Bhante Quote

"Some religious texts talk about the need to give up worldly pleasure or happiness, but I would personally like to see people give up their attachment to worldly misery. I would like to see them enjoying more of the simple pleasures of life. Many of those who are supposed to be wallowing in worldly pleasures, are who have everything at their command, tend to look miserable, gaunt and even miserable."

p. 90-91 Living Wisely: Further Advice from Nagarjuna's Precious Garland

Buddhist Killer

I've written about buddhism and violence in this blog. People are surprised that "Buddhist" commit violence.

To put it another way, is someone Christian if they go against so many of the core teachings? You can call yourself anything. And some of religion is culture. People can superficially identify themselves as something, but perhaps they are making an expression of culture, not so much religion. I don't mean to be elitist, but you know you can't be a Mets fan if you never watch a game, and you don't pay attention to them. There are rules to language use that we agree on. For me violence is not something you can do as a Buddhist, although out of ignorance greed and delusion we make mistakes. To be a Buddhist means you are on the path towards enlightenment, among other things, but that doesn't mean you have to be enlightened.

So I read an article today about the "signs" that Aaron Alexis was taking a turn for the worse. I skimmed an article about how hard it is to really predict human behavior and the potential for violence. I read the article from Wildmind. Bodhipoksa points out that even ill will was considered dangerous, let alone violence. He says "Alexis was not a Buddhist representative. He’s not a Buddhist teacher. He’s just another tragic figure with a mental illness and access to high-powered weaponry — and a person who, at times, practiced Buddhism. The time he took a gun and used it to kill people is not one of the times he was practicing Buddhism."

Danny Fisher is quoted in a Washington Post article that Buddhists are human beings too. I take that to mean that they are not perfect, can make mistakes. My friend told me the comments are interesting in this article, but I didn't get a chance to read many yet.

In general, in the spiritual life, we take ideals and work to move towards them. At times I have beaten myself up for not living up to those ideals. Of course that is unproductive, and doesn't help me move towards them. The correct utilization of ideals is something you hopefully learn on the path. So anyone can look at Mr. Alexis and say, wow you didn't live up to Buddhist ideals. Yea, of course. On the other hand, we don't need to let ourselves off the hook easily, to dismiss our mistakes as just being human and move on. We need to look deeply into ourselves and try and figure things out, if we're to progress at all along the path towards enlightenment.

It is important to "start where you are", be realistic, authentic. To create a false self that apes the ideals isn't true spirituality, but an act. "I am not enlightened" is something one of my friends used to always say. 

We can sometimes project our idealism onto others. It is important to see people as they really are, and not just what you want them to be. I think that is an important step along the spiritual path--to realize you are projecting idealistic expectations onto others, and that perhaps you can just work to see people clearly and work on your own progress, instead of positing ideals in other people. When you become disillusioned, and see people for who they really are, that can be a fairly liberating and self empowering thing. 

To become enlightened is not an easy thing. I don't know how rare or common it is. I know one teacher who claims to be enlightened, and I know people who think that's really funny because someone who was enlightened wouldn't brag about it. It is certain that others are ahead of me on the path and that I've got a lot of work to do. I can learn from people, and especially to look towards people who are ahead of you can be one way to learn what is possible. 

This incident will of course bring out a wide variety of opinions. We don't do mental health very well in America. For one, you can't see mental illness the way you can see a broken arm. If someone gets cancer, people pour out sympathy. When someone gets schizophrenia, we stay away like we're going to get mental germs. Our policies reflect our ignorances, and we spend a lot of money on ER visits instead of saving money with a good solid system. You don't hear the save money, don't expand government republicans ever talking about that one, because they have a preconception that government involvement is inherently bad. In my opinion our country has swung towards the far right, and we are in an era of callousness and greed. Greed, hatred, delusion and ignorance. You could say all eras are in a phase of that. I know a lot about mental health, and I can tell you, we don't really do it right in the good old USA. A lot of that has to do with our medical insurance system.

We get so afraid that if we give people benefits without working, even if it's in our own best interest, then people will become dependent on the government. Forget that some people don't have family to fall back on. Forget it that there are many structural inequalities that reinforce inequality. Why are guns and drugs so available in poor neighborhoods, and medical care, good schools and housing are not available. We like to blame the poor instead of work towards social justice, because of our fear of dependence. We don't like to talk about dependency issues in the golden parachutes of ineffective managers. We don't like to talk about dependency of the military welfare queens. Being greedy is good when you exploit others successfully, but not when you're just poor. We don't like to talk about personal responsibility as we bail out corporations. Then we can see the larger picture.

Second is the issue of gun control in the USA. I was in rural North Carolina and I saw a bumper sticker that said "Charlton Heston is my president". He was the president of the NRA, and an actor. We have a twisted gun culture that is very well organized around the investment of not impinging on our "freedom" to own a gun. 

You're going to need a lot of guns to enforce the inequalities of our system. Like prisons, guns are big business, and they pay lobbyists to keep things the same. Our alienated and disaffected population is too apathetic to rise up and conquer with common sense. You can manufacture all the statistics you want, and say guns don't kill people, people kill people, but taking guns out of people's hands causes less violence. I don't think the solution is that everyone else has a gun and they shoot Mr. Alexis before he gets too far. That just doesn't work for me.

So, as I say, the murder of 13 people, including Mr. Alexis, is going to bring out a lot of opinions. I am among the people with opinions.  

Quote from Living Wisely

"We fear fearlessness in the same way that we fear nonviolence. To act non-violently certainly appears to make one more vulnerable. You are dropping your defensiveness, leaving yourself more open, more exposed. However, this very vulnerability can be disarming, and even when it doesn't succeed in disarming aggression, the lack of desire for retaliation and security renders you much less vulnerable at a mental and emotional level. You do not feed the escalating verbal aggression out of which most physical violence issues. At its most developed, non-violence is equivalent to non-ego, there is no fixed identification with the threatened self, and therefore no fear for it, and no violence in defense of it." (p. 37-38)

Translating ancient wisdom

One thing that strikes me in Sangharakshita's recent book is how he is translating Nagarjuna into modern times. Reading his books on texts really brings them alive for me. I'm enjoying Living Wisely: Further Advice from Nagarjuna's Precious Garland.

relationship mantras

(Hopper)

1. Dear one, I am really here for you.
2. Dear one, I know that you are here, and I am very glad about it.

This is from the first essay in Right Here with You: Bringing Mindful Awareness into Our Relationships.

