The number one joy in life is breathing. There is no question about it. When given the choice of any two things one might do, exclusive of the other, breathing wins, hands down. Especially if the exclusive length of time is more than, say two minutes.
So, if you are willing to give up breathing for something else, then that is something! Giving up breath is giving up life. If there is something you love more than living itself, then that something IS the meaning of your life. It is a simple equation.
Friday, December 23, 2011
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Silence Rules Negativity
Silence rules negativity - absorbs it, transforms it.
Scissors, Paper, Rock. I don't know if I read or heard this somewhere, or just made it up -- intuitively, anyway, that game works if you take the "Rock" for silence.
Paper covers the Rock. If you take "Paper" for that which is temporary, and illusory, then, yes, Paper can appear to have victory over Rock. I never understood that one before. I thought they just made paper win over rock because you had to do it that way, for the game to work.
If you take "Scissors" for that which cuts, and is therefore painful and negative, then it makes sense that the Rock can destroy the Scissors. Otherwise, why not think of the Rock as that which sharpens scissors?
Scissors as negativity, is negativity in the positive sense. Cutting away that which is not needed, creates the masterpiece. Scissors also cut through the illusion, which is the paper, which covers the rock.
I am trying to remember Silence, the Rock, and let it absorb all negativity. As Jesus did. I don't need to cry out to my God, for God to know what I need. And I also can cry out, and the holy spirit can cry out from within me. If the cry comes from Silence itself, then let it.
On a less serious note, you can't lose traditional Scissors, Paper, Rock by choosing "Rock" all the time - why? Because, unless the person is a practiced "Scissors, Paper, Rock" competitor, they are likely to forget to punch you, if they win with something other than "Rock." You, on the other hand, already having a fist balled up, are likely to punch them every time. (Note, for documentation on traditional Scissors, Paper, Rock, see any" Charlie Chan" movie scene where No. 1 Son and No. 2 Son are waiting around, or trying to decide something.)
Scissors, Paper, Rock. I don't know if I read or heard this somewhere, or just made it up -- intuitively, anyway, that game works if you take the "Rock" for silence.
Paper covers the Rock. If you take "Paper" for that which is temporary, and illusory, then, yes, Paper can appear to have victory over Rock. I never understood that one before. I thought they just made paper win over rock because you had to do it that way, for the game to work.
If you take "Scissors" for that which cuts, and is therefore painful and negative, then it makes sense that the Rock can destroy the Scissors. Otherwise, why not think of the Rock as that which sharpens scissors?
Scissors as negativity, is negativity in the positive sense. Cutting away that which is not needed, creates the masterpiece. Scissors also cut through the illusion, which is the paper, which covers the rock.
I am trying to remember Silence, the Rock, and let it absorb all negativity. As Jesus did. I don't need to cry out to my God, for God to know what I need. And I also can cry out, and the holy spirit can cry out from within me. If the cry comes from Silence itself, then let it.
On a less serious note, you can't lose traditional Scissors, Paper, Rock by choosing "Rock" all the time - why? Because, unless the person is a practiced "Scissors, Paper, Rock" competitor, they are likely to forget to punch you, if they win with something other than "Rock." You, on the other hand, already having a fist balled up, are likely to punch them every time. (Note, for documentation on traditional Scissors, Paper, Rock, see any" Charlie Chan" movie scene where No. 1 Son and No. 2 Son are waiting around, or trying to decide something.)
Friday, December 9, 2011
Reminders
Being ready to die at any moment.
When your thinking gets to the end of its framework, it is time to let go, and receive more input.
Your experience of life is not constrained by gravity, and thinking does not hold it up. There is no place to fall to, if you let go of thinking.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Current Help
Settle into more consistent truthfulness
"Accept-reject, accept-reject" - remembering these are the same. Neither makes a difference.
waiting to see what I will do.
Realizing that I can't do anything by myself. The Everything does everything.
I take responsibility by allowing truth to be what is.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
We Are Not Trash - Occupy Encampments Destroyed
I've got to get off my duff and start writing every day about the changes that are happening in our country, finally. I am talking about the Occupy movement.
This week, the Oakland encampment was removed by police, and the Occupy Wall Street itself was summarily tipped into NYC sanitation trucks. We then read that the mayors and managers of 18 cities with occupations conference-called about what to do with them. Apparently, they decided the thing to do was treat them like trash to be swept away, and justify police actions with sanctimonious pronouncements about "public safety."
But the mayors - either 1%-er's like New York's Bloomberg, or terrified politicians like Jean Quan in Oakland, are just stumbling forward in a stage-play whose finale is already written. Their inevitable authoritarian reactions to Occupy merely serve the function of strengthening and widening the movement. The finale is the fall of the economic and political structures we have now, that are not working for 99% of the people (or more.)
The next act of the play, though, is improvisation. Change requires untried solutions; and not everything that gets tried will work. The Occupy Movement is creating new forms of democracy. A working system of elections, that voice the actual will of the majority, (with protection of minorities,) will have to be in place BEFORE the ultimate fall of the system, if we are to avoid massive violence and loss.
The next play, the one that comes after the new structures of democracy are in place, will be written by the new democracy itself. All we know now are the problems it will have to solve - the environmental emergency, creating opportunities for productive work for all, and the equitable distribution of resources that productive work creates.
