Maturity beckons also, asking us to be larger, more fluid, more elemental, less cornered, less unilateral, a living conversational intuition between the inherited story, the one we are privileged to inhabit and the one, if we are large enough and broad enough, moveable enough and even, here enough, just, astonishingly, about to occur. –excerpt…
The source of this list has been lost. I cannot give attribution. I know that I am not the one who compiled these words. I think it is an act of resistance to share them in this era of disharmony, of unrestrained ego, of the illusion that conflict has a worthwhile outcome. Leadership demands…
Why is the Buddha depicted with a countenance of calm, exuding an inner peace with circumstances as they may be? Nirvana. Nirvana is described variously as a mind and heart that accepts things as they happen to be. I’ve never met anyone who has achieved that. A few individuals seemed closer than I to…
We are engulfed in an immense ancient indifference that does not sleep or dream. Call it Nature if you will, though everything that is is natural— the lignite-bearing earth, the factory, a darkness taller than the sky. This out-of-doors that wins our release and temporary peace— not because it is pristine or pretty, but…
The years click by, one becomes older, and things get worse. Many would agree with this generalization of their experience. If one is unlucky it would be difficult to see life otherwise , beset with chronic medical issues, and subject to the indignities of medicare for treatment. Luck counts for a great deal in…
What follows is a guest post……………………….. Friday morning our Newfoundland/Golden Retriever mix, Astrid, roused me from sleep nearly an hour earlier than I’d hoped to get up the day after Thanksgiving. She wanted to be let out, of course. So I growled to myself, stumbled downstairs into the dawn, opened the sliding door to…
There are two more days left in November. Then comes December the darkest month, which is also the coming of Christmas. Christmas is a festival of lights. Darkness and light. This morning I wish that I were a bear having found a warm place to hibernate until spring. But I am not a bear…
That is a term that has not come to mind for many years. The concept means causation. Nothing comes to be apart from depending on many other things. It is an important, often used word in Buddhist texts. The Buddhist tradition takes cause and effect with total seriousness, –as serious as a heart attack…
We visited the ELMHURST ART MUSEUM on Saturday. May not one purpose of a holiday, be the opportunity to step outside of ordinary time, to be with friends and family, and to seek experiences that widen one’s world, increase one’s capacity to wonder? That is exactly what I wish for myself and for those…
Michael: Every time he comes up, he’s got no knife, he’s got no jacket, he’s got no pants, he’s got no boots. All he’s got is that stupid gun he carries around like John Wayne. That ain’t gonna help ya’. Axel: Oh, what the hell, Mike. Give him the boots. Michael: No way. I…