"I'll tell you one thing, Franny. One thing I know. And don't get upset. It isn't anything bad. But if it's the religious life you want, you ought to know right now that you're missing out on every single goddam religious action that's going on around this house. You don't even have sense enough to drinkwhen somebody brings you a cup of consecrated chicken soup- which is the only kind of chicken soup Bessie ever brings to anybody around this madhouse. So you just tell me, just tell me, buddy. Even if you went out and searched the whole world for a master- some guru, some boly man- to tell you how to say your Jesus Prayer properly, what good would it do you? How in hell are you going to recognize a legitimate holy man when you see one if you don't even know a cup of consecrated chicken soup when it's right in front of your nose? Can you tell me that?"

I was showing my boys all the different rupas and tankas. "This one is manjushri, this one is avalokateshevra....

"That one is the funny one?"
I tried to understand for a second. He heard hysterical instead of historical.

That's great--the hysterical Buddha. Of course I don't like the negative connotation in hysterical, which is part of the history of mistreatment of women by the medical profession, but still.

I'm reading Franny and Zooey because when I was on a date at the movies, I saw there's a Salinger movie coming out. I'd read Catcher In The Rye recent enough to move to it. I think the movie is going to be stupid, because the guy just wanted his art to speak for himself, and people kept doing crazy things in the name of his book. To be so colossally misunderstood, is quite tragic. 

I was reading Franny and Zooey, and I was thinking about how Franny was being Holden Caulfield like, in that everyone was a phony. And you could see how someone who was alienated, would really identify with the character. But I think he's doing it for a reason. I don't really know how deeply Salinger got into Buddhism, but he obviously knows a little about Buddhism. DT Suzuki was big in NYC at the time. Salinger later moved towards Advaita Vedanta. 

Franny is experiencing the first noble truth, that life is suffering. And she's reaching for more and she talks about The Way Of A Pilgrim, which I've yet to read. 

Franny keeps talking about how everyone is ego ego ego. Now, I think that can be a pretty superficial understanding of Buddhism, though in the beginning of the journey you can notice how colossally self involved everyone is, but then you just can't look at that sun too long because it hurts, and you turn away.

I read a lovely post by Danny Fisher about how your practice isn't even really about you.

I know you don't have to read every book mentioned by an author to understand a book, but there are clues into which traditions the book is placing himself. And I think Salinger is pointing to a kind of transcendence, the path to lead from suffering.

Unfortunately, the internal dialogue of alienation, does not necessarily point to a solution.  We all find out own solutions, if it's drugs, or art, or family, science or religion. I think he captures a visceral disgust for the world amongst adolescents. To have adolescents read him and not have the keys to transcending alienation, hopefully challenges them to find a key to transcending alienation. I have a book on alienation on my shelf that I haven't read, a cast off from a friend's philosophy past.

As I've said before appropriating culture to your own purposes is part shady and part business as usual.

Pasternak quote

"I think that if the beast who sleeps in man could be held down by threats--any kind of threat, whether of jail or retribution after death--then the highest emblem of humanity would be the lion tamer in the circus with his whips, not the prophet who sacrificed himself."

(From Doctor Zhavago p42 1991 Pantheon edition, translated by Mas Hayward and Manya Harari.)

Or a prophet who sits under a tree and becomes enlightened.

George Saunders' commencement speech

I know this video came out a while ago.

But I was reading a follow up interview.

Saunders commencement speech is a plea for kindness. In the interview, he shucks off Jesus-nature and Buddha-nature and suggests it's human nature.

Like the movie Groundhog Day, and other things, we can appropriate other's stuff to reinforce our ideas. I think that is a good thing. Syncretism is human nature as well. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis. We live in dialectical times. There is no foundation. No one true perspective. We need to wear many hats as they say on Monty Python.

I was reading a review of a book, a book was being praised because it didn't just conform Buddhism to the current times and cultures, but really dug deep into the origins as they really were. That is important too.

I remember a bit in Vishvapani's book, Gautama Buddha: The Life and Times of the Awakened One. Vishvapani Blomfield, about how it's better to put your penis into the mouth of a snake than to put it into a woman. That's not amongst the most popular quotes you read about Buddhism.

There has been more violence, and discussion of violence, in Buddhism.

Finally I will note an excellent book review by Bodhipaksa. I was sent a review copy and really hoped to like Warner's book, but I stopped reading it and therefore could not review it. I feel a responsibility to say positive things. So I will end with a quote from Bodhipaksa's review:

"Brad Warner is a funny and interesting teacher. He’s endearingly self-deprecating. There are some great discussions about the nature of faith, about the need to be ready for awakening, about the nature of time, and about the problems of translation."

worldly winds

The first time I saw Cloudy With A Chance For Meatballs, I was upset it was nothing to do with the book, which I quite liked. I saw a free outdoor screening of it last night in my community and I thought about the worldly winds. At first Flint's mother supports his interest in inventions, but then she dies. Then his father doesn't. The news girl thinks he's not good, then she grows to like him. The town really likes his invention, till it goes out of control. With any hollywood movie, it has to end nice, so in the end everything is OK.

The worldly winds are:

Gain and loss (materialism).
High status and low status.
Approval and disapproval.
Pleasure and pain (hedonism).

Other characters go through the worldly winds. The new anchor is just an intern and then she becomes famous because her silly assignment turns into a huge news story. The new station tries to belittle her even so, and when she returns to her nerd roots, they try to ridicule that too.

The town goes through the worldly winds. At first it's famous for sardines, and then they become unpopular. Then it's popular for raining food, then the food becomes too big and that becomes dangerous.

The cop is always trying to show his son that he loves him, he's trying too hard. Flint's own father, hiding behind bushy eyebrows, is concerned about the wildness of Flint's ambition; he seems a bit like a dream killer, but he's the one who buffets the various worldly wind storms his son creates.

There is a kid star who has grown obnoxious living off his old fame, trying to cling to the past. 

the dark side of meditation

The dark side of meditation is an interesting subject in that, to be completely honest, I've been guilty of tweeting all the positive article and never thought about the downside. I don't remember ever tweeting a negative article about meditation. 

There is a video, with Neuroscientist Willoughby Britton and Yoga / Buddhist Teacher Michael Stonewhich, which I found from a Wildmind post. I have to say I'm very curious what they will find.

Their point is that often trauma will come up and that people can be unprepared for it. Their other point is that people often need a kind of background to place their experience in, and that actually divorcing meditation from Buddhism might be one of the reasons why that might happen. (Or any other tradition.)

When I worked on Riker's Island, I didn't so much pay attention to the people who didn't get it. When I recently had a meditation at a staff meeting, I kept it moving when some people decided not to do it. Some people had a negative experience in the past, and I told them they didn't have to do it.

But I've always wondered why someone would not experience it positively. It seems so good, it's hard to imagine that for some it's not good.

