things. Rather they were interested in the process of life. Hence, the Neiye for instance, is about techniques of xin (xinshu 心術). Daoist cultivation in general is about harmonising one’s life with the flow of Dao. And, as to my personal cultivation, what I do know is that my participation on DaoBums has helped harmonise my xin. It’s a Daoist thing to be unaffected through having a calm xin. I’m still very much affected by many things, though far less so than I was before I started yoga, qigong, meditation etc. And less so than I was a few years ago when I first arrived on DaoBums. Some of that may be simply desensitising, but I know within myself that this lively forum with its mixture of wisdom and folly, of healthy and toxic attitudes, has helped me become more conscious of these traits with myself. And that awareness, through some mysterious alchemy, has changed me for the better. 
 

 

[Bindi]

3 hours ago, OldDog said:

 

Me either. I am not declaring something as a matter of fact. Just exploring different possible understandings of the Neiye text ... trying to see what fits.

 

The main point of the Neiye is that of laying out the conditions of practice that allow for the Dao to be experienced. It talks about the conditiins ... not so much the methods. There are references made to quieting the heart-mind of thought and emotions. How might that be done ... by dealing with the sources of input or dealing with the source of response ... or even both. By considering the later, I felt that it helped (me) break away from the usual notions of mind and effort needed to set the right conditions.Those notions were not fitting into my evolving sense of xin as a holistic process.The notion that the heart-mind's usual state is to respond suggests perhaps it's just not all about external stimuli being the impediment ... it is, at least in part, the response itself.

 

While that may be true ... it may also be true that if there is no response then the normal distractions do not disturb. It is not unlike the problem Zen meditators encounter where the effort spent on eliminating distractions can be also be a distraction. 

 

Admittedly, I am still working my way through this but it seems to be fitting into the picture better thsn my orevious understanding of what is needed to experience Dao. The Neiye has been a great challenge for such a small text.

 

I agree the Neiye doesn't refer to methods so much, but I think it does talk about *clearing/cleaning what is already there as part of the necessary process. Without this process of cleaning or clearing of the xin, however xin is defined, it seems to run the risk of spiritual bypassing. 

 

*chú 除 "eliminate; remove; clean out

 

 

Edited April 28, 2019 by Bindi

[OldDog]

13 hours ago, Yueya said:

This can lead into the trap of quietism.

 

I am not sure what you mean ... the turn of the phrase caused me to stop and consider what it might mean.

 

A while ago Bindi mentioned using yin-yang as a model.

 

6 hours ago, Bindi said:

If we could apply the concept of yin and yang to feeling and thinking respectively, this might be a model for the way in which they should ideally intertwine - both entirely definable individually, but each flowing into the other.  

 

That mention was really in reference to thought and feeling but reminded me of what you said about the "trap of quietism".

 

The problem with yin-yang as a model is that we most often think of it as a categorization of things ... this is yin, that is yang. I think that there is another way to look at yin-yang and that is as a process of alternating qualities ... change. Bindi notes " ... both entirely definable individually, but each flowing into the other", which seems to speak to both categorization and change. I think it may also apply to practices as well.

 

A holistic model of life/being/cognition would have to account for our normal active self and our quietened reflective self. When we consider what the Neiye teaches as a practice, in the back of our minds we are thinking about achieving and maintaining a state of awareness of Dao. Perhaps a goal of Neiye is to set up a more balanced ... holistic ... practice that allows us to alternate between the active state and the quietened state ... each informing the other as needed to produce a more balanced way of life.

 

Does that address the problem of quietism?

 

 

 

 

[OldDog]

6 hours ago, Bindi said:

And yet there are divisions in Chinese thought ... jing qi and shen,  I find these divisions meaningful, and important on the way to 'wholeness'.

 

Oh, I agree entirely. I deliberately stopped reading the paper on Chinese model of cognition ... just short of the discussion on jing and shen ... while I considered the understandings of xin. But, yeah, I am anticipating the consideration of jing and shen to figure prominently in the holistic model. Seems like xin, jing and shen are foundational.

 

 

[dawei]

On 11/8/2015 at 3:03 AM, Bindi said:

I was looking into the term xin today, it’s certainly a very comprehensive word, a modern Chinese-English dictionary (Chen, 2001) translates xin as: heart; mind; feeling; intention; centre.

Xin was further described in an article as "the root of physical and mental life. It is the seat of all emotions, and embodies the inherent goodness of human nature and wisdom. Xin helps to guide the individual’s way of life and attitude, and can lead one to deep contentment."
 
http://www.academicjournals.org/article/article1379496939_Li%20et%20al.pdf

So though xin seems to be associated with heart and mind, it’s not heart and our Western notion of mind, but mind that exists in the heart?

 

How do people cultivate xin?

 

This original link still works so decided to read it...

