[FairfieldLife] Re: Jerry Falwell dead
FAREWELL, FALWELL. YOU FELL WELL OFF THE FAR WALL. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, off_world_beings no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: At the age of 73. Jerry Falwell dead Who? Extremely influential right-wing fundamentalist Christian preacher. Check out one of the obits for details. Here's the NYTimes: http://tinyurl.com/33xoyt Ha ha ha, glad he's dead. He has done a service to the environment by dieing, the worms are loving living off all that fat. OffWorld OffWorld
[FairfieldLife] Re: Speaking of Buddha....at Target
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, bob_brigante [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Next time you're in Vegas, check out the shrine to Brahma in front of Caesars Palace, put there so Thai gamblers could appeal for luck: http://tinyurl.com/yunvqd I'm not sure how I feel about this trend. (And it *is* a trend...over half of the furnished or partially furn- ished apartments I saw in Sitges had Buddhas or Krishnas or some icon of Eastern spirituality on display.) On a practical level, designer-wise, these things are CHEAP. You can get a statue or a modern thangka for a fraction of what you'd pay for real art. And it looks hip, especially if you're designing an apartment and you've browsed through the pages of Architectural Digest or the other home fashion magazines and seen all the real Asian art on display in their showcase houses. So people snap these things up like they were hotcakes and them with a carton of maple syrup they need to use up. But on another level (just rappin' over coffee this morning), does this trend indicate anything else? Well, one of the things it indicates to me is a certain fas- cination that human beings have for the symbols of ideas, as opposed to the ideas themselves. How many people do we see on the streets every day wearing crosses around their necks, as if that makes them Christian, while living livestyles and doing things each day that *scream* of never having under- stood Christ's ideas? How many Buddha statues are seated beside the cash register in shops whose mer- chants are trying their best to squeeze out every penny they possibly can from the customers who enter their shops? All I'm trippin' on this morning is the human fas- cination with the *icons* of spirituality, as opposed to the *ideas* of spirituality. The late, unlamented Jerry Falwell probably had a house *full* of images of Christ, and used those images to promote his own image, and his own ideas, for decades. Some might suggest that *his* ideas had very little to do with the ideas of the fellow from Nazareth whose iconic image he was using as a sales tool. Same, in my opinion, with the fashionization of spiritual icons trend one tends to see around us in the world of interior design and fashion itself. Walking around a tiny beach town in Spain, I saw *hundreds* of T-shirts that contained Hindu images, Christian images, Buddhist images, and even Islamic images. They're all the rage, it would seem. And yet, if you stopped and asked the wearers of these icons to explain the *ideas* that form the basis of these spiritual movements whose visual icons they have appropriated as fashion items, how many would be able to do so? I'm just thinkin' as I'm writin' here; I haven't formed any real theories about all of this. But my first take on it is that the phenomenon is more related to the statue that Bob posted a link to above than it is to any real interest in or resur- gence of spiritual belief. In Vegas, some rich gamblers contributed a statue because they're superstitious, and believe it'll bring them luck at the crap tables. It's just about the desire to make more money. On the Big Island of Hawaii, there is a lovely hotel there filled with real Asian art that they bought cheap twenty years ago, and that recently was valued at five times the cost of the hotel itself when it was sold to the Japanese. Again, the display of religious art was about making more money. The Crusaders had a big cross painted on their shields and on their breast- plates as they murdered the infidel Arabs and the fellow Christains they deemed heretics. The suicide bombers who blow themselves and other hapless victims up on buses and in public squares probably have little medallions around their necks that contain an image of Mohammed, or some other symbol of Islam. I guess my over-coffee reaction to this religious- iconography-as-fashion-statement stuff is to wish that as many people had studied the IDEAS of the great spiritual teachers of the past as have used their images to decorate their houses and their bodies.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Dissecting brahma-suutras: I 1.4. (part 2/2)
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, cardemaister [EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:
(This is a rather easy one...)
BS I 1.4
tattu samanvayaat
(tat tu samanvayaat: no sandhi, no nuttin!)
tat that
tu 2 (never found at the beginning of a sentence or verse ;
metrically also %{tU4} RV. ; cf. Pa1n2. 6-3 , 133) pray! I beg ,
do , now , then , Lat. {dum} used (esp. with the Imper.) RV. ; but
(also with %{eva4} or %{vai4} following) AV. iv , 18 , 6 TS. S3Br.
c. ; and Mn. ii , 22 ; or , i , 68 ; xi , 202 ; often incorrectly
written for %{nu} MBh. (i , 6151 B and C) ; sometimes used as a
mere
expletive
samanvaya sam + anu + aya
sam adv. along with, together (mostly ---).
anu 3 ind. (***as a prefix to verbs and nouns*** , expresses)
after , along , alongside , lengthwise , near to , under ,
subordinate to , with. (When prefixed to nouns , especially in
adverbial compounds) , according to , severally , each by each ,
orderly , methodically , one after another , repeatedly. (As a
separable preposition , with accusative) after , along , over ,
near
to , through , to , towards , at , according to , in order ,
agreeably to , in regard to , inferior to Pa1n2. 1-4 , 86. As a
separable adverb) after , afterwards , thereupon , again ,
further ,
then , next.
aya m. ***going*** (only ifc. cf. [EMAIL PROTECTED]) ; (with %
{gavAm}) ` the going or the turn of the cowsN. of a periodical
sacrifice MBh. ; a move towards the right at chess Pat. (cf. %
{anA7naya}) ; Ved. a die Rv. x 166 , 9 AV. c. ; the number `
four ; good luck , favourable fortune Nalo7d.
anvaya [anu + aya - C.] m. ( %{i} see %{anv-i}) , following ,
succession [46,2] ; connection , association , being linked to or
concerned with ; the natural order or connection of words in a
sentence , syntax , construing ; logical connection of words ;
logical connection of cause and effect , or proposition and
conclusion ; drift , tenor , purport ; descendants , race ,
lineage , family.
samanvaya m. regular succession or order , connected sequence or
consequence , conjunction , mutual or immediate connection (%
{At} ind. , in consequence of ') Kap. Baadar. MBh. c. ; %{-
pradIpa} m. %{-pradipa-saMketa} m. %{sUtra-vivRti} f. N. of wks.
tat tu samanvayaat
But (tu) that (tat) immediate-connection-from (samanvayaa-t ||
samanvaya-at).
Svami Sivananda's translation:
But that (Brahman is to be known only from the Scriptures and not
independently by any other means is established), because it is the
main purpose (of all Vedantic texts).
[FairfieldLife] Continuing to dissect Brahma-suutras: I 1.3
BS I 1.3 shaastrayonitvaat [card's additions in brackets] zAstra [= shaastra] n[euter gemder word]. instruction, precept, rule, theory, a scientific or canonical work. yonitva n. the being an origin or source Nr2isUp. Kum. ; (ifc.) the arising from or being based on Sus3r. Sarvad. Word-for-word: scripture -being-the-source -from SS's translation: The scripture being the source of right knowledge.
[FairfieldLife] the same auspicious grains used in the Vedic ceremonies
http://www.mapi.com/en/newsletters/ayurveda_power_foods.html
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter drpetersutphen@ wrote: Just my usual too quick on the trigger response. I hear the term super string or anything of that ilk associated with TM and my brain locks-up! I'm sure it can have value for people, such as John Hagelin, who actually understand it and can facilitate deeper understanding of the mechanichs of consciousness, but for us lay folk it is mind numbing. That's its true purpose. :-) the invoking the too quick on the trigger response part or the mind numbing part? The mind numbing part. It's a sales technique designed to make the buyer think, O, these people are smarter than I am. I can tell because they use big words that I don't understand. There- fore they know what they're talking about. And so they sign on the dotted line, or continue to buy the inferior products of an inferior company because they have bought into the company's use of buzzwords. It's the same model used to sell hardware and software. We in the industry call it geekspeak. The more incomprehensible geekspeak you throw into the blurbs about your product, the more of the product you are likely to sell. Whatever the intellectual can I connect these possibly unrelated dots in my mind value that hypothetical exercises like Hagelin's might have for *him*, their value to the TM movement is as geekspeak. One of the trends that one finds in the study of *many* spiritual traditions is that many of the traditions that made the biggest impact on society, and in some cases have lasted the longest in history, were the ones that *dispensed with* geekspeak, or presented a clear alternative to it. Christ taught in the common language, using anal- ogies and metaphors that were comprehensible to the common man. As opposed to the language and the teachings used by the prevailing religions of his time. He developed a following. One of the primary reasons that the Catholic Church exterminated the Cathars was that they *taught in the common language*, not in Latin...and not in geekspeak. Buddha became popular because he rejected the high- falootin' language and rituals of the existing religions, and (again) taught in clear, non-geek- speak language to the common people, about things that they had to deal with...everyday stuff, like suffering and how to get past it. In the beginning, the TM movement taught in clear, non-geekspeak language about the benefits of medi- tation. And it developed quite a following. Over the years it abandoned that approach and began to rely more and more on geekspeak, which in my opinion was more designed to pander to and hold onto the existing followers than to attract new ones. The result? As some have pointed out here, more existing TMers die every year than new TMers are created. I'm not convinced that geekspeak is a good thing when it comes to spiritual teaching. Yeah, it may appeal to the intellect, which in turn appeals to the ego and the small self. But does it really help your life in any way to hear about superstrings and such stuff? Many people seem to *want* their minds numbed by high-falootin' language and concepts that they don't really understand. They *like* that stuff. Me, I'm drawn to those teachers and traditions that just speak clearly and without pretension about everyday stuff and offer clear, non-geekspeak techniques that offer more effective ways to deal with that everyday stuff. But that's probably just me...
[FairfieldLife] Re: Speaking of Buddha....at Target
I think it is the result of ideas becoming graphical entertainment for instant consumption. It is just the next step from all the crosses we saw as fashion accessories a few years ago. With religion as such a hot topic that can't be discussed in terms of the values of its ideas in educational systems, we end up with tons of people who claim to believe in God who couldn't define what they believe in in any theological detail. But it is not up for discussion because it is a special thought. As opposed as I am to most religious concepts, I believe that more religious education, not less is the answer. If our education system gave people more chance to think about these concepts in detail, we might have more people challenging the premises of all the assumptive beliefs that get flung around emotionally. Plus we could get at some of the really interesting stuff in scripture, insights into human nature, once it is taken outside the temple of being God's word. For the chick you saw, I am going to postulate that the depth of her understanding of the symbol on her jacket was inversely proportional to her level of hotness. That is a basic tenant from the bible of hotness that is my religion. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, lurkernomore20002000 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin jflanegi@ wrote: I just wanted to tip you all off that I found two very cool Buddha oriented things at Target last weekend. snip Anyway, sometimes the coolest things turn up in the oddest places... Yea, a couple months ago this black chick had the coolest jacket with a buddha figure on it in this city mall where I have a side business. I asked her where she got it, and she said at Kohls, or someplace like that. I don't know what meaning it had for her, but I thought it was awesome. lurk
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
Whatever the intellectual can I connect these possibly unrelated dots in my mind value that hypothetical exercises like Hagelin's might have for *him*, their value to the TM movement is as geekspeak. This is an excellent point. Any time a person uses a string of terms I don't have the background to understand, they are using words as hypnotic tools rather than to communicate. Since your intellect can't engage with undefined words, you resort to an emotional feeling of what the words feel like, and this shifts your mind's function off of its best chance to engage and challenge the concepts presented. This language form is not meant to inform, it is meant to shift mental states. That doesn't mean that you walk away as a zombie under their control, but it does make you a bit too spacey to stand up and shout STFU! I think the next generations are more vulnerable to infotainment graphics that sum up complexities into simple images. That is how their mind's are being trained to process. It has a similar effect but uses a different sense to achieve its no question goal. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter drpetersutphen@ wrote: Just my usual too quick on the trigger response. I hear the term super string or anything of that ilk associated with TM and my brain locks-up! I'm sure it can have value for people, such as John Hagelin, who actually understand it and can facilitate deeper understanding of the mechanichs of consciousness, but for us lay folk it is mind numbing. That's its true purpose. :-) the invoking the too quick on the trigger response part or the mind numbing part? The mind numbing part. It's a sales technique designed to make the buyer think, O, these people are smarter than I am. I can tell because they use big words that I don't understand. There- fore they know what they're talking about. And so they sign on the dotted line, or continue to buy the inferior products of an inferior company because they have bought into the company's use of buzzwords. It's the same model used to sell hardware and software. We in the industry call it geekspeak. The more incomprehensible geekspeak you throw into the blurbs about your product, the more of the product you are likely to sell. Whatever the intellectual can I connect these possibly unrelated dots in my mind value that hypothetical exercises like Hagelin's might have for *him*, their value to the TM movement is as geekspeak. One of the trends that one finds in the study of *many* spiritual traditions is that many of the traditions that made the biggest impact on society, and in some cases have lasted the longest in history, were the ones that *dispensed with* geekspeak, or presented a clear alternative to it. Christ taught in the common language, using anal- ogies and metaphors that were comprehensible to the common man. As opposed to the language and the teachings used by the prevailing religions of his time. He developed a following. One of the primary reasons that the Catholic Church exterminated the Cathars was that they *taught in the common language*, not in Latin...and not in geekspeak. Buddha became popular because he rejected the high- falootin' language and rituals of the existing religions, and (again) taught in clear, non-geek- speak language to the common people, about things that they had to deal with...everyday stuff, like suffering and how to get past it. In the beginning, the TM movement taught in clear, non-geekspeak language about the benefits of medi- tation. And it developed quite a following. Over the years it abandoned that approach and began to rely more and more on geekspeak, which in my opinion was more designed to pander to and hold onto the existing followers than to attract new ones. The result? As some have pointed out here, more existing TMers die every year than new TMers are created. I'm not convinced that geekspeak is a good thing when it comes to spiritual teaching. Yeah, it may appeal to the intellect, which in turn appeals to the ego and the small self. But does it really help your life in any way to hear about superstrings and such stuff? Many people seem to *want* their minds numbed by high-falootin' language and concepts that they don't really understand. They *like* that stuff. Me, I'm drawn to those teachers and traditions that just speak clearly and without pretension about everyday stuff and offer clear, non-geekspeak techniques that offer more effective ways to deal with that everyday stuff. But that's probably just me...
