Stranger things

[Taomeow]

46 minutes ago, old3bob said:

I wonder if any studies have been made about possible addictive effects of some products made with Stevia?  I haven't looked around for same yet.

 

Yes, there's some.  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7584803/

There's a naturopathic physician who wrote a book about it, "The Stevia Deception." 

https://empoweredsustenance.com/is-stevia-safe/

https://www.faim.org/the-stevia-myth 

[liminal_luke]

On 3/5/2024 at 2:18 PM, Nungali said:

Lard  - pig fat - is supposedly (now) healthy for us .

 

 

Lard is something of a conundrum for me.  Here in Mexico it's easily available and cheap, but I worry that the pigs are raised in conditions that mess with the omega 3/6 ratio of the oil, rendering what ought to be a healthy fat into one that's less so.  Maybe not though.  I'm mostly avoiding it for now, except in chicharron!

[old3bob]

2 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

Yes, there's some.  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7584803/

There's a naturopathic physician who wrote a book about it, "The Stevia Deception." 

https://empoweredsustenance.com/is-stevia-safe/

https://www.faim.org/the-stevia-myth 

 

Some great links there Taomeow, thanks!

I'm posting an excerpt copy from the last about sweetness addition,  also the first link speaks about liver, kidney and gastro intestinal effects (as far as I read so far) which sound pretty hairy!

 

"One of the major problems with sugar is that it is addicting. In fact, studies have shown that it is just as, and even more addicting than cocaine. For example, when lab rats are given free access to both cocaine and sugar, they prefer sugar over cocaine. Even rats who are already addicted to cocaine quickly switch their addiction to sugar as soon as they are offered a choice.¹

People, too, become addicted to sugar. That is one of the reasons why we have an obesity epidemic. Like cocaine, sugar triggers pleasure centers in the brain that drive us to eat sweets and encourage us to overindulge. Haven’t you ever eaten a piece of chocolate and then just had to have another and another? You just had to eat more even though you knew you had eaten enough. When you ignore sound judgment and make decisions based on cravings, you are addicted.

The addiction to sugar is not isolated to just sugar, but extends to all non-caloric sweeteners as well. It is not as much a “sugar” addiction as it is a “sweet” addiction. We become addicted to the sweetness rather than to sugar itself. Non-caloric sweeteners trigger the same pleasure centers in the brain that sugar does and causes the same cravings and addictions.

Researchers tested rats using saccharine, which is completely different chemically from sugar. The results were the same. The type of sweetener didn't matter, it was the sweet taste that triggers the powerful effect, not the type of sweetener or the specific chemical makeup of the sweetener. Stevia has the same effect. When rats are given the choice between saccharine or stevia, their preference for stevia is just as strong as it is for saccharin.²

Addiction to stevia was one of the characteristics I first noticed. People would switch their addiction from sugar or aspartame to stevia once they began using it. Instead of eating desserts and junk foods sweetened with sugar, they were eating the same types of foods sweetened with stevia. And they had the same cravings for sweets. Stevia does not curb your sweet tooth at all, it feeds it, keeping sugar cravings and addictions alive and active".

[old3bob]

2 hours ago, liminal_luke said:

 

Lard is something of a conundrum for me.  Here in Mexico it's easily available and cheap, but I worry that the pigs are raised in conditions that mess with the omega 3/6 ratio of the oil, rendering what ought to be a healthy fat into one that's less so.  Maybe not though.  I'm mostly avoiding it for now, except in chicharron!

 

well Tom Hanks survived for years on coconut fat and fish oils in his movie,  whereas and unless one is an old fashion lumberjack or in other high fat burning occupations one does need much lard.

Edited March 7 by old3bob

[Taomeow]

2 hours ago, old3bob said:

 

well Tom Hanks survived for years on coconut fat and fish oils in his movie,  whereas and unless one is an old fashion lumberjack or in other high fat burning occupations one does need much lard.

 

Fish oils in ample amounts may be as good as lard, but one would probably have to eat fatty fish every day -- some people do, in Japan, Taiwan, or wherever Tom Hanks survived his mishap.  

 

The Eastern European way is this:

 

Not just lard -- pork back lard prepared and preserved several different ways, raw salted, raw smoked, or cooked as a whole piece.  I am a huge fan.  Miss it always.  