I've always thought meditation and mindfulness are 100% pure goodness. But when I think about, I often find meditation harrowing. I have difficulty with negatvie content that comes up, from wincing at social faux pas, to the low light reel of my life, my low points in a kind of montage that proves how horrible I really am. There can be a shaming twist. For whatever reason, I struggle with constructing a positive view of myself, at times, and in meditation I usually work on conquering that problem; I also have more bold face reflections on my mistakes, which I see as positive. Usually I'm better defended. At times I feel I can see more clearly how to take a more pure tack. I see a goal and I take a direction towards it and sometimes I get waylaid. I experience that mostly as a positive thing to notice, even if it's sort of mistake oriented.

I didn't think my experiencing of myself as the wind and the trees after an intense meditation retreat as pathological, because in a retreat setting, there's lots of time and support to process your experience. I just thought it was nothing special.

There was a time when I was doing the 6 element practice at work during my lunch hour, and at a certain point I just realized that dismantling myself wasn't supported enough, and that I was beginning to experience it in a negative way or it was just too scary. I did not have enough of a foundation of positivity to support it. And to compound the problem, I didn't really reach out and talk to anyone until much later. So I just stopped doing that meditation, and I stopped meditating at lunch.

My feeling is that even though that was a kind of negative experience, in way what is negative to me is that I was brushing up against my limits, and I needed to sort of back off my ambition, and build up more metta.

I need to really work the Brahma Viharas. For what ever reason I don't have enough of a reserve of positivity inside me yet. And it's funny because I feel like I'm a pretty positive guy, externally. I'm in control enough of it, that I don't spill my negativity as much as I think others do, so I think I'm above average. But maybe I'm just not being authentic and real. It's a confusing balance. Translating our experience into appropriate action is an art. I think of that video where Patrick Stewart talks about how he donated and worked for domestic violence to honor his mother's experience, and he donated and worked for PTSD to honor his father's experience. He took the confusing experiences of his childhood and charted a positive course.

I think there are parts of ourselves we burry, because we don't know how to transform it enough to be public. I know that while we may have urges and translate feelings into extreme actions, like punching someone when we're angry, we can also just be present with our anger, and then act in our own best interest. Integration is not very easy for some people.

 I note there is a new book from Windhorse called Not About Being Good. The video suggests that we need to more fully embody our own nature, and not try to limit it.

I feel that for me, in the end, meditation is the solution. I will note with sorrow that there are some people who end up with a negative experience, and don't sort of turn the corner with it enough to make meditation helpful. I note that there are times in my life when I am trying to process something and it makes meditation really hard, and I need the patience to build up what's needed to help process some experience. I've written about putting the petal to the metal. I'd say in a way the spiritual life is about trying to be really efficient in the spiritual life, and not just pressing in the wrong way. Even so, when you realize you're pressing in the wrong way, that is a huge revelation, and contains much wisdom.

The easy thing to do would be to just exclude people who have too much trauma or are too unintegrated: The elitist sangha, the cool table at high school. But I don't think that's how the Buddha approached things. He was happy to take on Angulimala. Marpa was happy to take on Milarepa. But those are success stories. People drift away. There are stories where the Buddha feels limitations in people, or doesn't press too hard. He was always adept at seeing where people could improve and move along the path. He would do what he could to help. There's even the story where he tells a guy not to meditate. The guy goes ahead and meditates anyway and has a rough time of it, and the Buddha gives his best teaching on what you can do beyond meditation to progress and lay the foundation for meditation. (My source is the Meghiya Sutta.)

Saturday musings

"Job and Jesus, Pascal and Montaigne, evolutionary biology and neuroscience, Roland Barthes and William Blake offer glimpses of self and world that illuminated the path opened up by the Buddha." (p. 183 Living With The Devil by Stephen Batchelor)

What I found interesting about the above quote, is that I bet 100 Buddhist would come up with different lists of people who were enlightened outside of the traditions. And I bet these 100 Buddhists would probably not agree whether there were levels of enlightenment or what touching or coming close to enlightenment meant.

Job had patience, but I don't know enough about him. Jesus had some deep insights that many people groove on. I've dipped into Blake, I should read more of him.

Makes me want to try Montaigne again, I read a few essays and put the book down, even though I got something from it that I use every day. I know very little about Pascal or Roland Barthes.

I think at this point in human history you could become a genius by reading and trying to understand other's works, and you would be 100 times smarter than someone 100 years ago, even the geniuses of the time, but you wouldn't necessarily be original. I think originality happens all the time in problem solving and relationships because every relationship is unique, and every problem is unique in some way. But if you talk about contributing something original to science, mathematics or literature, then that's a harder test.

I've had some dim reviews of my blog, and while my partner reads it, she rarely says, "that was a good post." But I do think that the internet has democratized writing, and that more voices are potentially being heard. People who didn't necessarily find a book contract, can express themselves, and I'm willing to bet there are some real hidden gems on the internet. Sometimes you hear about people who get book deals from their blogs.

I'm hoping some day that Under The Influence of Food gets a book deal. But even if it doesn't, it's awesome that it exists. I think Justin Halpern got a book deal from his twitter tweets. I laughed so much with his book.

The internet has the illusion of permanence. But Amazon can change the terms of agreement about the books it stores that you bought, and think you own, and they could take it away or charge you more to store it. Blogger and WordPress could just go out of business. I felt entitled to Google Reader, and then they just discontinued. Then the next company I used stopped too. A quick reading, and I couldn't find out who pays for the space to store the websites of WordPress. Turns out you choose where to host it. Obviously I use Blogger, and I fear one day Google will charge for hosting.

I can't remember the science fiction book I read where it talked about layers of code, about ancient code layers. I know a computer scientist who was hired to go back and look on some of the original code layer he created.

Sometimes you go to look for a photo and the file has been "corrupted". How did that happen?

The internet is impermanent. I bet when the sun expands and engulfs the earth, that we have found another planet to get to. But will someone come and download earth's internet and transport it to another planet. Will their be interplanetary internet? Bet that connection will cost. Can you imagine a wire through space, like the wires they laid down along the Atlantic ocean for telephones.

I wonder how many people alive today will be considered enlightened by succeeding generations. I still think about the scifi book Forever Peace.

