Monday, June 3, 2019

sitting with pain



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In their MBSR Workbook, Bob Stahl and Elisha Golstein, present a very helpful how-to three step approach to working with chronic pain in meditation:


1) Investigate the pain and tension in the body:

A common knee-jerk reaction to pain is to clench and get tighter around it. Unfortunately, this can not only increase the physical pain, it may also begin a vicious cycle of reactions that lead to increased anger, fear, sadness, and confusion. Getting tight around pain further constricts the muscles and restricts blood flow, which may cause more spasms and pain, possibly even in other areas of the body. This cycle is difficult to stop, and in time you may discover that you're constricted not just around the painful area, but throughout the body.
The body scan provides an opportunity for you to reorient toward living and working with tension and pain. As you reeducate yourself about your pain by distinguishing physical sensations from mental and emotional feelings, you can learn to recognize strong sensations in the body as just physical sensations . . . 
Once you become aware of how you hold pain in the body, you can start figuring out how best to work with it . . . Mindful awareness will not only allow you to see where you're holding unnecessary tension, but will also help you soften and possibly release tension in these areas where there's no pain at all. Mindfulness also teaches you that if you can't release the tension, you can practice riding its waves, just observing them, letting them be, and allowing them to ripple wherever they need to go. 

2) Working with the emotions in physical pain:

Bringing mindful awareness to emotions allows you to begin to acknowledge them, no matter what they are, validating and acknowledging them without censorship and without resistance. As with physical pain, resistance to difficult emotions often causes more pain while learning to let be and go with them, rather than fighting them, can often diminish or change the suffering associated with them . . . 
As you gain more understanding of your physical pain, your emotional reactions to it, and the differences between them, you'll begin to see that there's a difference between physical pain and suffering. Even in times when you can't change the physical sensations of pain, you can change your emotional responses to them and thereby reduce your suffering. 

3) Living in the present moment:

When you identify with stress, tension, or chronic pain, you may think of it as a long-term problem or life sentence, and this attitude can take you out of the present moment and increase your suffering. Mindfulness teaches you to be here now. You don't know what the future may bring, and you really don't know if the stress and pain will last forever . . . 
Rather than being held hostage by your discomfort, you can cultivate the attitude that it's possible to learn from it. As you learn to let go of the past and not cling to a specific vision of the future, you'll be able to see things as they are in the moment, with a growing sense of freedom and the possibility of new options. This perspective transforms you, your pain, and your relationship to your pain.
Three proven steps that can change the way you live with your pain. Not easy, but well worth the effort. 



~ Marguerite Manteau-Rao




to be near





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It had been a good day after all.  This is what we were on the river for - to feel the power of it, to see it in action, to be near to it with as little as possible between us and it, to know it as an elemental force stripped of names and associations.  The hard work and aggravation, the unwieldy boat, stubborn as a mule, water like glue, all this was good, too.  What true understanding of the river could one acquire by a fast trip in ease and comfort?  And now, after such a day as this, it was good to be at rest, sheltered where wind and current could not reach us.





~ Harlan Hubbard
from Shantyboat Journal
edited by Don Wallis
art by the author


nets





Our love is
a sister of the light;
deftly, she unwinds
our shadowed nets.

Where they become
keening shawls
to shelter loss,
she pours oil of ease.

From underneath
she rips the knots,
the mass of algae dream
unties and drops.

And the reeds 
woven to cover
fear of the deep,
drift and slip.

Lines of empty eyes
that caught and held
everything blindly,
surge and see.

Water
urges us
to fluency.




~ John O'Donohue
from Echoes of Memory
photo from cog arts culture




listen with ease



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Have you ever sat very silently, not with your attention fixed on anything, 
not making an effort to concentrate, but with the mind very quiet, really still? 
Then you hear everything, don’t you? 

You hear the far off noises as well as those that are nearer and those that are very close by, 
the immediate sounds—which means really that you are listening to everything. 
Your mind is not confined to one narrow little channel. 
If you can listen in this way, listen with ease, without strain, 
you will find an extraordinary change taking place within you, 
a change which comes without your volition, 
without your asking; 

and in that change there is great beauty and depth of insight.




~ J. Krishnamurti




Sunday, June 2, 2019

blindsight






You can't tell that Sabriye Tenberken is blind. She rides horses to crisscross Tibet's forbidding passes and plateaus. When talking, she looks you straight in the eye and describes things by their colors: the yellow mushrooms or the azure lake. And to greet a visitor, she bounds down a flight of steps in her boarding school for visually impaired children in Tibet's capital Lhasa. In the playground Tenberken points to 15-year-old Ngudup, who is playing a song for her on his guitar. "For 11 years," she says, "he was locked up in a dark room."