 

[old3bob]

I'm 99% pork free because 99% those critters suffer horribly in tiny cages or very crowed pins until they are slaughtered.  Btw.  they are known to be smart animals)   As for cattle at least some live for awhile on wide open semi-natural grazing land in the several western states, but sadly many don't and also suffer greatly in confined and dirty spaces!  AKA as not kosher.

Edited March 7 by old3bob

[Taomeow]

What factory farms do to animals, birds and fish and what humans are designed to eat are two topics that have sadly merged into one, as though the latter is only possible if we accept the former.  But factory farms only came into vogue in the last 100 years or so...  the "damndest" years for all life forms on Earth if you don't count the ones still ahead.    

 

Edited March 7 by Taomeow

[Nungali]

7 hours ago, old3bob said:

I'm 99% pork free because 99% those critters suffer horribly in tiny cages or very crowed pins until they are slaughtered.  Btw.  they are known to be smart animals)   As for cattle at least some live for awhile on wide open semi-natural grazing land in the several western states, but sadly many don't and also suffer greatly in confined and dirty spaces!  AKA as not kosher.

 

The butcher up on the plateau, nearby, only has local meat . Combine this with mobile abattoir (a truck that comes to your farm and does a neat job of it  - so no horror truck trip to the huge death factory ) and things are much better .  Butcher  does the same with chicken, and sources pork and lamb from small holdings from  the next shire to the west . It also has excellent soil and produces good spuds  and a local trout farm and smoke house .... smoked trout , yum .

 

Its a bit more expensive , but you know what you are getting .

 

 

Local herd ;

[Taomeow]

Today is the International Women's Day.

 

It meant something at some point.  In 1908 when it all began, 15000 women marched in New York for shorter work hours, equal pay, and voting rights.

 

In the 5th grade, a boy in my class gave me a little pendant for the March 8th present.  I remember it well -- it was my first-ever piece of wearable jewelry.  A little pink crystal in the shape of a teardrop on a delicate chain.  I would still wear it today, it was surprisingly tasteful.  Later I found out that the boy made his dad go shopping with him, on the assumption that dad would be a better expert on what a girl might like for a present.  The boy grew up to become an expert in the field of economic espionage.  Stranger things happen.

 

 

 

 

 

       

 

 

[Nungali]

It passed me by  and not a single woman mentioned it to me ... except you . The main  thing that happened yesterday, in my world , was  some messed up woman launched a magical attack on my GF ...  then sent out emails to people about how she was going to start  harassing her on the physical plane  .... great timing !  

 

  I noticed also that last Mother's Day seemed to be more ignored  more than  usual ,  I got a bit freaked out about that ; one woman friend was sad as her  German partner and father of her child  (who can be a bit weird )  said he doesnt celebrate it because 'Hitler invented it '    !  She went to stay with her mother instead  so I sent her (and her mum ) some flowers  ( I found her crying in the street earlier ) .   

Another one, who has a little girl (who is half Moroccan , but they live here permanently and her mother is Australian , but father lives in Morocco ) ; I was going to help her make a card for her mother  but when she realized she shut it down "  They do not celebrate Mother's Day in Morocco , so dont bother ... I would probably throw it in the bin anyway ."

 

 

Wow  ......   I went off to sit in the forest by myself for a while . 

[Nungali]

'strangely coincidentally '  ;  

 

..... I just after the above   ... 'coincidental mother's day stuff '   

 

My XGF .. who is a CHAMP  ,  and gets on well with my GF ... they have both had twins and similar difficulties in kind  ....

 

- Okay you  Daobums ... NO ... that does not include me        (well, maybe a little bit    )  -

 

has been flogging it !  twins, an older boy , a daughter , single , working 4 jobs , helping others ,  collapsing but continuing solely because she  ' has to ' ,   got invited to some 'north coast woman's business seminar '  she went along and they had sprung an award on her about her awesomeness and achievements . Now thats opened up several new avenues for her  and she has made new contacts .... a bit of recognition  and assistance , finally ! 

 

 

[Taomeow]

 

One of those many stories most people never heard -- along with the stories of the great female samurai warriors of Japan, or the most powerful and successful pirate of all time who was a Chinese girl, or the three great women who headed the fight for independence from Moscow in the 15th century Novgorod Republic, and so on.  

 

This is Henriette D’Angeville, who, in 1838, climbed Mont Blanc with 18 bottles of wine, 26 roast chickens and a carrier pigeon.   She was the first woman to complete the ascend unaided.  Her outfit was homemade as there were no climbing clothes for women.  The pants stirred some controversy...  