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter drpetersutphen@ wrote: Just my usual too quick on the trigger response. I hear the term super string or anything of that ilk associated with TM and my brain locks-up! I'm sure it can have value for people, such as John Hagelin, who actually understand it and can facilitate deeper understanding of the mechanichs of consciousness, but for us lay folk it is mind numbing. That's its true purpose. :-) the invoking the too quick on the trigger response part or the mind numbing part? The mind numbing part. It's a sales technique designed to make the buyer think, O, these people are smarter than I am. I can tell because they use big words that I don't understand. There- fore they know what they're talking about. And so they sign on the dotted line, or continue to buy the inferior products of an inferior company because they have bought into the company's use of buzzwords. It's the same model used to sell hardware and software. We in the industry call it geekspeak. The more incomprehensible geekspeak you throw into the blurbs about your product, the more of the product you are likely to sell. One would think, if the TMO were using geekspeak as a sales technique, that one would find it in abundance on the primary Web site designed to sell TM, www.tm.org. But it doesn't have any geekspeak that I can find. It seems to use all simple, straightforward, everyday language.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Speaking of Buddha....at Target
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I think it is the result of ideas becoming graphical enter- tainment for instant consumption. Nice insight, remarkably parallel to my thoughts this morning in a post you probably haven't gotten to yet. Synchronicity, dude. :-) It is just the next step from all the crosses we saw as fashion accessories a few years ago. With religion as such a hot topic that can't be discussed in terms of the values of its ideas in educational systems, we end up with tons of people who claim to believe in God who couldn't define what they believe in in any theological detail. I lived around Methodists for years growing up, and as it turned out when I asked them, none of them knew where the name of their sect came from, or that their religion actually included a Method. But it is not up for discussion because it is a special thought. As opposed as I am to most religious concepts, I believe that more religious education, not less is the answer. I agree. There should be courses in comparative religion, stressing the ideas that these religions and belief systems were based upon, in every school. So MUCH of what we see about us on the News every night is about religion, and religious conflict, and yet most of the people watching (and, to tell the truth, most of the people creating the conflict) couldn't explain to you what their religion was about, much less any other religion, on a bet. If our education system gave people more chance to think about these concepts in detail, we might have more people challenging the premises of all the assumptive beliefs that get flung around emotionally. Plus we could get at some of the really interesting stuff in scripture, insights into human nature, once it is taken outside the temple of being God's word. I agree again. For the chick you saw, I am going to postulate that the depth of her understanding of the symbol on her jacket was inversely proportional to her level of hotness. That is a basic tenant from the bible of hotness that is my religion. Somewhere in my gotta save this box is a photograph of, I think, Elle Macpherson. She's nude, but accept- ably nude, because she is wearing body paint over the offending parts of her breasts. The image painted on them is the Buddha. I would be willing to bet that Elle Macpherson, as hot as she is wearing the Buddha, wouldn't be able to quote even one of Buddha's Four Noble Truths. But she is *definitely* an icon of hotness. And the real reason I kept the photo was that, as tasteless as the idea might seem to some people, I've never seen a portrait of the Buddha in which he looked happier. :-)
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Rory Goff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes, sorry, I was hoping the like that, like that would ironically belie my apparent distancing from the TBs, as truly I have nothing against them and am actually profoundly impressed with their devotion, purity and sattva. They are actually *very* real to me. It used to bother me that they seemed so self-absorbed that they could not see me, but I have found that the more I rest in my own Being and appreciate their innate and exquisite perfection, the more they rest in theirs and see mine, and there is only deeper and deeper love between us. They are my devotees, as I am theirs. Again, no worries, mate! :-) *L*L*L* Yes, I see there being two phases to the process, the TB process where one follows the guru and tunes one's mind and heart to Him perfectly, so that when it is time to learn to fly, one's faith in the guru and the guru-mind that one now carries will allow each of us to ascend at that time to our own unbounded freedom, no longer tethered to the guru, but set limitlessly free. The second phase could be called TBE, True Believer in Everything, because one is now at the point where every moment, every singularity is offered up on the throne of the Divine, as an instantaneous opportunity to turn Infinity as one desires, the much vaunted Field of All Possibilities in action. When I remarked that your expression of the word sweet was real, it was not meant as a criticism of the cherished True Believer devotion, but rather a recognition that you are a knower of Reality; dynamic, instantaneopus Infinity, more TBE than TB. That's all.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Inhofe: Scientists are reversing their stand
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, shempmcgurk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Climate Momentum Shifting: Prominent Scientists Reverse Belief in Man- made Global Warming - Now Skeptics May 15, 2007 Posted by Marc Morano [EMAIL PROTECTED] - 9:14 PM ET Climate Momentum Shifting: Prominent Scientists Reverse Belief in Man- made Global Warming - Now Skeptics Growing Number of Scientists Convert to Skeptics After Reviewing New Research Following the U.S. Senate's vote today on a global warming measure (see today's AP article: Senate Defeats Climate Change Measure,) Just for the record, a solid majority of senators voted for the measure (51-42), but it needed 60 votes to pass. The vote was for an amendment to a water projects bill that would have required the Army Corps of Engineers to take climate science into account in planning projects that might destroy natural barriers that protect coastal communities from storms and floods. http://www.sanluisobispo.com/347/story/42239.html In other words, the reference to a global warming measure is technically accurate but misleading. (Shemp, it sure would be nice if you'd go to the trouble to post links to your articles so we know where they're from.)
[FairfieldLife] Re: Speaking of Buddha....at Target
I have a few religious objects, and what a burden. I long ago stopped being HUGELY concerned if I turned my back on my brass Ganesha statue or if His symbol's place of honor was, er, kosher. He's about 10 inches from my typing hands -- sitting not on but in a veritable nest of unholy receipts -- and I have a Jesus ceramic voguing next to him, and then this terracotta reposing angel at their feet, and nestled amongst this crew is this metal statue of a hippo that has utterly no value except I don't know why but it's priceless to me. That's my three wisemen and their hippo. Oh, and Ganesha's rat is there too. And there's a photo of a Buddha statue in my bathroom. So, oh yeah, I'm going to hell. The sacred protocol that I adopted from Hinduism still echo enough for me to sense faint shame as I sin against my symbols. I haven't been a big practitioner of ritual -- a few thousand pujas only -- and entering church mood is not a knee jerk. But I've seen others doing moods, and as much as I want to deride the shallowness of their actions, I pause, since, every time I'm judging, I hear the sword of Damocles being sharpened. When I see Jews bewalling, black shrouded grandmothers lighting candles, Sufi faikers, the worn smooth toes of giant statues of saints in the Vatican -- toes worn down by the passing caresses of the faithful, or when I read about a Native American medicine man leaving some coins as an offering to a medicine plant that he's taking a few leaves from, I know that they're seeing from a rare perspective, and I intuit that it would be good to awaken that kind of processing in my own life. Not to make a symbol a more potent triggering device for emotions, not to emotionally foster an intellectual focus, but to learn to inwardly bow to my values and huggingly sing my love for them as if I were a white knight for them. Yeah, sure, Edg. I sit here right now with them encircled in my arms like a lap full of puppies. Oh, it's a squirmy mess of integrity. Not a one of these fuzzy concepts will hold still enough, and these mirth bombs cannot be contained by a mere hug or loving glance. And, as usual, my furry values scatter out into my life, unleashable, sniffing everything. If one of my values likes you, you get a hot sloppywet puppy breath lick. If not, a squirt of piss. After my pack has snuffed and snorted your pants' cuffs, dug for bones in your backyard, and snarled through a tug of war with your lace doilies, you might not invite me back. But there's a 101 of them thar Dalmatians -- who can make these yappers heal? I need a spiritual Cesar Millan to say, Si to them. Teach me to become pack leader. Maharishi, I've seen Cesar Millan, and you're no Cesar Millan. The movement never formally taught us about values, about the ways to culture them in our psychologies, identify the weeds amongst them, you know -- teach us HOW TO LIVE, not merely get out of the living business. Oh, just sit in that holy silence and your dogs will eventually settle down, begin to naturally behave. That was the promise. But my hounds of hate, mutts of must, curs of curse, man, these pissy pooches are just too embarrassing lately. The howling alone, ya know? I want to dump them all out in some wilderness where they belong, toss my leashes away, and be dogma free. There's that Annie Hall joke where Woody says he's like that guy whose wife thinks she's a chicken, but he doesn't want to disabuse her of the delusion because we need the eggs. I need the dogs to sniff the night air while I sleep in my cave, growl me awake, raise a hackle for me. Oh my the lions and tiger and bears they protect me from. Ain't nothing scarier than the shambling grizzly voids, the camouflaged rattler atheisms waiting, the pouncing pumas of proofs with claws extended, or the wandering monks of money. Gotta have ma dogs -- if only for the dung to toss at any monk who must be paid to pray. Edg Emotionally, I'm antsy around these symbols, cuz, well, Intellectually I think that there is a reason to --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, bob_brigante no_reply@ wrote: Next time you're in Vegas, check out the shrine to Brahma in front of Caesars Palace, put there so Thai gamblers could appeal for luck: http://tinyurl.com/yunvqd I'm not sure how I feel about this trend. (And it *is* a trend...over half of the furnished or partially furn- ished apartments I saw in Sitges had Buddhas or Krishnas or some icon of Eastern spirituality on display.) On a practical level, designer-wise, these things are CHEAP. You can get a statue or a modern thangka for a fraction of what you'd pay for real art. And it looks hip, especially if you're designing an apartment and you've browsed through the pages of Architectural Digest or the other home fashion magazines and seen all the real Asian art on display in their
[FairfieldLife] Re: Speaking of Buddha....at Target
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, lurkernomore20002000 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin jflanegi@ wrote: I just wanted to tip you all off that I found two very cool Buddha oriented things at Target last weekend. snip Anyway, sometimes the coolest things turn up in the oddest places... Yea, a couple months ago this black chick had the coolest jacket with a buddha figure on it in this city mall where I have a side business. I asked her where she got it, and she said at Kohls, or someplace like that. I don't know what meaning it had for her, but I thought it was awesome. lurk yeah. I like it when things affect me energetically, transcending any formal meaning they may have, typified in one sense by the expression, I may not know art but I know what I like. It may be why people are drawn to religious symbols, without having had much of a formal introduction or even an interest in the religion behind them. Or why we don't have to be meteorologists to appreciate a beautiful sky. Cool stuff! :-)
[FairfieldLife] Re: Inhofe: Scientists are reversing their stand
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, shempmcgurk shempmcgurk@ wrote: Climate Momentum Shifting: Prominent Scientists Reverse Belief in Man- made Global Warming - Now Skeptics May 15, 2007 Posted by Marc Morano Marc_Morano@ - 9:14 PM ET Climate Momentum Shifting: Prominent Scientists Reverse Belief in Man- made Global Warming - Now Skeptics Growing Number of Scientists Convert to Skeptics After Reviewing New Research Following the U.S. Senate's vote today on a global warming measure (see today's AP article: Senate Defeats Climate Change Measure,) Just for the record, a solid majority of senators voted for the measure (51-42), but it needed 60 votes to pass. The vote was for an amendment to a water projects bill that would have required the Army Corps of Engineers to take climate science into account in planning projects that might destroy natural barriers that protect coastal communities from storms and floods. http://www.sanluisobispo.com/347/story/42239.html In other words, the reference to a global warming measure is technically accurate but misleading. (Shemp, it sure would be nice if you'd go to the trouble to post links to your articles so we know where they're from.) Ever since you taught me that trick of taking at random a line from the article one posts and then googling it (which turns up the article and reference where it's from), I haven't bothered.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Speaking of Buddha....at Target
I have a few religious objects, and what a burden. I long ago stopped being HUGELY concerned if I turned my back on my brass Ganesha statue or if His symbol's place of honor was, er, kosher. He's about 10 inches from my typing hands -- sitting not on but in a veritable nest of unholy receipts -- and I have a Jesus ceramic voguing next to him, and then this terracotta reposing angel at their feet, and nestled amongst this crew is this metal statue of a hippo that has utterly no value except I don't know why but it's priceless to me. That's my three wisemen and their hippo. Oh, and Ganesha's rat is there too. And there's a photo of a Buddha statue in my bathroom. So, oh yeah, I'm going to hell. The sacred protocol that I adopted from Hinduism still echo enough for me to sense faint shame as I sin against my symbols. I haven't been a big practitioner of ritual -- a few thousand pujas only -- and entering church mood is not a knee jerk. But I've seen others doing moods, and as much as I want to deride the shallowness of their actions, I pause, since, every time I'm judging, I hear the sword of Damocles being sharpened. When I see Jews bewalling, black shrouded grandmothers lighting candles, Sufi faikers, the worn smooth toes of giant statues of saints in the Vatican -- toes worn down by the passing caresses of the faithful, or when I read about a Native American medicine man leaving some coins as an offering to a medicine plant that he's taking a few leaves from, I know that they're seeing from a rare perspective, and I intuit that it would be good to awaken that kind of processing in my own life. Not to make a symbol a more potent triggering device for emotions, not to emotionally foster an intellectual focus, but to learn to inwardly bow to my values and huggingly sing my love for them as if I were a white knight for them. Yeah, sure, Edg. I sit here right now with them encircled in my arms like a lap full of puppies. Oh, it's a squirmy mess of integrity. Not a one of these fuzzy concepts will hold still enough, and these mirth bombs cannot be contained by a mere hug or loving glance. And, as usual, my furry values scatter out into my life, unleashable, sniffing everything. If one of my values likes you, you get a hot sloppywet puppy breath lick. If not, a squirt of piss. After my pack has snuffed and snorted your pants' cuffs, dug for bones in your backyard, and snarled through a tug of war with your lace doilies, you might not invite me back. But there's a 101 of them thar Dalmatians -- who can make these yappers heal? I need a spiritual Cesar Millan to say, Si to them. Teach me to become pack leader. Maharishi, I've seen Cesar Millan, and you're no Cesar Millan. The movement never formally taught us about values, about the ways to culture them in our psychologies, identify the weeds amongst them, you know -- teach us HOW TO LIVE, not merely get out of the living business. Oh, just sit in that holy silence and your dogs will eventually settle down, begin to naturally behave. That was the promise. But my hounds of hate, mutts of must, curs of curse, man, these pissy pooches are just too embarrassing lately. The howling alone, ya know? I want to dump them all out in some wilderness where they belong, toss my leashes away, and be dogma free. There's that Annie Hall joke where Woody says he's like that guy whose wife thinks she's a chicken, but he doesn't want to disabuse her of the delusion because we need the eggs. I need the dogs to sniff the night air while I sleep in my cave, growl me awake, raise a hackle for me. Oh my the lions and tigers and bears they protect me from. Ain't nothing scarier than the the pouncing pumas of proofs with claws extended, the striped atheisms waiting, the shambling grizzly voids, or the wandering Oz monks of money. Gotta have ma dogs -- if only so's to have the dung to toss at any monk who must be paid to pray. Edg The above reposted after a re-write --- sigh --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, bob_brigante no_reply@ wrote: Next time you're in Vegas, check out the shrine to Brahma in front of Caesars Palace, put there so Thai gamblers could appeal for luck: http://tinyurl.com/yunvqd I'm not sure how I feel about this trend. (And it *is* a trend...over half of the furnished or partially furn- ished apartments I saw in Sitges had Buddhas or Krishnas or some icon of Eastern spirituality on display.) On a practical level, designer-wise, these things are CHEAP. You can get a statue or a modern thangka for a fraction of what you'd pay for real art. And it looks hip, especially if you're designing an apartment and you've browsed through the pages of Architectural Digest or the other home fashion magazines and seen all the real Asian art on display in their showcase houses. So people snap these things up like they were hotcakes and them with a carton
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes, I see there being two phases to the process, the TB process where one follows the guru and tunes one's mind and heart to Him perfectly, so that when it is time to learn to fly, one's faith in the guru and the guru-mind that one now carries will allow each of us to ascend at that time to our own unbounded freedom, no longer tethered to the guru, but set limitlessly free. The second phase could be called TBE, True Believer in Everything, because one is now at the point where every moment, every singularity is offered up on the throne of the Divine, as an instantaneous opportunity to turn Infinity as one desires, the much vaunted Field of All Possibilities in action. When I remarked that your expression of the word sweet was real, it was not meant as a criticism of the cherished True Believer devotion, but rather a recognition that you are a knower of Reality; dynamic, instantaneopus Infinity, more TBE than TB. That's all. Sweet! :-) Yes, although in one sense spacetime and growth is a big joke, on the other hand I think M. Scott Peck put it really well when he outlined four stages of growth: 1) Chaos, 2) Fundamentalism, 3) Eclecticism, 4) Love. He points out that a being identifying with any given stage cannot see above or beyond where it is, but can only interpret others as being in its own stage (one of us) or in any stages already recognized and below it, which (generally) it is reacting against as evil. Thus a fundamentalist (2), only familiar with (1) chaos and (2) fundamentalism, would interpret an eclectic (3) as being a non-fundamentalist, hence as chaotic, or evil (1). Similarly, an eclectic (3) can only interpret Love (4) as being non-eclectic, or somehow fundamentalist/chaotic, now synonymous with evil (2). I remember exactly when I first recognized unconditional Love as an actual presence or state, irrespective of person, and while I was instantly attracted to it, knew I had to Be it, it also scared the bejeezus out of me, as I realized that its very presence destroyed all my carefully-built-up scholarship and discrimination and mastery of eclecticism, everything I had identified with, revealing its core- nature of semi-conscious competition, power, etc. (this was in Harvard Divinity School). Not surprisingly, this glimpse also triggered the onset of a two-year Dark Night of the Soul :-) *L*L*L*
[FairfieldLife] The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming
Czech president calls for rational debate on global warming, rejects current hysteria The Associated Press Wednesday, May 16, 2007 PRAGUE, Czech Republic: Czech President Vaclav Klaus on Wednesday called for a rational debate on global warming, rejecting what he called hysteria driven by enviromentalists. Let's bring the debate to whether the 0.6 (degree Celsius warming over the last century) is much or little, how much Man has contributed to the warming and ... if there is anything at all Man can do about it, Klaus said when presenting his book Blue, Not a Green Planet. He charged that groups other than scientists have now seized on the topic and ambitious environmentalists are fueling a global warming hysteria that has no solid ground in fact and allows manipulation of people. It is about a key topic of our time, and that is the topic of human freedom and its curtailment, Klaus said. The approach of environmentalists toward nature is similar to the Marxist approach to economic rules, because they also try to replace free spontaneity of the evolution of the world (and of mankind) with ... global planning of the world's development, Klaus writes in his book. That approach ... is a utopia leading to completely other than wanted results, he says. Klaus, an economist by profession, has repeatedly warned that policy makers are pushed by the widespread fear of global warming to adopt enormously costly programs that eventually may have no positive effect. Klaus served as Czechoslovak finance minister after the 1989 fall of communism and as Czech prime minister after Czechoslovakia split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. As president, he now has mainly ceremonial powers.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Doesn't this remind you of a Maxfield Parris poster?