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Tenberken, 34, has brought light into Ngudup's life and into the lives of the other 48 children at her school. She and her staff don't just teach the kids Tibetan, Chinese and English, and practical skills like making beds and operating computers. They also give their charges dignity. Because of its high-altitude exposure to the sun, Tibet has unusually high rates of eye disease, and because of the prevalence of Buddhist beliefs, blindness is often regarded as punishment for misdeeds in a previous life. When Tenberken first went to Tibet seven years ago, she discovered that Tibetans had no idea what to do with their blind children. "It was depressing," she recalls. "We met kids who had been tied to a bed for years so that they didn't hurt themselves. Some couldn't walk, because their parents hadn't taught them."

Blind from a retinal disease by the time she was 13, Tenberken, who is German, studied for a master's degree in Tibetology at Bonn University and created Tibetan braille. She applied to various nongovernmental organizations to do fieldwork, but none would give her a job. So, along with her Dutch partner, Paul Kronenberg, 35, an engineer, Tenberken headed to Lhasa, waded through reams of red tape and was finally granted permission to open her school, raising the seed money by selling her autobiography. Says Tenberken: "We want to show the kids that they don't have to be ashamed. We want them to stand up and say, 'I am blind, not stupid!' They need to be proud of themselves, gather the strength to cope with discrimination and go out there as messengers for what they've learned."
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Tenberken's latest project is a farm some 300 kilometers from Lhasa, where blind adults are taught to raise animals and plant vegetables, and she's also establishing a center in Kerala, India, where trainees from developing countries can learn to set up similar schools. "There should be no limits for the blind," says Tenberken—clear proof that you don't need sight to have vision.

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~ Chaim Estulin and Ursula Sautter
for Timeasia

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the song of life









I have no name,
I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.
I have no shelter;
I am as the wandering waters.
I have no sanctuary, like the dark gods;
Nor am I in the shadow of deep temples.
I have no sacred books;
Nor am I well-seasoned in tradition.
I am not in the incense
Mounting on the high altars,
Nor in the pomp of ceremonies.
I am neither in the graven image,
Nor in the rich chant of a melodious voice.
I am not bound by theories,
Nor corrupted by beliefs.
I am not held in the bondage of religions,
Nor in the pious agony of their priests.
I am not entrapped by philosophies,
Nor held in the power of their sects.
I am neither low nor high,
I am the worshipper and the worshipped.
I am free.
My song is the song of the river
Calling for the open seas,
Wandering, wandering,
I am Life.
I have no name,
I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.




~ J. Krishnamurti
photo of a pulsar


belief - an escape





You believe in God, and another does not believe in God, 
so your beliefs separate you from each other. 

Belief throughout the world is organized as Hinduism, Buddhism, or Christianity, 
and so it divides man from man. We are confused, and we think that 
through belief we shall clear the confusion; that is, belief is superimposed on the confusion, 
and we hope that confusion will thereby be cleared away. 

But belief is merely an escape from the fact of confusion; 
it does not help us to face and to understand the fact 
but to run away from the confusion in which we are. 

To understand the confusion, belief is not necessary, 
and belief only acts as a screen between ourselves and our problems. 
So, religion, which is organized belief, becomes a means of escape 
from what is, from the fact of confusion. 

The man who believes in God, the man who believes in the hereafter, 
or who has any other form of belief, is escaping from the fact of what he is. 
Do you not know those who believe in God, 
who do puja, who repeat certain chants and words, 
and who in their daily life are dominating, cruel, ambitious, cheating, dishonest? 
Shall they find God? Are they really seeking God? 
Is God to be found through repetition of words, through belief? 
But such people believe in God, they worship God, 
they go to the temple every day, 

they do everything to avoid the fact of what they are - 
and such people you consider respectable because they are yourself.






~ J. Krishnamurti
from The Book of Life
with thanks to j krishnamurti online
art by Michelangelo



an undeniable love



Anna reading at Payne Hollow


An undeniable love for the river drew us away from town and down to the shore; the boat we built there was to carry us into a new existence. This regeneration gave a direction to our lives that Anna had never before contemplated; for me it was the fulfillment of old longings; yet we were both led on by a common desire to get down to earth and to express ourselves by creating a setting for our life together which would be in harmony with the landscape.

We catch fish for our own eating, get all our living as direct means as possible, that we may be self-sufficient and avoid contributing to the ruthless mechanical system that is destroying the earth. 