[Taomeow]

[Nungali]

Here is a strange thing .... three girls all having the same dream .   

 

  GFs twin daughters  and their friend  (having a sleep over ) .  They wake up freaked out that they where on the front lawn of the house  , they went outside because there was a 'witch' out there , a nasty one . They surrounded her and where about to kill her but then they woke up .

 

Curious .   We all know who it is , its the very weird neighbor , who has been mounting psychic and other 'attacks'  all over the place  ( for some time it appears,  as her past history comes to light . )

 

I had a  weird  situation with her 2 weeks back :   I am siting inside talking to a friend and he is facing me and observing out the window behind me ;  " There are people in your back yard !"

 

WTF ?  I go out but they are walking away to the driveway ; " Excuse me....  hello ..... do you want something ? "  They appeared to be huddled over something one held in her hands . It was  strange woman with another woman , a bearded woman, I had never seen before . She starts with an introduction and quickly goes into a confused babble , apology , an 'asking for forgiveness', various bodily contortions  and attempted yoga positions , getting on the ground, standing up ,  revealing parts of her anatomy  ( with no underwear ... ugh ! ) as she is 'dressed' in her usual  collection of scarfs and sarongs .  90% of her talk is new age cosmic babble speech ; " I feel in my heart center a oneness and desire to communicate with unbound less love  from my heart chi .... "  ( which is typical language from her ..... then she goes on to do underhanded shit  ) ... ie. extremely passive / aggressive '  attempted manipulator .

 

After telling them they had to leave a few times , the bearded lady tried to take hold of my arm , I evaded ... she didnt persist , she came very close to getting some aikido lessons - but I preferred the evasion with no contact at all method .  Wow - if I had gone and done that to her place, or any other woman's place .

 

Anyway they left but then  bearded lady came back with a 'present'  from the other one .. a present ?   "peace offering "  - nope, I am not gonna touch it .  Then she offered me her own  'present' .. no, go away .  She asked me again explaining that she had no idea what got sprung on her was going to happen ; " I was asked if I wanted to go with her to meet you ,  I have never had an introduction to anyone like that before and I hope I never  do again . "    So I shielded more and took the 'present ' , she left ,  ( a  small little hand made 'dolly')... what the fuck would I want with a little dolly ???    I put it on my fuchsite   slab, under the restraining hands of my Anpu statue .    It was deemed 'innocuous'  with the  smiling comment  ; " Nice of them to supply a voodoo doll for you . "   But since I dont do that shit, I put  dolly in a little reed boat and floated her off down the river towards the Great Sea .

 

Due to other shit she has done there is a 'sit down' scheduled  meeting with her and a couple of others  this week ,  my GF  ( who has had years long issues with her  and now they have ended up neighbors  (  .... great !  )  has asked me to come along as her 'energy guardian ' .  This should be 'interesting' .... at least .  What will the 'evil witch' do when cornered and exposed ?  ( Her 'bestie' will be there too as a support person for her , but this woman has also confided in me  that her friend is 'getting a bit too much' and has started trying to fuck her over as well ... when all the time she sprouts these love and light slogans  .) 

 

But three girls having the same dream ???  Even to me and my experience  ... that's a 'strange thing  ' .

 

 

[Taomeow]

@Nungali Strange indeed.  But dream-weavers are liars.  In the 8th grade, I had a dream about America.  In the morning, when I came to school, a boy in my class told me he had a dream about me in America, and apparently some relative I had there left me an inheritance of $76 million.  I still remember that number, and am still waiting...  

[Taomeow]

These are sculptures of the deity Tlaloc from the Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City.  To the natives, he was "the god who came from the sky," god of thunderstorms and destruction. However, some of Tlaloc's depictions do not look god-like or menacing. For example, here he looks more like a rather depressed pilot from a crushed plane.

 

Edited March 19 by Taomeow

[old3bob]

Another tough lady in a tough time in a tough territory that few have probably  heard of: Esther Hobart Morris, Justice of the Peace and Icon of Women's Rights,  by ABBY DOTTERER

 WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 2019

In late 1869, the territory of Wyoming was ahead of the rest of the United States in its strides for gender equality. Fifty years before the passage of the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, women in the territory were granted the right to vote and, beginning with Esther Morris, the territory’s first female justice of the peace, to hold public office.

