Returning to the uncarved block

Huí dào wèi diāokè de fāngkuài

回到未雕刻的方块

A collection of English and Chinese writings, in no particular order, to help one return to the uncarved block.

Contents

Story 1

Among the rocks and flying birds

Zài yánshí hé fēi niǎo lèi zhī jiān

在岩石和飞鸟类之间

Section 1 - The Death of Chaos

Section 2 - The Resurrection of Chaos

Story 2

Sit and Forget 

Zuò wàng

坐忘 

The Broken Branches

Zhéduàn de shùzhī

折断的树枝

A collection of writings to help one, 坐忘, sit and forget

Story 3

Flying through the realms

Fēiyuè zhū ji

飞越诸界

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Story 1

Among the rocks and flying birds

Zài yánshí hé fēi niǎo lèi zhī jiān

在岩石和飞鸟类之间

Section 1 - The Death of Chaos

Section 2 - The Resurrection of Chaos

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Rings and Roses

Jièzhǐ hé méiguī

戒指和玫瑰

Feet burning, take refuge in our shadows

Ránshāo de shuāng jiǎo, zài wǒmen de yǐngzi lǐ bìnàn

燃烧的双脚，在我们的影子里避难

Clouds exploding, but sitting nicely on the shelf

Yúncai xiàng bǎi fàng zài jiàzi shàng yīyàng zhà kāile

云彩向摆放在架子上一样炸开了

Playing in the ashes of once constructed life

Zài céngjīng gòuzhù shēnghuó chéng de huījìn zhōng wánshuǎ

在曾经构筑生活成的灰烬中玩耍

Wrestling with water, be still, reflect like a mirror

Yǔ shuǐ bódòu, níngjìng rú jìng

与水搏斗，宁静如镜

Laying down in the soft cushions of decay

Tǎng zài fǔlàn de ruǎn diànshàng

躺在腐烂的软垫上

The light goes out but it always returns to….

Dēng xímièle, dàn tā zǒng shì fǎnhuí…….

灯熄灭了，但它总是返回……。

Paint the sky pink, orange, and blue

Bǎ tiānkōng tú chéng fěnhóng sè, chéngsè hé lán sè

把天空涂成粉红色、橙色和蓝色

Forever connected

Yǒngyuǎn liánjiē

永远连接

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Section 1 - The Death of Chaos

Faith

Holger and I were on a business trip to Mumbai India to work with our global colleagues. We were having a very nice time in India, the food was unique and tasted fantastic, and the people of India were very kind and welcoming. Holger and I would walk half a mile each morning to practice yoga mediation with the locals. In the evening, we would spend time visiting Hindu temples, Sikh temples, and a Muslim mosque. 

One weekend our Indian friends took us to a mosque located off the coast of India in the middle of the Arabian sea. Haji Ali Dargah was the name of the mosque and it contains the tomb of Haji Ali Shah Bukhari. Bukhari was a Sufi saint who gave up all his worldly possessions to travel the world and spread knowledge about Islam. It is a belief of the Muslims that the holy saints who sacrifice and devote their lives in the way of Allah are immortal. Bukhari requested to be buried in the ocean so his followers built this mosque in the Arabian sea and buried Bukhari in a tomb there. Many around the world will visit this mosque to pay homage to this Sufi saint.

Legends tell us that Bukhari was once in his hometown and busy in his prayers when a woman passed by him crying and screaming. The saint asked her why she was crying and she pointed to an empty container in her hand and said that she had spilled the oil from it and if she goes home without the oil her husband would beat her. She was crying in need of help. The saint asked her to be calm and went with her to the place where the oil had been spilled. He then took the container from the lady and pushed his thumb into the earth and oil began to spray out from the earth like a fountain. Bukhari was able to completely refill her container. The saint gave her the container full of oil and she went away happily.

Moving on with the story, it was a beautiful sunny Saturday in Mumbai. Holger, Sangita, Pratish, and myself took a rickshaw taxi from the inner city of Mumbai to the southern part to visit the tomb of Haji Ali Shah Bukhari. It was about a 30 minute drive. Once we arrived, we had to walk through a very busy shopping plaza where locals were selling souvenirs, fruit, fish, and other small snacks. We rushed past and ignored the many requests from the locals trying to sell us items and finally arrived at the entry point to Haji Ali Shah Bukhari. This entry point was very unique, it had a narrow stone walkway going from the beach out to the mosque in the middle of the sea and was roughly 500 yards long. The water from the Arabian sea was constantly smashing against this stone walkway so we had to run very quickly across it and pause at times to avoid the large waves. We all got completely drenched in sea water. As we were running across this stone walkway, I noticed three men laying off to the side singing and chanting up into the heavens. All three men were severely disabled with missing arms and legs and seemed to be suffering intensely. They had sores and rashes all over their bodies and were dressed in torn clothing. They simply laid there on the rocks in the hot sun and the waves from the sea would splash all over them as they sang and chanted to the heavens. But there was something about the way they were singing and chanting that expressed a very deep connection with their God. The singing and chanting sounded something like this:

na-na na-na na-na

na-na na-na na-na

ya-ya ya-ya 

ya-ya ya-ya

uh-hu-uh-hu

uh-hu-uh-hu

wa-wa-wa-wa

wa-wa-wa-wa

na-na na-na na-na

na-na na-na na-na

ya-ya ya-ya 

ya-ya ya-ya

uh-hu-uh-hu

uh-hu-uh-hu

wa-wa-wa-wa

wa-wa-wa-wa

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Mothers touch

Some birds decided to build their nest on our back porch this year. I was fortunate enough to observe them as they built the nest, hatched their eggs, and raised their baby birds.

We named the mother bird 鸟一 (Niǎo yī) (pronounced: knee-owl-ee).

The father was named 鸟二 (Niǎo èr) (pronounced: knee-owl-ar).

There were 2 baby birds and we respectively named them:

古一 (Gǔ yī) (pronounced: goo-ee) 

and 

古二  (Gǔ èr) (pronounced: goo-ar) 

I was watching them the other day and noticed 鸟一 would sit on the eggs before they hatched and would also sit on 古一 and 古二 after they hatched. I suppose this was to protect them and keep them warm. 鸟一 would often go out to find worms and bring them back to the nest to feed 古一 and 古二. I noticed 鸟二 would also show up to the nest with worms and chirp at 鸟一 to move off the nest. 鸟一 would typically move out of the nest and sit on the edge and watched 鸟二 try to feed 古一 and 古二. 鸟二 would try to drop the worms on the baby birds but 鸟一 would often interfere and help place the worms into the baby birds mouths.

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Conversations with a Shiny Rock

Dear Shiny Rock,

How do you manage to sit so still and simply allow the world to push you around, throw you, crush you, walk all over you, and break you?

Shiny Rock:

This is my true nature and I could not have it any other way even if I wanted to. I accept that I am a shiny rock and try to focus on my contributing qualities. For example, I can help others hold things in place by simply moving on top of things. I can help others retrieve things stuck in high places by flying in the air and bumping into things. I can even show off my natural beauty by hanging from a necklace or skipping along water. So, I don’t consider myself to be used or pushed around or crushed or broken. I simply focus on the many ways I help others and this gives me a feeling of great purpose. Since I spend so much time helping others you will often see me sitting still so I can rest. But even when I am resting, I am still very busy holding some things in place.

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Conversations with a Beige Rock

Dear Beige Rock,

I have been thinking about something lately. Why do humans always want to change nature and try to rearrange things? For example, they often cut down trees or want to move nature all around in such unusual ways.

Beige Rock:

I am not completely sure why humans do this but I have experienced this myself and have been moved all around this world by these humans. “Neuroscience shows that the act of seeking itself, rather than the goals we realize, is key to satisfaction. All mammals have this seeking system, where dopamine, a neurotransmitter linked to reward and pleasure, will activate when planning activities. If rats are given access to a lever that causes them to receive an electric shock, they will repeatedly electrocute themselves.”

When I see the many humans wanting to change nature and themselves, I think they may simply be upset inside because life is hard. They go off planning activities like changing nature to receive this dopamine rush and it eases their internal pain for a moment. Once I begin to see this suffering inside of them, I can only exercise compassion towards them and wish them joy, peace, and happiness.  

One should try to be more accepting of nature and themselves because there is no error in any of this magnificent harmonious design in life. Practicing Mudita or 仁慈（Réncí) or Benevolence is an ancient method for minimizing this desire to want to change things. 仁慈 is true love and is unconditional. It takes great courage and acceptance to express love and kindness towards others and ourselves. There should not be any expectation of return for the kindness rendered towards another person. When practicing 仁慈 everything is done for the happiness and welfare of others. The far enemies of 仁慈 or benevolence are selfishness and anger. 

“Wise people are able to look beyond the mere notions of good and bad, right and wrong, to experience a sense of freedom. They know that nothing in this world is completely good or bad because it is always shades of gray. Attachment to the discrimination between right and wrong, good and bad, results in delusions and suffering.”

When we go off to meddle in the natural way we often create more suffering within ourselves. Zuangzi the ancient Chinese Taoist philosopher highlighted this in his Inner Chapter writings. This story is a creative way of showing how we tend to destroy our true nature or closeness with God by trying to change things.

Inner Chapters

內篇

The Normal Course for Rulers and Kings #7

應帝王:

The Ruler of the Southern Ocean was Shu, the Ruler of the Northern Ocean was Hu, and the Ruler of the Centre was Chaos. Shu and Hu were continually meeting in the land of Chaos, who treated them very well. They consulted together how they might repay his kindness, and said, 'Men all have seven orifices for the purpose of seeing, hearing, eating, and breathing, while this (poor) Ruler alone has not one. Let us try and make them for him.' Accordingly they dug one orifice in him every day; and at the end of seven days Chaos died.

南海之帝為儵，北海之帝為忽，中央之帝為渾沌。儵與忽時相與遇於渾沌之地，渾沌待之甚善。儵與忽謀報渾沌之德，曰：「人皆有七竅，以視聽食息，此獨無有，嘗試鑿之。」日鑿一竅，七日而渾沌死。

One final story I’d like to share with you is one an old Indian man told me a few hundred years ago while I was resting on the shore of a great river. 

One evening, an elderly Cherokee brave told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said “My son, the battle is between two wolves inside us all. One is evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other is good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather. Which wolf wins? 

The old Cherokee simply replied; “The one that you feed.”

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Faith

Xìnxīn

信心

You must have faith

nǐ bìxū yǒu xìnxīn

你必须有信心

You must believe in yourself

nǐ bìxū xiāngxìn zìjǐ

你必须相信自己

This will give you patience

zhè huì gěi nǐ nàixīn

这会给你耐心

Trust God in the storm

zài bàofēngyǔ zhōng xiāngxìn shàngdì

在暴风雨中相信上帝

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Worry

Yesterday, I was watching 鸟一, 鸟二, 古一, and 古二 for a bit. It was a nice sunny day with a cool breeze in the air. The parent birds continued to feed the two baby birds and the mother continued sitting in the nest to protect them and keep them warm. The birds are beginning to be more comfortable around me but 鸟一 and 鸟二 will still fly away when I get too close to the nest. 

I often wonder if birds worry the same way us humans worry. As I watched 鸟一 and 鸟二 yesterday, they seemed to be a bit cautious towards me and I suppose this is in their nature to be fearful of large human creatures. Some of us humans will hunt and eat birds so it would be in a bird's natural instinct to worry when near humans. So, is this fearful response simply a built in instinct and not actually a reflection of the bird's worrying mind? Is our human worry simply a built in instinct we adopted over the 1,000s of years of human existence and something that isn’t required so much anymore? Or has it ever been required?

The ancient sages considered worrying to be useless and absurd. They would teach others to let go of control and give any desire to have control or any worry over to God or the great Tao. Allow things to naturally unfold and have faith that everything that ever happens is part of this immaculate design we call life. 

Lao Tzu the Chinese sage wrote the following in Chapter 52 of the Dao De Jing:

Chapter 52

Everything in heaven and earth itself has a beginning,

And this beginning is the root of all things in heaven and earth (mother).

If you know the root (mother), you can know the branches (children), 

And if you know the branches (children) and grasp the root of all things,

Then there will be no danger (peace) for life.

Plug the hole of desire, close the door of desire,

And there will be no trouble in life.

If you open the hole of desire, you will add a lot of events, 

Which will add trouble in life.

Those who can perceive subtlety are called “ming” 明 (light of truth);

Those who can maintain humility are called strong.

Using its light to return to the inner clarity will not bring disaster to oneself,

Which is called the “common way” of eternity. 

Dì wǔshí'èr zhāng

第五十二章

tiānxià yǒu shǐ, yǐwéi tiānxià mǔ.

天下有始，以为天下母。

Jìdé qí mǔ, yǐ zhī qí zi;

既得其母，以知其子；

jìzhī qí zi, fù shǒu qí mǔ, méi shēn bù dài.

既知其子，复守其母，没身不殆。

Sāi qí duì, bì qí mén, zhōngshēn bù qín.

塞其兑，闭其门，终身不勤。

Kāi qí duì, jì qí shì, zhōngshēn bù jiù.

开其兑，济其事，终身不救。

Jiàn xiǎo yuē míng, shǒu róu yuē qiáng.

见小曰明，守柔曰强。

Yòng qí guāng, fùguī qí míng, wúyí shēn yāng; shì wèi xí cháng.

用其光，复归其明，无遗身殃；是为袭常。

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I am already good enough

Wǒ yǐjīng gòu hǎole

我已经够好了

I am proud of myself for overcoming so many difficulties

wǒ wèi zìjǐ kèfúle zhème duō kùnnán ér gǎndào zìháo

我为自己克服了这么多困难而感到自豪

I am not broken I am evolving

wǒ méiyǒu pòsuì wǒ zhèngzài jìnhuà

我没有破碎我正在进化

Always believe in yourself and you can achieve anything you want in life

shǐzhōng xiāngxìn zìjǐ nín kěyǐ shíxiàn shēnghuó zhōng xiǎng yào de rènhé shìqíng

始终相信自己您可以实现生活中想要的任何事情

Prove them wrong

zhèngmíng tāmen shì cuò de

证明他们是错的

Stop worrying

bié dānxīn

别担心

Stop doubting yourself

tíngzhǐ huáiyí zìjǐ

停止怀疑自己

Trust yourself

xiāngxìn zìjǐ

相信自己

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Conversations with a Sparkling Gray Rock

Dear Sparkling Gray Rock,

I often get caught up worrying about the future or dwelling on events in the past. What are your thoughts on this human concept of time? Why do we often try to calculate future events or attempt to correct the past instead of living in the present?