 

3 hours ago, OldDog said:

 

Oh, I agree entirely. I deliberately stopped reading the paper on Chinese model of cognition ... just short of the discussion on jing and shen ... while I considered the understandings of xin. But, yeah, I am anticipating the consideration of jing and shen to figure prominently in the holistic model. Seems like xin, jing and shen are foundational.

 

The paper on Chinese model of Cognition can be found here, along with other Neiye links:

 

 

[Wayfarer]

A great question.  It's kinda difficult to explain by circling around it so I am going to go straight which might seem a little abrupt.

 

Like many things in religion, when the meaning of something is unclear we can attribute lots of meanings to it and then suddenly it becomes all of those things.  The heart-mind doesn't relate to the heart or the mind as such. It's more a sense of feeling that occurs as a response to life and events.  

 

If you imagine from below your navel to above your chest is a cup, the sides of which are the width of your body.  Inside this cup there is water.  When we react to things in our day-to-day living whether happily, sad or angrily, the water gets disturbed, it sloshes around and it moves further up the cup.  So, the water can also be viewed as energy, but in truth it is neither, we just have to go with the metaphor for a moment.  

 

When a person is stressed their energy often feels like it is high in their chest, or in their throat.  They can suffer from heartburn, acid indigestion, shallowness of breath because all their energy is stuck high up in this cup.

 

When we are calm, when our mind is clear of thought, our energy begins to settle, our muscles relax from their tension, our body lets go and it begins to realign due to their being no tight muscles pulling it out of line.  As this happens there is a sense of something sinking.  

 

Let's say you have a neighbour with a dog that always barks, or they play music loudly all the time and you can hear it from your home.  You get stressed about this.  And when the noise stops there is some kind of release.  There is a feeling of dropping downwards.  This is the energy or water sinking into the base of the cup and becoming still.

 

When this becomes still it also becomes clear and there becomes the chance to see what is present there.  This presence is the One.  In verse 16 of the Dao de Jing it explains "to know stillness is to know the Constant, to know the Constant is to be Awake" and the Bible says "Be still and know that I am God".

This feeling of energy going up and down the body is what is being described in alchemical literature in Daoism.  

If you are to guard the heart-mind, or control it, it simply means that you let the waters, the energy settle i.e. not be disturbed by thoughts and emotions, not to respond but to look at two things a) the space in which thoughts flow in and out, and b ) the presence of stillness that can be experienced below our heart area when our mind and energies settle.

This "cup" is what Christians refer to as the Holy Grail.  It is the vessel that Jesus drank from at the Last Supper, in his hour of need.  He drank from the Presence of eternal calm and stillness that he called the Great Father, he did this at his lowest hour, at a time he would have had fear, and he turned to it for comfort.  In Daoism we might call it Dao, or I have seen it in the DDJ called the Great Mother, it doesn't matter because it cannot be named, it cannot be named because it is Yourself.

You don't need to think what Xin is or isn't.  You simply need to sit and forget.  You need Zuowang.  To let go of any thought of anything.  
 

There is one last thing that I will say here which also relates to Xin and it is to do with Awakening.  We can awake in three areas; in the head, when something in the brain suddenly realises that there is no self.  This can be the Koan approach of Zen, or it can be a sudden realisation that there is a Self, an I Am moment.  Secondly, it can be felt in the heart, and there is a feeling of beauty and overwhelming universal love.  And finally, it can occur in the belly area where there is a sense of no-thing at all, not a word for it, not a love of it, not an idea of self or no-self, just an endless still yet vibrant "something" and you just see, you just look, like you are lost for words and lost of thought.  Here is the Dao appearing as the Root.  All other "things" (myriad things or traces) are the same Root but are expressions of its Qi energy.

 

To practice guarding the heart-mind is to overlook the expression, the traces, and see within them and within you the still Root.

Hope that helps.

By the way, I am starting a closed group on Facebook called the Way of Simplicity & Stillness.  It is founded between me and a lady who has been a Daoist priest and she has experienced awakening.  We are beginning a new school of Daoism that follows the hidden lineage of hermits, poets and wanderers, and returns Daoism to the simple natural way it should be and has somehow lost.

So, it is early days, and when I am ready to launch it, I will ask the owners of this site if I can add the details to a forum.  If there is anyone interested in further details you can PM me

Edited April 28, 2019 by Wayfarer

[Rocky Lionmouth]

I’d like to offer the following in relation to a yin yang relationship between thinking and feeling:

 

I think feelings have a very Yang way about coming into my world of perceptions, they arise out of nothing and can be very dominant and loud while soon reaching a zenith and receding and dissipating. Thinking on the other hand, for me at least, arises very Yin-like. Input is sorted (messy and loud incoming) and thoughts start to follow, they recieve the input and filter it and start to adapt to contain sensory and theoretical knowledge. They then solidify gradually (slower than emotions) and reach their depth of scrutiny whereby an yang response of emotive characteristic urges upon me an action or position to take.

