Life Is Really Good!

[I]f you know your true nature of no coming, no going; no being, no nonbeing; no birth, no death, then you will have no fear and can dwell in the ultimate dimension, nirvana, right here and now. You don’t have to die to reach nirvana. When you dwell in your true nature, you are already dwelling in nirvana. We have our historical dimension, but we also have our ultimate dimension, just as Buddha does. ~Thich Nhat Hanh, Opening the Heart of the Cosmos, p. 22

I’m reminded of a chorus of the song “I Am Dwelling” (ICA, 1972):

I am dwelling on the tranquil sea, peace is swelling tides of victory;
And waves of joy are crashing on the shoreline of life’s unending sea.

Life is really good! Namaste.

image by Franklin O'Donnell www.nasa.gov/.../jpl/news/gracef-20060602.html

"My Stroke of Insight" (Additional Reflection)

This remarkable clip http://tinyurl.com/3l9h9y of about 15 minutes (via Michael and Molly Shaw) by brain researcher Jill Bolte Taylor is a seminal portrayal of who we are as conscious human beings in this universe of energy and peace and function. Please take time to watch and absorb its truth, hopefully never to forget it. ~jpc

Sunday Dialogue CIX

Journer: How do I know God?

Nez: My student* said, “God cannot be defined, described, or proven. God can only be ‘met.’”

Journer: Then how do I meet God?

Nez: Through communion with anything and no thing. And sometimes you’ll know.

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* commentary on Martin Buber by Rifat Sonsino and Daniel B. Syme, Finding God: Selected Responses

image: Mitch Albom's "Tuesday with Morrie" theater production, directed by Michael Montel

"Taoism"

There is a being, wonderful, perfect;
It existed before heaven and earth.
How quiet it is!
How spiritual it is!
It stands alone and it does not change.
It moves around and around,
but does not on this account suffer.
All life comes from it.
It wraps everything with its love as in a garment,
and yet it claims no honor, for it does not demand to be Lord.
I do not know its name, and so I call it Tao, the Way,
and I rejoice in its power.

~Huston Smith, The Illustrated World’s Religions, p. 123

We rejoice in its power. Namaste.

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image: Publications International, Ltd. people.howstuffworks.com/meaning-of-taoism.htm

Love Your Fate

Nietzsche was the one who did the job for me. At a certain moment in his life, the idea came to him of what he called “the love of your fate.” Whatever your fate is, whatever the hell happens, you say, “This is what I need.” ...If you bring love to that moment ... you will find the strength is there. ~A Joseph Campbell Companion, p. 38

Love your fate! Sounds good, but there is so much about my fate I cannot love yet: for example, the fateful fact that I will die. The possibility is there for me to take a relationship of love, I know, but I admit I don’t love all my fate yet. ~jpc

O to find the strength of love that is there. Namaste.

image: "Lord Byron on his Death-bed," depicted by Joseph-Denis Odevaere, Groeninge Museum, Bruges

"California Unveils Ambitious Climate Plan"

Jun 26, 2008
By Nichola Groom LOS ANGELES (Reuters) California ... took a major step forward on its global warming fight by unveiling an ambitious plan for clean cars, renewable energy and stringent caps on big polluting industries. The plan, which aims to reduce pollutants by 10 percent from current levels by 2020 while driving investment in new energy technologies that will benefit the state's economy, is the most comprehensive yet by any U.S. state.... "This is of tremendous importance, not only for California," Mary Nichols, chairman of the influential California Air Resources Board (CARB).... "By taking action here ... we will be able to help motivate other states in our nation."

From - To

I would feel more at home
with religion if it moved
from absolute truth to evolving story,
from magic to mystery,
from institution building to service.

~Randy Williams, adapted from EarthRise reflection

This is a treatise in a sentence that articulates spot-on what many feel about their religious or spiritual journeys. ~jpc

Let us pray for religions. Namaste.

image by Waheed M. Zuberi http://www.flickr.com/photos/waheedmz/2491559335/

Ordinary, Heroic Woman

“Strike” tells the story of a tough, resilient working woman who refuses to back down from her ... Communist bureaucrats.... [Volker Schlöndorff directs this movie] of Poland’s Solidarity movement.... The central figure is Agnieszka [played by Katharina Thalbach], a character based on Anna Walentynowicz, who worked in the Gdansk shipyards for many years and was a catalyst of the strike in August 1980 that foretold the end of Communism.... The key to the film, though, is Agnieszka’s own stubbornness, a quality that makes her both ordinary and heroic. ~A. O. Scott, review, nytimes.com, 6/15/07

Interview with Schlöndorff: “[A]nyone can have some influence. Agnieszka was like a grain of sand, and somehow the whole train of history derails because she was the way she was. It’s a bit like evolution.” ~Jeff Reichert, “Solidarity” blogs.indiewire.com/.../cat_interviews.html