Esther Hobart Morris was in her late 50s when she was appointed justice of the peace in South Pass City, Wyoming Territory, in 1870. 'n performing these duties I do not know as I have neglected my family any more than in ordinary shopping,' she wrote the following year, 'and I must admit that I have been better paid for the services rendered than for any I have ever performed.' Wikipedia.

While Morris is notable because of her excellent performance in this office and her advocacy for women’s suffrage both in the territory and, later, around the nation, much of her fame comes from something she almost certainly didn’t do. Long after Morris’s death, Fremont County legislator Herman Nickerson and University of Wyoming Professor Grace Hebard claimed that Morris deserved credit for effective lobbying in 1869 that resulted in the introduction of the women’s suffrage bill at the territorial legislature. This, however, seems not to have been what happened.

Born Esther Hobart McQuigg, in Tioga County, New York, on Aug. 8, 1814, she was orphaned at age 11 and apprenticed to a seamstress. She then, according to a brief biography at the website of the U.S. Capitol, became a successful hat-maker and businesswoman. In 1841, she married civil engineer Artemus Slack and gave birth to her first child, Edward Archibald or “Archy,” a year later.

Three years after the wedding, her husband died and Morris moved to Peru, Ill. to settle his estate. Doing this, she faced difficulties as women were not allowed to own or inherit property, the Architect of the Capitol writes. She re-married in 1850 to local merchant John Morris and gave birth to twin boys, Robert and Edward. In 1869, the family moved to gold-rush boom town South Pass City in the new Wyoming Territory, where John Morris opened a saloon.

The “terror of all rogues”

Esther Morris had been living in South Pass City for less than a year before her appointment as justice of the peace in early 1870 at the age of 55. During her eight and a half months in office as a judge, she heard nearly thirty cases.

Wyoming Territorial Secretary Edwin M. Lee wrote later that Morris’s court sessions were “characterized by a degree of gravity and decorum rarely exhibited in the judicature of border precincts.” He also said that during her administration, an “improvement in the tone of public morals was noticeable.”

An April 1870 piece in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper—a national publication—about Morris’s first day in the position focused, first, on her clothing. She wore “a calico gown, worsted breakfast-shawl, green ribbons in her hair, and a green neck-tie.” Later, however, the newspaper noted that Morris offered “infinite delight to all lovers of peace and virtue” and nicknamed her the “terror of all rogues.”

In January 1871, Morris was invited to a national women’s suffrage convention in Washington, D.C. but did not attend. Instead, she wrote a letter to prominent suffragist Isabella Beecher Hooker which was read aloud before the convention. She wrote that her appointment, due to the circumstances in the political climate, “transpired to make [her] position as a justice of the peace a test of a woman’s ability to hold public office.” She also wrote that she felt that her work was “satisfactory” though she regretted that she was “not better qualified to fill the position. Like all pioneers,” she noted, “I labored more in faith and hope.”

By 1890, when she was 75, Morris was well known in Wyoming as an advocate of woman suffrage. In statehood celebrations that July, she presented the flag of the new state to Gov. Francis Warren on behalf of the women of Wyoming. She died at 87 on April 2, 1902, in Cheyenne.

South Pass City in 1870. When Morris served there as justice of the peace, it was still a mining camp made up mostly of men who spent most of their social time in saloons. William Henry Jackson photo, USGS.

A reputation grows

More than seventeen years after her death, however, her reputation suddenly began to grow.

Herman Nickerson, who had been one of the early pioneers of South Pass City and later served many years as a state legislator representing Fremont County, published in the Lander-based Wyoming State Journal his first-hand account of a supposed tea party.

Longtime Fremont County legislator Herman Nickerson and University of Wyoming Prof. Grace Raymond Hebard marked a great many historic sites around the state. American Heritage Center.

According to Nickerson, Morris hosted a tea party in 1869 for South Pass City’s two candidates for Wyoming’s territorial council––William Bright and Nickerson himself. In front of a crowd of dozens of people, Morris supposedly extracted promises from both men that whichever of them won the seat would introduce a women’s suffrage bill to the new council. Bright was elected, proposed the bill and on Dec. 10, 1869, Territorial Gov. John Campbell signed it into law

“[T]o Mrs. Esther Morris,” Nickerson wrote, “is due the credit and honor of advocating and originating women's suffrage in the United States.” He explained that “there were about forty ladies and gentlemen present” at the party.