Shiny Rock:

These are some wonderful questions and items I have discussed before as I have been on this earth forever. Time is a concept created in the human mind and does not actually exist. There is only the present so this idea of the past or the future are merely delusions. 

I’d like to take a moment to tell you about an ancient Indian concept for growing corn. The native Indians in America had a secret technique for planting corn. They realized that planting corn seeds too early could be risky because the cold weather and frost might sneak in during the spring and kill the seedlings. They used a technique to avoid this risk by simply observing nature. They said “Plant the corn seed when the leaves from the oak tree are the size of a squirrel's ear.” This was an easy way for farmers to recognize when it was safe to plant the corn seeds and allowed them to simply use nature to tell them. 

Humans have always attempted to calculate future events as this is a technique for survival but this concept is rooted in fear and lack of faith. One does not need to plant the corn seed. One can simply roam into the forest and forage for food like the deer or rabbit or squirrel. This original concept of foraging and roaming about for food allows one to return closer to original human nature and connect more closely with God through faith. 

“Once you give away control then you will have it. When you are trying to act as if you are God and trying to control everyone and everything, you lose the divine energy. The more you give away control, the more it comes back.”

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Oneself

When in the midst of betrayal, loss, loneliness, and despair….

you reach out for something strong to hold onto and that thing you find is yourself. 

Dāng shēn chù bèipàn shīluò gūdú hé juéwàng zhī zhòng shí nǐ huì shēn chūshǒu qù zhuā zhù yīxiē jiānqiáng de dōngxī ér nǐ zhǎodào de jiùshì nǐ zìjǐ

当深处背叛失落孤独和绝望之中时你会伸出手去抓住一些坚强的东西而你找到的就是 你自己

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Isolated Eccentric - Feeling like I don’t belong

I enjoy being alone and do not care to be around other people. The feeling I get when around others is often too intense and loud. 

Someone once told me: “I find that the further along my spiritual path I travel the more I appreciate my own solitude. Being around most people means listening to them talk about things that are superficial and they often chase things that I no longer resonate with. I love the peace and quiet I experience in my own solitude and find that any time I spend around others must be followed by a period of quiet contemplation.“

“Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary”

• Steve Jobs

“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal”

• Albert Camus

“Do not be afraid of spending quality time by yourself. Find meaning or don’t find meaning but steal some time and give it freely and exclusively to your own self. Opt for privacy and solitude. That doesn’t make you antisocial or cause you to reject the rest of the world. But you need to breathe. And you need to be”

• Albert Camus

Inner Chapters 

內篇

The Normal Course for Rulers and Kings #6

應帝王:

Do not assume the additional reputation,

無為名尸，

do not act as wisdom treasury, 

無為謀府，

do not assume the responsibility of things, 

無為事任，

do not become the Master of Wisdom. 

無為知主。

Realize the road, should not be exhausted; 

體盡無窮，而遊無朕，

carefree, swim in the beginning of nothing. 

盡其所受於天，

Enjoy the nature given by nature and not from the present man-made gains, 

而無見得，

This is the state of mind of nihilism (emptiness, void, unoccupied, humble or modest)! 

亦虛而已。

The heart of the person is like a mirror, things do not welcome, 

至人之用心若鏡，

things do not send, things to the light. 

不將不迎，

Things do not stay, comply with nature, not selfish, 

應而不藏，

so can be detached from the outside and not harmed by the outside.

故能勝物而不傷。

無為名尸，無為謀府，無為事任，無為知主。體盡無窮，而遊無朕，盡其所受於天，而無見得，亦虛而已。至人之用心若鏡，不將不迎，應而不藏，故能勝物而不傷。

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Yoga meditation in Mumbai

I recalled a memory while I was practicing my mindfulness this morning…..walking down the stairs into the basement…slowly watch myself turn on the light switch...watch each step I take….clear the mind of all thoughts…step…step…step…step..turn the corner slowly…walk…walk…step…step…slowly open the door to the next room…turn on light switch….put shirt away…watch myself doing this….walk out of room…slowly turn off light switch and close door…breath in…breath out…clear the mind of all thoughts.

Please allow me to share this memory with you.

Holger and I enjoyed another Sunday morning walk to the Hindu temple Akshardham Swaminarayan Mandir स्वामीनारायण मंदिर to practice our daily yoga meditation. This temple had a very relaxed atmosphere and the meditation techniques were a nice way to begin each day. We would start off with some light stretching techniques and then move into sitting and focusing on our breathing while chanting …..ooommm…ooommm…ooommm…ooommm

On this particular day, while in deep meditation, a bee landed right on my hand and stung me on my finger. This pulled me right out of my relaxed state and placed me in a state of fear and worry. This was a valuable experience for improving my own meditation practice and forced me to clear my mind and go back to my breath and sit with the pain of this recent bee sting. Since this moment occurred, I began to appreciate the many distractions in life and view them as moments where I can refine my inner strength and improve my self control. 

We finished our yoga and returned to the hotel to eat a nice lunch. In preparation for an adventurous day, we shared a chicken biryani dish and had some refreshing drinks. A few hours later, Pratish met with us in the hotel lobby and we all got into the rickshaw taxi for a beautiful Sunday drive to visit the Buddhist Kanheri Caves कन्हेरी केव नो .

When we arrived at the Kanheri Caves there were many street vendors along the entrance selling fresh cut fruit. Holger bought a fresh cut slice of watermelon from an elderly woman and Pratish and I bought some water. We continued down the dirt path to finally arrive at the caves.

Upon entering the caves, we saw these gigantic ancient hand carved rock statues of Buddha that stood over 150 feet tall. Witnessing these acts of human creation that were made 1,000s of years ago was breathtaking. I paused for a moment and felt an enormous sense of humility pass over me.

God’s strength works through your humility.

Pride leads to our downfall.

Pride is often driven by poor self-worth and shame. 

We feel so badly about ourselves that we compensate by feeling superior.

We look for the flaws in others as a way to conceal our own flaws.

We relish criticizing others as a defense against recognizing our own shortcomings.

Be careful to not feel superior to others but practice accepting others instead.

“Tibetans look at a person who believes he is better than others and they simply say that person is like someone sitting on a mountain top. It is cold there, it is hard, and nothing will grow. But if the person puts himself in a lower position then that person is like a fertile field.”

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Conversations with a rock that looks like a puppy

Dear Rock that looks like a puppy,

Did anyone ever tell you that you look like a puppy? 

Puppy Rock:

Ahh, yes. I will hear that from others often. I suppose I do look a bit like a puppy and that is ok. You know I didn’t always look like this. Over the 1000’s of years I have moved around and gradually broken apart into many pieces and scattered myself all across the world. I am originally from the far eastern part of this world in a land you humans call China. Roughly 2000 years ago I was part of a large mountain called Jing Ting Mountain 敬亭山. One day, I broke away from this mountain and a traveler picked me up and brought me all the way over here to America. 

During my time in Jing Ting Mountain 敬亭山, I have witnessed many amazing writers and poets simply staring at this mountain and finding great inspiration. One day, I believe it was in the year 285, an older man named Solala Towler was sitting on a log at the base of the mountain and shared a story called The Way of Wu Wei. It went something like this:

Once upon a time, in the Land of the Middle Kingdom, there lived a great emperor.  This mighty lord lived in a magnificent castle, surrounded by many guards, ladies in-waiting, cooks, artists, philosophers, and doctors.  He awoke each day to the soft caresses of one of his many wives, ate his breakfast in a wonderful garden surrounded by the morning song of his many birds, and passed his days in the company of his many admirers and flatterers. But he was not happy.

He felt he was missing out on some essential things in life. Just what this essential thing was he did not know, but he knew that he did not have it, and this distressed him endlessly.  He filled his court with various magicians and philosophers, all of whom tried to tell him that if he would only listen to them and them alone he would find this essential and missing ingredient of his life. But he knew that each was only trying to better his own individual situation, and so he did not heed their shining and flattering words.

Instead, he winnowed them out, one by one, until there were only two groups left, the Confucians and the Taoists.  But he could not decide which of them had the secret and essential thing that he was lacking.  The Confucians were a haughty yet wise lot.  They did not flatter him in silken phrases like other philosophers had.  They told him of the mighty days of old, when the emperor was truly the son of heaven and could in heaven’s name.  All he had to do was return to those days and revive the ancient ways of the old rites and rituals and his kingdom would prosper - he would be happy and fulfilled, both as a ruler and a man.

The Taoists, on the other hand, seemed unorganized and motley crew. They never seemed to agree on anything, even among themselves and spent their days performing strange movements like animals in the garden; their nights drinking wine, reciting poetry, and trying to seduce his ladies-in-waiting.  But they were said to have great powers over the elements and the secret of eternal life. Of course, when he questioned them about this they only shrugged and said “we have but one precious secret and the one only, my lord”

“Well then,” he would say, “What is this precious thing?”

“Ah,” they would counter, “We cannot describe this secret in words, great and powerful Lord, we can only show it to you.”

“Agreed,” said the emperor, and announced a contest between the Confucians and Taoists.  Whichever could show him the true secret of their power, he said, would become the supreme teachers of the land.

On the appointed day, the Confucians and Taoists were led to a great chamber deep in the heart of the castle.  A great curtain was drawn down the center of the room, dividing the Taoists from Confucians. Both groups were told that they were to create a painting, a great work of art, on the wall on either side. This would be the final test of their power and knowledge. Whoever impressed the emperor the most would be awarded the prize.

The Confucians smiled and quickly ordered all the colors that were available in the royal storerooms. They immediately went to work designing and painting a magnificent mural.  The Taoists, on the other hand, ordered a great deal of wine and a few dozen soft cloths, the softest that were available. Then they went to work opening the wine.

Day after day the Confucians labored on their huge and wondrous mural. Day after day the Taoists ordered more wine and simply rubbed the wall with their soft cloths, over and over, while singing old drinking songs at the top of their lungs.

Finally came the day when the emperor would review each work of art and make his decision. First he visited the Confucians’ side of the room, certain that he would be in for a visual treat.  He had watched how assiduously the Confucians had applied their layers of colors on the wall and how they stopped often to study the ancient texts and perform slow and stately rituals before taking up their brushes again.

He was not disappointed. The Confucians had created a marvel of color and form.  He saw his whole city laid out before him, with his own castle in the very center of the city, the golden light of the setting sun glinting off its shapely and graceful roofs. At the edge of the painting he saw his own magnificent form astride his favorite war horse, leading his victorious troops into battle against an already vanquished enemy.

A great river ran across the bottom of the painting with cunning little waves painted all over it and the curly shadows of birds suspended above it. It was truly a wondrous and amazing sight and the emperor was at a loss as to how the Taoists could top it.

Imagine his surprise then when he crossed over to the other side of the room to view the Taoists’ work only to find a completely blank wall and a lot of slightly tipsy Taoists doing their strange cloud-like movements. True, the wall was very shiny and smooth after numerous applications with the soft cloths but there was nothing there, no paintings of his magnificence, no golden palace, no wondrous river.  “What is this,” he thundered, “you did not even try to paint a picture.  Is this the way you curry my favor?”

“Oh but we have done our best!” cried the Taoists indignantly, and a little rudely.

“But there is nothing there, “ said the emperor, “Is this really how you view me?  Is this your precious secret?”

“Wait one moment please,” said the oldest and tipsiest of the Taoists, his long beard still damp with wine.  “Please draw the aside the curtain between our walls and you will truly see our work”

So shaking his head in wonder, the emperor had the curtain drawn, revealing the dazzling painting of the Confucians. The emperor stood before it once again, marveling at its wonder and how they seemed to get his noble brow just so. Then, his mind already made up as to who was the winner that day, he turned once again to the Taoists’ blank wall, only to find there, not a blank wall after all but the reflection of the painting on the opposite wall. Only this time, instead of a flat and static picture, he saw the reflection on the unbelievably smooth and shiny wall, a moving picture.

Somehow, because of the play of light on the shiny surface there, it seemed as though the painting had come alive. There was the palace and the town again, only he thought he could detect movement behind its windows. The river itself moved, the waves lapping against each other and the birds whirling overhead. And lastly, he could see himself there, astride his great stallion, whose very nostrils seemed to quiver in the air while his own beard fluttered in the breeze and his lips seemed to move as he shouted orders to his troops.

He was amazed. He was astounded. He turned to the tipsy Taoists and asked them with humility and wonder in his voice just how they had managed this miracle. The Taoists seemed to hang their heads just a little and answered simply.

“It is actually in not doing that we achieved this wondrous thing, Sire all we did was create the space for the painting to happen and it painted itself.”

“Is this then your precious secret?” asked the great lord.

“Yes,” answered the Taoists, “it is indeed.”

“We call it Wu Wei”

By Solala Towler - Tales from the TAO

------------------------

The Eight Immortals Of The Wine Cup

yǐnzhōng bāxiān

飲中八仙

The eight immortals of the wine cup were a group of ancient Chinese Tang dynasty (618 to 907 AD) scholars who enjoyed drinking wine and writing poetry. Many of these men were advisors to rulers and practiced Taoism. Here are the names of the eight immortals:

Li Bai (李白)

He Zhizhang (賀知章)

Li Jin (李璡)

Li Shizhi (李適之)

Cui Zongzhi (崔宗之)

Su Jin (蘇晉)

Zhang Xu (張旭)

Jiao Sui (焦遂)

Below is a collection of some of their more popular poems written in English, Pinyin, and Chinese.

The Eight Immortals of the Wine Cup

Du Fu

Zhizhang rides his horse, but reels

As on a reeling ship.

Should he, blear-eyed, tumble into a well,

He would lie in the bottom, fast asleep.

Li Jin, Prince must have three jugs full

There he goes up to court.

How copiously his royal mouth waters

As a brewer’s cart passes by.

It’s a pity, he mournfully admits.

That he is not the Lord of the Wine Spring.

Our minister Li squanders at the rate

Of ten thousand yuan or dollars per day.

He inhales like a great whale,

Gulping one hundred rivers;

And with a cup in his hand he insists,

He loves the Sage and avoids the Wise.

Zongzhi a handsome youth, fastidious,

Disdains the rabble.

But turns his gaze toward the blue heaven,

Holding his beloved bowl.