Evolution happens . . . on the back of decision and solidarity. Namaste.

image: scene from movie, with Agnieszka in center and Lech Walesa character on her right, without cap (a union took down the Soviet Union)

Ever-present Meaning

It is said that the ruler of Portugal, after Lisbon was devastated [1755], asked what was to be done? And the answer came, “Bury the dead, and feed the living.” If nature is indifferent to human suffering, humans are not. In this way, meaning is rescued, for humans, too, are part of nature. ~James Carroll, “Humanizing Nature’s Fury,” boston.com, 5/19/08

Tsunamis, hurricanes, cyclones, floods, and earthquakes have taken hundreds of thousands of lives and left millions displaced in recent years, leading us to contemplate the tragedies of nature – not to mention nature’s ongoing sustenance over eons that we take for granted. ~jpc

Meaning never goes away, in tragedy or thanksgiving. Namaste.

Spiritual Evolution

Michael Roach [Buddhist monk] and Christie McNally [who would be, except it violates the tradition] vowed to be both celibate and never apart by more than 15 feet or so. . . . The couple did a three-year silent retreat in the yurt [their tent] from 2000 to 2003. ~Leslie Kaufman, “Making Their Own Limits in a Spiritual Partnership,” nytimes.com, 5/15/08 http://tinyurl.com/4ajkns

It’s at least interesting to see how the religious the world over, be they Buddhist, Catholic, Orthodox, Baptist, etc., are having to struggle with the role of women in real spiritual leadership. ~jpc

“Rise up, O [women] of God.” Namaste.

image: David Sanders for The New York Times (with the above article)

Sunday Dialogue CVIII

Journer: I just seem to be meandering through life.

Nez: My student* said, “Have you made up your own mind that your occupation is your real calling?”

Journer: What is my real calling?

Nez: To love creation – including yourself – and spirit at its heart.

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* Kierkegaard, Purity of Heart Is To Will One Thing, p. 199

image www.holyfamilysisters.org/95/Vocation_Prayer.html

Spiritual Paradox

Be broken to be whole.
Twist to be straight.
Be empty to be full.
Wear out to be renewed.
Have little and gain much.
Have much and get confused.

~Lao Tzu (6th cy. BCE), via Brian Stanfield, The Courage to Lead Daily Journal, June 26

Wisdom is much more than it appears to the eye. Namaste.

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image: “Ying Yang Eye” by Michelle Blaney www.chrissaas.com/michelle/index.htm

Build the Future

Something good was happening in the Presidential Primaries in the USA: folks were participating as never before, as evident in the photo of an estimated 75,000 at Portland, Oregon, on May 19. Why pick it to death? Why are we surprised? Can we give thanks for our less than perfect system of democracy? Can we rejoice in the new interest? ~jpc

Let us celebrate the new urge to build the future of our country. Namaste.

image: Barack Obama speaking, nytimes.com, 5/19/08 (Chris Carlson/AP)

Whose Pecking Order

Peter responded, “Do you think Jesus believed in a pecking order? If he did, it was ‘the last shall be first.’” ~jpc, Journer, novelette, p. 34

Thomas Berry talks a lot about a just pecking order of creation through legal rights, raising all kinds of questions: notably, why do our constitutions just address human rights? ~jpc

Whose guidelines are we to go by? Namaste.

image: by Jonathan Hayward, AP www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17889856/ (polar bear on Endangered Species list, 5/14/08)

Truly

Richard Dawkins: “If there is a God, it’s going to be a whole lot bigger and a whole lot more incomprehensible than anything that any theologian of any religion has ever proposed.” ~David Van Biema, “God vs. Science,” time.com, 11/5/06

Truly, and “it” – that mysterious power some call “God” – is absolutely incomprehensible,” yet absolutely “experienced.” ~jpc

That we might learn to reflect on what we experience. Namaste.

image: “Reflection” by Lucy Liew lucyliewart.com/mw_women.htm

Great Debate

A letter [Albert Einstein] wrote in 1954..., in which he described the Bible as “pretty childish” and scoffed at the notion that the Jews could be a “chosen people,” sold for $404,000 at an auction in London [this week].... [His famous quote in the science and religion debate is] “Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.” ~Dennis Overbye, “Einstein Letter on God Sells for $404,000,” nytimes.com, 5/17/08

Science is lame if it thinks it is all-knowing, and religion and science are blind if they do not see “God” at the heart of creation. ~jpc

The science and religion debate is critical. Namaste.

image: "God vs. Science," time.com, 11/5/06 (illustration by Brad Holland) http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1555132,00.html (debate began long before Darwin)

Death, Where Is Thy . . .