In this endeavor, no sacrifice is called for, no struggle or effort of will. Such a way is natural. Rather than hardship, it brings peace and inner rewards beyond measure.

Thus shantyboating has become, for us, a point of view, a way of looking at the world and at life. You take neither of them too seriously, nor do you try to understand their complexities. Who can? It is an obviously illogical philosophy, in which the individual is supreme. The claims made on him by his inner beliefs are above the demands of society. He is not without compassion, but his love is expended on those of his fellow men he is in contact with. With no schemes for universal betterment, he tends his own garden.

Is this selfish? No. The selfish man wants more than his share, a higher seat at the table than he is entitled to. One strong enough to stand by himself is not attracted by the prizes which the world offers. He has his own values, receives other rewards, for which there is no competition.

Instead of trying to make everyone alike, the state and society should encourage individualism. Individuals will never be too numerous; in fact, they are becoming harder to find. The river shantyboater has passed away, along with the old river; yet a few renegades will always be found, out in the brush somewhere, or on a forgotten bit of river shore, content with an environment the proud would scorn. The shantyboat strain is not likely to be cultivated out of existence, any more than the earth will ever be completely subdued.





~ Harlan Hubbard
excerpts from Payne Hollow: Life on the Fringe of Society

a shantyboat in winter - by Harlan Hubbard




Friday, May 31, 2019

I sit content








I exist as I am, that is enough,
If no other in the world be aware I sit content,
And if each and all be aware I sit content.
One world is aware, and by the far the largest to me, and that is myself,
And whether I come to my own today or in ten thousand or ten million years,
I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness, I can wait.
 
 
 
~ Walt Whitman
Walt's 200th birthday this year
 
 

the servant of unity







Most men in power have not the strength or wisdom
to be satisfied with the way
things are.

The sane know contentment, for beauty is their lover,
and beauty is never absent from the world.

The farther away light is from one's touch
the more one naturally speaks of the 
need for change.

Yes, overthrow any government inside
that makes you weep.

The child blames the external and focuses his energies there;
the warrior conquers the realms within
and becomes
gifted.

Only the inspired should make decisions
that affect the lives of many,

never a man who has not held God in his arms
and become the servant of 
unity.



~ St. Teresa of Avila
(1515-1582)
from Love Poems from God - Twelve Sacred Voices from East and West
translated by Daniel Ladinsky




mercy









The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest,—
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:
‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The thronèd monarch better than his crown:
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway,—
It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God’s,
When mercy seasons justice. 



~ William Shakespeare 
 from The Merchant of Venice
art by Van Gogh


 

the power of low position








Rivers and seas are rulers
of the streams of hundreds of valleys
because of the power of their low position.

If you want to be the ruler of people,
you must speak to them like you are their servant.
If you want to lead other people,
you must put their interest ahead of your own.

The people will not feel burdened,
if a wise person is in a position of power.
The people will not feel like they are being manipulated,
if a wise person is in front as their leader.
The whole world will ask for her guidance,
and will never get tired of her.
Because she does not like to compete,
no one can compete with the things she accomplishes.



~ Lao Tzu
from The Tao Te Ching
translation by j.h. mcdonald



Wednesday, May 29, 2019

the prodigal son

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It would be difficult to persuade me that the story of the Prodigal Son is not the legend of a man who didn't want to be loved.. When he was a child, everyone in the house loved him.  He grew up not knowing it could be any other way and got used to their tenderness, when he was a child.

But as a boy he tried to lay aside these habits.  He wouldn't have been able to say it, but when he spent the whole day roaming around outside and didn't even want to have the dogs with him, it was because they too loved him; because in their eyes he could see observation and sympathy, expectation, concern; because in their presence too he couldn't do anything without giving pleasure or pain.  But what he wanted in those days was that profound indifference of heart which sometimes, early in the morning, in the field, seized him with such purity that he had to start running, in order to have no time or breath to be more than a weightless moment in which the morning becomes conscious of itself.

The secret of that life of his which had never yet come into being, spread out before him.  Involuntarily he left the footpath and went running across the fields, with outstretched arms, as if in this wide reach he would be able to master several directions at once.  And then he flung himself down behind some bush and didn't matter to anyone.  He peeled himself a willow flute, threw a pebble at some animal, he leaned over and forced a beetle to turnaround:  none of this became fate, and the sky passed over him as over nature.  Finally afternoon came with all its inspirations; you could become a buccaneer on the isle of Tortuga, and there was no obligation to be that; you could besiege Campeche, take Vera Cruz by storm; you could be a whole army or an officer on horseback or a ship on the ocean:  according to the way you felt.  If you thought of kneeling, right away you were Deodatus of Gozon and had slain the dragon and understood that this heroism was pure arrogance, without an obedient heart.  For you didn't spare yourself anything that belonged to the game.  But no matter how many scenes arose in your imagination, in between them there was always enough time to be nothing but a bird, you didn't even know what kind.  Though afterward, you had to go home.