Radiant is he, like a tree of jade,

That stands against the breeze.

Su Jin, the religious, cleanses his soul

Before his painted Buddha.

But his long rites need to be interrupted

As often he loves to go on a spree.

As for Li Bai, give him a jugful,

He will write one hundred poems.

He drowses in a wine shop

On a city street in Chang-an;

And though his sovereign calls,

He will not board the imperial barge.

“Please your majesty”, he says,

“I am a God of wine”.

Zhang Xu is a calligrapher of renown,

Three cups make him the master.

He throws off his cap, wearing his pate

Unceremoniously before princes,

And wields his inspired brush, and lo.

Wreaths of clouds roll on the paper.

Jiao Sui, another immortal, elate

After full five jugfuls,

Is eloquent of heroic speech –

The wonder of all the feasting hall.

Yǐn zhōng bāxiān gē

Du Fu

zhīzhāng qímǎ shì chéng chuán, yǎnhuā luòjǐng shuǐdǐ mián.

Rǔ yángsān dòu shǐ cháotiān, dào féng qū chē kǒu liúxián, hèn bu yí fēng xiàng jiǔquán.

Zuǒ xiāng rìxìng fèi wàn qián, yǐn rú zhǎng jīng xī bǎichuān, xián bēi yuè shèng chēng bì xián.

Zōngzhī xiāosǎ měishàonián, jǔ shāng báiyǎn wàng qīngtiān, jiǎo rú yùshù línfēng qián.

Sū jìn chángzhāi xiù fú qián, zuì zhōng wǎngwǎng ài táo chán.

Lǐbái yī dòu shī bǎi piān, cháng'ān shì shàng jiǔjiā mián, tiānzǐ hū lái bu shàng chuán, zì chēngchén shì jiǔ zhōng xiān.

Zhāngxùsān bēi cǎo shèng chuán, tuōmào lù dǐng wánggōng qián, huīháo luò zhǐ rú yúnyān.

Jiāo suì wǔdǒu fāng zhuórán, gāo tán xióngbiàn jīng sì yán.

飲中八仙歌

杜甫

知章騎馬似乘船，眼花落井水底眠。

汝陽三鬥始朝天，道逢麴車口流涎，恨不移封向酒泉。

左相日興費萬錢，飲如長鯨吸百川，銜杯樂聖稱避賢。

宗之瀟灑美少年，舉觴白眼望青天，皎如玉樹臨風前。

蘇晉長齋繡佛前，醉中往往愛逃禪。

李白一斗詩百篇，長安市上酒家眠，天子呼來不上船，自稱臣是酒中仙。

張旭三杯草聖傳，脱帽露頂王公前，揮毫落紙如雲煙。

焦遂五斗方卓然，高談雄辯驚四筵。

------------------------

    Drinking Alone by Moonlight

Li Bai

Here among flowers with a flask of wine

With no close friends, I pour it alone.

I lift cup to bright moon, beg its company,

Then facing my shadow, we become three.

The moon has never known how to drink;

My shadow does nothing but follow me.

But with moon and shadow as companions the while,

This joy I find must catch spring while it's here.

I sing, and the moon just lingers on;

I dance, and my shadow flails wildly.

When still sober we share friendship and pleasure,

Then, drunk, each goes his own way—

Let us join to roam beyond human cares

And plan to meet far in the river of stars.

                                Yuè xià dú zhuó                         

                                       Lǐ Bái

huā jiān yī hú jiǔ.

Dú zhuó wū xiāngqīn.

Jǔ bēi yāo míngyuè.

Duì yǐng chéng sān rén.

Yuè jì bù jiě yǐn.

Yǐng tú suí wǒ shēn.

Zàn bàn yuè jiāng yǐng.

Xínglè xū jí chūn.

Wǒ gē yuè páihuái.

Wǒ wǔ yǐng língluàn.

Xǐng shí tóng jiāohuān.

Zuì hòu gè fēnsàn.

Yǒng jié wúqíng yóu.

Xiāng qī miǎo yúnhàn.

                                  Yuè xià dú zhuó         

                                                    月下獨酌

李白

花間一壺酒。

獨酌無相親。

舉杯邀明月。

對影成三人。

月既不解飲。

影徒隨我身。

暫伴月將影。

行樂須及春。

我歌月徘徊。

我舞影零亂。

醒時同交歡。

醉後各分散。

永結無情遊。

相期邈雲漢。

------------------------

Nostalgia

Li Bai

 Beside my bed a pool of light—

 Is it frost on the ground?

 I lift my eyes and see the moon,

 I lower my face and think of home. 

Jìngyè sī

 Lǐ Bái

chuáng qián míngyuèguāng, 

yí shì dìshàng shuāng,  

jǔ tóu wàng míng yuè, 

dītóu sī gùxiāng.

                                                             静夜思

                                                                李白

床前明月光， 

疑是地上霜，  

舉頭望明月， 

低頭思故鄉。

------------------------

Leaving Baidi Town in Early Morning

Li Bai

In early morning I start when Baidi is amid the rosy cloud

For Jiangling and travel a thousand miles within a day

As the riverbanks echo still with the monkey's crying aloud

Before a myriad of mountains the swift boat has glided away.

Zǎo fā bái dì chéng 

 Lǐ Bái

zhāo cí bái dì cǎi yún jiān ，

qiān lǐ jiāng líng yí rì huán 。

liǎng àn yuán shēng tí bú zhù ， 

qīng zhōu yǐ guò wàn chóng shān 。

早发白帝城

  李白

朝 辞 白 帝 彩 云 间 ，

 千 里 江 陵 一日 还 。

两 岸 猿 声 啼 不 住 ，

 轻 舟 已 过 万 重 山 。

------------------------

Returning Home As An Unrecognized Old Man

He Zhizhang

Small and young I left home, big and old I return

Speaking in my village voice with hair grown thin

Children, seeing and hearing me, wonder, who is this man?

And smiling, ask, sir, why do you come?

Huí xiāng ǒu shū

Hè Zhīzhāng

Shǎo xiǎo lí jiā lǎodà huí

xiāng yīnwú gǎi bìn máo shuāi

értóng xiāng jiàn bù xiāngshí

xiào wèn kè cóng hé chù lái

回鄉偶書

賀知章

少小離家老大回

鄉音無改鬢毛衰

兒童相見不相識

笑問客從何處來

------------------------

An Ode to a Willow Tree

He Zhizhang

The willow is dressed head to toe in jade,

Thousands of verdant branches drape like silk ribbons.

I know not who tailored your leaves to be so thin,

The springtime breeze of February resembles a scissor.

Yǒng liǔ 

Hè Zhīzhāng

bìyù zhuāng chéngyī shù gāo,

wàn tiáo chuíxià lǜ sī tāo.

Bùzhī xì yè shéi cái chū,

èr yuè chūnfēng shì jiǎndāo.

咏柳 贺知章

賀知章

碧玉妆成一树高，

万条垂下绿丝绦。

不知细叶谁裁出，

二月春风似剪刀。

------------------------

Questions and Answers in the Mountains

                                                              Li Bai

You ask me why I live in the blue-green mountains;

I smile and do not answer, my heart at leisure.

Peach blossom on flowing water goes distantly;

I dwell in another heaven where no earthly man belongs.

Shānzhōng Wèndá

        Lǐ Bái

Wèn yú hé yì qī bì shān,

Xiào ér bù dá xīn zì xián.

Táohuā liúshuǐ yǎo rán qù,

Biéyǒu tiāndì fēi rénjiān.

                                                            山中問答

                                                            李白

問余何意棲碧山，

笑而不答心自閒。

桃花流水窅然去，

別有天地非人間。

------------------------

Sitting Alone at Jingting Mountain

Li Bai 

The flock of birds have flown high and away,

A solitary cloud goes off calmly alone.

We look at each other and never get bored,

Just me and Jingting Mountain

Dú zuò jìng tíng shān

Lǐ bái

zhòng niǎo gāofēi jǐn

gūyún dú qù xián

xiāng kàn liǎng bùyàn

zhǐyǒu jìng tíng shān

獨坐敬亭山

李白

衆鳥高飛盡

孤雲獨去閒

相看兩不厭

只有敬亭山

------------------------

Bring in the wine

Li Bai

Don't you see

The water of the Yellow River comes up from heaven,

Rush to the sea and never return again;

don't you see

In the great halls bright mirrors, men grieve over white hair,

The morning is like blue silk and the evening is snow.

Life accomplishments are to be thoroughly enjoyed,

Don't make the golden cup empty to the moon.

Heaven made me, I am born to be useful,

When the money's gone, it will come back.

Cooking sheep and butcher the ox - let’s celebrate,

You will have to drink three hundred cups.

Master Cen,

Dan Qiusheng,

Bring in the wine,

The cups should not stop.

A song will be sung,

Please listen to me.

Bells, drums, and jade are not fine enough,

I wish to be drunk forever and never sober

The ancient sages have always been solitary,

Only the drinker can leave his name behind

When the Prince of Chen used to feast on Pingle,

Ten Thousand wine cups, do not restrain. Celebrate life.

Why does the host talk about having little money?

You must go buy the wine and I will drink it with you!

My amazing horse,

My furs are worth a thousand gold pieces,

Take them and exchange them for fine wine,

And together we will erase the worries of ten thousand ages.

Jiāng jìn jiǔ 

Lǐ bái 

lǐbái jūn bùjiàn, 

huánghé zhī shuǐ tiān shànglái, 

bēnliú dào hǎi bù fù huí; 

jūn bùjiàn, 

gāotáng míngjìng bēi bái fà, 

cháo rú qīngsī mù chéng xuě. 

Rénshēng déyì xū jìn huān, 

mò shǐ jīn zūn kōng duì yuè. 

Tiānshēng wǒ cái bì yǒuyòng, 

qiānjīn sàn jǐn hái fù lái. 

Pēng yáng zǎi niú qiě wéi lè, 

huì xū yī yǐn sānbǎi bēi. 

Cén fūzǐ, dān qiū shēng, 

jiāng jìn jiǔ, 

bēi mò tíng. 

Yǔ jūn gē yī qū, 

qǐng jūn wèi wǒ qīng ěr tīng. 

Zhōng gǔ zhuàn yù bùzú guì, 

dàn yuàn zhǎng zuì bù fù xǐng. 

Gǔlái shèngxián jiē jìmò, 

wéiyǒu yǐn zhě liú qí míng. 

Chén wáng xī shí yàn píng lè, 

dǒujiǔ shíqiān zì huān xuè. 

Zhǔrén hé wèi yán shǎo qián, 

jìng xū gū qǔ duì jūn zhuó. 

Wǔ huā mǎ, qiānjīn qiú, 

hū er jiāng chū huàn měijiǔ, 

yǔ ěr tóng xiāo wàngǔ chóu.

將進酒

李白

君不見，

黃河之水天上來，

奔流到海不復回;

君不見，

高堂明鏡悲白髮，

朝如青絲暮成雪。

人生得意須盡歡，

莫使金樽空對月。

天生我材必有用，

千金散盡還復來。

烹羊宰牛且為樂，

會須一飲三百杯。

岑夫子，

丹丘生，

將進酒，

杯莫停。

與君歌一曲，

請君為我傾耳聽。

鐘鼓饌玉不足貴，

但願長醉不復醒。

古來聖賢皆寂寞，

惟有飲者留其名。

陳王昔時宴平樂，

斗酒十千恣欢谑。

主人何為言少錢，

徑須沽取對君酌。

五花馬，

千金裘，

呼兒將出換美酒，

與爾同銷萬古愁。

------------------------

Evening moonlight river travel

Li Bai

Winds arise, tossed about on the river
Desolate and bleak autumn water and riverbank trees.
Riding the bow, beautiful clear evening
Raise the bamboo sail, and the boat easily cuts through the waves.

Around another green mountain, the moon follows us
Flowing water joins the clear blue sky.
Distant stars upon the river
Yet it feels like the hidden and cloudy forests.

The road and direction home very far away
Passing river moving into larger waters.
Personal sorrow as the flowered grasses decay
Hear again melancholy water caltrop songs.

Losing our course following low-water delta waterways
Emerge overlooking bright sandbars.
Thinking of me not being able to see you
Gazing into the far distance increases worry and separation.

Yuèyè jiāng xíng jì cuī yuánwài zōngzhī 

Lǐ bái 

piāoyáo jiāng fēng qǐ 

xiāosàhǎi shù qiū. 

Dēng lú měi qīngyè guà xí yí qīngzhōu. 

Yuè suí bì shān zhuǎn shuǐhé qīngtiān liú. 

Xiāng rú xīnghé shàng dàn jué yún lín yōu. 

Guī lù fānghàohào cú chuān qù yōuyōu. 

Tú bēi huì cǎo xiē fù tīng líng gē chóu. 

Àn qū mí hòu pǔ shā míng kàn qián zhōu. 

Huái jūn bù kějiàn wàng yuǎn zēng lí yōu.

月 夜 江 行 寄 崔 员 外 宗 之

李白

飘 摇 江 风 起

萧 飒 海 树 秋。

登 舻 美 清 夜

挂 席 移 轻 舟。

月 随 碧 山 转

水 合 青 天 流。

香 如 星 河 上

但 觉 云 林 幽。

归 路 方 浩 浩

徂 川 去 悠 悠。

徒 悲 蕙 草 歇

复 听 菱 歌 愁。

岸 曲 迷 后 浦

沙 明 瞰 前 洲。

怀 君 不 可 见

望 远 增 离 忧。

------------------------

Conversations with a Gigantic spotted rock

Dear Gigantic spotted rock:

What is the purpose of our existence in this life and what are we supposed to do?

Giant spotted rock:

This is a rather common question humans like to ask. The only answer I have is….

I don’t know. 

Wǒ bù zhīdào a.

我不知道啊。

One thing that has helped me with this experience in life is reading about spirituality. I especially enjoy reading poetry. Lately, I have been reading “The Yellow Court Classic” 黄庭经 written by Lady Wei Huacun. Lady Wei lived around the year 250 and enjoyed practicing Taoist cultivation techniques. She was forced into an arranged marriage and spent her earlier years raising two children. After her children were grown, she committed her life to Taoist cultivation. Legends tell us that she went off alone to practice deep meditation in a mountain cave and received messages from the heavens on how to visualize God within one's body. She wrote down these techniques in The Yellow Court Classic as instructions on aligning with the heavenly spirits 神 and improving the functions of the body. 