Morrie: We kid ourselves about death. To acknowledge that you’re going to die, and to be prepared for it at any time is a much better way to live. That way you can actually be more involved in your life while you’re living. It’s not being morbid ... it’s being realistic to prepare to die. Do what the Buddhists do. Every day, imagine a little bird on your shoulder that asks: ‘Is today the day? Am I ready? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person I want to be?’ ~Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom, p. 81, via Diann McCabe

What is the message, today, Little Bird. Go ahead, whisper it in my good ear.... Thank you, I needed that. ~jpc

Death, where is thy sting? Namaste.

image: fonzmom www.flickr.com/photos/49503003071@N01/830679709/

Sunday Dialogue CVII

Journer: What must I do to be a whole human being?

Nez: My student* said, “You are already a masterpiece. You cannot be improved. You have only to come to it, to know it, to realize it.”

Journer: But don’t I have to do something heroic?

Nez: Simply accept your masterpiece-ness, then be it, even heroically, as you bow to the masterpiece of creation.

______
* Osho, Ah, This! chap. 1

image: “First Haircut,” katbphotos

Until . . .

I arrive in rain and gloom and fog to see where in me is God. Or why God is not in me.... When asked, I say I was raised neither Christian nor anything else. I say I was raised by wolves. I have never prayed in a way that most devout people would consider praying. Yet I yearn to be tethered to a presence beyond myself. I could use that in my life. I need that. ~Ethan Gilsdorf, “Silence and Solitude,” boston.com, 5/18/08

Gilsdorf was attracted to several days of retreat at a Trappist monastery. There’s something about intentional silence and solitude that raises the question of why we yearn to be tethered to a presence beyond ourselves. ~jpc

Restless until we find true rest. Namaste.

image: Buddhist monk in monastery www.worldculture.org/pages/4_2007detail.html

Spatial Nomenclature

As we push the envelope of spatial words (notice I capitalize a few):

Cosmos: one (in my mind, bigger than Multiverse or universe)
Multiverse: one
universe: more than one (?)
galaxy: many
solar system: many
planet: many (Earth, one)
. . . How far do we go? Much farther down than ant hole.

Who decides these things? Just a model, never finished, always evolving, and all in the process of creation. (Should we capitalize the word Creation? Is it bigger than Cosmos?) ~jpc

What a wonderful world. (World?) Namaste.

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image: "The Visible Universe," our Universe within 14 billion Light Years http://tinyurl.com/y3bmfs

Unconditional Acceptance

[W]hen a man [sic] goes in quest of a fully meaningful life he is in quest of unconditional acceptance ... that one cannot give to oneself. ~John S. Dunne, A Search for God in Time and Memory, p. 37

Dunne helps us “cross over” into the spiritual journeys of Paul, Augustine, Luther, and Nietzsche to ground his point of acceptance from beyond ourselves. In this fundamental sense, we are not masters of our fate or masters of our souls. ~jpc

Acceptance comes or does not come, and certainly it does not come if I do not accept the acceptance offered. Namaste.

image: "Acceptance" by Lucy Liew lucyliewart.com/mw_women.htm

Heroic First Step

I have found that you do have only to take that one step toward the gods and they will then take ten steps toward you. That step, the heroic first step of ... [t]he hero’s journey has been compared to a birth: it starts with being warm and snug in a safe place, then comes a signal, growing more insistent, that it is time to leave. To stay beyond your time is to putrefy. Without the blood and tearing and pain, there is no new life. ~Diane K. Osbon, introduction to Reflections on the Art of Living: A Joseph Campbell Companion, p. 10

New life is stepping-out-of-the-womb awesome. Namaste.

image: Fledgling film www.eronsheean.com/fledgling.htm

Beyond Boomeritis

I have taken the call of the spirit ... [to step] out of the confines of my particular life to see it in the light of our collective evolution.... To act from this [truth] holds a revolutionary possibility that takes us beyond boomeritis into what may, in fact, end up being a truly paradigm-busting transformation for all of humanity. And that would make any boomer’s heart truly sing. ~Elizabeth Debold, “Boomeritis & Me: Not Just a Book Review,” WIE magazine, Fall-Winter 2002 http://www.wie.org/j22/debold.asp?page=1

If we’re caught in the depression of “boomeritis,” absorbed in me-self and shirking our destiny, there is a way out. That’s what Ken Wilber’s book Boomeritis is about. ~jpc

May my boomer heart sing. Namaste.

image: 2007 Purpose Prize winners www.encore.org/post-type/encore-campaign?page=1

Strange Emancipation

It is, after all, frightfully easy to be emancipated from “the world” or to become one with a deity or ontological absolute and leave all the world’s grossly unjust social structures and practices (racism, gender injustice, homophobia, religious bigotry, colonialism, caste, class division, environmental degradation, etc.) comfortably in place. ~J. Kripal, Tikkun magazine, http://www.realitysandwich.com/next_buddha_will_be_a_collective via Bill Salmon

We dread to read the litany of “all the world’s grossly unjust social structures and practices” one more time. We will not be emancipated from them, but can be emancipated to deal with and care for them. ~jpc

Emancipation, not as the world gives. Namaste.

image: Dr. Paul Farmer of PIH in Rwinkwavu village, Rwanda (Peter Van Agtmael/Polaris for Time) www.time.com/.../article/0,9171,1124311,00.html

Sunday Dialogue CVI

Journer: Does God change?