Living With The Devil Quotes

"The plight of both Mara and Satan is to be banished from life itself. My sense of alienation is like wise rooted in the numbness to interconnectivity. I feel as though I haunt the world rather than participate in it. Evan as I chatter to the midst of company, I feel eerily disengaged."(P. 139)

"To act is to risk. The contingency and complexity of life is such that we cannot foresee what will happen next. What seems a misfortune today (being crippled) turns out to be a blessing tomorrow (when all able bodied men are rounded up and killed). We act with the noblest intentions, having carefully weighed our options, only to make matters worse. Finding your kind smile and wise words patronizing your friend perversely chooses to do the opposite of what you suggest." (P. 141)

"Insight into the interconnectedness of life will only reinforce feelings of universal love and respect if we are alrady committed to the principle of equality, liberty, compassion and nonviolence." (172)

"As the deafening chatter of self-centeredness subsides, one recovers that silence wherein on hears more sharply the cries of the world." (173)

From Living with the Devilby Stephen Batchelor

violence and Buddhism

There have been a slew of articles asking interesting questions. The first one I saw was Raymond Ibraham's questioning of why the Muslims in Myanmar are getting no criticism, why do we assume that the Buddhists are over reacting? The Economist notes that conflict between Muslims and Buddhists is escalating. M. Sophie Newman asks if Buddhist are opposed to self defense? Bombs are going off in Buddhist sacred sites.  Michael Jerryson is a scholar of Buddhist violence and people accuse him of being anti-Buddhist even though he is a historian. I have even written a blog post about the hope of peace.

I'm not sure what to make of it. Does might make right? Is life just an eye for an eye? I hope for something different, but I also want to keep my eyes open and see what's really going on.

I remember when I would visit my father. He lived in a town that was a days bus ride away. I would go for holidays occasionally and for some time in the summer. He married a woman who had 3 daughters. I was older. The oldest daughter was used to being in charge. So the first half of the visit she would challenge my authority, and the second half, she would like having an older brother.

One visit, she was intent on challenging my commitment to non-violence by hitting her sisters, and seeing what I would do. The only thing that would stop her was to whack her back. So she exposed my lack of commitment to non-violence. I was willing to use violence to stop violence.

Now that's an artificial setup, and I'm not saying that's what going on in Myanmar. But what if the only response is violence. Tit for tat is the second best strategy. The best occasionally throws in some good, just to break any cycles, because if everyone is tit for tat, then the cycle of violence never ends. I can't remember where I read that stuff, but I believe in it to a certain level. I think often though, it's better to not strike back. The annoying thing with being more evolved, is that you overlook annoying and upsetting things because striking back won't solve any thing. Communication is the best way to resolve differences. And that's what peace workers do, they open dialogues and work to resolve conflict through communication and negotiation.

closer to the truth

A friend of mine suggested that spiritual communities see themselves as "closer to the truth," and therefore automatically become judgmental.

I have met people who were deep into spiritual communities who were not judgmental, so I don't think that is necessarily true, but I do see where he's coming from, and expanded it to any community, not just spiritual.

Thinking about this stuff, it's been rattling around in my head, and I don't have anything profound on it, but I just wanted to note the idea of someone who thinks they are closer to the truth, and how that leads to judgmentalism. Of course we make judgements all the time, but in our public selves, tolerance of difference is a virtue. Everyone has different experiences, circumstances, culture, race, class, sexual orientation and religion. Now some things are against the law, and there are hopefully appropriate punishments for that. And some things hurt others or society. I particularly get upset when someone litters right next to a garbage can. Or honks a car horn out of impatience, adding noise pollution to the world. We can't help but be judgmental. You can't torture babies for pleasure, to cite a famous ethical example that seems self evident. Being aware of judgments, and only acting on the ones that are useful, is a skill. What is useful is defined by perspective too, we can't step away from a perspective.

To think you're closer to the truth because you're connected to a community that is a sliver of the world--that is hubris. Of course experts are needed. The scientific community see global warming as a truth, though in a portion of the cultural landscape, people see it as a political belief to deny global warming as a kind of expression of a certain identikit. I think the scientific community's idea is more grounded in rules and well thought justification, and the other belief is more of a kind of political fear of government "taking over our lives," because if we really believed in global warming we might have to restrict our emissions, and they feel that should not even be on the table. They believe in the right to warm the earth hidden in the denial that is happening.

That some people feel they are closer to the truth is a natural thing. We go to the doctors for their medical opinions because of their expertise. Spiritual communities are different though. Doctors in America do not necessarily put forth a religious brand of medicine, it is detached, even if spirituality guides a doctor in their personal life. So what is the expertise of a spiritual community? It is for those members who wish to pursue that particular path. So they are experts for those people. This is why, I think, America included a separation of church and state. People fled religious persecution in Europe, and then tried to gain power and enforce their religion on others. People pointed out that that was a contradiction, and thus included religious tolerance in the idea of America.

So while my friend points out something that isn't in my opinion only about spiritual communities, and he doesn't mention that experts are closer to some truths--the dentist knows more about teeth than I do, I did agree with him that is can be a root of misplaced judgmentalism, a potential trap that separates and doesn't partake in the virtue of tolerance.

Quotes

Source

"The unrestrained wander about the world disguised as the well-restrained."

(p. 104 Buddhist Ethics, by Hammalawa Saddhatissa quoted from Samyuttanikaya)

"A fool is not company. The solitary walk is more worthwhile; a fool is no companion."

(p. 105 Buddhist Ethics, quoting 3 different place, including Dhammapada)

"Let no one neglect his own good for the sake of another's, however great. Let it be that, having understood the ideal, he engages himself in it."

(p. 115 Buddhist Ethics, quoting the Dhammapada)

The above quotes suggest not associating with others, not doing things for others. The Buddha of course thought the middle way was important. So we should probably walk between spiritual isolationism and spiritual gregariousness, between altruism and egoism.

In the end you can quote to justify anything, but judgement and common sense are to be your guide. Reflecting on behavior, ethics with others is important on the path to enlightenment. The path of ethics, meditation and insight starts with ethics. Getting one's house in order leads to the gladdening. To stop hurting others is a noble quest. It calls for groundedness and compassion, imagination about others experience.

Saranam

The refuges are as follows:

Buddham saranam gacchami (I go to the Buddha for refuge)
Dhammam saranam gacchami (I go to the Dhamma for refuge)
Sangham saranam gacchami (I go to the Sangha for refuge)

I use this in devotional chanting, and it's a formula that has surprising depth. Sangharakshita thinks that it is what defines a Buddhist.

