Computers Just Aren't Human !

[ThisLife]

This is my first post on this forum. I came across it apparently quite by accident while searching out an entirely unrelated topic on the web. Anyway, in this lobby the expected thing to do seems to be to introduce oneself, so, 'when in Rome',...

 

Since my early twenties, I've been increasingly drawn to trying to either understand, or experience, the hopeful 'reality' behind my conviction that everything that exists is spiritual. My current beliefs are that it is only some kid of mis-perception by our human mind that prevents most of us from seeing, or experiencing that awareness. To my eternal frustration, I have not yet had so much as a glimpse of what is often called a "realisation", with which to confirm my beliefs. The closest resemblance I have to any tangible support to hold on to are the intriguing chains of spiritual logic that I find myself drawn to. But whenever I look closely into them,... they're about as substantial as clinging to a rainbow.

 

Those chains of logic have often enough changed and gone off in different directions over the 35 years or so since I first noticed my attraction to them. The strongest, longest-lasting, and most recent was a 20 year connection with a very worldly-successful, Western Mahayana Buddhist group. However, recently I have irrevocably split from that path. My feelings are that, (in an oft-recurring tale), they were 'victims of their own success'. I think that with groups striving for Buddha, or God-like perfection,... very often the shimmering attraction of their mind-created dream makes them forget that their feet of clay are firmly here with all the rest of us living beings. Very often, that ever-present subtle delusion of spiritual pride slowly cuts them off from the genuine compassion for others which had initially given their original founding members such seemingly un-stoppable vigour.

 

But as my personal connection with Buddhism was in the process of breaking down, I was extremely fortunate in that I made connection with another non-methodoligical spiritual path,... Advaita. In conjunction with Zen and Taoism, I believe they are the only three major pathways that practice the 'method of no method'. After my experiences with the spiritual bureaucracy of a large Western Buddhist organisation, I am very, very drawn to a spiritual path with NO doctrine, NO dogma, and NO special, intermediary, priveledged collection of priests.

 

Anyway, there's my situation in a rather long-winded nutshell, (if I may be allowed to so mix my metaphors)

 

The title I used for this intro is because of the frustration I am experiencing trying to load an avatar image onto this forum. Perhaps someone can help me with some purely technical information ? (I am not very computer literate).

 

I have used this photo from my own computer before as an avatar so I know it works. But on this forum, it gets squished and distorted into a square that it says is 125 by 125. The image I want to use is 416 X 300, a JPEG, and 16.1 KB. I have seen many beautiful, interesting and complex avatars on this site, so I know I am missing some basic steps in the process. Undoubtedly, that is why I keep ending up with this squished, distorted and thoroughly unsatifactory image. (Perhaps it's a parallel for my spiritual endeavours !!)

 

Can any one help me with some basic computer advice ?? Spiritual matters later.

[Mal]

Hi this is life

 

Welcome to the 'bums

I came across it apparently quite by accident

the Tao moves in mysterious ways.

 

I photoshopped my avatar pic to 125 by 125 before I uploaded it. It is a bit of a fiddle. The tech support forum might yield a more helpful or easier solution.

 

Hope you have fun here.

[ThisLife]

Hi this is life

 

Welcome to the 'bums the Tao moves in mysterious ways.

 

I photoshopped my avatar pic to 125 by 125 before I uploaded it. It is a bit of a fiddle. The tech support forum might yield a more helpful or easier solution.

 

Hope you have fun here.

 

Dear Mal,

 

Thank you very much for the helpful suggestion re avatar photos. I'll try your idea out tonight when I'll hopefully have a long enough stretch of time to engage in a wrestling match with the mysterious mind of a computer !

 

I certainly agree with your statement that the Tao moves in mysterious ways. Through this unfathomable contraption of plastic, wiring and silicon I now find myself conversing instantly with a boomerang throwing Austalian completely on the opposite side of the world from myself. The early Taoists would have spent a lifetime striving for such a feat.

 

So we Westerners have got instant communication down. Have you had any success with Immortality yet ?

 

 

Cheers,

 

ThisLife

[Taiji Bum]

I also had to resize and my avatar is also very distorted. I actually look like a twin of Brad Pitt! Welcome to da Bums.

[ThisLife]

I also had to resize and my avatar is also very distorted. I actually look like a twin of Brad Pitt! Welcome to da Bums.

 

Dear Brad Pitt,,

 

Thanks for the welcome. I tried to follow Mal's advice but didn't have Photoshop. Tried Picasso,... but that did other kinds of mysterious things. Finally, I gave up and decided to try a stock avatar. In the process of trying to find one I liked, Google came up with a simple site that offered to resize any photo to avatar size,... and Presto !! - it worked !

 

So, what you see before you is a cyber-modified, stripped-down-for-action, turtle. I'm quite happy with the result.

 

From your reply I see that you also had some similar problems, and some different ones. I'm sorry to see that whatever program you used seems unfortunately to have left the top shell of your avatar in exactly the same condition as that of my turtle. Mal did say that the Tao works in strange ways.

 

Synchronicity ??

 

 

Cheers, (and thanks again for the welcome !)

 

ThisLife

Edited February 1, 2009 by ThisLife

[Mal]

[ThisLife]

Edited February 3, 2009 by ThisLife