This ancient text appears to contain valuable details on how one connects with all of existence and forms a deeper connection with God or Tao. Below is the poem from the first chapter. I attempted to translate this using technology but the content is very mystical and poetic. At the moment, the AI (artificial intelligence) technology is not yet able to fully understand cryptic poetry which has been intentionally written in this manner to conceal the information from folks who may use it in nefarious ways. I suspect after some additional training the AI will eventually be capable of understanding this content. Until this day comes, we will need to rely primarily on other humans to help interpret this.

I hope you have a great day! 

Zhù nǐ jīntiān yúkuài

祝你今天愉快

黄庭经  

The Yellow Court Classic

黄庭内景经

The Yellow Court Inner Landscape Classic

上清章第一

上清紫霞虚皇前 

太上大道玉晨君 

闲居蕊珠作七言

散化五形变万神 

是为黄庭曰内篇 

琴心三叠舞胎仙

九气映明出霄间 

神盖童子生紫烟 

是曰玉书可精研

咏之万过升三天 

千灾以消百病痊 

不惮虎狼之凶残

亦以却老年永延 

The First Chapter of Shangqing

In front of the Purple Clouds and Illusory Emperor of Shangqing, stands the Jade Morning Lord of the Great Tao. He resides in leisure and composes poetry in seven-character lines using the essence of the Rui Zhu flower.

He scatters and transforms the five elements, altering the myriad gods. This is known as the "Nei Pian" of the Yellow Court. His heart's qin music triples and dances, giving birth to the embryonic immortals.

The nine breaths reflect the brightness of the heavens, and the divine canopy of the child god emits purple smoke. This is known as the "Yu Shu," which can be studied to the fullest.

Chanting it ten thousand times will elevate one beyond the Three Heavens, vanquishing a thousand calamities and curing a hundred diseases. One will not fear the ferocity of tigers and wolves, and will also extend one's youthful years.

------------------------

古一 and 古二 need to explore

Let them leave the nest

You did your part so now you can rest

Let them go

Watch them grow

All we have left to do is watch and simply enjoy being alive

“In every one of us, there is a wounded inner child. To take care of this wounded child we need to be present with ourselves. Instead of putting our focus outside and searching for love, acceptance and recognition to fill up the hole inside, we need to take care of ourselves. Love yourself. This will heal the wounded inner child. Come into the present with mindfulness.” 

- Thich Nhat Hanh

------------------------

Section 2 - The Resurrection of Chaos

Peach Blossom Creek

桃花溪

张旭

隐隐飞桥隔野烟

石矶西畔问渔船

桃花尽日随流水

   洞在清溪何处边

Beyond the hidden flying bridge, wild mists gather.

Beneath the west bank's stony cliff, I stop to ask a fisher.

All day long these peach blossoms have floated down the stream.

This cave here, where the creek runs out, where does it lead?"

This is the Zhang Xu poem from the Three Hundred Tang Poems. There is a peach blossom story that is popular throughout Chinese literature. In the 4th century, a fisherman came to a cave in a stream. He thought he could see daylight at the far end. So he went in and then out the other side. There he found a village where people had lived an ideal life for the last seven hundred years-- Zhuangzi-style ideal, where you live simply, write with knots, and never want to go anywhere else. They treated him like an honored guest and he learned they knew nothing of anything that had happened in modern society. The next day he left and reported to the magistrate what he had found. But no one could ever find the cave again.

Zhang Xu (张旭) was a Chinese calligrapher and poet of the Tang Dynasty. A native of Suzhou, he became an official during the reign of Emperor Xuanzong. Zhang was one of the Eight Immortals of the Wine Cup in Du Fu's famous poem. He was also known as Rough Sage (草聖) for his great skill in the rough, or freely-cursive, script. He claimed to have grasped the essence of cursive writing by observing porters fight for their right-of-way against a princess' honor guard and by watching the solo performance of a famous sword-dancer named Lady Gongsun. When sufficiently lubricated, he might use his hair as a calligraphy brush before passing out drunk. Upon waking up, he would be very pleased at the quality of these works, which he could not reproduce in a sober state. 

https://tangshi.tuxfamily.org/zhangxu/ 

------------------------

Ji-gong 济公 

Excerpt from the writing - POETICIZE THE GOOD−ECCENTRICITY OF ENLIGHTENED ZEN CHARACTERS by Yong Zhi

“The act of “mingling” actually indicates a samadhic relationship between the self and others. Samadhi means the merging of subject and object as the culmination of action and cultivation presented in the previous pictures of the series. In samadhic experience, the conventional and habitual line between subject and object become softened or even dissolved. With regard to human relationship, samadhi is to mingle with people in such a manner that for a moment the conventional lines that differentiate and separate people are all broken down.

To mingle with people in the samadhic relationship means to penetrate all the established lines that differentiate and separate people. This also implies the disregarding of the established basis and criteria for measuring and judging people’s identities and status. In such a samadhic relationship the traditional labels that categorize people in terms of their spiritual nature and status, such as master and disciple, the religious and the profane, become insubstantial.”

Ji-gong 济公 was an ancient Chinese Buddhist monk who was kind and helpful. JiGong was an unusual monk who enjoyed drinking wine and eating meat. He often wandered around drinking his wine and wearing torn clothing and broken shoes. Legends tell us that he grew up in a wealthy family but one day his entire family died so he left modern society and dedicated his life to serving others and adopted a great interest in spirituality. He was a playful monk and enjoyed helping others in a samadhic way. He had special human abilities and used these to combat injustice in the world. 

Old man and the tree story

“Once Ji-gong saw an old man trying to hang himself from a tree. The man made a noose and was placing his neck into it when suddenly he saw Ji-gong, dressed in rags, coming his way chanting, “Die, Die, everything is over after I die, death is better than living, I will hang myself now.” Ji-gong also made a noose and looked like he was going to hang himself side by side with the old man from the same tree. The old man was puzzled and asked Ji-gong why he, a monk, would want to commit suicide. Ji-gong told him that he was commissioned to raise money to remodel the monastery. He had begged for three years and collected some money, but on his way back to the monastery, he stopped at a bar, got drunk, and somebody stole all his money. Having no face to go back to the monastery, he decided to end his life. 

The old man believed his story and said, “Don’t worry, I happen to have some money, which is no use for me anymore.” He gave Ji-gong five pieces of silver, which is all the money he had. Ji-gong took the silver and said, “Your silver does not shine as much as what I used to have, but I will take them.” So he took the money and walked away with a grin on his face. 

The old man felt even sadder and proceeded his suicide attempt, but Ji-gong returned. The old man thought the monk came back to thank him for the money. But Ji-gong said: “I see you’ve got nice clothing, why don’t you give that to me also so you can nakedly leave this world just as you nakedly came?” The old man was stunned; he looked up at the sky and sighed: “Why is it as difficult to die as it is to live, and how can I end my misery?” Ji-gong said, “Look, after you die, the wild dogs will come to tear you up, and your nice clothing will be wasted, but if you give it to me, I will make good use of it.” Ji-gong continued to tease and play with the desperate man, until the latter became amused and started to laugh with Ji-gong. The old man soon found this eccentric monk quite friendly and extremely entertaining. He started to open his heart and told Ji-gong his tragic story about the loss of his daughter. His suicidal mind-set miraculously dissolved. Ji-gong helped him to recover from the loss of his daughter and the story had a happy ending.  

Looking at the first part of the story, what Ji-gong has done cannot be considered good based on conventions. He shows no pity and sorrow for a desperate man, and even cheats money out of the poor man by fabricating a story. On the other hand, he has successfully intervened a suicidal attempt and saved a person’s life, which is, indeed, not bad. Therefore, what Ji-gong has done in this story cannot be judged on the basis of conventions as either “good” or “bad.” This story of Ji-gong is a classical example of samadhic play as a Zen’s manner of interaction with others. As discussed earlier, samadhi refers to a non-dualistic state of the mind, and samadhic play is an extraordinary mode of action in which subject and object merge to form a “heavenly flow.” In the samadhic playing with others, the line that demarcates self and others become softened or even dissolved. In the story of saving a suicidal person, Ji-gong, the savior, presents himself as a suicidal man in order to approach another suicidal man. He appears to be even more deplorable and corrupted than the one he is poised to help. In the story, the suicidal man fined himself in a situation where he cannot help feeling sympathy for Ji-gong and gives the monk all the money he has. Ji-gong does not approach the suicidal man as a Bodhisattva, the traditional image of the Buddhist savior who always dedicates his compassionate to all suffering beings. Nor does he take a position as a teacher who can preach profound wisdom about life and death. He does not even present himself as a decent person who can show some pity or sorrow for the suicidal man. The roles are dramatically intertwined; the savior takes a position which is even lower than that of the one who is to be saved. The conventional labels, such as the good and the bad, are not apt to speak about Ji-gong’s character and deeds in that story. Regarding the result of the story, Ji-gong not only saves the suicidal person but also uplifts his spirit, although what Ji-gong has done seems to mock all conventional ethical rules. The question is how this samadhic play, the Zen’s way of being with others, can work out a greater good beyond the polarity of good and evil on conventional basis. 

First, this samadhic play, as an act of mingling, gives rise to an extraordinary bond between people that can effectively release the sense of alienation people may suffer. In the story, the person attempts to commit suicide because he has lost all his families and feels estranged from society. Part of Jigong’s strategy is to build a sense of connection by closing the distance between him and the suicidal man as two strangers so the latter can feel an extraordinary intimacy with people. Suicide can be considered an unethical action, but Ji-gong does not repudiate it, instead, he imitates it. If Ji-gong chooses to approach the suicidal man as a master who takes a position to preach or criticize the latter based on any abstract doctrine, the distance between the two people will increase, and the latter may feel even more alienated. 

Second, the story is not only about how Ji-gong intervenes in a suicidal attempt, but also about how the samadhic play gives rise to an event of enlightenment so the suicidal man is saved both physically and spiritually. It seems extremely cruel on the part of Ji-gong to ask the suicidal man to give up his clothing. However, this is one of Zen’s eccentric tactics for shattering a person’s habitual mindset and inducing the experience of emptiness. This tact is similar to a sudden roar projected toward a disciple or a blow on his head with a stick, which is widely used in Zen monasteries. Zen prefers to “directly point to a person’s mind” rather than to preach or criticize a man for his ignorance, because, from Zen’s perspective, enlightenment is not a theoretical understanding but an existential breakthrough or a leap into a new world of consciousness. In order to transform the suicidal person’s view about reality which underlies his suicidal mindset, Ji-gong has to conduct a show in which he plays a clown. A jovial world suddenly unfolds against the background of the desperate situation, in which the suicidal man suddenly feels emancipated from his attachment. The transmission is completed when Ji-gong and the suicidal man start to laugh together. They laugh at each other, at themselves, and at the world.”

------------------------

The Path of Purification - Visuddhimagga

https://bps.lk/olib/bp/bp207h_The-Path-of-Purification-%28Visuddhimagga%29.pdf 

The Progress of Insight

1. Mind and Body

2. Cause and Effect

3. The Three Characteristics

4. The Arising and Passing Away

5. Dissolution, Entrance to the Dark night

6. Fear

7. Misery

8. Disgust

9. Desire for Deliverance

10. Re-observation

11. Equanimity

12. Conformity

13. Change of Lineage

14. Path

15. Fruition

Simply continue going through the cycles, enjoy each stage and flow through them again and again and again like a merry go round.

During the arising and passing away phase you may experience unusual powers

• Bi-location and poly-location

• Appearing and disappearing

• Walking through objects

• Flying

• Delving into the earth

• Walking on water

• Touching the sun and moon

• Traveling to other realms

• Producing various objects

• Hearing sounds both near and far

• Knowing the mind states and mental qualities of others

• Recalling past lives

If you want to cultivate the powers, you must attain very hard Jhanic states but they can and often do arise spontaneously. 

Simply gaze at nature and meditate. 坐忘 Zuò wàng - Sit and Forget. Clear the mind of thoughts by going back to the breath. 

Do not use this to manipulate anything outside of your own mind and body. Power corrupts. Practice kind intentions. Actions done for efforts other than compassionate purposes are likely to cause an ugly backlash. Stop meddling and simply watch it all happen.

Siddhis - Magical powers

In order for siddhis to be truly beneficial one must perceive it with a pure heart and mind, devoid of ego, selfishness and bad intentions. 

Once you obtain access to these powers, you no longer need them. That is the irony. 

------------------------

Nature is you

You can’t transform yourself. If we are going to hand over the direction of nature to nature, it is necessary that we let go of ourselves but it can’t be done.

Why?

Because you don’t actually exist as a separate ego or personality. You are only making a mess by trying to put things straight. You are trying to straighten out a wiggly world so no wonder you are in trouble. 

So, you can’t do anything. So, what can you do?

You Watch

And all you see is what goes on that is happening by itself. 

You’re breathing, the wind is blowing, the trees are waving, your blood is circulating. It’s all going on by itself. But you know, that’s you, that’s the real you, the you that goes on by itself. 

Your breath goes on without you forcing anything. We have to stop forcing and when we stop we find a world that is happening rather than being done. That happening is our fundamental self. The self is not something just inside the skin, it’s everything around us. When you look out at nature, you are looking at you.