From Saddhatissa's Buddhist Ethics p. 31:

"Saranam, however, does not denote exclusively "refuge," and in the comprehensive sense in which it should be taken lies the relationship of the Buddhist to the Buddha, which will eventually determine his whole attitude for the Sanskrit Monier Williams gives: "Sarana: protecting preserving. (Vedic. say rakkhake, Rgveda VI. 47. 8; one who protects or preserves; a protector, preserver, defender. (a) n. help, defense; a refuge, place of refuge, sanctuary, asylum (sometimes applied to a person); a private apartment, closet; a house, habitation, abode, lair, resting-place (of an animal)." Regarding the Pali we have Rhys Davids and Stede: "Saran: (Cp Vedic.)...shelter, house, refuge, protection etc," Buddhadatta Mahathera gives: "Protection, help, refuge, a shelter""

(footnotes omitted, also I excluded the diacritics because I don't know how to include them yet)

Buddha and Kshitigharba

 

 

(source)



Beginning of Theragatha

My hut is roofed, comfortable, free of drafts; my mind, well-centered, set free. I remain ardent. So, rain-deva. Go ahead & rain.

from Theragatha

Sunday morning thoughts

(Source)

Reading Buddhist Ethics so far, the introductions were not bad. Usually I skip those, but they were not bad.

The first chapter got technical quite quick. What struck me was that ethics is placed in the context of meditation, the hindrances, the jhanas. Ethics might be an expression of meditative depth.

That certainly grounds me. I make mistakes when I'm not meditating that I might not make if I were meditating. I'm going to go meditate now. 

thoughts of the day

Increased awareness can lead to problems. When you open up to the close calls between cars and buses and motorcycles and trucks on the roads of New York City, close calls happen every second. It's really terrifying. When you drive you have to be confident. But if you really think about how dangerous it all is, that is scary.

Metta and the other Brahma Viharas, helps us to frame things in a more positive compassionate way. Connecting with the spirit of Avalokiteshvara, you feel the interconnections that make it impossible to hurt yourself/others.

I saw a Bob Marley documentary the other day and began to like this song. Of course it has some things I don't believe in, but sometimes with some people you feel them raise above their tradition and speak to something universal.

"One Love / People Get Ready"

One Love! One Heart!
Let's get together and feel all right.
Hear the children cryin' (One Love!);
Hear the children cryin' (One Heart!),
Sayin': give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right;
Sayin': let's get together and feel all right. Wo wo-wo wo-wo!

Let them all pass all their dirty remarks (One Love!);
There is one question I'd really love to ask (One Heart!):
Is there a place for the hopeless sinner,
Who has hurt all mankind just to save his own beliefs?

One Love! What about the one heart? One Heart!
What about - ? Let's get together and feel all right
As it was in the beginning (One Love!);
So shall it be in the end (One Heart!),
All right!
Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right;
Let's get together and feel all right.
One more thing!

Let's get together to fight this Holy Armagiddyon (One Love!),
So when the Man comes there will be no, no doom (One Song!).
Have pity on those whose chances grows t'inner;
There ain't no hiding place from the Father of Creation.

Sayin': One Love! What about the One Heart? (One Heart!)
What about the - ? Let's get together and feel all right.
I'm pleadin' to mankind! (One Love!);
Oh, Lord! (One Heart) Wo-ooh!

Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right;
Let's get together and feel all right.
Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel all right;
Let's get together and feel all right.

[end]

I've been doing a sort of manta, "one love, one heart, lets get together and feel all right." I can't stop thinking about these two opposed leaders who got up on stage, and Marley got them to hold hands together. I'm going to watch a Leonard Cohen documentary next because it's coming off netflix soon.

In the Kalama Sutra, the Buddha suggests you stay away from intellectual speculation, and focus on your ethics. In Buddhism there is no orthodoxy, there's only orthopraxy.

I feel like the 5 precepts are better than the 10 commandments, because you don't have to believe in anything. They are rules that would suit you to follow. In the ten commandments, you have to me a monotheist.

I'm going to read Buddhist Ethicsnow.

Pema Chodron quote

“So even if the hot loneliness is there, and for 1.6 seconds we sit with that restlessness when yesterday we couldn’t sit for even one, that’s the journey of the warrior.” Pema Chodron

Mark Epstein quotes on desire

"From the Western, Puritan point of view, it’s always been seen as dangerous, devilish, the enemy. From the Eastern spiritual point of view—as adopted by many Western practitioners, at least—it has the connotation of something to be avoided, a poison. As a psychotherapist, I’ve been trained not to avoid the so-called “real stuff’—anger, fear, anxiety—and this certainly includes desire. Desire is the juice. It’s how we discover who we are, what makes a person themselves. I wanted to try to explore how to work with it more creatively. "

 "Different teachers have different approaches to this: some recommend avoidance of temptation or renunciation, while others talk about meeting desire with compassion. Another strategy is to recognize the impermanence of the object of desire for instance, by countering lust with images of how disgusting the body really is."

"Other teachers say that desire is really just energy that we have to learn how to use without getting caught by it."

"The Buddha’s point, I think, was that by renouncing clinging we actually deepen desire. Clinging keeps desire in a frozen, or fixated, state. When we renounce efforts to control or possess that which we desire, we free desire itself."

"It may not be so much that we have desire as that we are desire. Try- ing to renounce desire is like trying to renounce yourself. This isn’t the way to see the emptiness inside. But clinging is different. We can renounce clinging without estranging ourselves from desire."

 "Can you give your lover the freedom of their subjectivity and otherness? Admit that they are outside of your control?"

"One thing that has helped me think about this is the psychoanalyst Jessica Benjamin’s theory that there are two kinds of desire. A male desire (present in both sexes), which knows what it wants and is going after it, which is all about trying to obtain satisfaction. And a female desire, not just in women, which is more about interper- sonal, and intrapersonal, space. The male desire is about doing and being done to, while the feminine desire is about being. Think of a baby at the breast. In one version, the breast is trying to feed the baby—it’s forcing itself into the baby’s consciousness, or the baby’s mouth. In the other version, the breast just is. The baby has to find it, discover it, for herself. It’s almost like our culture is hip to “male” desire, assaulting us constantly with “you want this, you want that.” It’s so much in the object mode that it doesn’t yield the room for what she’s calling a femi- nine desire, which is “Give me some space to know what I really want.” "

"A famous psychoanalyst named Otto Kernberg speaks of sexual union as the experience of a lover revealing himself or herself as a body that can be penetrated and a mind that is impenetrable."

"...the Buddha taught not only abour suffering, but about the end of suffering. Desire is only a problem when we mistake what’s ephemeral for an object, something we can permanently grasp. It’s only suffering because we don’t understand."
From an interview in Tricycle

Quote from Thanissaro Bhikkhu

“Give in to this impulse, give in to that impulse, obey your thirst. It’s good for the economy, it’s good for you spiritually. Watch out, if you repress your desires you’re going to get tied up in psychological knots.” The lessons our culture teaches us—to go out and buy, buy, buy; be greedy, be greedy; give in, give in—are all over the place. And what kind of dignity comes from following those messages? The dignity of a fish gobbling down bait. We’ve got to unlearn those habits, unlearn those messages, if we want to revive words like dignity and restraint, and to reap the rewards that the realities of dignity and restraint have to offer our minds."