...


Once you walked in to its full smell, most matters were already decided.  A few details might still be changed; but on the whole you were already the person they thought you were; the person for whom they had long ago fashioned a life, out of his small past and their own desires; the creature belonging to them all, who stood day and night under the influence of their love, between their hope and their mistrust, before their approval or their blame.


It is useless for such a person to walk up the front steps with infinite caution.  They will all be in the living room, and as soon as the door opens they will all look his way.  He remains in the dark, wants to wait for their questions.  But then comes the worst.  They take him by the hands, lead him over to the table, and all of them, as many as are there, gather inquisitively in front of the lamp.  They have the best of it; they stay in the shadows, and on him alone falls, along with the light, all the shame of having a face.


Can he stay and conform to this lying life of approximations which they have assigned to him, and come to resemble them all in every feature of his face?  Can he divide himself between the delicate truthfulness of his will and the coarse deceit which corrupts it in his own eyes?  Can he give up becoming what might hurt those of his family who have nothing left but a weak heart?


No, he will go away.  For example, while they are all busy setting out on his birthday table those badly guessed presents which, once again, are supposed to make up for everything.  He will go away for ever.  Not until long afterward would he realize how thoroughly he had decided never to love, in order not to put anyone in the terrible position of being loved.  He remembered this years later and, like other good intentions, it too had proved impossible.  For he had loved again and again in his solitude, each time squandering his whole nature and in unspeakable fear for the freedom of the other person.  Slowly he learned to let the rays of his emotion shine through into the beloved object, instead of consuming the emotion in her.  And he was pampered by the joy of recognizing, through the more and more transparent form of the beloved, the expanses that she opened to his infinite desire for possession.





~ Rainer Maria Rilke
excerpt from The Prodigal Son
from the Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge
art by andy warhol
















the inner law





He whose law is within himself
Walks in hiddenness.
His acts are not influenced
By approval or disapproval.
He whose law is outside himself
Directs his will to what is 
Beyond his control
And seeks
To extend his power
Over objects.

He who walks in hiddenness
Has light to guide him
In all his acts.
He who seeks to extend his control
Is nothing but an operator.
While he thinks he is 
Surpassing others,
Others see him merely
Straining, stretching,
To stand on tiptoe.

When he tries to extend his power
Over objects,
Those objects gain control
Of him.

He who is controlled by objects
Loses possession of his inner self:
If he no longer values himself,
How can he value others?
If he no longer values others,
He is abandoned.
He has nothing left!

There is no deadlier weapon than the will!
The sharpest sword
Is not equal to it!
There is no robber so dangerous
As Nature (Yang and Yin).
Yet it is not nature
That does the damage:
It is man's own will!




~ Chuang Tzu
translation by Thomas Merton





he who stretches






Procrustes was a host who adjusted his guests to their bed.
Procrustes, whose name means "he who stretches."


He kept a house by the side of the road where he offered hospitality to passing strangers, who were invited in for a pleasant meal and a night's rest in his very special bed. Procrustes described it as having the unique property that its length exactly matched whomsoever lay down upon it. What Procrustes didn't volunteer was the method by which this "one-size-fits-all" was achieved, namely as soon as the guest lay down Procrustes went to work upon him, stretching him on the rack if he was too short for the bed and chopping off his legs if he was too long. Theseus turned the tables on Procrustes, fatally adjusting him to fit his own bed.


We are no sooner out of the womb than we must begin this precarious unfolding and shaping of who we are. If we have bad or destructive times in childhood, we begin to fix on a survival identity to cover over and to compensate for what happens to us. If we are never encouraged to be ourselves we begin to construct an identity that will gain us either attention or approval. When we set out to construct our lives according to a fixed image, we damage ourselves. The image becomes the desperate focus of all our longing. There are no frames for the soul. In truth, we are called, in so far as we can, to live without an image of ourselves, or at least to keep images we have free and open. When you sense the immensity of the unknown within you, any image you have built of yourself gradually loses its promise. Your name, your face, your address only suggest the threshold of your identity. Somehow you are always secretly aware of this. Sometimes. you find yourself listening to someone telling you what you should do or describing what is going on inside you, and you whisper to yourself that they have not the foggiest idea who you actually are.




~ John O'Donohue
from Eternal Echoes