Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Practice

"Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is vitally important that you do it." - Mahatma Gandhi

Practice doesn't make perfect. There is no perfect. Practice makes progress, which is all we can expect. In retrospect things almost always seem obvious. Some choices seem stupid, though at the time they were perfectly sensible.

Trying too hard just makes things worse. Follow the middle way, 70% effort or attention according to BK Frantzis. The important thing is to keep trying. Return to the breath or whatever object of concentration.

"Doing something feels better than doing nothing" -PBSKids sponsor

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Sleep





Settling in to the dark silence, the monkey mind slowly stops hopping. A comfy cocoon, a womb, a tomb. Near-emptiness gives rise to semi-lucidity, semi-reality. The Little Bang. Dao/wuji begets taiji begets yin and yang beget heaven, earth, and man beget the myriad things; the vivid, emotive, elusive dream world. For hours or days it is all there is. Until from without or within the bubble pops. Light, feeling, finally thought flood in.

"One day about sunset, Zhuangzi dozed off and dreamed that he turned into a butterfly.
He flapped his wings and sure enough he was a butterfly...
What a joyful feeling as he fluttered about, he completely forgot that he was Zhuangzi.
Soon though, he realized that that proud butterfly was really Zhuangzi who dreamed he was a butterfly, or was it a butterfly who dreamed he was Zhuangzi!
Maybe Zhuangzi was the butterfly, and maybe the butterfly was Zhuangzi? This is what is meant by the 'transformation of things.'"

We are all here in the act of creation
When I am dreaming, I don't know if
I'm truly asleep or if I'm awake
And when I get up, I don't know if I'm
truly awake, or if I'm still dreaming.
Dream, Dream, Dream, Dream, life is
but a dream.
Traveling the waves of an infiinite ocean
I feel the deepest emotion
I see a shadow of reality
Please hold me closely and take me away.
I'm the first person
you're the second person
Earlier today I was in the third person.

-Forest for the Trees, Dream