• Alan Watts

------------------------

Amazing Grace

Amazing grace how sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me

I once was lost, but now I'm found

Was blind but now I see

It was grace that taught my heart to fear

And grace my fears relieved

How precious did that grace appear

The hour I first believed

Through many dangers, toils, and snares

I have already come

This grace that brought me safe thus far

And grace will lead me home

When we've been here ten thousand years

Bright, shining as the sun

We've no less days to sing God's praise

Than when we first begun

Amazing grace how sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me

I once was lost, but now I'm found

Was blind but now I see

Qíyì ēndiǎn

奇异恩典

qíyì ēndiǎn de shēngyīn duōme tiánměi

奇异恩典的声音多么甜美

zhěngjiùle xiàng wǒ zhèyàng de kělián chóng

拯救了像我这样的可怜虫

wǒ céngjīng mílù, dàn xiànzài wǒ zhǎodàole

我曾经迷路，但现在我找到了

céngjīng shīmíng dàn xiànzài wǒ míngbáile

曾经失明但现在我明白了

shì ēndiǎn jiàohuìle wǒ de xīn qù kǒngjù

是恩典教会了我的心去恐惧

kuānshù wǒ de kǒngjù

宽恕我的恐惧

nà ēndiǎn xiǎndé héděng bǎoguì

那恩典显得何等宝贵

wǒ dì yī cì xiāngxìn de shíkè

我第一次相信的时刻

jīnglì xǔduō wéixiǎn, láokǔ hé wǎngluó

经历许多危险、劳苦和网罗

wǒ yǐjīng láile

我已经来了

dào mùqián wéizhǐ, zhè shǐ wǒ ānquán de ēndiǎn

到目前为止，这使我安全的恩典

ēndiǎn huì dài wǒ huí jiā

恩典会带我回家

dāng wǒmen zài zhèlǐ yī wàn nián

当我们在这里一万年

míngliàng, xiàng tàiyáng yīyàng shǎnyào

明亮，像太阳一样闪耀

wǒmen yǒu hěnduō tiān lái gēsòng shàngdì

我们有很多天来歌颂上帝

bǐ wǒmen gāng kāishǐ de shíhòu

比我们刚开始的时候

qíyì ēndiǎn de shēngyīn duōme tiánměi

奇异恩典的声音多么甜美

zhěngjiùle xiàng wǒ zhèyàng de kělián chóng

拯救了像我这样的可怜虫

wǒ céngjīng mílù, dàn xiànzài wǒ zhǎodàole

我曾经迷路，但现在我找到了

céngjīng shīmíng dàn xiànzài wǒ míngbáile

曾经失明但现在我明白了

------------------------

The Violet

Jane Taylor

Down in a green and shady bed,

A modest violet grew,

Its stalk was bent, it hung its head,

As if to hide from view.

And yet it was a lovely flower,

Its colors bright and fair;

It might have graced a rosy bower,

Instead of hiding there,

Yet there it was content to bloom,

In modest tints arrayed;

And there diffused its sweet perfume,

Within the silent shade.

Then let me to the valley go,

This pretty flower to see;

That I may also learn to grow

In sweet humility.

Zǐluólán

紫罗兰

Jane Taylor

zài yī zhānglǜyīn chéng yīn de chuángshàng,

在一张绿荫成荫的床上，

wēnhé de zǐluólán shēngzhǎng,

温和的紫罗兰生长，

tā de jīng wānqūle, tā dīxiàle tóu,

它的茎弯曲了，它低下了头，

hǎoxiàng yào duǒ qǐlái yīyàng.

好像要躲起来一样。

Rán'ér tā shì yī duǒ kě'ài de huā,

然而它是一朵可爱的花，

tā de yánsè xiānyàn ér měilì;

它的颜色鲜艳而美丽；

tā běn kěyǐ wéi méiguī sè de liángtíng zēngtiān guāngcǎi,

它本可以为玫瑰色的凉亭增添光彩，

yǔqí duǒ zài nàlǐ,

与其躲在那里，

rán'ér tā mǎnzú yú zhànfàng,

然而它满足于绽放，

yǐ púsù de sècǎi páiliè;

以朴素的色彩排列；

nàlǐ sànfàzhe tiánměi de xiāngqì,

那里散发着甜美的香气，

jìjìng de yīnliáng chù.

寂静的阴凉处。

Ránhòu ràng wǒ dào shāngǔ qù,

然后让我到山谷去，

zhè duǒ piàoliang de huā zhídé yī kàn;

这朵漂亮的花值得一看；

wǒ yě kěyǐ xuéhuì chéngzhǎng

我也可以学会成长

zài tiánmì de qiānbēi zhōng.

在甜蜜的谦卑中。

------------------------

Snow

Even when the decay 

is upon us

in late autumn

The snow arrives

and

the beauty of life

is once again revealed

Xuě

雪

jíshǐ fǔxiǔ

即使腐朽

zài wǒmen shēnshang

在我们身上

zài shēnqiū

在深秋

xuě láile

雪来了

hé

和

shēngmìng zhīměi

生命之美

zàicì bèi jiēlù

再次被揭露

------------------------

Dissolution phase - Dark night of the soul

The feeling of life being meaningless. 

The meaning you created in your mind is no longer meaningful.

How to defeat this stage:

• Don’t judge the feelings

• Accept the feelings. Sit with them.

• Accept life as it is

• Surrender

• Don’t accept judgment from others

• Be your true self

Once you reach a state of equanimity you will realize that we are nothing but that we are also everything. This will allow your heart to grow and allow you to develop a strong understanding of compassion. 

Become an empty vessel with no intentions or desires and the Dao will fill you and all will be attracted to you. Submit. Allow things to be as they are. Seek the lowest places so that we push nothing onto the world or onto the people. 

You are perfect the way you are and so is everyone else.

Accept yourself as you are. Accept others as they are.

The more you relinquish power to others, the more power you will have.

How to become pure again:

Return to the uncarved block

Unlearn what society has taught us

There is no morality

Trust that all will be ok. Let go

Understand that you already belong to the world

I am fine the way I am and do not need outside approval

------------------------

Tao Te Ching

Chapter 37

The tao never acts with force,

Yet there is nothing that it cannot do

If rulers could follow the way of the Tao,

Then all of creation would willingly follow their example.

If selfish desires were to arise after their transformation,

I would erase them with the power of the Uncarved Block.

By the power of the Uncarved Block,

Future generations would lose their selfish desires.

By losing their selfish desires,

The world would naturally settle into peace.

第三十七章

道常无为而无不为。候王若能守之，万物将自化。

化而欲作，吾将镇之以无名之朴，镇之以无名之朴，夫将不欲。

不欲以静，天下将自定。

------------------------

The Beloved Guest

Mahmud Shabistari

Cast away your existence entirely,

for it is nothing but weeds and refuse.

Go, clear out your heart's chamber;

arrange it as the abiding-place of the Beloved.

When you go forth, He will come in,

and to you, with self discarded,

He will unveil His beauty.

Qīn'ài de kèrén

亲爱的客人

chèdǐ pāoqì nǐ de cúnzài,

彻底抛弃你的存在，

yīnwèi tā zhǐ bùguò shì zá cǎo hé lèsè.

因为它只不过是杂草和垃圾。

Qù ba, qīnglǐ nǐ de xīnshì;

去吧，清理你的心室；

ānpái tā zuòwéi zhì'ài zhě de jūsuǒ.

安排它作为挚爱者的居所。

Dāng nǐ chūqù shí, tā huì jìnlái,

当你出去时，他会进来，

ér duì nǐ, pāoqì zìwǒ,

而对你，抛弃自我，

tā jiāng zhǎnxiàn tā dì měilì.

他将展现他的美丽。

------------------------

Joyfully Laughing

I ran into Allen at the pub today as I was eating some spicy chicken wings and drinking a beer. We had some interesting conversations. Allen has often reminded me of my uncle who passed away a few years ago so I enjoy talking with him. 

It is funny but a little scary how similar he is to my uncle. They both worked in mechanical jobs, were very interested in nature, and enjoyed raising and hunting birds. Allen was telling me how he used to raise pheasant and duck. He had some great stories about how he used to raise and hunt these birds.

Allen said that his wife had passed away years ago and how this caused a painful experience but also brought him into a deeper spiritual connection to life. He said sometimes he will see his deceased wife in the house, almost like a ghost. He said that he also sees many features from his wife in his own granddaughter and she often reminds him of her. Also, he mentioned that he has lately noticed this synchronicity in life that I also experience. For example, Allen told me that sometimes when he is thinking about a close friend that this friend will call him on the phone at that very moment and we both agree that this is an unusual experience but also something very mystical. 

Later in our conversations, while he was talking about doves, he mentioned that doves typically walk around small streams and eat the rock pebbles. The doves eat these rock pebbles to help with digesting their food. Birds do not have teeth so in order to digest food they have a secondary stomach called a gizzard. The rock pebbles become lodged in the gizzard and rub around with one another to smash up the food to aid in digestion. After some time, the rock pebbles become very smooth so the bird will vomit them out and eat fresh rock pebbles which are more rigid. I suppose the rocks and the birds have an intimate connection in this life too. What are the odds of a man who is very similar to my deceased uncle telling me about rocks and flying birds? hahahaha

All there is left to do is laugh at the irony. “The enlightened eccentrics are often portrayed as both the laughers and the laughable. Laughing becomes a feature of the enlightened ones in their manner of being with people. The laugh, however, does not indicate any negative or cynical attitude against the world. It reflects a poetic attitude in which the enlightened ones endorse worldly happiness and at the same time laugh at it.”

------------------------

JiGong 济公 song

  Broken shoes, broken hats

  Broken cassock

 you laugh at me he laugh at me

  Broken a fan

  Namo Amitabha

  Namo Amitabha

  Namo Amitabha

  Namo Amitabha

  hey hey hey hey

 No hassle, no worries, no worries

  The world is hot and cold

  Let's go, let's go, let's go

   Where is the injustice, there is me

  Where is the injustice, there is me

  Broken shoes, broken hats

  Broken cassock

  laugh at me crazy laugh at me

  Wine and meat through the intestines

Xié er pò mào er pò

鞋儿破 帽儿破

shēnshang de jiāshā pò

身上的袈裟破

nǐ xiào wǒ tā xiào wǒ

你笑我 他笑我

yī bǎ shàn er pò

一把扇儿破

ná mó ēmítuófó

南无阿弥陀佛

ná mó ēmítuófó

南无阿弥陀佛

ná mó ēmítuófó

南无阿弥陀佛

ná mó ēmítuófó

南无阿弥陀佛

āi, āi hāi āi hāi

哎，哎嗨哎嗨

wú fán wú nǎo wú yōuchóu

无烦无恼无忧愁

shìtàiyánliáng jiē kànpò

世态炎凉皆看破

zǒu a zǒu, lè ya lè

走啊走，乐呀乐

nǎ li yǒu bùpíng nǎ yǒu wǒ

哪里有不平哪有我

nǎ li yǒu bùpíng nǎ yǒu wǒ

哪里有不平哪有我

xié er pò mào er pò

鞋儿破 帽儿破

shēnshang de jiāshā pò

身上的袈裟破

xiào wǒ fēng xiào wǒ diān

笑我疯 笑我颠

jiǔròu chuān chángguò

酒肉穿肠过

------------------------

Story 2

Sit and Forget 

Zuò wàng

坐忘 

The Broken Branches

Zhéduàn de shùzhī

折断的树枝

A collection of writings to help one, 坐忘, sit and forget

------------------------

Karen Mok - All Of A Sudden

Mòwénwèi - hūrán zhī jiān

莫文蔚 - 忽然之间

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFWg55t0QlI 

All of a sudden, the sky dims and the earth darkens

Hūrán zhī jiān tiānhūndì'àn

忽然之间 天昏地暗

Maybe the whole world suddenly becomes empty

Shìjiè kěnéng hūrán shénme dōu méiyǒu

世界可能忽然什么都没有

I remember you, and in turn remember myself

Wǒ xiǎngqǐle nǐ zài xiǎngdào zìjǐ

我想起了你 再想到自己

Why is is that when I'm feeling very fragile, I always miss you

Wǒ wèishéme zǒng zài fēicháng cuìruò de shíhòu huáiniàn nǐ

我为什么总在非常脆弱的时候 怀念你

I understand, I'm too unable to let go of your love, too familiar with your attentiveness

Wǒ míngbái tài fàng bù kāi nǐ de ài tài shúxī nǐ de guānhuái

我明白 太放不开你的爱 太熟悉你的关怀

I can't tell apart, if I think of you for comfort or for grief

Fēn bù kāi xiǎng nǐ suànshì ānwèi háishì bēi'āi

分不开 想你算是安慰还是悲哀

And now, even if all clock-hands come to a stop, even if life becomes like dust

Ér xiànzài jiùsuàn shízhēn dōu tíngbǎi jiùsuàn shēngmìng xiàng chén'āi

而现在 就算时针都停摆 就算生命像尘埃

Can't break apart, we may instead have more faith in love

Fēn bù kāi wǒmen yěxǔ fǎn'ér gèng xiāngxìn ài

分不开 我们也许反而更相信爱

If this universe is ultimately going to disappear

Rúguǒ zhè tiāndì zuìzhōng dūhuì xiāoshī

如果这天地 最终都会消失

I don't want you to be missing from the cherished memories of my journey

Bùxiǎng yīlù zǒu lái zhēnxī de huíyì méiyǒu nǐ

不想一路走来珍惜的回忆 没有你

------------------------

I want to spend time with you.

我想和你虚度时光

Author: Li Yuansheng

作者：李元胜

Together with you, I want to idle away the time,

我想和你虚度时光,

Lowering down our heads and watching the fish 

比如低头看鱼

Or walking away after leaving the teacups on the table,

比如把茶杯留在桌子上，离开

Ignoring the beautiful shadows they cast. 

浪费它们好看的阴影

I even want to idle away the sunset, 

我还想连落日一起浪费，

taking a walk to kill the time till the stars fill up the night sky.

比如散步，一直消磨到星光满天

I also want to idle away the time when the wind arrives,

我还要浪费风起的时候

sitting in the corridor entranced, 

坐在走廊发呆

Till the sorrow clouds in your eyes have blown away out of the window.

直到你眼中乌云，全部被吹到窗外

I have squandered my world, it passes me by,

我已经虚度了世界，它经过我

Tired and seemingly never loved.

疲倦，又像从未被爱过

However, tomorrow, I will still do the same, idling

但是明天我还要这样，虚度

An eyeful of flowers,

满目的花草，

life should be just as beautiful,

生活应该像它们一样美好，

Or meaningless like a movie having been ignored..

一样无意义，像被虚度的电影

Desperate love and life sacrifice bring us a short while of silence.

那些绝望的爱和赴死，为我们带来短暂的沉默

I want that we squander each other. 

我想和你互相浪费

Together, idle away the short silence and the long meaninglessness

一起虚度短的沉默，长的无意义

Together, fritter away the delicate ancient universe

一起消磨精致而苍老的宇宙

Like leaning against a wooden rail and looking down at a mirror, a watery pool,

比如靠在栏杆上，低头看水的镜子

Till all the things that have been squandered, 

直到所有被虚度的事物

behind our backs, grow thin wings.

在我们身后，长出薄薄的翅膀

------------------------

Letting Go

It is difficult to find happiness with oneself, but impossible to find it anywhere else. Nothing in life is permanent. Everything and everyone comes and goes. Life will play out the way it will play out, not how you want it to play out. Learn to just let go!

