Can you think of anything more yummy than a bowl of cherries? Maybe it has been a very long time since you’ve tasted fresh cherries in springtime. When we become adult we tend not to indulge ourselves in such ordinary, and natural experiences of joy. Our minds are seduced by things more abstract, and…
What a session last night at Starbucks. At least fifteen of us were seated around a table of a size to accommodate ten people. The room was echoing with voices, with the cacophony of the cappuccino machine used by the baristas. Nevertheless the group intently listened to chosen readings from the Tao te Ching. …
I watched again on video the wedding between Britain’s Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. I wish the couple well. There are few things more fraught with risk than marriage. There are many inevitable unknowns, like the under water volume of the iceberg that looks so beautiful and benign on the surface. Good luck to…
The Tao doesn’t take sides; it gives birth to both good and evil. The Master doesn’t take sides; she welcomes both saints and sinners. The Tao is like a bellows; it is empty yet infinitely capable. The more you use it, the more it produces; the more you talk of it, the less you…
I considered writing about the Texas High School shooting. A lot has been written already in the NY Times, the Washington Post and other sources. Another breakout of violence will roil the Texas community for years. Surely the families who lost kids will be shattered for as long as they live. My expression of…
Is beauty in the eye of the beholder? One is tempted to answer “yes” or answer “no.” Then to follow up with a discussion on the latest findings on brain research. Alternatively there is the description of objectively measurable parameters of proportion, of design technique. To take either side is an interesting game. I’ve…
In life, a man commits himself, draws his own portrait and there is nothing but that portrait. *** If I have excluded God the Father, there must be somebody to invent values. We have to take things as they are. Life is nothing until it is lived. *** Man is all the time outside…
I am diabetic. Finding no sugar added ice cream makes me happy. The taste is perfect, with no sugar added. I think these words by Herman Hesse make the point. In every truth the opposite is equally true. For example, a truth can only be expressed and enveloped in words if it is one-sided….
Thursday evening six of us sat around a small table at Taste of Paris. Wine, coffee, steamed clams, pastries, were a satisfying accompaniment to conversation that ranged from Mach Picchu, Peru, to the nature of daily life in antiquity, infuseded by awareness of divinity. And, I believe that Barry managed to keep tabs with…
….and the soul is just a car. What an interesting wide-ranging discussion last night! Around fifteen or so of us sat together in the Coffee Shop and discussed ideas expressed by Plato in his treatment of Socrates, awaiting the carrying out of the death sentence imposed by the Athenian Assembly. Perhaps there are worse…