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Marek Reavis reavismarek@ wrote: Totally Parrish. It's beautiful, too. That's Hillary, right? On the White House balcony or something? What a great political poster. FWIW, it isn't a poster, it's a still image from a Hillary campaign video narrated by Bill Clinton. I looked at the video again. Actually it's a still image from a still image in the video. So, before it was put on the video, it was a still image.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Inhofe: Scientists are reversing their stand
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, shempmcgurk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: snip (Shemp, it sure would be nice if you'd go to the trouble to post links to your articles so we know where they're from.) Ever since you taught me that trick of taking at random a line from the article one posts and then googling it (which turns up the article and reference where it's from), I haven't bothered. No, just do readers the courtesy of taking 2 seconds to include the URL in your post, rather than making each of them take a minute or so to locate it by googling. Plus, if you don't, that might lead them to suspect you don't *want* anybody to know where the article comes from.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, shempmcgurk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Czech president calls for rational debate on global warming, rejects current hysteria The Associated Press Wednesday, May 16, 2007 PRAGUE, Czech Republic: Czech President Vaclav Klaus on Wednesday called for a rational debate on global warming, rejecting what he called hysteria driven by enviromentalists. Let's bring the debate to whether the 0.6 (degree Celsius warming over the last century) is much or little, how much Man has contributed to the warming and ... if there is anything at all Man can do about it, Klaus said when presenting his book Blue, Not a Green Planet. He charged that groups other than scientists have now seized on the topic and ambitious environmentalists are fueling a global warming hysteria that has no solid ground in fact and allows manipulation of people. It is about a key topic of our time, and that is the topic of human freedom and its curtailment, Klaus said. The approach of environmentalists toward nature is similar to the Marxist approach to economic rules, because they also try to replace free spontaneity of the evolution of the world (and of mankind) with ... global planning of the world's development, Klaus writes in his book. That approach ... is a utopia leading to completely other than wanted results, he says. Klaus, an economist by profession, has repeatedly warned that policy makers are pushed by the widespread fear of global warming to adopt enormously costly programs that eventually may have no positive effect. Klaus served as Czechoslovak finance minister after the 1989 fall of communism and as Czech prime minister after Czechoslovakia split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. As president, he now has mainly ceremonial powers. Q. On a recent British television programme it was claimed that a large part of global warming is caused by the oceans, and is entirely natural. Would you please comment? A. This is a very dangerous idea and widely believed by those who would gladly accept that we need do nothing to prevent or reduce our emissions of carbon gases which cause global warming. It is very important that we learn to cope not only with global warming but also with the complete changes that are taking place in the fabric of our planet. There are many scientists on both sides of this question, and the purveyors of oil are not slow to employ those who say there is nothing to worry about. According to the Masters, Who are the only people Who can know with certainty, 80 per cent of the rise in temperature in the world is due to global warming caused by man. Twenty per cent is due to certain changes in the relation between the sun and the Earth which Maitreya Himself has brought about, in part to draw our attention to the urgency of dealing with this danger to our planetary life. http://www.shareintl.org
[FairfieldLife] The World's Fastest Indian
If you don't follow through on your dreams, you might as well be a vegetable. - H.J. (Burt) Munro, 1967 This is one of those feel good Road Trip movies. It traces the long journey of Burt Munro from Invercargill, New Zealand to the Bonneville Salt Flats, dragging the 1920 Indian motorcycle (and thus the name of the movie) that he'd streamlined and worked on most of his life with him. He wants to see how fast it'll go, and the Salt Flats is the only place he can find out. Burt is 68 years old, and with a heart condition. Tom: Aren't you scared you'll kill yourself if you crash? Burt: No... You live more in five minutes on a bike like this going flat out than some people live in a lifetime. After a long journey, during which he meets many wonderful people, he arrives in Utah and, despite being laughed at by most of the people he knows back home and many of the people there in Bonneville for Speed Week, he sets the World's Land Speed Record for under-1000cc motorcycles, 190.07 mph. Unofficially, that 68-year-old man got that 48-year-old Indian up to 205.67 mph. Burt was a real character, and he's played (very subtly) in the movie by Anthony Hopkins. There's not much mush or schmaltz in this film, just the plain story of a plain guy who wanted to achieve a little something before he died. And who did. It might be an inspiration to those of us who are...let's face it...approaching Burt's age and, like him, might still have a few things left to achieve. The film is well worth a rental, and who knows...it might inspire you to go out and do something crazy yourself.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Jerry Falwell dead
In a message dated 5/15/07 1:24:40 P.M. Central Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Dunno about any of this, but I'd sure love to hear what Jesus has to say to him face to face. Even if Jesus said Well done my fine and faithful servant? ** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Rory Goff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin jflanegi@ wrote: Yes, I see there being two phases to the process, the TB process where one follows the guru and tunes one's mind and heart to Him perfectly, so that when it is time to learn to fly, one's faith in the guru and the guru-mind that one now carries will allow each of us to ascend at that time to our own unbounded freedom, no longer tethered to the guru, but set limitlessly free. The second phase could be called TBE, True Believer in Everything, because one is now at the point where every moment, every singularity is offered up on the throne of the Divine, as an instantaneous opportunity to turn Infinity as one desires, the much vaunted Field of All Possibilities in action. When I remarked that your expression of the word sweet was real, it was not meant as a criticism of the cherished True Believer devotion, but rather a recognition that you are a knower of Reality; dynamic, instantaneopus Infinity, more TBE than TB. That's all. Sweet! :-) Yes, although in one sense spacetime and growth is a big joke, on the other hand I think M. Scott Peck put it really well when he outlined four stages of growth: 1) Chaos, 2) Fundamentalism, 3) Eclecticism, 4) Love. He points out that a being identifying with any given stage cannot see above or beyond where it is, but can only interpret others as being in its own stage (one of us) or in any stages already recognized and below it, which (generally) it is reacting against as evil. Thus a fundamentalist (2), only familiar with (1) chaos and (2) fundamentalism, would interpret an eclectic (3) as being a non-fundamentalist, hence as chaotic, or evil (1). Similarly, an eclectic (3) can only interpret Love (4) as being non-eclectic, or somehow fundamentalist/chaotic, now synonymous with evil (2). I remember exactly when I first recognized unconditional Love as an actual presence or state, irrespective of person, and while I was instantly attracted to it, knew I had to Be it, it also scared the bejeezus out of me, as I realized that its very presence destroyed all my carefully-built-up scholarship and discrimination and mastery of eclecticism, everything I had identified with, revealing its core- nature of semi-conscious competition, power, etc. (this was in Harvard Divinity School). Not surprisingly, this glimpse also triggered the onset of a two-year Dark Night of the Soul :-) *L*L*L* Yes, spacetime and growth *are* a big joke, and while we are laughing at them, they are laughing right back at us, watching our every move, evaluating, seeing if we are slave or master, with neck, hand and leg-irons at the ready! Ha-Ha! You are bringing out the mirth and giggles in me again...could we call the Peck stages, 1- sleepwalking, 2-awakened point value, 3-awakened multi-point value, 4-awakened infinite point value, which then transcends its point value altogether? A beautiful model. It certainly explains the dynamics here on FFL sometimes where the eclectics (you know who you are! hehe) will mistake a state of unconditional love for that of fundamentalism and/or chaos. And I can totally relate to that moment of recognition when unconditional Love was recognized clearly and unmistakably by me as the goal and being simultaneously completely terrified! HA-HA! Seems gently silly now, but at the time and whenever I would think of it afterwards, I'd have a visceral reaction like I knew I could no longer hide in my skin. Unnerving to say the least. Like the joke about the General watching the opposing army advance on him, and he turns to his aide, and barks, Bring me my brown pants!. In any case, yes, all that is left after that is the steady and exciting journey towards death and dissolution (!), all resistance is futile. Once bitten by the Supreme Love Bug we all succumb eventually. :-)
[FairfieldLife] Underwear Soup (Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming)
My parents didn't want me to be vegan -- always pushed me to eat meat. It's just soup! But, Mom, there's a big pork hock in it. Don't eat that, just enjoy the veggies in it. Like that. I would tell her this, Suppose I cook up a nice soup and as I ladle it out into your bowl you notice that my underwear is in the pot? Can I tell you to not eat my gotchies but enjoy the rest of the soup? She didn't get it. Meat was life to her. This global warming debate is like that. We have these folks saying, What's a little carbon cloud from China, breath the air for crissakes. They're saying, you know, ignore, nay, enjoy the nuance of Eau du Fruit de Looms wafting in your oxygen. To me it's not about if we're reaching the so-called tipping point. I think we're near or passed it, but to complain about it NOW, when, like for 200 years, we've been spewing every manner of filth into ocean and atmosphere is a cruel twisting of the knife in Mother Nature's back. Howzbout you go camping, hike for three days, get above the tree line, find a flat spot, pitch a tent, thank God for the glorious display of beauty, grab a cup and walk to the stream for a drink. Dip it into the stream. Ah, pure mountain water, but wait, who's that sumbitch pissing just twenty yards up-stream? Why, I think I'll kill the infidel. I mean whoever saw the first person pissing in a stream should have stopped that practice right on the spot, eh? Just would have taken a well thrown rock, and maybe we wouldn't have six billion people pretending that mercury in tuna fish ain't so bad a price to pay for modern life. It's not the bottom of the slippery slope that rankles me -- it's that first step onto it. Are we humans contributing to global warming by 80% compared to nature's 20%, or is it that we're doing only 1% damage? WHO CARES! STOP PISSING IN MY STREAM. Hell, one molecule of turd in a hundred million gallons of water is TOO MUCH UNDERWEAR IN THE SOUP. An airplane with three guys in it crashed into a major reservoir for Napa, CA where I lived at the time. For YEARS, they couldn't find the bodies or plane. I called the tap water Dead Man's Soup. Then there's that joke about the guy offering a woman at the bar $5,000 for sex. She's never done it for money before, but hey, five big clams is hard to ignore, so she accepts the offer. In the motel room, the guy says, I was lying about the money. I only have $50. She's miffed, says she's no whore. He says, We already established that. Now we're just talking about price. Like that, when I throw away my Styrofoam fast food containers, when I toss my old batteries, when I dump my crankcase oil out in the vacant lot, or when I, for instance, piss into the public's flowing mindset -- even if the piss if anti-Falwell flavored -- who am I to throw any stone at anyone? Ask not from whom does the globe warm, it warms from we. And until we taste the still-dilute redolence of industry in our water and air, until we become outraged at upstream pissers, until someone goes up to Adam and smacks him a good one in the puss and says spit that apple out of your mouth, we're all going to be served underwear soup. Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, shempmcgurk shempmcgurk@ wrote: Czech president calls for rational debate on global warming, rejects current hysteria The Associated Press Wednesday, May 16, 2007 PRAGUE, Czech Republic: Czech President Vaclav Klaus on Wednesday called for a rational debate on global warming, rejecting what he called hysteria driven by enviromentalists. Let's bring the debate to whether the 0.6 (degree Celsius warming over the last century) is much or little, how much Man has contributed to the warming and ... if there is anything at all Man can do about it, Klaus said when presenting his book Blue, Not a Green Planet. He charged that groups other than scientists have now seized on the topic and ambitious environmentalists are fueling a global warming hysteria that has no solid ground in fact and allows manipulation of people. It is about a key topic of our time, and that is the topic of human freedom and its curtailment, Klaus said. The approach of environmentalists toward nature is similar to the Marxist approach to economic rules, because they also try to replace free spontaneity of the evolution of the world (and of mankind) with ... global planning of the world's development, Klaus writes in his book. That approach ... is a utopia leading to completely other than wanted results, he says. Klaus, an economist by profession, has repeatedly warned that policy makers are pushed by the widespread fear of global warming to adopt enormously costly programs that eventually may have no positive effect. Klaus served as Czechoslovak finance minister after the
[FairfieldLife] Re: Inhofe: Scientists are reversing their stand
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, shempmcgurk shempmcgurk@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: snip (Shemp, it sure would be nice if you'd go to the trouble to post links to your articles so we know where they're from.) Ever since you taught me that trick of taking at random a line from the article one posts and then googling it (which turns up the article and reference where it's from), I haven't bothered. No, just do readers the courtesy of taking 2 seconds to include the URL in your post, rather than making each of them take a minute or so to locate it by googling. Plus, if you don't, that might lead them to suspect you don't *want* anybody to know where the article comes from. I'm as courteous as you are tolerant.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Underwear Soup (Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming)
On May 16, 2007, at 1:11 PM, Duveyoung wrote: My parents didn't want me to be vegan -- always pushed me to eat meat. It's just soup! But, Mom, there's a big pork hock in it. Don't eat that, just enjoy the veggies in it. Like that. I would tell her this, Suppose I cook up a nice soup and as I ladle it out into your bowl you notice that my underwear is in the pot? Can I tell you to not eat my gotchies but enjoy the rest of the soup? She didn't get it. Meat was life to her. http://soychick.com/soyblog/index.php?/archives/99-Vegan-Parents-Kill- Their-Babies.html VEGAN PARENTS KILL THEIR BABIES FRIDAY, MAY 11. 2007 Dramatic headlines flooded the news back in 2004 and again today as Lamont Thomas, 31, and Jade Sanders, 27 were convicted of malice murder, felony murder, involuntary manslaughter and cruelty to children last week in Georgia. http://www.news4jax.com/news/13286030/ detail.html Headlines such as these fuel the nay-sayers and convince them that the benefits of vegan or strict vegetarian diets are false and help them rationalize the reasoning they maintain on their stance that consuming animal products is the best and only way to obtain proper nutrition. It is true that the couple are vegans, but its not the diet that killed the child. It was negligence. It was lack of knowledge and information to nourish the child properly. It had nothing to do with abstaining from meat or dairy by any means. The parents of Crown(the baby) fed the child soymilk and apple juice instead of nursing the child with breast milk. The child wasn't obtaining enough nutrients not because of the diet the parents practiced, but by lack of nutrients in general. The parents were starving the child...not due to being vegan, but by depriving the child with essential nutrients which the mother would have been able to provide. When people read the headlines, they won't read the details, they probably won't even scan the article. They'll just assume that it was the diet that caused it, when it wasn't that at all and dismiss the good veganism brings. Regardless if the parents were vegan or not, the child would have died on that diet. The difference is, if the parents were not vegan, the headlines would have read differently. It would have said, Parents convicted of murder, not Omnivore Meat Eating Parents Convicted of Murdering their Infant!. Its sad that the child died because the negligence, but it was involuntary manslaughter by all means. I'm convinced that the parents did not intentionally kill their child. They just didn't know better. And unfortunately, such ignorance will lead to Anti-Vegetarians to make claims that vegans shouldn't have kids, or that vegan diets are not sufficient for pregnant mothers and nursing mothers. I've even read some stupid articles claiming that vegans choose not to breast feed because human breast milk is against our beliefs. Vegans choose not to consume animal milk, human milk is a separate issue. Animals are not being harmed or dying from it. Whether a mother chooses to breast- feed is her choice and no one else should say otherwise. If the author of that article was educated and not just angry, he wouldn't make such false claims, but I guess we're all entitled to our own beliefs. I just hope people learn from this mistake and not dismiss it as a fault in veganism.
