Around You

"Acquire a peaceful spirit, and around you thousands will be saved."  ~Saint Seraphim of Sarov

Brainwashed

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Full lyrics HERE.

Here's the question:  if you suspected that you had been brainwashed by your culture to act certain ways and believe certain things, what is the first thing you'd do to regain control over your life?

 

We had still duties which we ought to perform…

In this excerpt from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, ©1818, young Victor Frankenstein mourns the death of his mother:

She died calmly, and her countenance expressed affection even in death. I need not describe the feelings of those whose dearest ties are rent by that most irreparable evil, the void that presents itself to the soul, and the despair that is exhibited on the countenance. It is so long before the mind can persuade itself that she whom we saw every day and whose very existence appeared a part of our own can have departed for ever—that the brightness of a beloved eye can have been extinguished and the sound of a voice so familiar and dear to the ear can be hushed, never more to be heard. These are the reflections of the first days; but when the lapse of time proves the reality of the evil, then the actual bitterness of grief commences. Yet from whom has not that rude hand rent away some dear connection? And why should I describe a sorrow which all have felt, and must feel? The time at length arrives when grief is rather an indulgence than a necessity; and the smile that plays upon the lips, although it may be deemed a sacrilege, is not banished. My mother was dead, but we had still duties which we ought to perform; we must continue our course with the rest and learn to think ourselves fortunate whilst one remains whom the spoiler has not seized.

Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus is in the public domain, and may be downloaded freely (in multiple formats, including Kindle and EPub) from Project Gutenberg, HERE.

"I think God calls all of us to fill different roles at different times and I think that He wanted Donald Trump to become president, and that's why he's there."  ~White House press secretary Sarah Sanders (source)

Hmm.

 

Instead Of

“Whoever wants music instead of noise, joy instead of pleasure, soul instead of gold, creative work instead of business, passion instead of foolery, finds no home in this trivial world of ours.”  ~Hermann Hesse

Well, that's not exactly a picker-upper, is it?

To Test

To Test Whether We Are Attached to Something
By Ajahn Jayasaro (via)

We can test whether we are attached to something by observing our reaction to its absence.

If we are attached to goodness, we feel upset with people who act badly.
If we are attached to our teachers, we feel angry with people who criticize them.
If we are attached to our views, we feel frustrated with people who oppose them.
If we are attached to peace, we feel aversion to unpeaceful situations.

If we devote ourselves to goodness wisely, we feel compassion for people who act badly.
If we devote ourselves to our teachers wisely, we are patient with people who criticize them.
If we hold our views lightly, we find ourselves stimulated by people who oppose them.
If we follow the path of peace wisely, we see unpeaceful situations as a challenge.

I think I know.

"All options are on the table," John Bolton said. What he meant by that was, "If they don't give us what we want, we might just kill them and take it."

It's a behavior we accept on the international level we would never accept on the individual level. The next time you go grocery shopping, display a firearm and explain to the clerk that you would like to negotiate the price, that "all options are on the table." In 8-10 years you can tell me what happened.

There are countries like Nicaragua and Honduras that have asked for America's help, but instead have seen their aid slashed.  Trump wants to build a wall to keep them out.  He said that they are disease-ridden and violent.

Then there are countries like Venezuela that have not asked for America's help,but it looks like they're going to get it whether they want it or not.  Their humanitarian crisis has touched his soul.  He feels compelled to do something, to take action.

I wonder what's different?

"We're more popular than…"

I think I prefer John Lennon to Jesus Christ.

Jesus was perfect right out of the box.  By definition, he could do wrong.  Everything he did was bathed in goodness and light.

John, on the other hand, was a deeply flawed individual, but he worked really hard to overcome his demons.  He stumbled at times, but he fought forward and ended a better person than when he started.

It's the second example that is more relevant to my life.

Chang and Eng

Excerpted from The Two, the biography of the original Siamese Twins, Chang and Eng Bunker, by Irving and Amy Wallace, ©1978:

On another visit to Philadelphia, the fact that the twins were genuinely united saved them from a fine or jail. A spectator, shaking hands with Chang, squeezed his hand painfully hard. Immediately, Chang punched him, knocking him off his feet. The man rose, summoned the law, and the twins were hauled before a magistrate on charge of assault and battery. The magistrate, after studying the twins connecting band, addressed the complainant. The judge agreed that Chang could be jailed for assault, but added that if Eng were also jailed it would amount to false arrest and the complainant himself would have to be prosecuted. Needless to say, the injured party dropped his charges.

It's a strange thing to think about, but I've wondered what would happen if one person, conjoined with another, committed a crime.  This judge didn't really answer that question, he just found a clever way to avoid making the decision himself.