At the end of his account, he noted that he did not write it for “political purposes” but “to correct historical misstatements.”

But Nickerson appears to have been making some misstatements of his own. His account in the Wyoming State Journal implies that only he, the Republican, and Bright, the Democrat, were running for a single seat on the territorial council. In fact, seven candidates were running from Sweetwater County, where South Pass City was located at the time, for three seats in the upper house in the new territory’s legislative body. Bright was the third highest vote-getter with 747 votes, and so won a seat on the council. Nickerson came in fifth, and did not.

Bright and all the members of both houses of that first territorial legislature were Democrats. One reason the suffrage bill succeeded may have been their desire to embarrass the governor, a Republican. But he surprised them by signing the bill.

There is no record of any meeting between Morris and Bright before the election. After the bill was passed, however, Morris and her son did pay a call on Bright back in South Pass City, to thank him for his efforts. The son, Robert Morris, wrote a letter about the visit to The Revolution, a weekly magazine that advocated for women’s rights.

While she was alive, Morris credited Bright with passage of the bill. In her 1871 letter to Hooker, she wrote that “to William H. Bright belongs the honor of presenting the woman suffrage bill.” In that letter, too, there was no mention of a tea party.

Herman Nickerson and Grace Raymond Hebard put up a marker in South Pass City in 1920 naming Esther Morris as the 'author of female suffrage in Wyoming.' An early version, left, and Nickerson, right, with a later version. American Heritage Center.

Nickerson and Hebard

While Morris did not credit herself for the passage of the suffrage bill, others, long after she and Bright had both passed away, claimed it for her.

After Nickerson’s account was published, University of Wyoming professor and historian Grace Raymond Hebard rallied by his side, hoping to credit Morris for the introduction of the bill. Nickerson and Hebard were friends, and had spent many days and miles marking historical sites around Wyoming.

He may have been looking to advance the status of Wyoming’s Republican party at a time when women were 18 months away from winning the vote nationwide.Nickerson, that is, may have been hoping to extend some credit for the passage of the original bill to his own party.

For her part, Hebard was a staunch supporter of women’s rights and Esther Morris made a convincing hero. Contemporary historians now agree, however, that Hebard made things up from time to time. Historian Virginia Scharff labels Hebard a “self-described feminist” who did everything she could to “stake women’s claim to space, to historical significance.”

Grace Raymond Hebard in an undated photo. She spread H. G. Nickerson’s story of Esther Morris’s tea party widely after he published it in 1920, and it continued to spread widely long after her death. American Heritage Center.

Hebard clearly championed Morris as the “Mother of Woman Suffrage.” According to Hebard, Morris and Bright held discussions about women’s rights around fireplaces in their homes. Hebard credited these conversations with giving Bright the inspiration and the final courage to introduce the women’s suffrage bill. In later stories Hebard changed the tea party into a dinner party.

In 1920, Hebard and Nickerson had a stone marker erected in South Pass City memorializing the “Site of Office and Home of Esther Morris, First Woman Justice of the Peace, Author of Female Suffrage in Wyoming.”  ....

 

Edited March 21 by old3bob

[Taomeow]

The real horseback riding stance

 

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1570590947143131

[Gerard]

.

Edited March 24 by Gerard

[Gerard]

 

 

In reply to Taomeow's post about Eastern European pork delights, I have eaten them in Hungary in a breakfast banquet and it was really nice especially when paired with vegs. like fresh tomatoes, radish red and green peppers. Highly recommended.

 

But my personal favourite pork food is Spanish Ibérico ham. Otherworldly! 

Edited March 24 by Gerard

[S:C]

Marvellous, how everyone has their own constant unique direct and unfailing and perception of ‘true reality‘ and ‘objectivity’! I do admire those who have it, life must be a lot easier….

[Taomeow]

4 hours ago, S:C said:

Marvellous, how everyone has their own constant unique direct and unfailing and perception of ‘true reality‘ and ‘objectivity’! I do admire those who have it, life must be a lot easier….

 

Or a lot harder. 

 

[silent thunder]

We each experience reality from the center of our own awareness and that experience always seemingly alights in awareness as whole and complete with no holes or ommissions.  Yet this does not imply that we experience the all of reality... just that our experience is whole and full for us. 