[FairfieldLife] tm ireland
Tony Blair's one success in his 10-year tenure is his fostering of peaceful developments in Northern Ireland (in co-operation with the Irish government)which have resulted in an extraordinary peace between die-hard opponents - now actually sharing power together. A Berlin wall experience.. But what was the contribution of TM groups in this? MMY pulled out from the UK a couple of years ago. So what info is there on special TM developments in North or South Ireland that could account for these extraordinary developments? Could any Irish readers help us out here? Thanks.
[FairfieldLife] Underwear Soup (Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming)
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: snip wonderful rap, to Ask not from whom does the globe warm, it warms from we. And until we taste the still-dilute redolence of industry in our water and air, until we become outraged at upstream pissers, until someone goes up to Adam and smacks him a good one in the puss and says spit that apple out of your mouth, we're all going to be served underwear soup. Very nice indeed.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- thanks for your outstanding points, most valid indeed!. OTOH, on occasion, metaphorical analogues to math/physics principles can be useful in helping us find parallels to certain deep, subtle properties of relative existence. The downside is the risk of logical errors such as the appeal to authorities, and geekspeak, or jargon. Since the TMO has been known to use some (or all) of such logical fallacies, we become naturally suspicious, and rightly so!. Such mathematical principles as the E8 Lie group point to (contrary to MMY and Hagelin) strictly relative principles, akin to the Buddhist principles of interconnectedness and dependent origination; and ultimately, the holographic nature of the universe: a concept pioneered in Buddhism - more so than in Hinduism. (wiki - the Buddhism of Tien Tai). At any rate, no, pure Consciousness - as pointed out by the quantum pioneers themselves (since some of them apparently had an intuitive knowledge of Being-In-Itself, especially Schroedinger); is not a subject of modern scientific inquiry (unless** - as pointed out by Jim Flanagan, we restrict the inquiry by safe qualifications such as this is my experience:..etc.. Then, such studies can be scientific as long as one doesn't tweak the statistics (as in the MUM studies). Thus, pure Consciousness is not a field. One can make parallels to certain facets of relative existence (explored and explained more by the Buddhists than Hindus) - particularly the nature of Dharma, karma, and reincarnation; and the various elements of cause and effects. As mentioned before, such relative concepts would be interconnectedness, dependent origination, and the holographic nature of existence. Such concepts may point to THAT, but as several contributors have already pointed out, there's no direct connection between Being and quantum mechanics. I might add that the concept of a Singularity has a ringing appeal to what me might experience as That; but again, a Singularity has to be something relative in order for scientists to investigate it, according to the commonly accepted notions of scientific inquiry. (that does not of course include private revelations). BTW private revelations were in the domain of the Gnostics, as opposed to appeal by Authorities ; such as the local Bishop, Pope, etc. Naturally, Gnosticism was a very dangerous, heretical approach; since if one can discover innate wisdom through interior inquiry, who needs the Pope? In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter drpetersutphen@ wrote: Just my usual too quick on the trigger response. I hear the term super string or anything of that ilk associated with TM and my brain locks-up! I'm sure it can have value for people, such as John Hagelin, who actually understand it and can facilitate deeper understanding of the mechanichs of consciousness, but for us lay folk it is mind numbing. That's its true purpose. :-) the invoking the too quick on the trigger response part or the mind numbing part? The mind numbing part. It's a sales technique designed to make the buyer think, O, these people are smarter than I am. I can tell because they use big words that I don't understand. There- fore they know what they're talking about. And so they sign on the dotted line, or continue to buy the inferior products of an inferior company because they have bought into the company's use of buzzwords. It's the same model used to sell hardware and software. We in the industry call it geekspeak. The more incomprehensible geekspeak you throw into the blurbs about your product, the more of the product you are likely to sell. Whatever the intellectual can I connect these possibly unrelated dots in my mind value that hypothetical exercises like Hagelin's might have for *him*, their value to the TM movement is as geekspeak. One of the trends that one finds in the study of *many* spiritual traditions is that many of the traditions that made the biggest impact on society, and in some cases have lasted the longest in history, were the ones that *dispensed with* geekspeak, or presented a clear alternative to it. Christ taught in the common language, using anal- ogies and metaphors that were comprehensible to the common man. As opposed to the language and the teachings used by the prevailing religions of his time. He developed a following. One of the primary reasons that the Catholic Church exterminated the Cathars was that they *taught in the common language*, not in Latin...and not in geekspeak. Buddha became popular because he rejected the high- falootin' language and rituals of the existing religions, and (again) taught in
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
TurquoiseB wrote: Back in the trashbin you go. Oh, my God! Barry put Jim back in the trashbin. That occured to me when writing it up. The exact *same* story can be pointed to by God freaks Where did that term come from? Is that the opposite of atheist freaks? Yes, and it's totally innocuous. It's a lingering Sixties-ism in my speech. So far on FFL I have used the term dozens of times, in contexts such as enlightenment freak and Bruce Cockburn freak or music freak (both referring to myself), or neat freak, or Mongo freak (referring to fans of a certain short fictional detective). It's a slang way of referring to the odd things that some people get off on. It has no negative connotations, except, seemingly, in your mind. And what's a God freak anyway? I think the term freak is possibly reserved for those pushing an agenda, as it appears you are doing now, my dear Buddhist atheist. Jim, since you stopped actively slamming me, I've taken a chance and replied to a few of your posts as if you were an adult, and as if you were actually a rational human being. My mistake. Back in the trashbin you go. Someday (in my opinion) you should try a little introspection and try to view yourself as others see you, not as you like to see yourself. First you react to me suggesting that Guru Dev would be shocked to hear himself referred to as His Divinity by his followers as if what I said was some kind of an insult. It was intended to be a *compliment*, dude. The term used to honor him by some...uh...Guru Dev freaks IMO *belittles* him, *belittles* a teacher of enlightenment, and *belittles* the whole process of enlightenment in my opinion, and that was what I intended to convey. But you perceived it as some kind of insult, and reacted as if you *personally* had been insulted. That's YOUR problem, dude, not mine. And now you take offense at a simple Sixties-ism, get all huffy and offended, and start hurling terms like atheist and Buddhist as if *they* were insults. Can't you *feel* the emotional loading that *you* place on such terms? I sure can, and I'd be willing to bet a few others on this forum have developed their intuition to the point that they can feel it, too. So back in the trashbin with you, dude. It's not worth trying to communicate with you if you're going to be so cluelessly reactive here. For the record, I don't care what other people believe, about God or about Guru Dev. I'm just trippin' on language, and occasionally pointing out when people make statements or ask questions based on *assumptions*. Their entire followup statement or question is based on *accepting* the assumption as true; otherwise the followup statement or question has no meaning. To react to the statement or to answer the question, one has to *accept* the assumption as true. Some of us don't accept those assumptions, is all. My agenda is merely to point out these assumptions when they occur, which is clearly in the spirit defined for this group on its main page. The vast majority of people on this planet believe in God, so much so that it has become a never-challenged assumption on their part. Some of *them* react strongly when someone points out the fact that it *is* an assumption, and a completely unproven assumption at that. It seems to me that this is what's going on here with your response. Despite your claim, you *are* trying to start something. Instead, by acting like a petulant child, you have ended something instead, my experiment in seeing if you could have a rational conver- sation without...uh...freaking out when you encounter ideas that differ from yours. I wish you the best of luck with your life and your beliefs. May they both make you very happy. But dude...I'm just TIRED of all the prepubes- cent arguing here, and want to spend what little time I spend here talking with adults who can treat ideas that differ from their own ideas as Just Ideas, not some kind of attack. You don't seem to be one of those people.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
Peter wrote: Lurk, what the f**k is your problem, you a**hole! ;-) Very impressive, Peter.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Jerry Falwell dead
Bhairitu wrote: I would have my doubts about him ever seeing Jesus. jstein wrote: I wouldn't. I'll bet Jesus can hardly wait. How much would you be willing to wager?
[FairfieldLife] Surfing Cannes
I've been watching the opening ceremonies of the Cannes Film Festival (the *60th* Cannes Film Festival) and all the hoopla and press conferences surrounding it and it appears that, unlike last year, there may be some pretty interesting films, both in competition and out of it. Out of competition there will be Sicko, of course, and U2 3D, which sounds pretty interesting -- a live U2 concert filmed in 3D. In competition there will be a new David Fincher flick, Zodiac, which is always of interest because it's a David Fincher flick. There will be new films from the Coen brothers and from Gus Van Sant and Tarantino. There will be what looks in the preview clips like a wonderful animated film from (I think) Iran that seems to reveal a great deal about what life is really like there. Iran has troubled youth and hippies and humor. :-) But the one that most has my attention after the opening day's hoopla is a new film by Chinese director Wong Kar Wai called My Blueberry Nights. I just watched the press conference on this one, featuring the director talking about his first English-language film, and two of the stars, Jude Law and Norah Jones. Yes, that Norah Jones. The director cast her without ever meeting her, just on the basis of her voice. She's never acted before. Judging from her presence at the press conference and the awed reaction of the journalists who had just seen the film that she and Jude Law had not yet seen, I think we can expect a *stunning* performance from her, and from the more seasoned actors she got to work with like Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Tim Roth, and Rachel Weisz. My Blueberry Nights is a road movie, and that alone would have me looking forward to it, but the sense of *family* that I perceived between the actors and the director during this press conference *really* has me looking forward to it. More from Cannes as I find it by clicking through the French satellite channels. It's not as if I'm really there or anything, but the surprising availability of so much footage of the films themselves and the press conferences and ceremonies is almost like being there. I may put on my tux before clicking further.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
Sorry sinhlnx, I'm finding it harder to follow your points than Hagelin's! And you're not even using any quantum maths! strictly relative principles, akin to the Buddhist principles of interconnectedness and dependent origination - MMY consistently identifies the Unified Field with the ABSOLUTE, the origin of the dualistic Relative. holographic nature of the universe: a concept pioneered in Buddhism - if you mean things like smaller than the smallest = greater than the greatest; or as above, so below; or as is the atom, so is the universe etc then such holographic parallels predate Buddhism.. pure Consciousness is not a field - Hagelin says it's the field of all fields; a field effect of consciousness, as in the Maharishi Effect, means that changes in the coherence and quality of indivindual consciousness has an effect on others over and above one- to-one interactions through action or communication. I think this is not anti-Buddhist. The Natural Mind, Buddha Nature, transcends individuality.. enlivening the Buddha Nature in oneself naturally creates positive effects in others - a field effect. there's no direct connection between Being and quantum mechanics - Hagelin talks of superstring theory. Transcending the individual mind and the quantum + gravity unification brings us to the Unified Field Consciousness - the Being or pure consciousness/existence of everything.. So don't really see where the discrepancy between MMY and Buddhism lies. I personally see myself as more Buddhist than anything else.. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, sinhlnx [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- thanks for your outstanding points, most valid indeed!. OTOH, on occasion, metaphorical analogues to math/physics principles can be useful in helping us find parallels to certain deep, subtle properties of relative existence. The downside is the risk of logical errors such as the appeal to authorities, and geekspeak, or jargon. Since the TMO has been known to use some (or all) of such logical fallacies, we become naturally suspicious, and rightly so!. Such mathematical principles as the E8 Lie group point to (contrary to MMY and Hagelin) strictly relative principles, akin to the Buddhist principles of interconnectedness and dependent origination; and ultimately, the holographic nature of the universe: a concept pioneered in Buddhism - more so than in Hinduism. (wiki - the Buddhism of Tien Tai). At any rate, no, pure Consciousness - as pointed out by the quantum pioneers themselves (since some of them apparently had an intuitive knowledge of Being-In-Itself, especially Schroedinger); is not a subject of modern scientific inquiry (unless** - as pointed out by Jim Flanagan, we restrict the inquiry by safe qualifications such as this is my experience:..etc.. Then, such studies can be scientific as long as one doesn't tweak the statistics (as in the MUM studies). Thus, pure Consciousness is not a field. One can make parallels to certain facets of relative existence (explored and explained more by the Buddhists than Hindus) - particularly the nature of Dharma, karma, and reincarnation; and the various elements of cause and effects. As mentioned before, such relative concepts would be interconnectedness, dependent origination, and the holographic nature of existence. Such concepts may point to THAT, but as several contributors have already pointed out, there's no direct connection between Being and quantum mechanics. I might add that the concept of a Singularity has a ringing appeal to what me might experience as That; but again, a Singularity has to be something relative in order for scientists to investigate it, according to the commonly accepted notions of scientific inquiry. (that does not of course include private revelations). BTW private revelations were in the domain of the Gnostics, as opposed to appeal by Authorities ; such as the local Bishop, Pope, etc. Naturally, Gnosticism was a very dangerous, heretical approach; since if one can discover innate wisdom through interior inquiry, who needs the Pope? In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter drpetersutphen@ wrote: Just my usual too quick on the trigger response. I hear the term super string or anything of that ilk associated with TM and my brain locks-up! I'm sure it can have value for people, such as John Hagelin, who actually understand it and can facilitate deeper understanding of the mechanichs of consciousness, but for us lay folk it is mind numbing. That's its true purpose. :-) the invoking the too quick on the trigger response part or the mind numbing part?