The book was a lot more interesting than I expected it to be.  The brothers were far more than just sideshow freaks.  They retired from show business at an early age, married sisters and fathered 21 (!) children, owned slaves and ran a successful farm, met Abraham Lincoln; they led full and happy lives.

The walls have ears, the screen has eyes

I used to be on a lot more social media sites, several years ago, but gave most of them up after my Mom was diagnosed with cancer.

It was then that Facebook started popping up ads for quack cancer cures. They told me I could treat my mother with laetrile. They promised a complete cure.  I didn't fall for it, of course, but it was still upsetting; they were telling me things I wanted to believe.

And the thing is, I had never posted about my mother's health. Apparently someone close to me did, then Mark Zuckerberg connected the dots and pointed me out to the scammers as an easy mark.

That was when I walked away from it all.

I still have my email and my blog, but that's all.   I'm much more careful than I used to be.  I use "Private" mode for most things, to eliminate the cookie trail, and I use the Tor Browser sometimes to mask my information further.

It's not paranoia.  They really are watching me, watching all of us.

That's the world we live in.

I Think…

[embed]https://youtu.be/FeGmP0E5bHE[/embed]

I don't hear a guitar in there.  It seems to be just a bass, a tambourine, a drum, and a sporadic keyboard.

That's a little different.

P.O.'d

Yesterday I received a Christmas card from my sister-- a card she had mailed two months ago.

Mona recently sent a card to my Dad, who lives three miles away.  It took two weeks to get there.

The post office used to be so good, and now they are almost useless.  We've had to start paying all our bills online, not because we want to, but because we were being hammered by late fees in spite of mailing payment sometimes weeks before the due date.

We can't depend on them anymore.

And that's a shame.

We need

 

 

"We need magic and bliss, and power, myth, and celebration and religion in our lives, and music is a good way to encapsulate a lot of it." ~Jerry Garcia

 

 

The Lesser Of

I'm paraphrasing, but already the Democrats are saying things along the lines of, "No matter how deeply flawed our candidate is, you still have to vote for him because the alternative is even worse."

This feels like the prelude to another truly awful choice.

It shouldn't have mattered anyway.

After 9/11 happened, the company my father worked for sent out a memo saying they would no longer use a local motel.  They said it was owned by Arabs who refused to fly the American flag.

My father stopped by this motel on the way to work the next day, and saw the American flag flying.  He went inside and talked to the manager, and discovered this motel was owned by an Indian gentleman.

He reported these things when he got to work that day.  The motel was flying the American flag, the motel is not owned by Arabs.

But the company never rescinded the memo, and they never used that motel ever again.

Red Round Rhythm

red round rhythm by Norman Engel, 2013

“I ain’t nothing but tired;  man, I’m just tired and bored with myself.”  ~Bruce Springsteen, Dancing in the Dark

The Lord's Prayer

The translation is based upon research by Dr. Neil Douglas-Klotz, an expert in the Aramaic Christian, Jewish mystical and Sufi traditions. He translated the prayer as if it came directly from the Aramaic (via):

O Breathing Life, your Name shines everywhere!
Release a space to plant your Presence here.
Envision your “I Can” now.
Embody your desire in every light and form.
Grow through us this moment’s bread and wisdom.
Untie the knots of failure binding us, as we release the strands we hold of others’ faults.
Help us not forget our Source, yet free us from not being in the Present.
From you arises every vision, power, and song, from gathering to gathering.
Amen: may our future actions grow from here!

And here is the traditional King James version, Matthew 6: 9-13:

After this manner therefore pray ye:

Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever.  Amen.

MLK Day

When Malcom X returned from his pilgrimage to Mecca, he said basically, "You know what? I have met some new people, had some new experiences, and I have changed my mind."

That's a very brave and rare thing for anyone, and unheard of for a public figure. Can you name another off the top of your head?  Can you name a single politician who said, "Hmm, maybe I'm wrong?"

Most people will go to great lengths, stretching logic to the breaking point, to avoid changing their minds.  Pride gets in the way, and it becomes more important to win the argument than it is to be right.

So today, as you remember the bravery and persistence of the Civil Rights leaders, take a few minutes to appreciate the ordinary people who quietly saw what was going on, didn't like it, and changed their minds.

It's hard to admit it when we're wrong. It's hard to adapt to a new way of doing things.

The people who did so deserve a little credit, too.

So be careful!