I propose the next step for Occupiers is to demand public space for Occupations as a right, in EVERY locality. People need to gather for long periods of time - these are informal constitutional conventions. They are political free speech of the highest order. Money is not speech, as the Supreme Court would have it. But human bodies, gathered in protest, ARE. Their right to gather trumps the local ordinances that would prevent it.
Furthermore, there are now millions of homeless people in the United States. For a person to live, they need shelter. To have a decent life, they need the same shelter every night, and the right not to be kicked out of it. Millions of homeless people is not a normal phenomenon - it is not simple "delinquency." It is a symptom of the sickness that befouls us. In this housing emergency, we need a provision of public space for camping, and it has to be usable - in cities, near facilities and public transportation. Yes, Occupy encampments attract homeless people, of course! Mayors should be welcoming and accommodating this. Occupy Wall Street has plenty of resources to keep itself clean and safe. Less well-endowed occupations should be supported by their cities with water and sanitation. Until we have well-built homes for all, encampments are our right, and our political necessity.
The 1% are losing their minions by the second. One Oakland mayoral adviser resigned in protest at this week's police action. More importantly, veterans of our reckless foreign wars are showing up at occupations in force. Last February, Madison, WI police disobeyed orders to remove protesters from the capitol rotunda. Working class soldiers and police are waking up, and will not be used to suppress dissent.
This is why I say the battle is won - the tide has turned. If the road ahead it not yet clear, at least people are starting to wake up, and see that we need to go in the opposite direction from the one the 1%-ers have been leading us in.
This week, the Oakland encampment was removed by police, and the Occupy Wall Street itself was summarily tipped into NYC sanitation trucks. We then read that the mayors and managers of 18 cities with occupations conference-called about what to do with them. Apparently, they decided the thing to do was treat them like trash to be swept away, and justify police actions with sanctimonious pronouncements about "public safety."
But the mayors - either 1%-er's like New York's Bloomberg, or terrified politicians like Jean Quan in Oakland, are just stumbling forward in a stage-play whose finale is already written. Their inevitable authoritarian reactions to Occupy merely serve the function of strengthening and widening the movement. The finale is the fall of the economic and political structures we have now, that are not working for 99% of the people (or more.)
The next act of the play, though, is improvisation. Change requires untried solutions; and not everything that gets tried will work. The Occupy Movement is creating new forms of democracy. A working system of elections, that voice the actual will of the majority, (with protection of minorities,) will have to be in place BEFORE the ultimate fall of the system, if we are to avoid massive violence and loss.
The next play, the one that comes after the new structures of democracy are in place, will be written by the new democracy itself. All we know now are the problems it will have to solve - the environmental emergency, creating opportunities for productive work for all, and the equitable distribution of resources that productive work creates.
I propose the next step for Occupiers is to demand public space for Occupations as a right, in EVERY locality. People need to gather for long periods of time - these are informal constitutional conventions. They are political free speech of the highest order. Money is not speech, as the Supreme Court would have it. But human bodies, gathered in protest, ARE. Their right to gather trumps the local ordinances that would prevent it.
Furthermore, there are now millions of homeless people in the United States. For a person to live, they need shelter. To have a decent life, they need the same shelter every night, and the right not to be kicked out of it. Millions of homeless people is not a normal phenomenon - it is not simple "delinquency." It is a symptom of the sickness that befouls us. In this housing emergency, we need a provision of public space for camping, and it has to be usable - in cities, near facilities and public transportation. Yes, Occupy encampments attract homeless people, of course! Mayors should be welcoming and accommodating this. Occupy Wall Street has plenty of resources to keep itself clean and safe. Less well-endowed occupations should be supported by their cities with water and sanitation. Until we have well-built homes for all, encampments are our right, and our political necessity.
The 1% are losing their minions by the second. One Oakland mayoral adviser resigned in protest at this week's police action. More importantly, veterans of our reckless foreign wars are showing up at occupations in force. Last February, Madison, WI police disobeyed orders to remove protesters from the capitol rotunda. Working class soldiers and police are waking up, and will not be used to suppress dissent.
This is why I say the battle is won - the tide has turned. If the road ahead it not yet clear, at least people are starting to wake up, and see that we need to go in the opposite direction from the one the 1%-ers have been leading us in.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Occupy Denver 1st Amendment Petition
Wow - I just noticed that I haven't posted in October, yet. This is what I wrote as my reason for signing the petition to the Governor of Colorado and the Mayor of Denver, to respect the free speech and peaceable assembly rights of the Occupy Denver encampment:
In order for the right of peaceably assembly to be a real right, there must be a place where peaceable assembly is allowed. Any and all public space is, by rights, the space where people are free to assemble. If there is an on-going event of political expression, the right to assemble for any length of time may not be denied.
If the event goes on for longer than 24 hours, then the use of camping equipment is necessary for the right to assemble to upheld. Equal rights for rich and poor, means that a peaceable assembly for the purpose of political expression cannot be denied to those who can't afford a place to live, or a commute. Government at any level (federal, state or local) may not deny "Creator-endowed" rights.
In order for the right of peaceably assembly to be a real right, there must be a place where peaceable assembly is allowed. Any and all public space is, by rights, the space where people are free to assemble. If there is an on-going event of political expression, the right to assemble for any length of time may not be denied.
If the event goes on for longer than 24 hours, then the use of camping equipment is necessary for the right to assemble to upheld. Equal rights for rich and poor, means that a peaceable assembly for the purpose of political expression cannot be denied to those who can't afford a place to live, or a commute. Government at any level (federal, state or local) may not deny "Creator-endowed" rights.
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