Nez: My student* said, “There is no end to the birth of God.”

Journer: That’s an unsettling thought.

Nez: Creation never stops changing, thank “God.”
______
* D.H. Lawrence, “God Is Born,” The Complete Poems..., p. 683

image by Peter Bruce Wilder www.dbaergo.com/diverse.html

Holy Ones

It will not do simply to translate the difficult word “God” into some highly or subtly qualified phrase such as “our ultimate concern.” ...[Such] expressions are masquerading as empirical name tags, and they are used as though they referred to something.... [T]hey put us in the worse situation of speaking a meaningless language. ~Paul Van Buren, The Secular Meaning of the Gospel, p. 170

In the reflection yesterday, Van Buren was talking about the “objective” Jesus, and his followers’ experience with him. That was the “something” that helped them to understand the word “God.” Similarly, followers’ experience with Siddhartha Gautama helped them to understand the word “Buddha.” ~jpc

Holy ones embody spirit’s presence. Namaste.

image: "Lord Buddha, Siddhartha, Sakhya Muni" photo by Colin Dunjohn (11/10/04) http://www.pbase.com/colind/image/38116387

Decisive Event

Athanasius, in his essay on the Incarnation [chp. 20], offers a “proof” of the resurrection of Jesus[:] ...the freedom of Christians, their liberation from the bondage of superstition and wasted lives, their freedom to love even their enemies and to face death unafraid [p. 184].... The decisive event was one which they felt had happened to them, and which alone made it possible for them to “decide” [p. 170]. ~Paul Van Buren, The Secular Meaning of the Gospel

They made big decisions after the transforming grace event for works of freedom. ~jpc

Resurrected living. Namaste.

image: "Compassion" by Dale Wicks http://artbywicks.com/e-greetings.htm

Deep Breathing

Spirit.
Breath.
The animating principle.
The prime mover.

Breathing out. Breathing in.
Expiration. Inspiration.
Dying and borning again.

In every cycle of breath ... there is a moment of absolute calm, an instant when history comes to an end ... the lungs praying to be filled ... longing to be animated by spirit.

~Sam Keen, Hymns to an Unknown God, p. xv

Let our breathing guide us. Namaste.

image: The Art of Deep Breathing www.marijuana-addict.com/.../

Universal Community

Judge every social device, every proposed reform, every national and every local enterprise by the one test: Does this help towards the coming of the universal community. ~Josiah Royce (1855-1916), The Problem of Christianity, pp. 404-05

In 1913, Royce meant mostly human community by his phrase “universal community.” But now, almost 100 years later, let’s take him at his word, at least the “beloved community” (his phrase) of the whole Earth. ~jpc

Think at least 100 years ahead. Namaste.

image www.communityrites.com/casting.php

Four Seasons

Spring: time of rebirthing
Summer: time of ripening
Autumn: time of fulfilling
Winter: time of reposing

We learn this cycle of life and death by reflecting on our universal nature. Choose your poetry as you savor the journey. ~jpc

‘Tis very good. Namaste.

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image: four seasons Chinese scrolls chineseartbrushes.com/four-seasons-chinese-br...

Deep Change

In unexpected ways, science and mysticism are ... reinforcing each other.... [This revolution is] going to have big cultural effects.... First, the self is not a fixed entity but a dynamic process of relationships. Second, underneath the patina of different religions, people around the world have common moral intuitions. Third, people are equipped to experience the sacred, to have moments of elevated experience when they transcend boundaries.... Fourth, God can best be conceived as the nature one experiences at those moments, the unknowable total of all there is. ~David Brooks, “The Neural Buddhists,” newyorktimes.com, 5/13/08

I’m surprised a solid conservative journalist in a daily global medium is giving voice to such a revolution that can “have big cultural effects.” ~jpc

Deep human change is happening. Namaste.

image: "Gaia - Our Mother" by Anna A. http://tinyurl.com/5jc2q8

Sunday Dialogue CV

Journer: Are humans the pinnacle of creation?

Nez: My student* said, “You are a child of the universe / no less than the trees and the stars; / you have a right to be here.”

Journer: Does that mean humans are less valuable than trees and stars?

Nez: It means we all have a right to be here, as creations of the universe.

* Max Ehrmann, from “Desiderata”

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image: Todd Pierce photo of Redwoods of Muir Woods National Monument, California, and human (probably in awe) tp://tinyurl.com/5o2tdv