From Thanissaro Bhikkhu from tricycle teachings: addiction

4th of July

Liberal commies like me have a harder time expressing patriotism because we feel so let down by the promise of equality and justice. There is no doubt that the middle class is shrinking and we have drifted right into the politics of hate. What's to be proud of there?

God fearing red blooded Republicans seem to have won. The vapid anti-government talk of personal responsibility, white washes structural inequality, racism, poverty, and the limited reductionism of the republican victory. I take no pride in the anti-community, greedy darwinism of the Reagan dawn.

Even Nixon sent poor people large tax rebates in the mail, no stigma. Current republicans are indifferent to others suffering, justifying it by talk of enabling the poor and cycles of poverty. I happen to work with the poor and know what they are talkin about, but disagree about whether we are smart enough to work with that.

And the neo-liberals have allowed it all to happen, went gently into the night. Chaney may have had lots of Halliburton stock, but I challenge democrats to rid themselves of this stock. Oh, no wait, greed is good. No wait, greed isn't good. We need to two party system to throw out corrupt politicians on both sides.

I'm grateful to my grandfathers and fathers, grandmothers and mothers, who fought for a better America. I hope to have to courage to fight for a fair and just America. An America that doesn't need to flex it's muscle through the military, but flexes it's dignity with restraint and wisdom.

Current Pop

"...when the self become a selfie — when people start approaching themselves and others as things, to be posed, bartered or possessed, rather than as beings with rich and infinitely various inner lives —morality becomes destabilized, making it difficult to determine the difference between a playful risk and real one, or even between violation and fun."

This is from an excellent article from The Record: Music News from NPR, which includes videos, called "When Pop Stars Flirt With Bad Taste".

The article ends: "Party music creates a space where the things that do run us — whether they're good things, like ethical codes or laws protecting the vulnerable, or painfully restrictive ones, like the grind of money-making and the trap of consumerism — seem to give way, and a space opens up for exploring desire, sensuality, and the unexpected. Blurred lines can lead to exciting new places. But sometimes we need to draw them, for ourselves, again."

I hadn't seen these videos all the debates are about and a few seconds into each one is enough for me. The phrase "guarding the gates of the senses" comes into my mind. The freedom to explore one's sexuality is not something someone else gives you, it's something you claim or take for yourself. But as the first quote points out, the objectification of people isn't what sexuality is about. We lose the rich inner lives.

My partner said after I showed her some videos and read the article to her, "You know how we teased that all the old people should go onto an island somewhere? Well, now I want to go to that island."

McMindfulness

"Bhikkhu Bodhi, an outspoken western Buddhist monk, has warned: "absent a sharp social critique, Buddhist practices could easily be used to justify and stabilize the status quo, becoming a reinforcement of consumer capitalism." Unfortunately, a more ethical and socially responsible view of mindfulness is now seen by many practitioners as a tangential concern, or as an unnecessary politicizing of one's personal journey of self-transformation."

This is from an excellent article called, "Beyond McMindfulness" by Ron Purser and David Loy.

Also, "In their branding efforts, proponents of mindfulness training usually preface their programs as being "Buddhist-inspired." There is a certain cachet and hipness in telling neophytes that mindfulness is a legacy of Buddhism -- a tradition famous for its ancient and time-tested meditation methods. But, sometimes in the same breath, consultants often assure their corporate sponsors that their particular brand of mindfulness has relinquished all ties and affiliations to its Buddhist origins."

And this: "But mindfulness, as understood and practiced within the Buddhist tradition, is not merely an ethically-neutral technique for reducing stress and improving concentration. Rather, mindfulness is a distinct quality of attention that is dependent upon and influenced by many other factors: the nature of our thoughts, speech and actions; our way of making a living; and our efforts to avoid unwholesome and unskillful behaviors, while developing those that are conducive to wise action, social harmony, and compassion."

I thought a lot about this when I was reading Mindfulness For Dummies. First off, I think it's a wonderful book, and I recommend it. But I have often wondered at the denuding of the Buddhist roots, as stated above, in the mass marketing of mindfulness by people who want to make a living off of it. The Dharma is supposed to be free. When you turn to marketing, to sell ideas, a presentation of ideas, then you're selling a presentation of ideas. Old time Buddhist might guard ideas because people were not "ready" for them. But today you can go pretty far on reading ideas. Sangharakshita talks about intellectual indigestion. You get too much before you are ready for it. The information age has created an open source Buddhism, which is good, but it lacks the social supports of integrating all that information.

There's a conflict in a way, people want to pursue their joy, and that means there's a million yoga teachers, and a million meditation teachers. I was at the library today and I almost got a Buddhist book because I've seen so much advertising for it. The spiritual marketplace is fiercely contested, and bought.

I actually like to look at all the ads in Tricycle and other Buddhist magazines. But I've never bought anything from them.

Spiritual materialism isn't just buying cool rupas and great meditation benches, it's also going on retreats with name dropping teachers, and going to foreign countries to study with teachers. It's hard to know if that's really what's required. Maybe you can stay where you are and deepen your practice by your own efforts, and the support of a good local sangha.

Of course generosity is about putting your money where your values are, but it's also a subtle way of increasing the money for a sangha. I've gotten the softest sell at Buddhist centers, but there have been times where I got a harder sell on giving to the community than I did in Christian churches.

Which all goes to show you that you can never turn off your critical faculty, and that if someone pitches you from a spiritual angle, that's just another pitch. Good spiritual friends exemplify, and don't ask anything for it.

I've heard people coming off long retreat, get people wanting them to give them the gist of it, without doing the work. You don't really need anyone else, you just need to go deeper into yourself. Of course the community is good for support. Giving it, not necessarily getting it.

Tintin in Tibet

I'm reading Tintin in Tibet (The Adventures of Tintin)

I scanned it for Buddhist references. There is one scene with a stupa, that Captain Haddock wrecks when he bumps into it. Of course the setting in the mountains give it a sense of place.

They go to a monastery, where there are a bunch of monks. They have yellow hats, which makes them Gelugpa. One of the monks can levitate, and can sense where a person is from an article of clothing, and then denies it to be mysterious.

I don't really like the Yeti part of the story.

Herge wrote it before the invasion, and flight of the Dali Lama, in 1959 by China, but it was published in book form in 1960.

The Dali Lama said, "For many people around the world Tintin in Tibet was their first introduction to Tibet, the beauty of its landscape and its culture. And that is something that has passed down the generations," and he gave it an award.