"In truth, happiness is suffering in disguise but in such a subtle form that you don’t see it. If you cling to happiness, it’s the same as clinging to suffering, but you don’t realize it. When you hold on to happiness, it is impossible to throw away the inherent suffering. They’re inseparable like that. Thus the Buddha taught us to know suffering, see it as the inherent harm in happiness, to see them as equal. So be careful! When happiness arises, don’t be overjoyed, and don’t get carried away. When suffering comes, don’t despair, don’t lose yourself in it. See that they have the same equal value."  ~Ajahn Chah

I guess

"I guess by now I should know enough about loss to realize that you never really stop missing someone-– you just learn to live around the huge gaping hole of their absence." ~Alyson Noel

Foreign

There is no foreign land; it is the traveler only that is foreign. ~Robert Louis Stevenson

Sunrise

Shepherdess with Herd at the Alps During Sunrise by Waldemar Fink, 1908

I love the way the brush strokes mimic the distortion of sunlight on the moisture of your eyes.

Ambitions

"Driven by the hunger for fame and originality, we are like these monkeys, thinking that we are so clever in discovering things and convincing our fellow humans to see what we see, think what we think, driven by ambition to be the savior, the clever one, the seer of all. We have all kinds of small ambitions, such as impressing a girl, or big ambitions, such as landing on Mars."  ~Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche (via)

I don't know if it's all bad.

Wanting to impress the girl has made me a better person.

You Better Find

[embed]https://youtu.be/SrGSt5eDt9o[/embed]

When the truth is found to be lies
And all the joy within you dies…

Full lyrics HERE.

Tear Down The

"If there's a concrete wall in front of you, go through it. Go over it. Go around it. But get to the other side of that wall."  ~Donald Trump (Yes, it's real:  source)

See What's Become of Me

I didn't really need a punch line- I just really liked the first four panels.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal by Zack Weinersmith is on the web HERE.

Karma Chameleon

"Some people think karma is fate. 'It must be my karma,' they sigh, resigning themselves to some calamity. But karma doesn’t have to be bad. It can be good. And we make our own karma. Every thought, feeling, and deed sows a habitual karmic seed in our mind that ripens into a corresponding positive, negative, or neutral experience. Anger and jealousy manifest as painful, unhappy experiences. Selfless, joyful thoughts and feelings flower into wondrous, fulfilling experiences.

"So we don’t have to resign ourselves to 'our karma.' We control our karma. Every moment is a new juncture, a chance to improve our way of thinking and thus our circumstances. This principle of interdependent causation is the bedrock of the Buddha’s first teachings, the four noble truths."  ~Tulku Thondup Rinpoche (via)

My favorite definition of karma is:  "Where you are now is a result of decisions made in the past; where you will be in the future is the result of decisions you make now."

We're not gods.  We don't have complete control.

But we do have quite a bit.

Not Because

"I want to underscore this point: we find greed difficult to control not because it is natural, but because it has been generated by long, unchecked habituation. This is important to recognize, because even though old habits may be tough to break, all habits can be broken."  ~17th Karmapa

I've heard that excuse so many times in my life.  When people behave terribly-- taking more than their fair share, leering at pretty girls-- they make the claim that this is natural; simple human nature.  They argue the other side, too:  the reason they hate homosexuality and powerful women is because it's unnatural, and therefore sinful.

I don't think "natural" and "unnatural" are really all that important.

I've never known an honorable person to argue that they are.

Covers

Minor Keys

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Fascism 101

Manufacturing a crisis in order to invoke emergency powers is something we've seen before.

It didn't end well.

In Defiance of All That Is Bad

“Even when we don’t ‘win,’ there is fun and fulfillment that we have been involved, with other good people, in something worthwhile. We need hope. An optimist isn’t necessarily a blithe, slightly sappy whistler in the dark of our time. To be hopeful in bad times is not being foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of competition and cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.

“What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places - and there are so many - where people have behaved magnificently, it energizes us to act, and raises at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.” ~Howard Zinn,  A Power Governments Cannot Suppress (via)

Dictatorial Reasoning

"It is no more logical to think 'I am more important than this person' than it is to think 'I’m more important than this insect.' Such a view has not one single logical reason to support it but is merely dictatorial and egotistical reasoning. An ant’s life may be of little consequence to us, but to the ant it is everything."  ~Lama Zopa Rinpoche (via)

Nothing is Fixed

"Again and again, develop compassion for all sentient beings in general, and particularly for those who dislike you. It might be difficult at first, but you will never attain enlightenment as long as you continue to feel ill-will towards your enemies. Those who are now your enemies were in former lives your parents, and there is nothing fixed about the status of an enemy or friend. To feel hostility towards enemies and affection towards your friends is nothing but a deluded form of perception.