Letting go and going softly with the flow of the universe is indeed the best attitude towards life. Things which are meant for us will come into our lives anyway. 

Today we will be met with a series of events, all of which are just temporary situations. So don’t mind what happens, come what may, because someday this dream is going to end.

Brahman and Atman:

The teacher asks his student to bring him a fig.

“Open it” says the teacher.

“What do you see there?”

“Some very small seeds, sir”

“Open one of those small seeds. What do you see there?”

“Nothing at all, sir”

“Truly from what you cannot see, the whole fig tree grows. That is reality. That is Atman. That are Thou.”

Brahman underlies the whole universe. It is the life force which is the subtle essence of everything. One cannot see Brahman.

------------------------

My 9 year old self

Author: Helen Dunmore

You must forgive me. Don't look so surprised,

perplexed, and eager to be gone

balancing on your hands or on the tightrope.

You would rather run than walk, rather climb than run

rather leap from a height than anything.

I have spoiled this body we once shared.

Look at the scars and watch the way I move

careful of a bad back or a bruised foot.

.

Do you remember how, three minutes after waking

we'd jump straight out of the ground floor window 

into the summer morning

That dream we had, no doubt it's as fresh in your mind

as the white paper to write it on.

We made a start, but something else came up

a baby vole, or a bag of sherbet lemons -

and besides that summer of ambition

created an ice-lolly factory, a wasp trap

and a den by a cesspit

I'd like to say we could be friends

but the truth is we have nothing in common

beyond a few shared years. 

I won't keep you then.

Time to pick rosehips

 for tuppence a pound,

time to hide down scared lanes

from men in cars after girl-children

------------------------

There is no error

Méiyǒu cuòwù

没有错误

Author: Alan Watts

Everything that ever happens…

Céngjīng fāshēng de yīqiè...

 曾经发生的一切...

Everything I have ever done…

 Wǒ zuòguò de yīqiè...

 我做过的一切...

Everything anyone else has ever done…

Qítā rén zuòguò de yīqiè...

 其他人做过的一切...

Was part of a harmonious design…

Shì héxié shèjì de yībùfèn......

 是和谐设计的一部分......

There is no error at all.

 Wánquán méiyǒu cuòwù.

 完全没有错误。

So, let us not take life so seriously.

 Suǒyǐ, ràng wǒmen bùyào bǎ shēnghuó kàn dé nàme yánsù.

 所以，让我们不要把生活看得那么严肃。

There isn't any problem at all.

 Yīdiǎn wèntí dōu méiyǒu.

 一点问题都没有。

The meaning of being alive is just being alive.

 Huózhe de yìyì jiùshì huózhe.

 活着的意义就是活着。

------------------------

The Poisoned Tree

Author: Jack Kornfield

The maturity we can develop in approaching our difficulties is illustrated by the traditional story of a poisoned tree. On first discovering a poisoned tree, some people see only its danger. Their immediate reaction is, "Let's cut this down before we are hurt. Let's cut it down before anyone else eats the poisoned fruit." This resembles our initial response to the difficulties that arise in our lives, when we encounter aggression, depression, or sorrow in ourselves and others. Our initial response is to avoid them, saying, "These poisons afflict us. Let us uproot them; let us be rid of them. Let us cut them down." 

Other people, who have journeyed further along the spiritual path, discover this poisoned tree and do not meet it with aversion. They have realized that to open to life requires a deep and heartfelt compassion for all that is around us. Knowing the poisoned tree is somehow a part of us, they say, "Let us not cut it down. Instead, let's have compassion for the tree as well." So out of kindness they build a fence around the tree so that others may not be poisoned and the tree may also have its life. This second approach shows a profound shift of relationship from judgment and fear to compassion.

A third type of person, who has traveled yet deeper in spiritual life, sees this same tree. This person, who has gained much vision, looks and says, "Oh, a poisoned tree. Perfect! Just what I was looking for." This individual picks the poisoned fruit, investigates its properties, mixes with other ingredients, and uses the poison as a great medicine to heal the sick and transform the ills of the world. Through respect and understanding, this person sees in a way opposite to most people and finds value in the most difficult circumstances.

------------------------

How can we know that it is not a blessing if it is a blessing in disguise?

Sàiwēngshīmǎ, yān zhī fēi fú

塞翁失马，焉知非福 

Author: Zhuangzi / Chuang-tzu / 莊子

Fū huòfú zhī zhuǎn ér xiāngshēng, qí biàn nàn jiàn yě.

夫禍福之轉而相生，其變難見也。

Jìn sāi shàng zhī rén yǒu shàn shù zhě, mǎ wúgù wáng ér rù hú. Rén jiē diào zhī.

近塞上之人有善術者，馬無故亡而入胡。人皆吊之。

Qí fù yuē:`Cǐ hé jù bù wéi fú hū?

其父曰：此何遽不為福乎？

Jū shù yuè, qí mǎ jiāng hú jùnmǎ ér guī. Rén jiēhè zhī.

居數月，其馬將胡駿馬而歸。人皆賀之。

Qí fù yuē:`Cǐ hé jù bùnéng wéi huò hū?

其父曰：此何遽不能為禍乎？

Jiā fùliáng mǎ, qí zi hǎo qí, duò ér zhé qí bì. Rén jiē diào zhī.

家富良馬，其子好騎，墮而折其髀。人皆吊之。

Qí fù yuē:`Cǐ hé jù bù wéi fú hū?

其父曰：此何遽不為福乎？

Jū yī nián, hú réndà rù sāi, dīng zhuàng zhě yǐn xián ér zhàn,

居一年，胡人大入塞，丁壯者引弦而戰，

jìn sè zhī rén, sǐzhě shíjiǔ, cǐ dú yǐ bǒ zhī gù, fùzǐ xiāng bǎo.

近塞之人，死者十九，此獨以跛之故，父子相保。

Gù fú zhī wèi huò, huò zhī wéi fú, huà bùkě jí, shēn bùkě cè yě.

故福之為禍，禍之為福，化不可極，深不可測也。

There was an old farmer who had worked his crops for many years. One day his horse ran away. Upon hearing the news, his neighbors came to visit. “Such bad luck,” they said sympathetically.

“Maybe,” the farmer replied.

The next morning the horse returned, bringing with it three other wild horses. “How wonderful,” the neighbors exclaimed.

“Maybe,” replied the old man.

The following day, his son tried to ride one of the untamed horses, was thrown, and broke his leg. The neighbors again came to offer their sympathy for what they called his “misfortune.”

“Maybe,” answered the farmer.

The day after, military officials came to the village to draft young men into the army. Seeing that the son's leg was broken, they passed him by. The neighbors congratulated the farmer on how well things had turned out.

“Maybe,” answered the farmer.

------------------------

Dealing with disrespect

When one feels disrespected this is merely a sign of one disrespecting others. We should not interfere with the fate of others, it is a sign of disrespect towards others when we interfere. 

Detach from them

Be happy for them

Let them go

Forget about society's teachings regarding how people should behave. Let them go and accept them as they are. Move on.

As Alan Watts says:

To actually become a better version of yourself, you need to accept yourself as you are. By continually trying to improve, we are never satisfied, and never accept anything. 

And this causes us to “fail”. 

The reason you want to be better is the reason why you aren’t. Wanting to improve creates negative energy, frustration and too much of “trying hard” when instead if we are at ease and relaxed and in a good vibe about ourselves and our life we will attract good things naturally.

When you are being yourself, you have to be willing to violate people’s expectations of you. You have to be willing to disappoint them. You have to be willing for them to react negatively. You have to dig up the courage to stand on your own and be yourself. Being accepted by yourself ends up being more important than by the outside world.

How would another know what is best for you or how would you know what is best for another?

“Kindly let me help you or you’ll drown," said the monkey, putting the fish up in the tree.

------------------------

It’s alright Ma, I’m Only Bleeding

Author: Bob Dylan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBNWkCsmqAY 

Darkness at the break of noon

Shadows even the silver spoon

The handmade blade, the child's balloon

Eclipses both the sun and moon

To understand you know too soon

There is no sense in trying

Pointed threats they bluff with scorn

Suicide remarks are torn

From the fools gold mouthpiece the hollow horn

Plays wasted words, proves to warn

That he not busy being born

Is busy dying

Temptation's page flies out the door

You follow, find yourself at war

Watch waterfalls of pity roar

You feel to moan, but unlike before

You discover that you'd just be one more

Person crying

So don't fear if you hear

A foreign sound to your ear

It's alright, Ma, I'm only sighing

As some warn victory, some downfall

Private reasons, great or small

Can be seen in the eyes of those that call

To make all that should be killed to crawl

While others say don't hate nothing at all

Except hatred

Disillusioned words like bullets bark

As human gods aim for their mark

Make everything from toy guns that spark

To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark

It's easy to see without lookin' too far

That not much is really sacred

While preachers preach of evil fates

Teachers teach that knowledge waits

Can lead to hundred-dollar plates

Goodness hides behind its gates

But even the President of the United States

Sometimes must have to stand naked

And though the rules of the road have been lodged

It's only people's games that you got to dodge

And it's alright, Ma, I can make it

Advertising signs that con

You into thinking you're the one

That can do what's never been done

That can win what's never been won

Meantime, life outside goes on

All around you

You lose yourself, you reappear

You suddenly find you got nothing to fear

Alone you stand with nobody near

When a trembling distant voice, unclear

Startles your sleeping ears to hear

That somebody thinks they really found you

A question in your nerves is lit

Yet you know there is no answer fit

To satisfy, ensure you not to quit

To keep it in your mind and not forget

That it is not he, or she, or them, or it

That you belong to

But though the masters make the rules

For the wise men and the fools

I got nothing, Ma, to live up to

For them that must obey authority

That they do not respect in any degree

Who despise their jobs, their destiny

Speak jealously of them that are free

Do what they do just to be

Nothing more than something they invest in

While some on principles baptized

To strict party platform ties

Social clubs in drag disguise

Outsiders they can freely criticize

Tell nothing except who to idolize

And say "God bless him"

While one who sings with his tongue on fire

Gargles in the rat race choir

Bent out of shape from society's pliers

Cares not to come up any higher

But rather get you down in the hole

That he's in

But I mean no harm, nor put fault

On anyone that lives in a vault

But it's alright, Ma, if I can't please him

Old lady judges watch people in pairs

Limited in sex, they dare

To push fake morals, insult and stare

While money doesn't talk, it swears

Obscenity, who really cares

Propaganda, all is phony

While them that defend what they cannot see

With a killer's pride, security

It blows the minds most bitterly

For them that think death's honesty

Won't fall upon 'em naturally

Life sometimes must get lonely

My eyes collide head-on with stuffed

Graveyards, false goals, I scuff

At pettiness which plays so rough

Walk upside down inside handcuffs

Kick my legs to crash it off

Say, okay, I've had enough

What else can you show me?

And if my thought-dreams could be seen

They'd probably put my head in a guillotine

But it's alright, Ma, it's life, and life only

------------------------

Grateful

Don’t let others tell you that failing is bad. Failing is simply life or God pointing one into a new direction. The key to misery is to look at your hardship and ask “Why me?”. The key to joy is to look at your blessings and ask the same question. Being grateful helps dissolve the ego or self. If you are grateful, you act out of the sense of enough and not out of a sense of scarcity.

Be content with what you have. Rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you. “A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.” When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everybody will respect you.

“The mind, conditioned as it is by the past, always seeks to recreate what it knows and is familiar with. Even if it is painful, at least it is familiar. The mind always adheres to the known. The unknown is dangerous because it has no control over it. That’s why the mind dislikes and ignores the Present Moment.”

• Eckhart Tolle

Dì èrshí'èr zhāng

第二十二章

Qū zé quán, wǎng zé zhí, wā zé yíng, bì zé xīn, shǎo zé dé, duō zé huò.

曲则全，枉则直，洼则盈，敝则新，少则得，多则惑。

Shì yǐ shèngrén bào yī wéi tiānxià shì.

是以圣人抱一为天下式。

Bù zì jiàn, gù míng; bù zì shì, gù zhāng, bù zì fá, gù yǒugōng; bù zì jīn, gù zhǎng.

不自见，故明；不自是，故彰，不自伐，故有功；不自矜，故长。

Fū wéi bùzhēng, gù tiānxià mò néng yǔ zhī zhēng.

夫唯不争，故天下莫能与之争。

Gǔ zhī suǒwèi"qū zé quán"zhě, qǐ xūyán zāi? Chéng quán ér guī zhī.

古之所谓"曲则全"者，岂虚言哉？诚全而归之。

Dao De Jing 22

The increase granted to humility

The partial becomes complete; the crooked, straight; the empty, full; the worn out, new. He whose (desires) are few gets them; he whose (desires) are many goes astray.

Therefore the sage holds in his embrace the one thing (of humility), and manifests it to all the world. He is free from self- display, and therefore he shines; from self-assertion, and therefore he is distinguished; from self-boasting, and therefore his merit is acknowledged; from self-complacency, and therefore he acquires superiority. It is because he is thus free from striving that therefore no one in the world is able to strive with him.

That saying of the ancients that 'the partial becomes complete' was not vainly spoken: - all real completion is comprehended under it.

------------------------

The law that marries all things

Author: Wendell Berry

The cloud is free only

to go with the wind.

The rain is free
only in falling.

The water is free only
in its gathering together,

in its downward courses,
in its rising into the air.

In law is rest
if you love the law,
if you enter, singing, into it
as water in its descent.

Or song is truest law,
and you must enter singing;
it has no other entrance.

It is the great chorus
of parts. The only outlawry
is in division.

Whatever is singing
is found, awaiting the return
of whatever is lost.

Meet us in the air
over the water,
sing the swallows.

Meet me, meet me,
the redbird sings,
here here here here.

------------------------

Feeling Jealous

1. Admit you are jealous

2. Don’t compare yourself to others and realize we are all unique and different. Water, Fire, Earth, Metal are all equally important.

3. Work on yourself. Improve yourself

4. Practice Mudita, wish nothing but good things towards others.

Someone once told me, jealousy is a power game that people in a weak position use to gain or regain control over the person they intend to make jealous. It works pretty well, because it triggers instinctual drives over which most people have little control unless trained and educated to have control. So both parties are guilty. If the victim (the one made jealous) would realize that jealousy is meaningless, then there would be no reason for the attacker (the one that makes the victim jealous) to go ahead with this. 