Supposedly the author Herge was having difficulty at the time, falling out of love with his wife and falling in love with his younger assistant, according to the wikipedia article.

Kids meditating

Batchelor quote

"As we proceed along the well trodden path of Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism, or Islam, we may begin to weary of their certainties. Perhaps trails that branch off the main track and peter out in the anarchy of wilderness catch our attention. We realize that the path we are taking might disappear into a pathless land." p. 81 Living With The Devil: A meditation on good and evil

Five Food Contemplations

From Savor by They

"Last Call" by Larissa MacFarquhar

I get sent books, and occasionally other things, like once I got opera tickets. I love the opera. I love movies. I enjoy free things, it makes me feel important. Some people joke that blogging is narcissistic. "Didn't you read my blog," Sheldon Cooper says in Big Bang Theory. There are some blogisattvas.

Sometimes I don't like a book. I try to only say positive things. I write detailed blogs about what I dislike, but I don't publish them. I have a lot of books I didn't really like and I guess the person who sent them might be disappointed. I only comment when I like a book. Often I report I got something in the mail, so as to give it some publicity. I get more than enough stuff though, and if it stopped I would be OK with that too. Often I review books that I have bought. I spent a fortune on books. I've sent a lot of workers at Windhorse on retreat. Sometimes I get something that I really like, and it's just a PDF. That's a low investment that makes me feel less pressure. No mail, no hard copy, just the electronic information.

I started reading the New Yorker in high school in Wisconsin. An English teacher brought in a stack one day and said "read this magazine, it's the best magazine." That's what we did in class that day. I loved the magazine. You'd think the class would misbehave, but we just enjoyed the magazine.

When I moved to NYC I got a subscription. Off and on I've read it over the past 23 years. More on than off. I don't currently have a subscription. When I was out of work I had to tighten my belt, and I will probably be tightening my belt for years to dig out of the debt I've accumulated. Have to cut expenses where you can. I don't have a TV, I don't have cable. I go into the projects, poor neighborhoods, and without fail people have huge flatscreen TVs. How do they get them? But I digress.

So I was pleased when New Yorker sent me this article called "Last Call". It's about suicide in Japan, and a monk who counsels people. It's a fascinating article for me on many levels.

When I was at NYU people started jumping to their death at the library. It has a huge internal space, and a long drop. NYU quickly put up plexiglass barriers. At the time I thought, "that won't work." But I read an article in the New Yorker about how a net worked at the Empire State Building. You'd think if someone really wanted to do it they would jump to the net, and then crawl to the edge and jump, but little things like that stop people. It doesn't seem too easy. Lots of people jump of the Golden Gate Bridge. A few survive. If you go feet first and angle it a little so you don't go too deep, you can survive. Universally everyone who survives reports the minute the stepped off, they regretted it. Instead of nets the Golden Gate Bridge uses volunteers that approach people who look like they are going to jump. They don't want to mar the look of this iconic bridge.

I've felt suicidal in my life. As a teenager who hadn't found his place in the world, I sometimes romanticized the idea.

I worked on Riker's Island in the suicide unit, and learned how to work with people who needed affect regulation and distress tolerance help. Most people just are expressing deep unhappiness. You really need a plan and the intent to carry out the plan to be truly suicidal. Most people are just upset and are trying to dramatize their plight. Once they ventilate their feelings and get some empathy, they settle down. Not that there is much you can do to help people who are incarcerated, but listening sometimes helps.

Riker's Island is a big mental hospital where people who were caught with drugs get time served. If we legalized cannabis we would save so much money. I don't hear the big government haters talking about that one too much. Colorado was smart. Legend has it that it's only an influential newspaper man's antipathy for cannabis that lead to it's being made illegal. Substance abuse is a huge tragedy, and we do need to try and keep a lid on it, so I'm ambivalent about legalization. In our current ruthless politics of the bottom line, I can see arguments for it.

More recently I felt suicidal when I made a big mistake. I never really developed a plan or the intent to carry suicide out, I just had ideation. But I felt so horrible for what I'd done, ending it seemed preferable. Luckily I had loyal friends and family who helped me through that time.

Japan has a particular twist on suicide. They're not the worst country in terms of suicide, a surprising list, not sure what it means to be on top, means. In Japan there are hikikomori, which are shut-ins who don't leave their rooms. They've given up on trying to find a place in society.

A Rinzai monk named Nemoto has connected with these people, and holds workshops where he has people imagine they are dead, and he holds a funeral for them. Often times it has a strange effect on them. Nemoto became weirdly giddy in life when he left the monastery. It was so hard being at the monastery that living ordinary life became so easy. The hardships he endured gave him a kind of perspective. And somehow people started being attracted to his counseling. He's doing bodhisattva work.

Nemoto started to feel overwhelmed by it all, and then his father got sick and he stopped responding to all the e-mails he got. He had heart problems, and got angioplasty. He finally wrote the people he'd been corresponding with for years, and they didn't care. Sitting in the hospital he supposedly cried for weeks. He entered a dark night of the soul, when you realize you're not getting anything back from your spiritual practice. And yet somehow he found a way back. He saw some messages of support. He decided he wanted to meet people face to face, and not take e-mails and phone calls. The ones who made it to his remote temple put in the effort to get there. He felt meetings got a kind of resolution that gave him a better feeling about working with people.

I won't give the dramatic ending away.

Larissa MacFarquhar has written a beautiful article. Unfortunately the content is not free yet. Magazines tease you by giving you some content, but they can't give it all away. A subscription to the New Yorker isn't that much and you really get what I consider to be the best magazine in the USA.

(I've had a few friends who've interned at the New Yorker, and I danced with Emily Naussbaum, the TV critic in the New Yorker, once, about 20 plus years ago at a party. My second ex introduced me to her probably the last time we went out together. ("All my exes live in New York and Connecticut" isn't such a good rhyme.) I don't really hobnob with the intelligencia of New York, despite my desire to join the club. But I can read their lovely work, and so can you.)

Supposedly Japan doesn't have a lot of psychotherapy. Nemoto was functioning as a kind of crisis psychotherapist, listening to people. He realized that people needed to extend some efforts to utilize him, and he wanted to step out of the circular talking. When I was a therapist I used to feel despair when I felt a kind of circular talking, a clinging to a story. What Yalom called the "help refusing complainer" in his famous book on groups.