 

My gal is navigating a process by which one of her eyes has ceased to function accurately at all.  She's nearly blind in one eye.  The lense has become distorted and dimpled and so refracts light in myriad directions, not just a single direction (which is readily corrected for by glasses/lenses).  She is amazed when looking at the same picture with each eye seperately and how vastly different they appear given how the signals are received by the conditioned perceptual system and it trying to rectify imaging through the usual process.

 

The reality for her is that when it's not reconcilable for both eyes to contribute to a picture of the world that reconciles as complete, her brain simply shuts down the input from one eye and ignores it utterly, so as to compensate for the experience of wholeness.  Yet her experience of seeing is not diminished in her experiential process at all.  It still seems complete and whole, (unless she closes the dominant eye and forces the subbed eye into operation).

 

We learned about this with our son when he was in 4th grade and one of his teachers realized his eyes were not tracking accurately.  Through working with an optometrist and a set of exercises, we were able to aid him in developing more accuracy which allowed him to read and process more readily... but in the process of finding out where his alterations of perception lay... there were clear indicators of when his brain was simply shutting off input entirely from one eye, depending on conditions and fatigue, etc.  It was utterly fascinating to witness first hand.

 

And this is perhaps why Naive Realism is still so rampant among humans to this day, even though it's been summarily dismissed since the age of the Stoics.  It is a compelling notion that our experience of life is whole, complete and accurate, and it's also very comforting to assume we see the world as it is, entirely accurately when it's all actually interpretation, storytelling, projective and assumption/conditioning based.

 

At this point much of the cultivation process seems like a dance with the process of bringing awareness to the process of the Storyteller who crafts elaborate and detailed stories about the nature of reality, from the few parcels of signals that we receive from our perceptual process.

 

It's quite disconcerting (or downright horrifying) to come face to face with the aspects of our assumptions about perception and the universe and realize they are wholly innacurate illusions.  At this point for me, the realm of absolute certainty is the realm of the arrogance of ignorance.

 

And it's entirely understandable that so many folks retreat from such processes of awakening when they get glimpses through the veil, it's quite disorienting and uncomfortable and so rather than pursue the path of truth, they dig back in deeply to the comfort of Naive Realim and the absolute certainty of former interpretation versus exploring what is...

 

edit to add:

Adyashanti has two statements that resonate on this point for me:

 

"Most of us want to feel better, we don't actually want to see that we're misperceiving things.  But that's the core of spirituality.  And the only way to really wake up is to realize that the way you perceive yourself is not true."
Adyashanti

 

"

Enlightenment is a destructive process.
It has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier.
Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth.
It's seeing through the facade of pretence.
It's the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true."
 Adyashanti

 

Edited March 30 by silent thunder

[Cobie]

11 hours ago, S:C said:

… I do admire those who have it … 

Are you sure? 

 

…
15. The common people see things clearly; 
16. I alone am in the dark. 
17. The common people discriminate and make fine distinctions; 
18. I alone am muddled and confused. 
…
21. The masses all have their reasons [for acting]; 
22. I alone am stupid and obstinate like a rustic. 
23. But my desires alone differ from those of others— 
24. For I value drawing sustenance from the Mother.

DDJ Ch. 20 (Henricks, MWD) 

 

 

Edited March 30 by Cobie

[Mark Foote]

8 hours ago, silent thunder said:

 

Enlightenment is a destructive process.
It has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier.
Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth.
It's seeing through the facade of pretence.
It's the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true."

 Adyashanti

 

 

 

"Happier", maybe not, but happiness is intrinsic to the states of concentration, according to the Gautamid:

 

I know that while my father, the Sakyan, was ploughing, and I was sitting in the cool shade of a rose-apple tree, aloof from pleasures of the senses, aloof from unskilled states of mind, I entered on the first meditation, which is accompanied by initial thought and discursive thought, is born of aloofness, and is rapturous and joyful, and while abiding therein, I thought: ‘Now could this be a way to awakening?’ Then, following on my mindfulness, Aggivissana, there was the consciousness: This is itself the Way to awakening. This occurred to me, Aggivissana: ‘Now, am I afraid of that happiness which is happiness apart from sense-pleasures, apart from unskilled states of mind?’ This occurred to me…: I am not afraid of that happiness which is happiness apart from sense-pleasures, apart from unskilled states of mind.’
 