 

I know the categorization pitfall, i’m not saying they’re one or the other, but when i manage to observe their process and interplay the rationality is yielding, inviting and collecting inwards while emotivity moves in an more expressive, judging way, feelings have a tendency to be dominant even when they are mixed.

 

And they follow one another, as for their nascent order i thinks a bit of the old ”hen/egg came first sitch” but receptivity comes first as far as senosry input goes for me.

 

Xin is a beautiful concept, i had a major bump from the descriptions in this thread guys, thank you.

Would anyone dare elaborate further implications of the meaning of ”open your heart”? Being happy is definetly accurate, but i believe this also relates to an intent, yi right?

Would you say yi is of the xin somehow? Whats the common theory say in classical daoist teachings about the relation between xin and yi?

[KuroShiro]

2 hours ago, Rocky Lionmouth said:

Xin is a beautiful concept, i had a major bump from the descriptions in this thread guys, thank you.

Would anyone dare elaborate further implications of the meaning of ”open your heart”? Being happy is definetly accurate, but i believe this also relates to an intent, yi right?

Would you say yi is of the xin somehow? Whats the common theory say in classical daoist teachings about the relation between xin and yi?

 

Yi is not the Spirit of the Fire Element but it's all connected as we are One.

[OldDog]

5 hours ago, Rocky Lionmouth said:

I think feelings have a very Yang way about coming into my world of perceptions, they arise out of nothing and can be very dominant and loud while soon reaching a zenith and receding and dissipating. ... whereby an yang response of emotive characteristic urges upon me an action or position to take.

 

I would not have classed feelings as yang ... But your point resonates with my experience. I have noticed over the years that as I read translations of ancient texts, that my emotional response is a pretty reliable initial indicator of how I will see the text ... either for its intended content or in how I regard the translator. It prompts my reasoning mind to dig a little deeper for rational understanding.

 

For example: A recent analysis I read regarding Neiye left me emotionally disturbed, almost indignant, over the manner in which the author presented his analysis. That I was so disturbed was,  in and of itself, disturbing. I really had to put on the breaks and consider what was provoking the response. It lead me to a more rational position where I could identify three aspects of the analysis and it's presentation that accounted for the emotional response. A rather negative experience overall. There are many other examples of positive and reinforcing emotional responses that have lead, as you say, to a real bump in understanding. This negative instance was just a more recent and reverberating example. But, it's an ill wind that blows no good. I now have a clearer understanding of how analysis can be presented and how authors can subtly influence a readers reception of the material, which by contrast really helps me understand why I like some authors/translators over others. I digress ... This is all meta to the Xin discussion.

 

5 hours ago, Rocky Lionmouth said:

Would you say yi is of the xin somehow?

 

This is a good question. The Neiye speaks a lot to the quality of heart-mind in attaining to Dao. I take that to mean virtue ( as in Te ) and I have long believed that intent plays a role in virtue. This is probably is worthwhile thread under this exploration of Xin. Am interested in how the other bums see virtue.

 

 

Edited May 11, 2019 by OldDog
spelling, grammar and clarification

[OldDog]

4 hours ago, Rocky Lionmouth said:

... the old ”hen/egg came first sitch” ...

 

Yeah, the ole which came first the chicken or the egg bit.

 

I can answer that ... at least from the evolutionary point of view.

 

The animal that produced the egg was not quite yet a chicken.

 

Just saying.

[Rocky Lionmouth]

On 2019-05-11 at 2:12 PM, KuroShiro said:

 

Yi is not the Spirit of the Fire Element but it's all connected as we are One.

 

This young blockhead asks your patience and illumination on this matter,

 

Each phase having a spirit does ring familiar but i can’t say where i read it. My question sprang from suddenly realizing while writing the post you replied to that i hadn’t studied Yi at all, while still claiming to use it and presuming to know what it is. Unsubstantiatedly so 😁

[Rocky Lionmouth]

On 2019-05-11 at 4:23 PM, OldDog said:

The Neiye speaks a lot to the quality of heart-mind in attaining to Dao. I take that to mean virtue ( as in Te ) and I have long believed that intent plays a role in virtue. This is probably is worthwhile thread under this exploration of Xin. Am interested in how the other bums see virtue.

 

Thanks for sharing that experience Dog, i had an almost identical experience just two days ago during a discussion on what yon and yang actually are, its quite the thing to multitask repairing ones inner ”fusebox”, figuring out the response and dealing with it to fruitful means. I knida bungled the last step though... might have accused a lazily quessplaining windbag of being a lazy windbag.... whoops. 😬

 

I think an ill wind that widens your knowledge of self must be blowing at least some good maybe? Not to force a silver lining on you, i just mean even if the whole thing was a negative instance you seem to have made yourself a glass of lemonade.

 

I really like what you wrote in the last paragraph!

Lemme get back to you on virtue, i’m interested to read fellow Bums views too! If i may be so bold: i think that would make a great thread on its own too!