Some people only feel valuable when they feel someone else is jealous. If no one is jealous, they feel that what they are or what they have is meaningless. In other words, they are dependent upon others for their good feelings about themselves and they can only possess these feelings when someone else simultaneously feels bad, deficient, deprived, unhappy, etc. 

“When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within himself, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment; he needs help.”

• Thich Nhat Hanh

------------------------

Por ti volaré 

Artist: Andrea Bocelli

Song: Por ti volaré 

For you I'll fly

When I live alone

I dream of an horizon

without words

In the darkness and under lights

everything is black to my eyes

if you're not with me, here

You in your world

separated from mine by an abyss

Hey, call me

I'll fly to your remote world

For you I'll fly

wait till I arrive

the end of my journey is you

to live just the two of us

For you I'll fly

through skies and seas

to your love

Opening my eyes at last

I'll live with you

When you're far away

I dream of an horizon

with no words

and I know that you're always there, there

A moon made for me

always illuminated for me

after me, after me, after me

For you I'll fly

wait till I arrive

the end of my journey is you

to live just the two of us

For you I'll fly

through skies and seas

to your love

Opening my eyes at last

I'll live with you

For you I'll fly

through skies and seas

to your love

Opening my eyes at last

I'll live with you

For you I'll fly

I'll fly...

------------------------

fúshēng liù jì

浮生六记

Six Records of Floating Life

Chūzì qīngcháo shěn fù

出自清朝沈复

Author: Shen Fu

wú rén yǔ wǒ lì huánghūn, wú rén wèn wǒ zhōu kě wēn.

无人与我立黄昏，无人问我粥可温。

No one stood with me at dusk, no one asked me if the porridge was warm.

Wú rén yǔ wǒ niǎn xídēng, wú rén gòng wǒ shū bànshēng.

无人与我捻熄灯，无人共我书半生。

No one turns out the lights with me, and no one shares my book with me for half my life.

Wú rén péi wǒ yè yǐ shēn, wú rén yǔ wǒ bǎjiǔ fēn.

无人陪我夜已深，无人与我把酒分。

No one to accompany me late at night, no one to share the wine with me.

Wú rén shì wǒ xiāngsī lèi, wú rén mèng wǒ yǔ qiánchén.

无人拭我相思泪，无人梦我与前尘。

No one wiped my tears of lovesickness, no one dreamed of me and the past.

Wú rén péi wǒ gù xīngchén, wú rén xǐng wǒ chá yǐ lěng.

无人陪我顾星辰，无人醒我茶已冷。

No one accompanies me Gu Xingchen, no one wakes me up and my tea is cold.

Wú rén tīng wǒ shù zhōngcháng, wú rén jiě wǒ xīntóu mèng.

无人听我述衷肠，无人解我心头梦。

No one listens to my heart, no one interprets my dreams.

Wú rén jū wǒ yán zhōng lèi, wú rén chóu wǒ dúxíng lù.

无人拘我言中泪，无人愁我独行路。

No one restrains my tears, no one worries me to walk alone.

Huíshǒu xiànglái xiāosè chù, wú rén děng zài dēnghuǒ lánshān chù.

回首向来萧瑟处，无人等在灯火阑珊处.

Looking back at the place that has always been bleak, no one is waiting at the dimly lit place

------------------------

God's lonely man

Author: Thomas Wolfe

The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, peculiar to myself and to a few other solitary men, is the central and inevitable fact of human existence. When we examine the moments, acts, and statements of all kinds of people -- not only the grief and ecstasy of the greatest poets, but also the huge unhappiness of the average soul…we find, I think, that they are all suffering from the same thing. The final cause of their complaint is loneliness.

------------------------

Shǔyú nǐ.

属于你。

You Belong

    Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald

Nǐ huì fāxiàn nǐ de kěwàng shì pǔbiàn de kěwàng, nǐ bìng bù gūdú, 

你会发现你的渴望是普遍的渴望，你并不孤独，

“That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, 

yě bù gūlì yú rènhé rén.

也不孤立于任何人。

That you're not lonely and isolated from anyone. 

Shǔyú nǐ.

属于你。

You belong.”

------------------------

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

Author: William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed—gazed—but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

------------------------

Sūshì dōngzhì rì dú yóu jíxiángsì

蘇軾 冬至日獨遊吉祥寺

On the Winter Solstice, Traveling Alone to the Temple of Fortune, by Su Shi

Dōngzhìrì Dúyóu Jíxiáng Sì 

冬至日獨遊吉祥寺

On the Winter Solstice, Travelling Alone to the Temple of Fortune

Jǐng dǐ wēi yáng huí wèi huí,

井底微陽回未回，

At the bottom of the well, the tiniest sunlight has not returned;

xiāoxiāo hán yǔ shī kū gāi.

蕭蕭寒雨濕枯荄。

the sighing rain moistens dried up roots.

Hérén gèng shì sū fūzǐ,

何人更似蘇夫子，

Who most resembles Master Su?

bùshì huā shí kěn dú lái.

不是花時肯獨來。

It is not the time for blossoms, so I consent to come here alone.

------------------------

Stoned Immaculate

I’ll tell you this... No eternal reward will forgive us now. For wasting the dawn. Back in those days, everything was simpler and more confusing.

One summer night, going to the pier. I ran into two young girls. The blonde one was called Freedom. The dark one, Enterprise. We talked and they told me this story. Now listen to this...

I’ll tell you about Texas radio and the big beat. Soft driven, slow, and mad. Like some new language. Reaching your head with the cold, sudden fury of a divine messenger. Let me tell you about heartache and the loss of god. Wandering, wandering in hopeless night.

Out here in the perimeter, there are no stars. Out here we is stoned. Immaculate.

• Jim Morrison

------------------------

答张五弟

A Reply

Author: Wang Wei

Zhōng nán yǒu máowū, qián duì zhōng nánshān.

终南有茅屋，前对终南山。

I have a place on the Chungnan slopes.

Sitting there you can see the Mountains.

Zhōngnián wú kè cháng bìguān, zhōngrì wúxīn cháng zì xián.

终年无客常闭关，终日无心长自闲。

No one there, no guests, the gate is closed.

No plans all day, just time and silence.

Bùfáng yǐnjiǔ fù chuídiào, jūn dàn néng lái xiāng wǎng huán.

不妨饮酒复垂钓，君但能来相往还。

Nothing stops you gazing and dreaming.

Why not come and try to find me there?

⁃

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Excerpt from A Path With Heart

Author: Jack Kornfield

"The Tibetan teacher Kalu Rinpoche puts it this way:

You live in illusion and the appearance of things. There is a reality, but you do not know this. When you understand this, you will see that you are nothing, and being nothing you are everything.

That is all.”

Healing comes in touching this realm of non separation. We discover that our fears and desires are based on delusion, on a sense of separateness that is fundamentally untrue.

In discovering the healing power of emptiness, we sense that everything is intertwined in a continuous movement.

With this wisdom we can open to one moment after another and live the ever changing Tao. We discover we can let go and trust, we can let the breath breathe itself and the natural movement of life carry us with ease.

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Sit and Forget

Zuò wàng

坐忘 

坐忘 or sit and forget or sitting with blank mind is an ancient Chinese Taoist meditation practice. The idea is to simply sit down and erase your mind of all thoughts. This practice does take some time to perform but appears to work quite well. When one practices 坐忘, it empties the mind and allows the Tao to flow through. 

This practice seems to bring one to a new realization and one gains an understanding of nothingness. Coming into the present moment while watching nature and clearing thoughts allows one to awaken to the true reality. 

What if we would heal ourselves by simply explaining to ourselves that we are not actually injured or diseased or broken or in pain or having any problems at all?

What if we would allow ourselves to realize how amazing and perfect we are with all our flaws and attachments and whatever society labels as evil or bad?

What’s with this self-blaming condition we often see throughout society? Humans seem to be the only creatures that do it. Birds, turtles, frogs, dogs, bugs, trees, and all else in creation do not seem to fight with the process. 

What if we would sort of just let everything be the way it is and stop fighting with the natural way?

Why shouldn’t we allow ourselves to be healed in this way?

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Story 3

Flying through the realms

Fēiyuè zhū jiè

飞越诸界

------------------------

Saying Hello To Metempsychosis

Xiàng lúnhuí wènhǎo

向轮回问好

The sun is divided from the shadows.

The plants are vibrant and new.

Watching the straw home but allowing…

the bizarre golden creature to gaze into the distance.

There is a silence,

beyond the chirping birds and wind.

Sit there, sit there, simply watch it.

When the sun glistens upon the tree leaves

and

the wind tosses them around

and 

the budding flowers blossom

and

The birds sing to us their special tunes…

one can only relax into immaculate equanimity

and

say hello to the beautiful things that surround us.

You are Beautiful!

Nǐ hěn měilì!

你很美丽！

Xiàng lúnhuí wènhǎo

向轮回问好

tàiyáng yǔ yīnyǐng fēnkāi.

太阳与阴影分开。

Zhèxiē zhíwù shēngjī bóbó, xīnxiān.

这些植物生机勃勃，新鲜。

Kànzhe dàocǎo huí jiā dàn yǔnxǔ

看着稻草回家但允许

níngshì yuǎnfāng de qíyì jīnsè shēngwù.

凝视远方的奇异金色生物。

Yǒuyī zhǒng chénmò,

有一种沉默，

chāoyuè míngjiào de niǎo er héfēng.

超越鸣叫的鸟儿和风。

Zuò zài nàlǐ, zuò zài nàlǐ, zhǐshì kànzhe tā.

坐在那里，坐在那里，只是看着它。

Dāng yángguāng sǎ zài shùyè shàng

当阳光洒在树叶上

hé

和

fēng jiāng tāmen pāo lái pāo qù

风将它们抛来抛去

hé

和

hánbāo dài fàng de huāduǒ zhànfàng

含苞待放的花朵绽放

hé

和

niǎo er xiàng wǒmen gēchàng tāmen tèbié de qǔdiào……

鸟儿向我们歌唱它们特别的曲调……

yīgè rén zhǐ néng fàngsōng dào wánměi de píngjìng zhōng

一个人只能放松到完美的平静中

hé

和

xiàng wǒmen zhōuwéi měilì de shìwù wènhǎo.

向我们周围美丽的事物问好。

Nǐ hěn měilì!

你很美丽！

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Most in the modern world have the belief that human teleportation or flying is impossible. 

I know a man who can fly using an aircraft but have you ever experienced or witnessed teleportation or flying to alternate dimensions or realms? The Buddhists refer to this concept in the Visuddhimagga doctrine. 

https://www.bps.lk/olib/bp/bp207h_The-Path-of-Purification-%28Visuddhimagga%29.pdf 

“When his concentrated mind is thus purified, bright, unblemished, rid of defilement, and has become malleable, wieldy, steady, and attained to imperturbability, he directs, he inclines, his mind to the kinds of supernormal power. He wields various kinds of supernormal power. Having been one, he becomes many …”

“The same method of explanation applies to the clause having been many, he becomes one: but there is this difference. After this bhikkhu thus created a manifold state, then he again thinks, “As one only I will walk about, do a recital, ask a question,” or out of fewness of wishes he thinks, “This is a monastery with few bhikkhus. If someone comes, he will wonder, ‘Where have all these bhikkhus who are all alike come from? Surely it will be one of the elder’s feats?’ and so he might get to know about me.” Meanwhile, wishing, “Let me be one only,” he should attain the basic jhāna and emerge. Then, after doing the preliminary work thus, “Let me be one,” he should again attain and emerge and then resolve thus, ‘Let me be one’. He becomes one simultaneously with the resolving consciousness. But instead of doing this, he can automatically become one again with the lapse of the predetermined time. 

He appears and vanishes: the meaning here is that he causes appearance, causes vanishing. For it is said in the Paṭisambhidā with reference to this: “‘He appears’: he is not veiled by something, he is not hidden, he is revealed, he is evident. ‘Vanishes’: he is veiled by something, he is hidden, he is shut away, he is enclosed”. 

Now, this possessor of supernormal power who wants to make an appearance, makes darkness into light, or he makes revealed what is hidden, or he makes what has not come into the visual field come into the visual field. 

How? If he wants to make himself or another visible even though hidden or at a distance, he emerges from the basic jhāna and adverts thus, “Let this that is dark become light” or “Let this that is hidden be revealed” or “Let this that has not come into the visual field come into the visual field.” Then he does the preliminary work and resolves in the way already described. It becomes as resolved simultaneously with the resolve. Others then see even when at a distance; and he himself sees too, if he wants to see.”

“Seated cross-legged he travels: he goes seated cross legged. Like a winged bird: like a bird furnished with wings. One who wants to do this should attain the earth kasiṇa and emerge. Then if he wants to go cross-legged, he should do the preliminary work and determine an area the size of a seat for sitting cross legged on, and he should resolve in the way already described. If he wants to go lying down, he determines an area the size of a bed. If he wants to go on foot, he determines a suitable area the size of a path, and he resolves in the way already described: “Let it be earth.” Simultaneously with the resolve it becomes earth.  Here is the text: “‘Seated cross-legged he travels in space like a winged bird’: he is normally an obtainer of the earth-kasiṇa attainment. He adverts to space. Having adverted, he resolves with knowledge: ‘Let there be earth.’ There is earth. He travels (walks), stands, sits, and lies down in space, in the sky. Just as men normally not possessed of supernormal power travel (walk), stand, sit, and lie down on earth, so this possessor of supernormal power, by his attaining of mental mastery, travels (walks), stands, sits, and lies down in space, in the sky” 

Let us continue to explore this.

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Hold on, I see a cat

I see the cat, so please hold on. We are going to separate and that is ok. I see this coming and we both do. But this separation is no different than a leaf falling off the tree in the autumn. We will both go our separate ways and try to enjoy all the great memories we had together. Being the leaf, I will fall to the ground and add nutrients to the soil to feed the living plants in the spring.

The birds soar without a care.

The leaves fall with no concern.

Let us be the same.

I see the lighting too. Let us count the lights.... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23. Oh, I am tired of counting......but let me tell you about a special light I witnessed that gave us a sign. This is our buddy. He will help us move through this extreme change. 

Thanks Buddy!

I would also like to mention, there was a bee flying near me today but it flew off and hid underneath the bottom of a metal table. The bee flew near my leg but I didn't bother it and it didn't bother me. We sort of just existed together but had no real interaction and this was a nice experience. 