(MN 1 246-247, Vol I p 301)

 

Whatever happiness, whatever joy, Ananda, arises in consequence of these five strands of sense-pleasures, it is called happiness in sense-pleasures.
 

Whoever, Ananda, should speak thus: ‘This is the highest happiness and joy that creatures experience’—this I cannot allow on [their] part. What is the reason for this? There is, Ananda, another happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness. And what, Ananda, is this other happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness? Here, Ananda, a [person], aloof from pleasures of the senses, aloof from unskilled states of mind, enters and abides in the first meditation that is accompanied by initial thought and discursive thought, is born of aloofness and is rapturous and joyful. This, Ananda, is the other happiness that is more excellent and exquisite than that happiness.

 

Whoever, Ananda, should speak thus: ‘This [the first meditative state] is the highest happiness and joy that creatures experience’–this I cannot allow on [their] part. What is the reason for this? There is, Ananda, another happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness. And what, Ananda, is this other happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness? Here, Ananda, [an individual], by allaying initial and discursive thought, [their] mind inwardly tranquillised and fixed on one point, enters and abides in the second meditation which is devoid of initial and discursive thought, is born of concentration, and is rapturous and joyful. This, Ananda, is the other happiness that is more excellent and joyful than that happiness.
 

Whoever, Ananda, should speak thus… And what, Ananda, is this other happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness? Here, Ananda, [an individual], by the fading out of rapture, abides with equanimity, attentive and clearly conscious, and [they] experience in [their] person that happiness of which the [noble ones] say: ‘Joyful lives [the one] who has equanimity and is mindful’. And entering on the third meditation [they] abide in it. This, Ananda, is the other happiness that is more excellent and exquisite than that happiness.
 

Whoever, Ananda, should speak thus… And what, Ananda is the other happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness? Here, Ananda, [an individual], by getting rid of happiness and by getting rid of anguish, by the going down of [their] former pleasures and sorrows, enters and abides in the fourth meditation which has neither anguish nor happiness, and which is entirely purified by equanimity and mindfulness. This, Ananda, is the other happiness that is more excellent and exquisite than that happiness.
 

“Whoever, Ananda, should speak thus: ‘This [the fourth meditative state] is the highest happiness and joy that creatures experience’-this I cannot allow on [their] part. What is the reason for this? There is, Ananda, another happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness. And what, Ananda, is this other happiness more excellent and exquisite than that happiness? Here, Ananda, a [person], by wholly transcending perceptions of material shapes, by the going down of perceptions due to sensory impressions, by not attending to perceptions of difference, thinking: “Ether is unending’, enters and abides in the plane of infinite ether. This, Ananda, is the other happiness that is more excellent and exquisite than that happiness.
 

…[a person], by wholly transcending the plane of infinite ether and thinking: ‘Consciousness is unending’, enters and abides in the plane of infinite consciousness… …[a person], by wholly transcending the plane of infinite consciousness, and thinking: ‘There is no thing’. enters and abides in the plane of no-thing… …[a person]. by wholly transcending the plane of no-thing, enters and abides in the plane of neither-perception-nor-non-perception.
 

…[a person], by wholly transcending the plane of neither-perception-nor-non-perception. enters and abides in the stopping of perceiving and feeling. This, Ananda, is the other happiness that is more excellent and exquisite than that happiness.”

 

(MN I 398-400, Vol II p 67-69)

 

“…What do you think about this, reverend Jain: Is King Seniya Bimbisara of Magadha, without moving his body, without uttering a word, able to stay experiencing nothing but happiness for seven nights and days?”
 

“No, your reverence.”
 

“What do you think about this, reverend Jain: Is King Seniya Bimbisara of Magadha, without moving his body, without uttering a word, able to stay experiencing nothing but happiness for six nights and days, for five, for four, for three, for two nights and days, for one night and day?”
 

“No, your reverence.”
 

“But I, reverend Jain, am able, without moving my body, without uttering a word, to stay experiencing nothing but happiness for one night and day. I, reverend Jain, am able, without moving my body, without uttering a word, to stay experiencing nothing but happiness for two nights and days,, for three, four, five, six, for seven nights and days.”
 

(MN I 94, Vol I p 123-124)

 

 

Gautama also said that whatever one imagines a particular state of concentration to be, it is otherwise, and that the states are attained by "lack of desire, by means of lack of desire".

 

Strange!

 

 

Edited March 30 by Mark Foote