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
Claudiouk, Please tell me the definitions you'd have for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field. I think you're being fuzzy and mixing the Absolute with Being, but I see Being as the relative, qualities that must be described dualistically -- thus, I would say that the Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute. This fuzziness is what I finally decided was a tell about the lack of subtlety for Maharishi's vocabulary. To me, soul, consciousness, Being, atma, are all in the relative. They're egoically spawned concepts. Tell me your definitions for awareness and sentience while you're at it. To me the Absolute is pure mystery -- Being can pretend to be the Absolute, even fool the rishi's that it is the Absolute, but I've seen the Absolute, and Being, I gotta tell ya, you're no Jack Kennedy. Anyone else want a piece of this? Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, claudiouk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sorry sinhlnx, I'm finding it harder to follow your points than Hagelin's! And you're not even using any quantum maths! strictly relative principles, akin to the Buddhist principles of interconnectedness and dependent origination - MMY consistently identifies the Unified Field with the ABSOLUTE, the origin of the dualistic Relative. holographic nature of the universe: a concept pioneered in Buddhism - if you mean things like smaller than the smallest = greater than the greatest; or as above, so below; or as is the atom, so is the universe etc then such holographic parallels predate Buddhism.. pure Consciousness is not a field - Hagelin says it's the field of all fields; a field effect of consciousness, as in the Maharishi Effect, means that changes in the coherence and quality of indivindual consciousness has an effect on others over and above one- to-one interactions through action or communication. I think this is not anti-Buddhist. The Natural Mind, Buddha Nature, transcends individuality.. enlivening the Buddha Nature in oneself naturally creates positive effects in others - a field effect. there's no direct connection between Being and quantum mechanics - Hagelin talks of superstring theory. Transcending the individual mind and the quantum + gravity unification brings us to the Unified Field Consciousness - the Being or pure consciousness/existence of everything.. So don't really see where the discrepancy between MMY and Buddhism lies. I personally see myself as more Buddhist than anything else.. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, sinhlnx sinhlnx@ wrote: --- thanks for your outstanding points, most valid indeed!. OTOH, on occasion, metaphorical analogues to math/physics principles can be useful in helping us find parallels to certain deep, subtle properties of relative existence. The downside is the risk of logical errors such as the appeal to authorities, and geekspeak, or jargon. Since the TMO has been known to use some (or all) of such logical fallacies, we become naturally suspicious, and rightly so!. Such mathematical principles as the E8 Lie group point to (contrary to MMY and Hagelin) strictly relative principles, akin to the Buddhist principles of interconnectedness and dependent origination; and ultimately, the holographic nature of the universe: a concept pioneered in Buddhism - more so than in Hinduism. (wiki - the Buddhism of Tien Tai). At any rate, no, pure Consciousness - as pointed out by the quantum pioneers themselves (since some of them apparently had an intuitive knowledge of Being-In-Itself, especially Schroedinger); is not a subject of modern scientific inquiry (unless** - as pointed out by Jim Flanagan, we restrict the inquiry by safe qualifications such as this is my experience:..etc.. Then, such studies can be scientific as long as one doesn't tweak the statistics (as in the MUM studies). Thus, pure Consciousness is not a field. One can make parallels to certain facets of relative existence (explored and explained more by the Buddhists than Hindus) - particularly the nature of Dharma, karma, and reincarnation; and the various elements of cause and effects. As mentioned before, such relative concepts would be interconnectedness, dependent origination, and the holographic nature of existence. Such concepts may point to THAT, but as several contributors have already pointed out, there's no direct connection between Being and quantum mechanics. I might add that the concept of a Singularity has a ringing appeal to what me might experience as That; but again, a Singularity has to be something relative in order for scientists to investigate it, according to the commonly accepted notions of scientific inquiry. (that does not of course include private revelations). BTW private revelations were in the domain of the Gnostics, as
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Claudiouk, Please tell me the definitions you'd have for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field. I think you're being fuzzy and mixing the Absolute with Being, but I see Being as the relative, qualities that must be described dualistically -- thus, I would say that the Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute. This fuzziness is what I finally decided was a tell about the lack of subtlety for Maharishi's vocabulary. To me, soul, consciousness, Being, atma, are all in the relative. They're egoically spawned concepts. Tell me your definitions for awareness and sentience while you're at it. To me the Absolute is pure mystery -- Being can pretend to be the Absolute, even fool the rishi's that it is the Absolute, but I've seen the Absolute, and Being, I gotta tell ya, you're no Jack Kennedy. Anyone else want a piece of this? I'll jump in, even though I haven't thought about this stuff in Physics metaphors since I left the TM movement (and haven't missed thinking that way). I suspect you have a good point about any Unified Field Theory that physicists could come up with having to do purely with the relative world. That is the only field they play in. As for the relative world not being Jack Kennedy, however, my experiences have con- vinced me that it *is* Jack Kennedy. Although the relative world is purely relative, it is *also* pure Absolute. That is the very essence of its mystery. But, at the same time, I have my doubts as to science's ability to ever grok that, much less include it in any of their theories of How Things Work. Things only work in the field of the relative, and thus that is the field they are playing in and trying to find some way to describe. That'll take them long enough and will be challenging enough. They should leave asking the Absolute to get up off the bench and join the game to mystics.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
you're no Jack Kennedy - not sure what THAT means.. no I'm Claudio. I'm sure we all have our own views on these matters and how far our definitions are fuzzy, and how bad that is in fact, is all rather fuzzy to me. I think language can only point the way.. re definitions for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field - I don't find MMY's usage of these terms, as in his Gita or more recent pronouncements, problematic. They refer to a transcendental realm of awareness, beyong thoughts or concepts or even objective reality, which is universal, oneness, non-duality, the fundamental reality of Being, Existence, Reality.. as opposed to duality, individuality, physical reality characterised by locality, isolation etc. Can't say I'm philosophically minded so not that bothered with fuzzy thinking. re Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute - suggests you yourselk have an understanding of the difference between Absolute and Relative. The Unifield Field is the theoretical Non- Duality of Nature, the Unity underlying the Diversity of the Relative. Hence I don't find it that difficult to equate it with the Absolute. Yes we are dealing with concepts that have arisen from different epochs and philosophical traditions but if one takes a broader view one can see the equivalences and idsentities rather than get bogged down obsessively with finer details that end up distorting the reality. But hey, that's just my opinion and understanding. So what conclusions are you making from your premises as expressed in your posting (apart from questioning mine, I mean)? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Claudiouk, Please tell me the definitions you'd have for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field. I think you're being fuzzy and mixing the Absolute with Being, but I see Being as the relative, qualities that must be described dualistically -- thus, I would say that the Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute. This fuzziness is what I finally decided was a tell about the lack of subtlety for Maharishi's vocabulary. To me, soul, consciousness, Being, atma, are all in the relative. They're egoically spawned concepts. Tell me your definitions for awareness and sentience while you're at it. To me the Absolute is pure mystery -- Being can pretend to be the Absolute, even fool the rishi's that it is the Absolute, but I've seen the Absolute, and Being, I gotta tell ya, you're no Jack Kennedy. Anyone else want a piece of this? Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, claudiouk claudiouk@ wrote: Sorry sinhlnx, I'm finding it harder to follow your points than Hagelin's! And you're not even using any quantum maths! strictly relative principles, akin to the Buddhist principles of interconnectedness and dependent origination - MMY consistently identifies the Unified Field with the ABSOLUTE, the origin of the dualistic Relative. holographic nature of the universe: a concept pioneered in Buddhism - if you mean things like smaller than the smallest = greater than the greatest; or as above, so below; or as is the atom, so is the universe etc then such holographic parallels predate Buddhism.. pure Consciousness is not a field - Hagelin says it's the field of all fields; a field effect of consciousness, as in the Maharishi Effect, means that changes in the coherence and quality of indivindual consciousness has an effect on others over and above one- to-one interactions through action or communication. I think this is not anti-Buddhist. The Natural Mind, Buddha Nature, transcends individuality.. enlivening the Buddha Nature in oneself naturally creates positive effects in others - a field effect. there's no direct connection between Being and quantum mechanics - Hagelin talks of superstring theory. Transcending the individual mind and the quantum + gravity unification brings us to the Unified Field Consciousness - the Being or pure consciousness/existence of everything.. So don't really see where the discrepancy between MMY and Buddhism lies. I personally see myself as more Buddhist than anything else.. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, sinhlnx sinhlnx@ wrote: --- thanks for your outstanding points, most valid indeed!. OTOH, on occasion, metaphorical analogues to math/physics principles can be useful in helping us find parallels to certain deep, subtle properties of relative existence. The downside is the risk of logical errors such as the appeal to authorities, and geekspeak, or jargon. Since the TMO has been known to use some (or all) of such logical fallacies, we become naturally suspicious, and rightly so!. Such mathematical principles as the E8 Lie group point to (contrary to MMY and Hagelin) strictly
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Claudiouk, Please tell me the definitions you'd have for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field. I think you're being fuzzy and mixing the Absolute with Being, but I see Being as the relative, qualities that must be described dualistically -- thus, I would say that the Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute. This fuzziness is what I finally decided was a tell about the lack of subtlety for Maharishi's vocabulary. To me, soul, consciousness, Being, atma, are all in the relative. They're egoically spawned concepts. Tell me your definitions for awareness and sentience while you're at it. To me the Absolute is pure mystery -- Being can pretend to be the Absolute, even fool the rishi's that it is the Absolute, but I've seen the Absolute, and Being, I gotta tell ya, you're no Jack Kennedy. Anyone else want a piece of this? In my understanding, Consciousness, Being, Absolute, and Unified Field are all synonymous in MMY's teaching.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
To me Being is all the gunas perfectly balanced but still having the quality of being manifest -- that is, observable and thus distinct from the Absolute -- just exactly as a mirror is functional but invisible to human eyes that are tuned to see only to the mirror's reflections. That quality of having all qualities nested in virtual potential, and its quality of objectivity, these are what I think the Unified Field is to today's physicists -- they make statements like an infinite amount of energy can come from any cubic centimeter of virtual field. Sounds like Brahma to me. Now, what kicks Being off balance and into full manifestation? Can't be nothing but the Absolute, right? But the Absolute has no feet! And in fact the Absolute does NOT have the quality of having no feet too! See? Gonna come out stupid sounding whenever one talks about the Absolute. That's the mystery -- there's no connection between the Absolute and Being and this is a powerful deep truth, but as Turq just reminded us, the Relative is nothing but the Absolute. Hence the paradox -- Godel loved it. I'm waiting for a physicist to say, Hey, is it just me, or did I just see the universe blink off for a scintillation's halflife? Then, I'll say they're sniffing around the Absolute's hydrant. In a dream, everything's real only as long as the dreamer is there. Of all the statements one can make about the Absolute, that pausing of bliss, that silence of deep dreamless sleep is about as truthful as any lie a brain can tell. Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, claudiouk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: you're no Jack Kennedy - not sure what THAT means.. no I'm Claudio. I'm sure we all have our own views on these matters and how far our definitions are fuzzy, and how bad that is in fact, is all rather fuzzy to me. I think language can only point the way.. re definitions for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field - I don't find MMY's usage of these terms, as in his Gita or more recent pronouncements, problematic. They refer to a transcendental realm of awareness, beyong thoughts or concepts or even objective reality, which is universal, oneness, non-duality, the fundamental reality of Being, Existence, Reality.. as opposed to duality, individuality, physical reality characterised by locality, isolation etc. Can't say I'm philosophically minded so not that bothered with fuzzy thinking. re Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute - suggests you yourselk have an understanding of the difference between Absolute and Relative. The Unifield Field is the theoretical Non- Duality of Nature, the Unity underlying the Diversity of the Relative. Hence I don't find it that difficult to equate it with the Absolute. Yes we are dealing with concepts that have arisen from different epochs and philosophical traditions but if one takes a broader view one can see the equivalences and idsentities rather than get bogged down obsessively with finer details that end up distorting the reality. But hey, that's just my opinion and understanding. So what conclusions are you making from your premises as expressed in your posting (apart from questioning mine, I mean)? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung no_reply@ wrote: Claudiouk, Please tell me the definitions you'd have for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field. I think you're being fuzzy and mixing the Absolute with Being, but I see Being as the relative, qualities that must be described dualistically -- thus, I would say that the Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute. This fuzziness is what I finally decided was a tell about the lack of subtlety for Maharishi's vocabulary. To me, soul, consciousness, Being, atma, are all in the relative. They're egoically spawned concepts. Tell me your definitions for awareness and sentience while you're at it. To me the Absolute is pure mystery -- Being can pretend to be the Absolute, even fool the rishi's that it is the Absolute, but I've seen the Absolute, and Being, I gotta tell ya, you're no Jack Kennedy. Anyone else want a piece of this? Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, claudiouk claudiouk@ wrote: Sorry sinhlnx, I'm finding it harder to follow your points than Hagelin's! And you're not even using any quantum maths! strictly relative principles, akin to the Buddhist principles of interconnectedness and dependent origination - MMY consistently identifies the Unified Field with the ABSOLUTE, the origin of the dualistic Relative. holographic nature of the universe: a concept pioneered in Buddhism - if you mean things like smaller than the smallest = greater than the greatest; or as above, so below; or as is the atom, so is the universe etc then such holographic parallels predate
[FairfieldLife] Re: Reflections on Patanjali's Yoga Sutras (For Richard and all)
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On May 15, 2007, at 1:31 PM, John wrote: I believe Patanjali had inherited the knowlege of the nature of the divine through his vedic background. What Vedic background? Probably the one called Rig Vedyou know, the oldest transmitted record? Remember?the one that is orated in Sanskrit, and as the oldest record of such. Yoga Sutras are also orated in Sanskrit. You know...the one that talks about yogis and yoga. Remember that one?...The Rig Ved. OffWorld
[FairfieldLife] Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming
Countries that stands to lose heavily due to Global-Warming are India, bangladesh, Mexico and most African countries. Countries that stand to gain from Global-Warming are Canada, Russia, North-european countries and ofcourse Alaska. An arid and desicated India cannot create Maharishi's Ram-Raj. shempmcgurk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Date: Wed, 16 May 2007 15:29:40 - Subject: [FairfieldLife] The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming Czech president calls for rational debate on global warming, rejects current hysteria The Associated Press Wednesday, May 16, 2007 PRAGUE, Czech Republic: Czech President Vaclav Klaus on Wednesday called for a rational debate on global warming, rejecting what he called hysteria driven by enviromentalists. Let's bring the debate to whether the 0.6 (degree Celsius warming over the last century) is much or little, how much Man has contributed to the warming and ... if there is anything at all Man can do about it, Klaus said when presenting his book Blue, Not a Green Planet. He charged that groups other than scientists have now seized on the topic and ambitious environmentalists are fueling a global warming hysteria that has no solid ground in fact and allows manipulation of people. It is about a key topic of our time, and that is the topic of human freedom and its curtailment, Klaus said. The approach of environmentalists toward nature is similar to the Marxist approach to economic rules, because they also try to replace free spontaneity of the evolution of the world (and of mankind) with ... global planning of the world's development, Klaus writes in his book. That approach ... is a utopia leading to completely other than wanted results, he says. Klaus, an economist by profession, has repeatedly warned that policy makers are pushed by the widespread fear of global warming to adopt enormously costly programs that eventually may have no positive effect. Klaus served as Czechoslovak finance minister after the 1989 fall of communism and as Czech prime minister after Czechoslovakia split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. As president, he now has mainly ceremonial powers. - Be a better Globetrotter. Get better travel answers from someone who knows. Yahoo! Answers - Check it out.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Reflections on Patanjali's Yoga Sutras (For Billy G. and all)
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Richard J. Williams [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: John wrote: As an extension of Chopra's analogy, we can say that if one has not reached cosmic consciousness, then the phenomenal world is an illusion or Maya due to the effects of the gunas. The point I was trying to make, John, is that if Purusha, the Transcendental Person, is part and parcel of the relative world of prakriti and subject to the three gunas, then, according to Shankara, the highest God, Creator Brahm, is just an illusion - a result of Maya, thus not real. You are mistaken, the creator brahm is not the highest god. Mahalakshmi is. OffWorld If God is an illusion and not real, then there is no Transcendental Person in the absolute sense. You must admit that this is a significant conundrum and probably the reason why all the Upanishadic commentators ascribed to either dualism, quasi-dulaism, or qualified dualsism - Ramanuja, Madhva, Vallaba, Nimbarka, and Chaitanya, instead of adwaita. While all these acharyas were transcendentalists, they did not agree with Shankara concerning the Absolute nature of the Purusha. In fact, as pointed out by Vaj, the notion that Brahman is an unmanifest and impersonal Absolute without attributes is almost pure Middle Way Buddhism (Madyamika). It is very difficult to relate on a personal level to a non-person and at the same time call that person God, who is obviously a Person, by definition, according to the Upanishads.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
Being is all the gunas perfectly balanced but still having the quality of being manifest - MMY, frequently talked about Being = the Absolute and, for instance in the Gita, how the Gunas are the first Relative manifestation from this Absolute/Being. the Relative is nothing but the Absolute is just because the manifestation is just another point of view of the Absolute - as Hagelin tried to show, even in the Unified Fileld equations, one can discern the non-duality underlying diversity. And in higher states of consciousness first the distinction betweeen Absolute and Relative is established, then the non-duality of reality. All rather theoretical stuff for me anyway - I'll wait and see what personal experience brings - so far nothing remotely about Gunas or Being or Absolutes.. unfortunately. But going back to your formulation, if the Absolute is NOT Being, and Being is just a finer value of the Relative, and there is a mystery about how the Absolute becomes Relative, what consequences/implications you see in that then regarding meditation, knowledge, enlightenment etc? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: To me Being is all the gunas perfectly balanced but still having the quality of being manifest -- that is, observable and thus distinct from the Absolute -- just exactly as a mirror is functional but invisible to human eyes that are tuned to see only to the mirror's reflections. That quality of having all qualities nested in virtual potential, and its quality of objectivity, these are what I think the Unified Field is to today's physicists -- they make statements like an infinite amount of energy can come from any cubic centimeter of virtual field. Sounds like Brahma to me. Now, what kicks Being off balance and into full manifestation? Can't be nothing but the Absolute, right? But the Absolute has no feet! And in fact the Absolute does NOT have the quality of having no feet too! See? Gonna come out stupid sounding whenever one talks about the Absolute. That's the mystery -- there's no connection between the Absolute and Being and this is a powerful deep truth, but as Turq just reminded us, the Relative is nothing but the Absolute. Hence the paradox -- Godel loved it. I'm waiting for a physicist to say, Hey, is it just me, or did I just see the universe blink off for a scintillation's halflife? Then, I'll say they're sniffing around the Absolute's hydrant. In a dream, everything's real only as long as the dreamer is there. Of all the statements one can make about the Absolute, that pausing of bliss, that silence of deep dreamless sleep is about as truthful as any lie a brain can tell. Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, claudiouk claudiouk@ wrote: you're no Jack Kennedy - not sure what THAT means.. no I'm Claudio. I'm sure we all have our own views on these matters and how far our definitions are fuzzy, and how bad that is in fact, is all rather fuzzy to me. I think language can only point the way.. re definitions for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field - I don't find MMY's usage of these terms, as in his Gita or more recent pronouncements, problematic. They refer to a transcendental realm of awareness, beyong thoughts or concepts or even objective reality, which is universal, oneness, non- duality, the fundamental reality of Being, Existence, Reality.. as opposed to duality, individuality, physical reality characterised by locality, isolation etc. Can't say I'm philosophically minded so not that bothered with fuzzy thinking. re Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute - suggests you yourselk have an understanding of the difference between Absolute and Relative. The Unifield Field is the theoretical Non- Duality of Nature, the Unity underlying the Diversity of the Relative. Hence I don't find it that difficult to equate it with the Absolute. Yes we are dealing with concepts that have arisen from different epochs and philosophical traditions but if one takes a broader view one can see the equivalences and idsentities rather than get bogged down obsessively with finer details that end up distorting the reality. But hey, that's just my opinion and understanding. So what conclusions are you making from your premises as expressed in your posting (apart from questioning mine, I mean)? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung no_reply@ wrote: Claudiouk, Please tell me the definitions you'd have for consciousness, the Absolute, Being, and the Unified Field. I think you're being fuzzy and mixing the Absolute with Being, but I see Being as the relative, qualities that must be described dualistically -- thus, I would say that the Unified Field is a good metaphor for Being, not the Absolute. This fuzziness
[FairfieldLife] Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Jason Spock [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Countries that stands to lose heavily due to Global-Warming are India, India's got 1.129 billion people. It's high time you folks stopped fucking like jack-rabbits. bangladesh, Mexico and most African countries. Countries that stand to gain from Global-Warming are Canada, Russia, North-european countries and ofcourse Alaska. An arid and desicated India cannot create Maharishi's Ram- Raj. shempmcgurk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Date: Wed, 16 May 2007 15:29:40 - Subject: [FairfieldLife] The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global- warming Czech president calls for rational debate on global warming, rejects current hysteria The Associated Press Wednesday, May 16, 2007 PRAGUE, Czech Republic: Czech President Vaclav Klaus on Wednesday called for a rational debate on global warming, rejecting what he called hysteria driven by enviromentalists. Let's bring the debate to whether the 0.6 (degree Celsius warming over the last century) is much or little, how much Man has contributed to the warming and ... if there is anything at all Man can do about it, Klaus said when presenting his book Blue, Not a Green Planet. He charged that groups other than scientists have now seized on the topic and ambitious environmentalists are fueling a global warming hysteria that has no solid ground in fact and allows manipulation of people. It is about a key topic of our time, and that is the topic of human freedom and its curtailment, Klaus said. The approach of environmentalists toward nature is similar to the Marxist approach to economic rules, because they also try to replace free spontaneity of the evolution of the world (and of mankind) with ... global planning of the world's development, Klaus writes in his book. That approach ... is a utopia leading to completely other than wanted results, he says. Klaus, an economist by profession, has repeatedly warned that policy makers are pushed by the widespread fear of global warming to adopt enormously costly programs that eventually may have no positive effect. Klaus served as Czechoslovak finance minister after the 1989 fall of communism and as Czech prime minister after Czechoslovakia split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. As president, he now has mainly ceremonial powers. - Be a better Globetrotter. Get better travel answers from someone who knows. Yahoo! Answers - Check it out.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Reflections on Patanjali's Yoga Sutras
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Richard J. Williams [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: According to Patanjali, Ishvara is the inner controller, higher than even the subtlest relative. Billy wrote: In some circles Ishvara represents Brahman and his consort Prakriti, wherein is found his immanent nature Brahma, the son, the Creative intelligence behind and controlling the Gunas/Prakriti. There's no mention in Patanjali's Yoga Sutras of Ishvara and his consort And yet Rama and Sita were known in ancient Egypt, at least 3,000 years earlier, as was Sanskrit. OffWorld - that idea came much later with the rise of the tantric sects during the Gupta Age. The Yoga of Patanjali is based on the Sankhya or radical dualism - there's no shakti in it and no impersonal God, which if you think about it, is a contradiction in terms.
[FairfieldLife] Shemp and 72 virgins
Lets assume Shemp is to get 72 virgins in paradise. Here sir Shemp some incentives for you. If you purchase carbon credits, you get 142 virgins. If you prevent Global-Warming, you get 252 virgins. If you promote Global-Cooling, you get 372 virgins. If you protect the Amazon rain-forest, you get 462 virgins. If you give Mexican workers a fair deal, you get 582 virgins. If you prevent Pollution, you get 622 virgins. If you protect endangered species, you get 742 virgins. If you bring in Massive Solar - electricity, you 832 virgins. If you usher in the Ram-Raj, the Golden age, you get a White Robe and a Golden Harp.!! - It's here! Your new message! Get new email alerts with the free Yahoo! Toolbar.
[FairfieldLife] Christian quiz
In celebration of the death of Jerry Falwell, here is a flash quiz on Christian trivia. Answers below (must scroll down) Questions: 1) Are there more Sikhs or Christians in India? 2) Which country has more Christians: India or Venezuela? Answers: 1) Christians are 2.3% of the population and Sikhs are 1.9% 2) India has just about the same amount of Christians as Venezuela: about 26 million.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Christian quiz
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, shempmcgurk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In celebration of the death of Jerry Falwell, here is a flash quiz on Christian trivia. Answers below (must scroll down) Questions: 1) Are there more Sikhs or Christians in India? 2) Which country has more Christians: India or Venezuela? I think the Indians when asked are they Muslims, Sikhs, or Krisnians?, then, Yes, I am a Chrisnian is often the answer Christians are stupid. Krishna was born from a Virgin, was poor but of Royal descent, created many miracles, and in some versions was crucified...and of course...reincarnates again. Chrisna is Krishna. Interesting Video here: http://tinyurl.com/2pzoda OffWorld
Re: [FairfieldLife] tm ireland
In a message dated 5/16/07 12:54:51 P.M. Central Daylight Time, clau [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Tony Blair's one success in his 10-year tenure is his fostering of peaceful developments in Northern Ireland (in co-operation with the Irish government)which have resulted in an extraordinary peace between die-hard opponents - now actually sharing power together. A Berlin wall experience.. But what was the contribution of TM groups in this? MMY pulled out from the UK a couple of years ago. So what info is there on special TM developments in North or South Ireland that could account for these extraordinary developments? Could any Irish readers help us out here? Thanks. Yes , it's the English and Irish immigrants in the US practicing TM that are having the ME on their motherlands.er something like that. ** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Underwear Soup (Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on g...
In a message dated 5/16/07 1:17:28 P.M. Central Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: until someone goes up to Adam and smacks him a good one in the puss and says spit that apple out of your mouth, we're all going Adam wasn't the first to piss in the stream, it was Eve! ** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The sane voice of Vaclav Klaus on global-warming
In a message dated 5/16/07 5:06:02 P.M. Central Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Countries that stands to lose heavily due to Global-Warming are India, bangladesh, Mexico and most African countries. Countries that stand to gain from Global-Warming are Canada, Russia, North-european countries and ofcourse Alaska. An arid and desicated India cannot create Maharishi's Ram-Raj. All they have to do are some yagyas and play the Rain Raga ** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.
[FairfieldLife] Hitchens comments on Falwells death
Awesome Vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkAPaEMwyKU OffWorld
[FairfieldLife] Ron Paul?
Republican Ron Paul KNOWS that he will never overturn a woman's right to choose about her own body. Apart from that he seems like the next best leader next to Obama OffWorld
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues I think the next generations are more vulnerable to infotainment graphics that sum up complexities into simple images. That is how their mind's are being trained to process. It has a similar effect but uses a different sense to achieve its no question goal. Yeah those damn kids. When we were their age we use to have to trod through 20 miles of snow to go rounding or fly in the domes. Kids! Next thing you know they will be listening to rock'n'roll -- or even blues music!. (the devils music)
[FairfieldLife] Re: Speaking of Buddha....at Target
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I've never seen a portrait of the Buddha in which he looked happier. Even though he kept thinking, I know this is not going to end well ... um suffering and all
[FairfieldLife] Re: Inhofe: Scientists are reversing their stand
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: (Shemp, it sure would be nice if you'd go to the trouble to post links to your articles so we know where they're from.) The Journal of Fringe and Insane Scientists has strict copyright laws.
[FairfieldLife] Ron Paul
Republican Ron Paul KNOWS that he will never overturn a woman's right to choose about her own body. Apart from that he seems like the next best leader next to Obama. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5VeaUW12pY OffWorld
[FairfieldLife] Re: Inhofe: Scientists are reversing their stand
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: (Shemp, it sure would be nice if you'd go to the trouble to post links to your articles so we know where they're from.) The Journal of Fringe and Insane Scientists has strict copyright laws. ROTFL!!
