Those who know don’t talk.
Those who talk don’t know.
Close your mouth, block off your senses, blunt your sharpness, untie your knots, soften your glare, settle your dust.
This is the primal identity.
Be like the Tao.
~Tao-Te-Ching
Category: <span>philosophy</span>
Once again my own words fail me. Here are some from the Buddha.
This is what should be done
By one who is skilled in goodness,
And who knows the path of peace:
Let them be able and upright,
Straightforward and gentle in speech.
Humble and not conceited,
Contented and easily satisfied.
Unburdened with duties and frugal in their ways.
Peaceful and calm, and wise and skillful,
Not proud and demanding in nature.
Let them not do the slightest thing
That the wise would later reprove.
Wishing: In gladness and in safety,
May all beings be at ease.
Whatever living beings there may be;
Whether they are weak or strong, omitting none,
The great or the mighty, medium, short or small,
The seen and the unseen,
Those living near and far away,
Those born and to-be-born,
May all beings be at ease!
Let none deceive another,
Or despise any being in any state.
Let none through anger or ill-will
Wish harm upon another.
Even as a mother protects with her life
Her child, her only child,
So with a boundless heart
Should one cherish all living beings:
Radiating kindness over the entire world
Spreading upwards to the skies,
And downwards to the depths;
Outwards and unbounded,
Freed from hatred and ill-will.
Whether standing or walking, seated or lying down
Free from drowsiness,
One should sustain this recollection.
This is said to be the sublime abiding.
By not holding to fixed views,
The pure-hearted one, having clarity of vision,
Being freed from all sense desires,
Is not born again into this world.
The Metta Sutra
5 stars from me! a must see…. touched me in too many ways to count.
Ah….the road(s) not traveled…….. Om shanti.
Do you imagine the universe is agitated?
Go into the desert at night and look out at the stars.
This practice should answer the question.
The superior person settles her mind as the universe settles the stars in the sky.
By connecting her mind with the subtle origin, she calms it.
Once calmed, it naturally expands, and ultimately her mind becomes as vast and immeasurable as the night sky.
~Lao Tzu
Today, my own words fail me. Here are some from the Buddah
This is what should be done
By one who is skilled in goodness,
And who knows the path of peace:
Let them be able and upright,
Straightforward and gentle in speech.
Humble and not conceited,
Contented and easily satisfied.
Unburdened with duties and frugal in their ways.
Peaceful and calm, and wise and skillful,
Not proud and demanding in nature.
Let them not do the slightest thing
That the wise would later reprove.
Wishing: In gladness and in saftey,
May all beings be at ease.
Whatever living beings there may be;
Whether they are weak or strong, omitting none,
The great or the mighty, medium, short or small,
The seen and the unseen,
Those living near and far away,
Those born and to-be-born,
May all beings be at ease!
Let none deceive another,
Or despise any being in any state.
Let none through anger or ill-will
Wish harm upon another.
Even as a mother protects with her life
Her child, her only child,
So with a boundless heart
Should one cherish all living beings:
Radiating kindness over the entire world
Spreading upwards to the skies,
And downwards to the depths;
Outwards and unbounded,
Freed from hatred and ill-will.
Whether standing or walking, seated or lying down
Free from drowsiness,
One should sustain this recollection.
This is said to be the sublime abiding.
By not holding to fixed views,
The pure-hearted one, having clarity of vision,
Being freed from all sense desires,
Is not born again into this world.
Reposted from Aug, 2008
I am s
o happy to be a part of this group. Please join us on April 12 for our annual birthday show. Click here for flyer.
I’m still “in process” of cobbling my story together. The ‘working’ title is “Tales from the East”. The blurb I submitted reads:
Personal challenges take on deeper meanings when viewed from different perspectives. This telling will weave together a personal tale with an ancient story out of the Bhagavad Gita.
Woke up to the news of the large-scale earthquaking in Chile. No doubt there will be many, more events to come right up until April 22 (at the very least). as the alignment of the planets reminds us just who is Boss. Now, sit for a few moments and watch where your mind goes after reading that. Then, take a long, slow, deep breath.
Chant Om.
(Go to a yoga class and ask the teacher, “why om?”)