"If you train your mind to recognize everything as insubstantial like a dream, hostility towards enemies will lose its meaning entirely. This is crucially important, because ordinarily our lives are driven by the yearning to acquire food and clothing, possessions, partners, status and acclaim. We put a great deal of thought into devising the cleverest, most efficient ways to obtain them, and we think, 'So-and-so has this much money, my friends have this much, so I need more.' Or: 'In the past, I stayed in this kind of house, in this part of town, but now I shall move to a better place.'

"We must put a stop to all such thinking."  ~Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

Repulsive

"Yet for every story of warped lives which fifty years later the critics of progressive schools might present, the Recording Angel might, no doubt, offer a hundred, telling of boys and girls thwarted and starved by traditional processes which made learning a repulsive and meaningless discipline to be suffered like measles, bad weather, or ill-tempered parents." ~Hermann Hagedorn

After my Mom taught me to read, I was pretty much self-taught; an autodidact.  The classroom should have expanded my horizons, but instead it walled me in.  I loathed every minute of it.

I can honestly say I learned nothing of value in a traditional classroom.  It was all just a tremendous waste of time.  Remembering those times makes me anxious and unhappy.

I have no warm, nostalgic memories of my school days, save one:  I met my future wife there, in the seventh grade.

That's kind of cool.

 

128

Sonnet 128
William Shakespeare

How oft, when thou, my music, music play'st,
Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds
With thy sweet fingers, when thou gently sway'st
The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,
Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap
To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,
Whilst my poor lips, which should that harvest reap,
At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand!
To be so tickled, they would change their state
And situation with those dancing chips,
O'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait,
Making dead wood more blest than living lips.

Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,
Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.

Statistical Anomalies

We traveled through La Guardia airport over the holidays, and the TSA "randomly" selected my Lebanese wife for a pat down.

She was the only one I saw "randomly" selected.

Sunset

Mona sent me this picture of the sunset she saw on her drive home.

The sky above makes the world below seem so insignificant.

Lost In Your Eyes

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This has the feel of a Van Morrison song.  It's become a favorite.

Full lyrics HERE.

FWIW

"For what it’s worth:   it’s never too late or, in my case, too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit, stop whenever you want. You can change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. And I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again."  ~Eric Roth,  in the film adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's (to whom this quote is often falsely attributed) The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Time Travel

This train of thought makes me happy.

From childhood, we in America are taught that the way to prevent war is to have an insanely powerful military and put a boot to the neck of all who oppose us; stomp out the seedling before it grows into a tree.

But it turns out that's not the only way.

The Outward Sign Of Inward Grace

In this excerpt from Americans: A Book of Lives, ©1946, Hermann Hagedorn describes the business environment of Theodore Roosevelt's America:

To these men the rapid development of the country seemed a definite good in itself and became, indeed, a kind of religion, not superseding so much as fulfilling the Christian principles on which most of them had been brought up. Like the capitalists of the Old World, they had been taught that thrift was among the noblest of the Christian virtues. Financial success, which could be regarded as the effect of thrift (though actually it was more often its direct antithesis, the profit of a shrewd gamble), was therefore regarded by them as the outward sign of inward grace. If their methods were challenged, they answered that progress could not wait on fine ethical distinction, very certain that the increase of the material comforts which they promoted, was progress, and therefore of God.

I wish I could say, "What a strange and incomprehensible time!"

But I can't.

The Things They Hold Precious

Another excerpt from If I Knew Then What I Know Now– So What? by Estelle Getty, ©1988:

As a student of human nature, I love to people-watch. It's also essential to my craft-- I'll pick things up I see on the street and incorporate them into my roles. It was my idea, for instance, for Sophia and her handbag to never be parted. Not that she carries one, but that she never puts it down.

Elderly women, and I've seen this a hundred times, never put their purses down. I think I know why: when you displace people, take them from the homes they've had for 40, 50, 60 years, when you take their furniture and their dishes and their pots and their pans, and you put them in some retirement home, or even in the home of their children, you take away everything that's familiar. What they have left--the things they hold precious-- go in their purses: the medicine, personal treasures, pictures of grandchildren, important cards and documents. Putting down your purse is like putting down your life.

This book was such a pleasant surprise!

Disconnected

"We seem to have lost the sense that we can freely and happily extend ourselves for others. In modeling our social institutions on business principles, we have become very disconnected from our own noble heart."  ~Ogyen Trinley Dorje (source)

Change

"When you forgive, you in no way change the past-- but you sure do change the future."  ~Bernard Meltzer (via FortySomethingHeyHey)