[FairfieldLife] Dalai Lama Quote from Snow Lion Publications
Note: forwarded message attached. - Don't get soaked. Take a quick peak at the forecast with theYahoo! Search weather shortcut.---BeginMessage--- Title: Snow Lion Publications Newsletter Dalai Lama Quote of the Week If we have been reborn time after time, it is evident that we have needed many mothers to give birth to us the first cause bringing about bodhicitta is the recognition that all beings have been our mother. The love and kindness shown us by our mother in this life would be difficult to repay. She endured many sleepless nights to care for us when we were helpless infants. She fed us and would have willingly sacrificed everything, including her own life, to spare ours. As we contemplate her example of devoted love, we should consider that each and every being throughout existence has treated us this way. Each dog, cat, fish, fly, and human being has at some point in the beginningless past been our mother and shown us overwhelming love and kindness. Such a thought should bring about our appreciation. ...if all other sentient beings who have been kind to us since beginningless time are suffering, how can we devote ourselves to pursuing merely our own happiness? To seek our own happiness in spite of the suffering others are experiencing is tragically unfortunate. Therefore, it is clear that we must try to free all sentient beings from suffering. --from An Open Heart: Practicing Compassion in Everyday Life by the Dalai Lama, edited by Nicholas Vreeland, afterword by Khyongla Rato and Richard Gere SNOW LION PUBLICATIONS is dedicated to the preservation of Tibetan Buddhism and culture by publishing books about this great tradition. Tibetan culture is seriously endangered in its homeland and is striving to continue outside of Tibet. To support this effort, in addition to publishing and distributing books, Snow Lion offers a wide range of dharma items, purchased primarily from Tibetans in exile. These include visual art and ritual objects, statues and thangkas, videos, traditional music, and many gift items offered through our webstore and "Snow Lion Buddhist News Catalog" (Newsletter)--over 2000 items--the largest selection anywhere. To browse the complete list go towww.snowlionpub.comand select any of the categories in left-hand margin. When you choose to purchase from Snow Lion you are directly supporting the large effort to publish more Buddhist texts and help the Tibetan people.THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT. You are receiving this announcement from Snow Lion Publications because you have previously subscribed on our website. To continue receiving messages, we recommend that you add [EMAIL PROTECTED] and [EMAIL PROTECTED] to your address book. If you'd like to change or cancel your subscription, please visit our subscription pages at www.snowlionpub.com/pages/lists.php, www.snowlionpub.com/pages/unsubscribe.php,or email us at [EMAIL PROTECTED]. Please note that these announcements are also available in plain text, if you are having trouble receiving them. AN OPEN HEART:Practicing Compassion in Everyday Life by the Dalai Lama,edited by Nicholas Vreeland, afterwordby Khyongla Rato and Richard Geremore... Contact Us: N. America:(800) 950-0313 Worldwide:(607) 273-8519 By Mail: PO Box 6483, Ithaca, NY 14851 USA By Email:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On the Web:www.snowlionpub.com New Items Available Online: New Books New Dharma Items On Sale! Gifts 2007 Calendars General Catalog: www.snowlionpub.com Sign Up: Receive Snow Lion's Weekly Quotes, Announcements, or Quarterly "Snow Lion Buddhist News Catalog" at the List Management Center. Snow Lion Publications is happy to send you a weekly quote from various Tibetan Buddhist teachers. Visit our website for these related items: 20% OFF all Snow Lion Titles in our Library of Tibetan Buddhism Culture Read the Latest Edition ofthe "Snow Lion Buddhist
[FairfieldLife] Dalai Lama Quote
Note: forwarded message attached. - Get your own web address. Have a HUGE year through Yahoo! Small Business.---BeginMessage--- Title: Snow Lion Publications Newsletter Dalai Lama Quote of the Week The theory of interdependence allows us to develop a wider perspective. With wider mind, there is less attachment to destructive emotions like anger, therefore more forgiveness. In today's world, every nation is heavily interdependent, interconnected. Under these circumstances, destroying your enemy--your neighbor--means destroying yourself in the long run. You need your neighbor. More prosperity in your neighbor, you'll get the benefit. Now, we're not talking about the complete removal of feelings like anger, attachment, or pride. Just reduction. Interdependence is important because it is not a mere concept; it can actually help reduce the suffering caused by these destructive emotions. We can say the theory of interdependence is an understanding of reality. We understand that our future depends on global well-being. Having this viewpoint reduces narrow-mindedness. With narrow mind, one is more likely to develop attachment, hatred. I think this is the best thing about the theory of interdependence--it is an explanation of the law of nature. It affects profoundly, for example, the environment. --from The Wisdom of Forgiveness: Intimate Conversations and Journeys by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Victor Chan * * * * The latest news is now available on line in the Snow Lion Buddhist News & Catalog. SNOW LION PUBLICATIONS is dedicated to the preservation of Tibetan Buddhism and culture by publishing books about this great tradition. Tibetan culture is seriously endangered in its homeland and is striving to continue outside of Tibet. To support this effort, in addition to publishing and distributing books, Snow Lion offers a wide range of dharma items, purchased primarily from Tibetans in exile. These include visual art and ritual objects, statues and thangkas, videos, traditional music, and many gift items offered through our webstore and "Snow Lion Buddhist News Catalog" (Newsletter)--over 2000 items--the largest selection anywhere. To browse the complete list go towww.snowlionpub.comand select any of the categories in left-hand margin. When you choose to purchase from Snow Lion you are directly supporting the large effort to publish more Buddhist texts and help the Tibetan people.THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT. You are receiving this announcement from Snow Lion Publications because you have previously subscribed on our website. To continue receiving messages, we recommend that you add [EMAIL PROTECTED] and [EMAIL PROTECTED] to your address book. If you'd like to change or cancel your subscription, please visit our subscription pages at www.snowlionpub.com/pages/lists.php, www.snowlionpub.com/pages/unsubscribe.php,or email us at [EMAIL PROTECTED]. Please note that these announcements are also available in plain text, if you are having trouble receiving them. THE WISDOM OF FORGIVENESS:Intimate Conversations and Journeysby His Holiness the Dalai Lamaand Victor Chanmore... Contact Us: N. America:(800) 950-0313 Worldwide:(607) 273-8519 By Mail: PO Box 6483, Ithaca, NY 14851 USA By Email:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On the Web:www.snowlionpub.com New Items Available Online: New Books New Dharma Items On Sale! Gifts 2007 Calendars General Catalog: www.snowlionpub.com Sign Up: Receive Snow Lion's Weekly Quotes, Announcements, or Quarterly "Snow Lion Buddhist News Catalog" at the List Management Center. Snow Lion Publications is happy to send you a weekly quote from various Tibetan Buddhist teachers. Visit our website for these related items: 20% OFF all Snow Lion Titles in our Library of Tibetan Buddhism Culture Read the Latest Edition ofthe "Snow Lion Buddhist News Catalog" (Newsletter)
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Rory Goff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I think M. Scott Peck put it really well when he outlined four stages of growth: 1) Chaos, 2) Fundamentalism, 3) Eclecticism, 4) Love. Interesting model. It could describe my TMO journey -- perhaps others also. Chaos -- the seekings stage looking for IT. Fundamentalism -- Having found IT, being totally committed to it. Spreading the Word. Eclectic -- some disenchantment leads to branching out to other views and methods. Love -- love for TMO and its wave in the 60's an 70's, and love for all true traditions and schools. And for all seekers and finders. And I am sure many have found stages 5, 6, and 7. He points out that a being identifying with any given stage cannot see above or beyond where it is, but can only interpret others as being in its own stage (one of us) or in any stages already recognized and below it, which (generally) it is reacting against as evil. Thus a fundamentalist (2), only familiar with (1) chaos and (2) fundamentalism, would interpret an eclectic (3) as being a non-fundamentalist, hence as chaotic, or evil (1). Similarly, an eclectic (3) can only interpret Love (4) as being non-eclectic, or somehow fundamentalist/chaotic, now synonymous with evil (2). That assumes that people have a hierarchtical view of the stages. And a superiority complex. I look at much of my fundamentalist period as sweet and progressive. I was thinking earlier of perhaps my most fundamentalist period -- as one of the teams of four governors sent out to teach the first intro citizen sidha courses in the spring/summer of 1977. During one lecture Q and A on on of the 4-6week courses, I fell off my chair laughing at a wonderful exchange. Everyone was laughing long and deep. It was a light, magic time. 2 of the 7 governors / guys flying and/or around have become rajas. I wish them the best. Lots of support of nature in that era. And I rememeber I would go back to my dorm room (at a premier university where we were holding the course) and sit on the cold linoleum floor in a lotus, reading the gita -- (the hari krishna one to boot) and loving it, so absorbed in the knowledge. And great programs. I don't look back on that period as inferior. It was just different than my current stage. I remember exactly when I first recognized unconditional Love as an actual presence or state, irrespective of person, and while I was instantly attracted to it, knew I had to Be it, it also scared the bejeezus out of me, as I realized that its very presence destroyed all my carefully-built-up scholarship and discrimination and mastery of eclecticism, everything I had identified with, revealing its core- nature of semi-conscious competition, power, etc. (this was in Harvard Divinity School). Not surprisingly, this glimpse also triggered the onset of a two-year Dark Night of the Soul :-) My above experience was at Stanford so that explains the smoothness and grandeur of the experience compared to yours. :) What I experienced is probably much different, smaller, in terms of stages than you. However, I don't see or experience and of the discorrdance that you have. Each (perhaps micro-stage) I have experienced has flowed into the next. Without horror or destruction of past stages. Each stage has its charm and value. The first stage, I touched on that in a post last weekend, was wonderfully charged with the enthusiasm and energy of a teen seeker. To have that again! *L*L*L* d*d*d darkness, dumbness and daffiness.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes, spacetime and growth *are* a big joke, and while we are laughing at them, they are laughing right back at us, watching our every move, evaluating, seeing if we are slave or master, with neck, hand and leg-irons at the ready! Ha-Ha! You are bringing out the mirth and giggles in me again...could we call the Peck stages, 1- sleepwalking, 2-awakened point value, 3-awakened multi-point value, 4-awakened infinite point value, which then transcends its point value altogether? A beautiful model. It certainly explains the dynamics here on FFL sometimes where the eclectics (you know who you are! hehe) will mistake a state of unconditional love for that of fundamentalism and/or chaos. And I can totally relate to that moment of recognition when unconditional Love was recognized clearly and unmistakably by me as the goal and being simultaneously completely terrified! HA-HA! Seems gently silly now, but at the time and whenever I would think of it afterwards, I'd have a visceral reaction like I knew I could no longer hide in my skin. Unnerving to say the least. Like the joke about the General watching the opposing army advance on him, and he turns to his aide, and barks, Bring me my brown pants!. In any case, yes, all that is left after that is the steady and exciting journey towards death and dissolution (!), all resistance is futile. Once bitten by the Supreme Love Bug we all succumb eventually. :-) *lol* Yes; I like all this! I think too for me the deepest lesson from M. Scott Peck is, if the model helps me understand another, see myself in the other and the other in myself, then it's useful. If I am tempted to use it to pigeonhole another, to exalt myself over another or place myself ahead of another, then I can remember the deeper implication -- that I cannot ever really judge where another lies on this scale. After all, all we can see is where we are -- and where we've been. And if another looks to be *behind* us, how can we know that they're not really *ahead* of us, on another turn of the spiral entirely? In truth, on several levels, all I ever really know is myself! And appreciate the Other :-) *L*L*L*
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues I think the next generations are more vulnerable to infotainment graphics that sum up complexities into simple images. That is how their mind's are being trained to process. It has a similar effect but uses a different sense to achieve its no question goal. Yeah those damn kids. When we were their age we use to have to trod through 20 miles of snow to go rounding or fly in the domes. Kids! Next thing you know they will be listening to rock'n'roll -- or even blues music!. (the devils music) Ha-Ha! Why when I was their age, I had to Seriously the greatest impact on a child's mind and whether or not they view life with clear and intelligent discrimination is how their parents see things. Amazing how unfazed my daughter is by some of the less helpful social influences these days, and on the other hand how susceptible some of her (mostly past) friends are. She was joking with me the other day, yeah dad, I turned out so badly- many of the kids I go to school with do drugs on Friday night, and here I am attending a school play with my mom Also we were talking about how when parents say one thing but do another, even though the child can't articulate the disconnect, they are totally aware of it on a visceral level, and if the disconnect continues, they will naturally lose respect for the parent, and tune them out. Something that is way too common, in any generation. So our kids keep us real too when we are tuned into them in the present vs. stories about how we should be raising them.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: That assumes that people have a hierarchtical view of the stages. And a superiority complex. snip Or a belief in space-time and growth, which is perhaps saying the same thing! But anyway, you have anticipated the point I just brought up with Jim, which is that we cannot truly know another -- ever. When we are tempted to see another as being where we have been, it may be they are on another turn of the spiral, or perhaps in another topographical universe entirely :-)
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Rory Goff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin jflanegi@ wrote: Yes, spacetime and growth *are* a big joke, and while we are laughing at them, they are laughing right back at us, watching our every move, evaluating, seeing if we are slave or master, with neck, hand and leg-irons at the ready! Ha-Ha! You are bringing out the mirth and giggles in me again...could we call the Peck stages, 1- sleepwalking, 2-awakened point value, 3-awakened multi-point value, 4-awakened infinite point value, which then transcends its point value altogether? A beautiful model. It certainly explains the dynamics here on FFL sometimes where the eclectics (you know who you are! hehe) will mistake a state of unconditional love for that of fundamentalism and/or chaos. And I can totally relate to that moment of recognition when unconditional Love was recognized clearly and unmistakably by me as the goal and being simultaneously completely terrified! HA-HA! Seems gently silly now, but at the time and whenever I would think of it afterwards, I'd have a visceral reaction like I knew I could no longer hide in my skin. Unnerving to say the least. Like the joke about the General watching the opposing army advance on him, and he turns to his aide, and barks, Bring me my brown pants!. In any case, yes, all that is left after that is the steady and exciting journey towards death and dissolution (!), all resistance is futile. Once bitten by the Supreme Love Bug we all succumb eventually. :-) *lol* Yes; I like all this! I think too for me the deepest lesson from M. Scott Peck is, if the model helps me understand another, see myself in the other and the other in myself, then it's useful. If I am tempted to use it to pigeonhole another, to exalt myself over another or place myself ahead of another, then I can remember the deeper implication -- that I cannot ever really judge where another lies on this scale. After all, all we can see is where we are -- and where we've been. And if another looks to be *behind* us, how can we know that they're not really *ahead* of us, on another turn of the spiral entirely? In truth, on several levels, all I ever really know is myself! And appreciate the Other :-) *L*L*L* Yes, it is a good point, and a constant reminder, lest I begin to take my movie subtitles as gospel. :-) And the issue at hand isn't whether someone is behind us or ahead of us. It is what we do with the information. Peck's model just seems to fit so elegantly, and the dynamics of [albeit illusory] spiritual growth can be seen as fitting perfectly into such a model. So, on the one hand Peck's model may explain a situation to the point where we can realize an A-HA experience from the clarity that the model imposes on such dynamics. Yet to take it a step further and condemn another for where they might be seen realistically in Peck's model irreperably destroys the model, because its pinnacle is the inclusive nature of unconditional love, not the exclusivity of the prior states. So recognizing things for what they are, and always being cognizant of our surrender to His and Her Creation is the important lesson. That's what I got when you said the other person may be several turns ahead of us. I don't believe that they are with regard to Peck's model if they in fact are not. On the other hand if I use such a situation for condemnation, I am no longer adhering to the ultimate truth of Peck's model. Its a difficult and precise pathway to take, to at once see things for what they are, the point value, and the valid interrelatedness of the points, and at the same time recognizing that the relationships as they appear are sacred because they are within Brahman. A similar analogy could be used for the much abused Caste system of India, the purpose of which is to allow for quickest growth within one's dharma. How is this then abused? By becoming a system of one group lording their status over another. Instead of recognizing different levels as being a natural part of life, there is our temptation to instead use them as a means of subjugating and negatively categorizing another. The way out lies not in deciding to ignore such natural distinctions as are made in Peck's model or the caste system, and pretend that such a model is stood on its head, or doesn't really exist, but rather to work to accept such a model, and not abuse the Divine information we gain from understanding and seeing clearly such distinctions.