If I could sum up everything I’ve learned over the past few decades and reduce it down to 2 words, today those words would be:
Practice Kindness.
…more later. New Class starts today, 4:30pm. We’re gonna talk about Om.
Recently I read somewhere, that it takes 10, 000 hours of consistent & persistent study to achieve Mastery over the subject at hand. The author of these remarks meant it quite literally, and meant for us all to add up the hours spent in serious study, and practice. If you are fortunate enough to attend a school of formal learning, they will do the math for you and assign you some letters to add after your name. This may make living in this new-normal world easier, or not. Time will tell.
The first book I was assigned to read when I began my yoga teacher training in 1998, was titled Mastery by George Leonard, and for me, the bookworm, it was a surprising and disappointing assignment. I was burning to dig into ancient indian texts on how to achieve enlightenment and change my life, and stuff like that. Mastery was small stuff. I am grateful that my thinking has evolved since I achieved my 10,000 hours.
With Saturn in Virgo residing in my third house, natally, I’ve always been quite picky about subject matters regarding intelligence, mental health, communications, education, and siblings. You will find me quite firm in my opinions regardless of how quickly said opinions change. And, change again. Mutable signs are like that.
Then there are the ten thousand sorrows and ten thousand joys that the Asian Buddhists write of. Why 10,000? Why not 11, 001?
I had a major spiritual awakening during a vedic math class once. I’ve never forgotten that moment and it has been a source of delight in my memory cells ever since. Numbers are a deep source of symbolic information, yes?
Wikipedia informs me that there is a 10,000 year clock , conceived in 1986 and currently being built by a group of new-normal-wizkids including Jeff Bezos , of Amazon, who donated 42 million towards this project! It’s called The Clock of the Long Now.
How appropriate.
But why, 10,000 years? Why not 11,001?
Other details to consider:
- 10,000 years = 864,000 ,000 seconds
- 14,400, 000 minutes
- 240,000 hours
- 1428 weeks (rounded down)
Then, sadly, of course, there is that ever vigilant, awake & ready army of 10,000 , which has been mythologized, dramatized, and institutionalized since 400 BC.
But the most recent incident of 10,000, the inspiration for this blog post, came in the mail from Amazon.com. It’s my new pedometer! It counts my steps. According to the new-normal-thinking of 2014, we need to take 10,000 steps a day if we want to lose weight, 6, 000 steps to maintain one’s fitness, etc. etc., and blah, blah, blah. I’ll let you know how it goes.
10,000?
And, last, just for fun : 10,000 Maniacs.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxW0CUaPWAE&w=420&h=315]
May you live for 10,000 years. Om shanti, shanti, shantihi.
Can you see the nest? It’s brand new! The Feng Shui of it, is simply marvelous. I am grateful.
Tomorrow is the first of a series of experiential workshops using the astrological natal chart as tool for self-inquiry and self-development. It’s been quite a ride for me personally, as I have chosen to follow the stars for most of my life.
These days Uranus is conjunct my mid-heaven and moving in towards a conjunction with the NN. Neptune is conjunct SN natally. Obviously, things are changing. Unknown territory looms ahead for me. Thanks to the stars, Pluto is finally past my moon. Om shanti.
The outer planets, along with all things lunar, have captured my attention for decades. As a working astrologer who reads charts for individuals, I am also particularly interested in Time, time-measurement, time-management, time-keeping, and what I call Time-Scaping, which is what happens once we have mastered our personal relationship with time and create a life-rhythm which is sustainable. The cycles of the planets along with the orbit of the moon provide the raw data that is needed.
Anyway, I digress. Tomorrow’s workshop will tackle the idea that the Lunar Nodes represent our Soul’s Purpose in this incarnation. We’ll look at the nodes in our respective natal charts and discuss it. Then we’ll take our new found information and practice being our ‘true selves’ using various yogic techniques.
I’ve been doing this work for a lifetime already, and I still get excited when I see the look of “enlightenment” come over someone’s face. That sudden expression brought on by the combination of insight, understanding, and joy is unmistakeable.
If you’re in or aound Asbury Park, NJ, find us! The door is round and open (rumi)