I notice sometimes that people are focused on their rationalization, and have a hard time seeing past their justification of what they did to see that someone is pointing out "what about this". They just press the button and resume the story. Sometimes empathy can help people feel heard, and then they begin to listen to themselves more deeply. I do that too. I'm not putting myself above others. But it's an interesting phenomenon. How do you really change? I think meditation, relationships and psychotherapy are three ways lots of people work for change. Change isn't easy. We can't solve a problem on the terms that created the problem, we have to be infused with a new  perspective. When you're hunkered down in self justification, it's hard to take on another perspective. Koans are about breaking out of a perspective and trying something new.

So go get a New Yorker and read this awesome article.

(I read an article that you can increase blog traffic by saying "How Can I die?" I think our deep political unrest contributes to individual strife here in the USA.)

congratulations

As reported on TBC News, Mike Osgood becomes Vimalamoksa (dot under the s, Westernized spelling Vimalamoksha). A Sanskrit name meaning “Pure Liberation”. Private Preceptor Shantinayaka.

Vimalamoksa allowed an e-mail to be posted on this blog. Vimalamoksa embodies the true spirit of spiritual depth. I rejoice in your merit. 

Social Justice in the USA

(source)

I have been reading the writings of Henry A. Giroux. I am disgusted with American politics. I experience horrified anxiety, the far enemy compassion.

Just to take one quote:

"The neoliberal policies funded by the new financial elite cut funding for programs such as Head Start, eliminate breakfast programs for poor children and portray people on food stamps as freeloaders. The latter baseless insult is particularly vicious since the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is crucial for low-income children living in extreme poverty because it "greatly reduce[s] food insecurity . . . which, in turn, greatly enhances their chances of doing well in school and growing up to be successful, productive adults."

(Giroux cites a Krugman article for the quote.)

Johnson's war on poverty has turned into a war on the poor. In this climate nobody is surprised by the idea of a coming civil war. When you hear things like the military has bought up a bunch of ammunition. I have friends who think civil war is inevitable. They are arming themselves against the upcoming civil war.

Giroux writes, "As public visions fall into disrepair, the concept of the public good is eradicated in favor of the narrow, private orbits of self-interest and individual happiness, characterized by an endless search for instant gratification, consumer goods and quick profits."

Non-violence is a key commitment in Buddhism. Violence tells one they have left the path. People are ill when they move towards samsara. We've lost a sense of interconnectivity, which is a force that counters isolation. We've lost a sense of spirituality that asks us to reach for more than instant gratification.

There is a temptation to turn away from what is happening; The social injustice, the politics of hate and hurtfulness, the pushing of people into precariousness, blaming the victim, the cultivation of fear and isolation.

Giroux suggests the appropriate response is more strenuous activism and advocacy. I think Occupy Wall Street is the the tip of potential for what we can do. I think there is an Arab Spring coming, and I hope it's non-violent. Social justice actions counter the dispair, isolation and lack of compassion.

I wish what Chesar Chavez said was true:

"Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed. You cannot uneducate the person who has learned to read. You cannot humiliate the person who feels pride. And you cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore."

But I fear we lose focus. I've lost focus with meditation and vegetarianism. I forget what I have read in The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-vegetarian Critical Theory, 20th Anniversary Edition.

I'm listening to The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. and I am aghast at what has happened to America.

I'm looking into Barbara Kingsolver's solution, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life. Even if we've lost the activism of the Vietnam era, we still have the power of the consumer. An educated consumer that rejects "food science" that processes the nutrition out of whole foods, is one small positive step.

Buying food at your local famer's market helps us to wipe the carbon stench off our "organic" vegetables from the factory farms in California, and support local farmers.

I was sickened to read the other day that our ginormous corn surplus has found it's way into our honey.  (Honey isn't vegan anyway, it's taking the not given.) I read that farm grown Tilapia is as bad as bacon. To think that fish is free range from the ocean is just wrong. Even if it is from the ocean they take their huge dragnets and kill everything in the water and air.

The irony of KFC offering to donate money when you buy a giant soda... If you can't see the irony in that, you've lost any sense of propriety. That's like handing someone a crack pipe and giving them a coupon to a rehab. It doesn't make any sense. So many health problems addressed in the medical-industrial complex are our own creation. We are happy to spend billions of dollars trying to fix things after the fact instead of an ounce of prevention. And people worry about their freedom to buy a big gulp when Bloomberg tries to do one small gesture, by limiting the size of sodas. Soda is the perfect obesity machine--you don't feel the fullness of the calories you ingest. That is your freedom cause?! We've lost a sense of the larger social justice vision.

We've lost our middle class. I could go on and on. As this post demonstrates, I'm going to share more ideas of social justice here. Even if I'm not a perfect person, I can articulate social justice ideas.

So we fight the despair, become wise consumers, educate ourselves instead escapism, fight the horrified anxiety, voice our viewpoints in as many ways as politically possible, and work to evolve ourselves into the higher evolution.

Here's a video that challenges our current state of affairs:

The why and how of effective altruism

Long Direct Quote from Living with the Devil by Stephen Batchelor

One moment we are "pathing," only in the next to find ourselves "stuck" and "blocked." We may not have lost our sense of purpose and direction, but feel incapable of making any headway. It is as though a barrier has been placed across our path and we can find no way to surmount it. We feel hindered, trapped, frustrated. The more we struggle to be free of the obstacle, the more we seem to bang our head against the wall. It is as though Mara deliberately puts immovable objects in our way to frustrate our aspirations. We find ourselves paralyzed by an obsession or fear, we meet with accidents and calamities, we are debilitated by disease and the ravages of aging.

Progress along the Buddhist path to awakening is said to be "obstructed" by the devil of compulsions. A compulsion is any mental or emotional state that, on breaking into consciousness, disturbs and captivates us. Whether inflamed by anger or inflated by pride, we feel ill at ease and hemmed in. A compulsion encloses us within its boundaries. When overwhelmed by depression, not only are we inwardly sunk in despair but whatever we see, hear and touch is abhorrent.

Shantideva compares compulsions to "bands of thieves" who lie in waiting for an opportunity to invade us and "steal the treasures" of our minds. As soon as there is a lapse in self-awareness, a compulsive thought or image is liable to erupt, triggering a torrent of longing or despair that leaves us rattled and bewildered. As creatures of Mara, compulsions act as if they were autonomous forces. We suffer anxiety or panic "attacks" and feel overwhelmed by unwelcome thoughts. We are seized by feelings and images that we cannot seem to shake off.

The depiction of Mara as autonomous being who argues with Buddha illustrates how such drives feel as though they happen to one. I do not choose to be lustful, lethargic, conceited, or deluded; I find myself feeling that way. I do not decide in advance to think a thought; it comes to me as a ready-made phrase. I talk of "my" desires, "my" fears, and "my" doubts as though I somehow owned and controlled them. But when I try to let go of them, I find that it is not so much I who have them, but they who have me.