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter drpetersutphen@ wrote: Just my usual too quick on the trigger response. I hear the term super string or anything of that ilk associated with TM and my brain locks-up! I'm sure it can have value for people, such as John Hagelin, who actually understand it and can facilitate deeper understanding of the mechanichs of consciousness, but for us lay folk it is mind numbing. That's its true purpose. :-) the invoking the too quick on the trigger response part or the mind numbing part? The mind numbing part. I was asking a bit tongue-in-check. I understood your intent. But wanted to (humorously ?) introduce another possibility -- that M. does such to invoke an irritation / vansana-driven response to it. Resolvong the vasana in those who respond. Perhaps a fringe theory, but as credible as the trance / marketing theory, IMO. N.s comment about leaving Purusha because he did not pass the test of patience, may (maybe not) be an example of this. IMO, and experience, M uses a lot of techniques to purify those around him. As did SBS, apparently -- sending M running with secret message to swami miles away. M to only find out it was a sort of hoax, just to put M thru some necessary loop of activity. Such tecnniques can drive many crazy and they leave. Others stick it out, and apparently gain some good thngs. I can't say for sure. But I know the techniques have validity from experience. It's a sales technique designed to make the buyer think, O, these people are smarter than I am. I can tell because they use big words that I don't understand. There- fore they know what they're talking about. I am sure there is a segment of the market that responds like that. I suggest it may be smaller than you surmise. And so they sign on the dotted line, or continue to buy the inferior products of an inferior company because they have bought into the company's use of buzzwords. It's the same model used to sell hardware and software. We in the industry call it geekspeak. The more incomprehensible geekspeak you throw into the blurbs about your product, the more of the product you are likely to sell. To fools perhaps. Most people I know respond to substance. Perhaps you hang with the wrong crowd :) Whatever the intellectual can I connect these possibly unrelated dots in my mind value that hypothetical exercises like Hagelin's might have for *him*, their value to the TM movement is as geekspeak. One of the trends that one finds in the study of *many* spiritual traditions is that many of the traditions that made the biggest impact on society, and in some cases have lasted the longest in history, were the ones that *dispensed with* geekspeak, or presented a clear alternative to it. So the premeise is that those who communicate clearly have a larger impact than those who don't. Perhaps a revolutionary concept. Christ taught in the common language, using anal- ogies and metaphors that were comprehensible to the common man. As opposed to the language and the teachings used by the prevailing religions of his time. He developed a following. Which prevailing religions were those and what languge and teachings do they attempt to foster on to the public? One of the primary reasons that the Catholic Church exterminated the Cathars was that they *taught in the common language*, not in Latin...and not in geekspeak. I appreciate the Cathers directlness, but were the catholics of the time submerged in geekspeak? How so? Buddha became popular because he rejected the high- falootin' language and rituals of the existing religions, and (again) taught in clear, non-geek- speak language to the common people, about things that they had to deal with...everyday stuff, like suffering and how to get past it. Yet baptists and fundamentalist ministers today gather millions with far from simple language, logic and metaphors. Go figure! In the beginning, the TM movement taught in clear, non-geekspeak language about the benefits of medi- tation. More stage II. In the beginning, it was God-consciousness, divine love, angels, gods, and Charlie Lutes golden oratory of SRM. And it developed quite a following. Over the years it abandoned that approach and began to rely more and more on geekspeak, which in my opinion was more designed to pander to and hold onto the existing followers than to attract new ones. The result? As some have pointed out here, more existing TMers die every year than new TMers are created. I find a lot of the newer language and cited studies more straightforward than the SIMS days. YMMV. I'm not convinced that geekspeak is a good thing when it comes to spiritual teaching. Yeah, it may appeal to the intellect, which
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes, it is a good point, and a constant reminder, lest I begin to take my movie subtitles as gospel. :-) *lol* Good one! And the issue at hand isn't whether someone is behind us or ahead of us. It is what we do with the information. Peck's model just seems to fit so elegantly, and the dynamics of [albeit illusory] spiritual growth can be seen as fitting perfectly into such a model. So, on the one hand Peck's model may explain a situation to the point where we can realize an A-HA experience from the clarity that the model imposes on such dynamics. Yet to take it a step further and condemn another for where they might be seen realistically in Peck's model irreperably destroys the model, because its pinnacle is the inclusive nature of unconditional love, not the exclusivity of the prior states. Bingo! And condemning another is only (re)consigning portions of ourself to exile, to Hell, for the time being. (Not that there's anything Wrong with that. :-) ) There may be other pinnacles beyond stage 4, including what may look like pre-stage-4 exclusivity to us. All we can really know is where we are, and where we've been -- not where another truly is, except as a perfect mirror and opportunity to love yet more aspects or particles of ourself, of the past we've left behind and which seeks to reintegrate with us, to grow into us, into our Love-Being. So recognizing things for what they are, and always being cognizant of our surrender to His and Her Creation is the important lesson. That's what I got when you said the other person may be several turns ahead of us. I don't believe that they are with regard to Peck's model if they in fact are not. Perhaps. I find I don't fully trust *any* perception of the other unless it is crystalline-perfect, simply and utterly divine, nothing other than myself, and the heart then says Yes! This is the Truth! I can rest here. But either way, if they are showing us (or we are showing ourself) something other than this, we/they are offering us an opportunity to heal, to grow, to expand, and so they represent our future as well as our past :-) On the other hand if I use such a situation for condemnation, I am no longer adhering to the ultimate truth of Peck's model. Yes! Its a difficult and precise pathway to take, to at once see things for what they are, the point value, and the valid interrelatedness of the points, and at the same time recognizing that the relationships as they appear are sacred because they are within Brahman. Sweet! A similar analogy could be used for the much abused Caste system of India, the purpose of which is to allow for quickest growth within one's dharma. How is this then abused? By becoming a system of one group lording their status over another. Instead of recognizing different levels as being a natural part of life, there is our temptation to instead use them as a means of subjugating and negatively categorizing another. Yes. Is Violet really superior to Red? The way out lies not in deciding to ignore such natural distinctions as are made in Peck's model or the caste system, and pretend that such a model is stood on its head, or doesn't really exist, but rather to work to accept such a model, and not abuse the Divine information we gain from understanding and seeing clearly such distinctions. And remembering it's only one way to understand the self, and our various particles, and beyond this is the real treasure, the unknowable but fully-appreciatable :-) *L*L*L*
[FairfieldLife] Re: Cool doo dee doo doo story
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Rory Goff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning no_reply@ wrote: That assumes that people have a hierarchtical view of the stages. And a superiority complex. snip Or a belief in space-time and growth, which is perhaps saying the same thing! But anyway, you have anticipated the point I just brought up with Jim, which is that we cannot truly know another -- ever. When we are tempted to see another as being where we have been, it may be they are on another turn of the spiral, or perhaps in another topographical universe entirely :-) Yes, which perhaps is another way of saying, don't waste time and energy judging others. Because one lacks the appropriate reference points to others' lives -- as you point out. But as much or more, its an unnecessary chatter of the mind, this is good, he is bad, she is ok, that is good ... One only needs to judge others if and when one must make a decision regarding that person. Whic is 1 out of 100 or 1/1000 common monkey-mind judgements. The others are idle chatter. (all apologies to monkeys). That we often can only see others from our own frame of reference, our cultural/religious/intellectual, emotional frameworks, perhaps is a famine of imagination. I was thinking this morning that this quality of empathy and really seeing from anothers' view needs to be cultured in childhood when the mind is nimbe and formative. I saw a squirrel dart in from of my car and he was terrified, running valiantly across the road as I swerved to miss it (which I did.) The reality of the situation was my view: little tiny squirrel, regular sized car. But from the squirrel's perspective, the car was easily 15-20 times its height. So It would be like a 120 foot tank roaring 3 times faster than I could run, zipping in front of me as I was crossing the road. My mind is not automatically trained to think from that view. It occurred to me kids could more easily, naturally, imagine such and culture that quality for later in life.
[FairfieldLife] Posting Totals
A few people are getting a tad close to the limit, with two days to go 'till we reset the count: Turq - 32 Jim Flanegin - 30 New Morning - 31 Judy - 26 No problem. Just giving you a heads up.
[FairfieldLife] beyond any drug thing
http://f1.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/kDhLRqyczxn5QNTdSFLIgAR3n_ix4zDjVysliMa43k90yQ7OyCbwwSh79NqNtBOVJ2BZLmGKJQRt7Ap_jRyqQ1H1T7SDCiI/TM.mp3
[FairfieldLife] Re: Whole Brain Functioning - flaws of Unity
The greatest and weirdest paradox for me is in dealing with the idea that everything is Pure Consciousness or Brahman. In that case, we can't say, it's my ignorance that's keeping me from realizing this since this too is Brahman, the ignorance, the process of moving out of it, getting into ignorance in the first place...all Brahman. Now if we start to obssess on this, we go crazy in the infinite regress of I AM Brahman. In order to get there, we have to reach the end of infinite regress and just BE. At that point, there is no explanation, no paradox and no suffering, since suffering is in trying to figure it out in the first place. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, jim_flanegin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, claudiouk claudiouk@ wrote: A lot of good points have been made about ways of handling suffering eg Marek's concerning putting the attention away from suffering, on attention itself - hence manage to transcend suffering; or by embracing suffering/demons eg Rory or Jim. I can see the wisdom in all this. Am also impressed with some of the reported experiences. Raging against the clouds will not make the sun shine back any sooner. In the end we seem to have to do the rope trick in reverse - pretend the snake is just a rope. Or pretend that the rope is really a snarling snake. Become more immune to it at any rate. For instance raging anger needs to subside into indifference or equanimity, in order for us to transcend duality. Go deep into the tunnel of anger and sadness and the light at the end of it is not indifference. This is where a leap of faith is required, at least before enlightenment - that this is not just wishful thinking, that goodness can and will overcome evil in the end. The premise in all of this is that suffering is the natural state, the core of it all. Maybe evil has only temporarily overtaken goodness -- the core. However my focus was on the dynamics of Unity giving RISE to creation as discussed in recent webcast conferences - the rope/snake comment by MMY, the risposte by Hagelin concerning different perspectives of his Unity equations. And the inherent covering of ignorance and forgetfulness MMY noted between silence and dynamism. So on the one hand we have the view of creation arising from the precise, sequential unfoldment of the Laws of Nature reputedly working without problems - excuse me, what about suffering, was my question. Where is the unifiedfield chart connecting physics with moral philosophy, karma etc? And what evidence is there in nature of moral values anyway? Maybe you / we see suffering everywhere because we are in a localized hell and the vaster realm of things is more towards heaven -- the happiness/suffering ration approaching larger numbers Suffering as I see it comes about when we don't deal effectively with the challenge before us. If that challenge was a strong karma from the past that has us literally on a railroad track as a quadraplegic and a train coming at us at 80 miles an hour, well, adios muchacho, nothing to be done in that case. However, in less extreme situations, it is a matter of developing hard won skills, perspective, Being, so that either our surroundings arrange themselves so that we are not confronted by the most difficult set of circumstances from which to extricate ourselves, or, if faced with a challenging situation or period of life, we know enough and have enough tools at our disposal to find a way out, without either making the situation worse, or causing greater and/or additional problems for ourselves later on. The point being that suffering will naturally happen to us as part of our life Dharma, if we do not yet have the tools, capacity or skills to avoid it. It is a natural result of the way the world is set up for us to grow and learn at the maximum rate. It is literally how we learn to keep our balance and learn to walk as children. If we didn't topple over and bang our heads, we'd never learn to walk. New morning was talking about drugs earlier as a way to temporarily alleviate suffering, with the caveat that if we were to use them as a constant solution, we'd end up like Elvis or Rush Limbaugh (I'm paraphrasing here...). So learning to not suffer is just that, a learning process. Not a solution in a bottle, or a mantra by itself, or just thinking different thoughts, but an entirely new, integrated approach, where we transform ourselves in order to in effect live in a different world. One just as challenging and comprehensive as that in which we would suffer, but through our hard won skill, perspective and capacity, the suffering is no longer
[FairfieldLife] Re: Visualizing the E8 root system
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: [Barry wrote:] Christ taught in the common language, using anal- ogies and metaphors that were comprehensible to the common man. As opposed to the language and the teachings used by the prevailing religions of his time. He developed a following. Which prevailing religions were those and what languge and teachings do they attempt to foster on to the public? This is laughably wrong, BTW, on both counts. The prevailing religions of the time didn't use incomprehensible language. But even more starkly wrong, Jesus is recorded as having said explicitly that his parables and metaphors had hidden meanings that only those in the know could understand: And he said, 'He who has ears to hear, let him hear.' And when he was alone, those around him with the twelve [disciples] asked him about the parables. And he said to them, 'To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, so that they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven' (Mark 4:9-12; similarly in Matthew 11:9-15). Sounds like quite the elitist, doesn't he? He repeats He who has ears to hear, let him hear something like a dozen times in connection with one or another of his parables, indicating they have multiple levels of meaning beyond the surface understanding of the words. Jesus is *known* for his geekspeak. It is *the* predominant characteristic of his teaching. Not only did he speak in enigmatic, koan-like parables to the masses, he engaged in highly sophisticated wordplay with the Jewish religious authorities that left them baffled and confused. He developed a following *despite* the fact that his teaching was couched in highfalutin language, far from easily accessible to the common man. His geekspeak challenged them, puzzled them, intrigued them, drew them in. It was, indeed, a highly effective sales technique.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Hitchens comments on Falwells death
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, off_world_beings [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Awesome Vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkAPaEMwyKU OffWorld * Tinky Winky had something to say,too: http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/05/16/falwell_tinky/