Once we learn to accept it, loneliness is pleasant and amazing. 

Once we reach this state of acceptance, we simply watch all the beauty around us and admire it with deep reverence. Walk, walk, walk, step, step, step. Watch each step carefully.

We didn't go anywhere. 

We didn't lose anything. 

We simply changed.....like a caterpillar that changes into a beautiful butterfly. 

I absolutely love being alone with myself. It brings me great joy. I am simply a butterfly flying about in the random sequence that we like to call life.

Love you>

Love you>

Love you>

To me, acceptance begins with accepting ourselves. Then, after accepting ourselves just the way we are, we are able to accept others without harboring negative judgments towards them. We make peace with all that is inside and around us.

I find it challenging dealing with the anger we might express once we begin practicing acceptance. We begin to heal but it is difficult to watch the transformation as we know it is painful for others and ourselves.

Did you know that the caterpillar screams loudly as it transforms into a butterfly?

In my experience, change is often painful. How can one have joy without suffering? They are the same.

Jesus replied, "Whatever is planted will be plucked out if it is not planted by my heavenly Father." (Matthew 15:13 ESV) All inner thoughts that do not conform to the truth must be pulled out, and pulling out is a painful process, but it must be pulled.

But after pulling out the weeds, what happens if the land doesn't grow anything?

That is in the hands of God and one would need to turn to faith and trust in God.

But, land that does not grow plants will be abandoned, let us not waste our hearts.

I see your point but Jesus went into the desert for 40 days where there was no life and this is where he avoided temptation from the devil. So, maybe the land that does not grow plants is where we find our heart.

I see millions of wishes flying in the air. You asked that I let you go, so I will grant you this wish. I wish nothing but the best for you in this amazing life. Sorry we grew apart but we are forever connected and the leaf simply fell from the tree and the caterpillar turned into a butterfly. 

One last thing to note, as we both learn to Let Go…..we merge as one and become that immaculate butterfly. “Having been one, he becomes many”. Oh, sweet beautiful butterfly, please go off and fly and show the world your remarkable beauty.

Ài nǐ

爱你

Love You

------------------------

Learning to fly

Be yourself. Be your true authentic self. Ignore how others may pass judgment. This is not your problem but their own problem. 

Be silent.

Be still.

Relax into it.

Be kind towards others and love them.

Judgment?

It is ok. I will run into new people in life who will accept me and love me for who I am and appreciate the joy I bring to this world. Sometimes people separate and that is ok. This all happens for a reason and is part of a grand immaculate plan. 

Who am I to say how things should be or should not be?

We are all simply dust in the wind. 

We are all no different than the small weed that grows through the cracks of a stone walkway. 

There is no difference.

Benevolence, righteousness, propriety and music are all man-made norms and postulated values. Both of them are obstacles to the boundless life art realm that manifests one's freedom. Therefore, they must be eliminated and forgotten one by one. "Leaving the body" means forgetting the attachment to the physical body; "removing knowledge" means eliminating the delusion of the senses. 

Yes, this understanding is basically correct. 

Concepts such as benevolence, righteousness and propriety are social value systems that are artificially specified and externally added to human beings. Although these concepts are important in maintaining social order, they also limit and restrain human freedom and nature.

To achieve the "life art realm" advocated by Taoism and realize the infinite liberation of human nature, we must "eliminate and forget them one by one". We need to abandon the attachment and dependence on the physical body and the senses, which is "leaving the body and removing knowledge".

"Leaving the body" means forgetting the attachment to the physical body and not being bound by external appearance.  

"Removing knowledge" means abandoning rational thinking and intellectual cognition to avoid being deluded by the senses and knowledge.

To achieve the state of "sitting in oblivion" expressed in the Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi's writings "The Inner Chapters", we must eliminate the acquired norms such as benevolence, righteousness and propriety, get rid of the dependence on the physical body and the intellect, abandon external rational thinking, and return to the free state of human nature. This is a process of selfless entry into concentration and returning to authenticity.

I have nothing else left that I could possibly say.

------------------------

Was I doing my best?

Yes, everything in an experience, when your spiritual world rises, when other people’s do not rise at the same time, you will lose synchronization and disconnect, so this is normal. At this level we can better connect with humans of the same frequency and improve each other and finally help humans in need. 

When your intentions are pure, you don’t lose people….people lose you but you then realize through this separation that we are all forever connected. 

Maybe it was the best you could do at the time with your resources, with your current wounds, with the knowledge that you had at the moment. Maybe it was the best you could do at the time?. 

We both tried so hard to connect with one another but we both ignored or rejected these attempts. You enjoyed wandering in the modern world while I went off into another world with myself. I only knew how to gaze at nature and clear my mind of all thoughts. It is all I knew to do at the time. I went off to another place, another world, another dimension, a place I can’t really describe but it is a beautiful and magical place. I will miss you. I will miss everyone. Just know that I will be back one day but nobody knows when. 

Both resentment and guilt must be washed away in divine grace before we can really feel good about ourselves. 

Wow, it hurts. It really hurts. I am sorry we grew apart. Please please please tell me what I can do to make you feel better, to help us through this. You mentioned the root (mother) I came from and this is the truth. I am not sure why but I enjoy being alone and detached from this constructed society. I see that you want me to be different but I don’t know how to be anything other than what I am. I have felt alone for some time, watching my friends and family go one by one. At first, I struggled with this isolation wondering if something was wrong with me but there is nothing wrong with me or anyone else. I sit here alone and joyfully weep. But I have reached a new state where I am able to go out into the world and playfully mingle with others and share my kindness and acceptance.

I can only wish you joy and happiness in this life. I will pray all day and night for us. Mudita!

------------------------

Watch your step

This morning, while sitting outside the hotel, I met a man named Bob. He told me how he bought a new truck and also about his service dog. His dog's name is buddy. It is good to have a buddy in life. He told me how he used to have a camp in Tionesta and I told him I used to have one there too. He reminds me of another person named Bob who may have been saying some prayers at the time. Synchronicity. 

I told him I had to go take care of some things and went to be alone so I could joyfully weep.

These other dimensions are quite interesting and seem to manifest when you begin to "watch your step". Walk, walk, walk, step, step, step. Just watch your steps. This is what my Buddhist friend Sayan told me. It is called walking meditation and can be quite healing. 

The thing about leaves is there are normally many leaves that fall from the tree in autumn, so when one leaf falls from the tree you should expect many more to simultaneously fall. One should practice accepting and embracing this remarkable and grand change.

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Gods Realm

This afternoon, I met an old man who was about 70 years old and seemed to be very worn down and tired. He didn't have many teeth left and could barely breath while walking. I asked him if he needed help with anything and he said no. 

We walked down the hall together and he sat down to share some life stories with me.

He told me that he grew up on a farm and that his parents always liked to call him cow shit and told him that he wasn't very good at things so he was basically shit in their view.

He had 2 sons, one was born with cerebral palsy and the other one was a wild and violent person. His son with cerebral palsy did not speak at all except for this one time when he was watching a man have a heart attack and spoke up to the medics that were trying to save him. He said “Excuse me, can I pray for this dying man?” The medics said “Sure”.

The boy went over to the window to pray “Dear Jesus, please help this man who is dying. The folks trying to save him have no idea what they are doing.”

He then went on to tell me about his other son, the violent one. This son was a kickboxer and one time he attacked his father and punched him so hard in the eye that it destroyed his eye and ever since this experience occurred he has been blind in this one eye. 

He proceeded to tell me about his plans for burial after he passes on from this life. The idea was to take his body to an old cow pasture, wrap it in plastic, sprinkle lime in it so it can decompose and bury it in a ditch. Then, after his body rots and absorbs into the soil, it will feed nutrients to the grass and eventually feed the cows. Finally, after the cows eat the grass, he will move through their stomach and eventually turn into cow shit and prove his parents to be correct. hahaha

He said, “all we can do is joyfully laugh at these things”. Laughter heals us from the pains in life. Have fun with it and use the healing power of laughter.

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Let It Happen By Itself

                         Author: Alan Watts

Music as an artform is essentially playful. We say you play the piano. You don’t work the piano. Why? Music differs from travel. When you travel, you are trying to get somewhere.And, we of course, because being a very compulsive and purposeful culture are busy getting everywhere faster and faster and faster til we eliminate the distance between places. I mean, with modern jet travel, you can arrive almost instantaneously. What happens as a result of that is that the two ends of your journey become the same place. So you eliminate the distance, you eliminate the journey. Because the fun of the journey is to travel not to obliterate traveling. So then, in music though, one does not make the end of a composition the point of the composition. If that were so, the best conductors would be those who played the fastest. And there would be composers who wrote only finales. People would go to concerts just to hear one crashing chord..hahaha.

Say when dancing, you don’t aim at a particular spot in the room. That’s where you should arrive.The whole point of the dancing is the dance. Look at the people who live to retire and put those savings away. And then when they’re 65, they don’t have any energy left. They are more or less impotent and they go rot in a senior citizens home community. Because we’ve simply cheated ourselves the whole way down the line. We thought of life by analogy with a journey or pilgrimage which had a serious purpose at the end and the things was to get to that end. Success or whatever it is or maybe heaven after you’re dead. But we missed the point the whole way along. It was a musical thing and you were supposed to sing or to dance while the music was being played. But you had to do that thing, you didn’t let it happen. And so, in this way, the human being sometimes becomes an organism for self frustration. Let’s take, Korzybski called man “A Time Binder”. That means, he’s the animal peculiarly aware of the time sequence. And as a result of this he’s able to do some very remarkable things. He can predict. He studies what’s happened in the past and he says ‘the chances of so and so of that happening again”, so he predicts. Thus it’s very useful to be able to predict, because that has survival value. But at the same time, it creates anxiety. You pay for this increased survival ability involved in prediction by knowing that in the end you won’t succeed. We’re all going to fall apart, by one way or another. It might happen tomorrow, it might happen fifty years from now. But it all comes apart in the end. And people get worried about that. They get anxious. So what they gain on the roundabout they lost on the swings. So then, if you see on the other hand that existence….this is as I said my basic metaphysical assumption which I won’t conceal from you, that existence is musical in nature. That is to say that it is not serious. It is the play of all kinds of patterns. We can look upon different creatures as we look at different games. As we look at checkers, chess, backgammon, tennis. There is the tree game, the beetle game, the grass game. Or you can look at them, as you look at different styles of music.There are all these different things doing their stuff. And we’re doing that. Now existence, you see, is something that is spontaneous. The Chinese word for nature, 自然 (Zìrán) , means that which happens of itself. Your hair grows by itself, your heart beats by itself, you breathe pretty much by itself. Your glands secrete their essences by themselves. You don’t have voluntary control over these things. So we say it happens spontaneously. So when you go to sleep and you try to go to sleep you interfere with the spontaneous process of going to sleep. Try to breathe, real hard, and you find you get balled up in your breathing, So, if you gotta be human, you just have to trust yourself to have bowel movements and go to sleep and digest your food. Of course, if something goes seriously wrong and you need a surgeon, that’s another matter. But, by and large, healthy human beings don't need surgery. 

So, you gotta let go and let it happen, because if you don’t, you’re going to be all clutched up. You’re going to be constantly trying to do what can happen healthily only if you don’t try.

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Falling In Love

I asked my grandfather what falling in love was like for him.

He was 82 at the time.

My Grandma, his wife, had died 2 years before.

We were sitting in his living room reading and then talking and I asked him what falling in love was like.

He stopped and this look went across his face.

It was………immense and complete emotion……it was as if every memory he had was condensed into that moment across his face and he then said

“You know the metaphor of life in the storm on the ocean don’t you grandson?”

“Yes”

“Well, for me it was like being in that storm and I looked and I saw all sorts of other people, people on rafts, in motorboats and even Yachts”

He then smiled it was a pure and joyful smile, it was the first time I’d seen him genuinely smile since before his wife’s death 

“But your grandma wasn’t in a yacht, she was on a raft like me, sure I could have gone for that yacht or that nice motorboat but they weren’t her.”

“So, what did you do grandpa?”

“Well I swam over to her of course! Once I got there I told her about the way she made me feel, of course she didn’t believe me but I stuck around and eventually we grew to know each other and then I brought it up again and she of course still didn't believe me!”

“And what did you do then!?”

“Well I asked, what can I do to prove this feeling I have about you to be true?

She looked at me and went ‘something truly insane’

“Aaannnndddd??!!”

“I did the only truly insane thing you can do out at sea! I tied the anchor to me and fell off the boat!”

“But aren’t you going to drown!”

“Well sure! I was gonna drown but she was worth it. If I had to drown it would be for her!”

“What did she do!?”

“Well she did what I hoped she would, grandson! She jumped in after me!”

There was a long pause and my grandpa still had that smile on his face. I was young and didn’t fully understand his words at the time. He saw my confused face, then put his book down, got off the chair, came over and grabbed me by the shoulders to tell me something I will never forget…….

“Son, the point is that she was willing to drown for me just as much as I was for her, she was willing to dive, to fall down into that deep dark cold abyss where no warmth can touch your bones and no light can reach your eyes for me just as I was for her. Love shouldn’t be measured in distance or time my boy, sure you can be together as long as me and my Lee-Ann were and you can be as many miles apart as your great grandfather was from his wife when he served in Europe half a world away but it isn’t the time or the length of love that matters, it’s the depth my boy. So, find someone that’s willing to dive that depth just as much for you as you are for them find someone who’s willing to fall down into that dark cold black just to get you back all so you can lash your two rafts together and brave that storm we call life together. Do you understand grandson?”

“Not fully but I feel like I get the point?”

“Good the point is all that matters…..go on let’s finish reading…..”

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Buddhism - 6 Realms of existence

Yama, lord of the dead, holds a large round mirror in which the phenomenal world of samsara is reflected. Samsara refers specifically to the cycle of existences to which beings are doomed through the process of rebirth. The world reflected in the mirror consists of Six Realms. The six realms are Gods Realm, Human Realm, Demi-god Realm, Animal Realm, Hungry Ghost Realm, and Hell Realm. Our minds and bodies are constantly going through these realms. While practicing deep meditation or mind altering drugs (hallucination) one can intentionally explore these realms or metaphysical worlds and observe them with the mind and body. 

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Hindu Mythology 14 Realms

7 Upper lokas

The seven upper universes, or vyahrtis, speak to a high-condition of cognizant mindfulness. They range from being conscious and go through the different phases of illumination until the rishi arrives at Samadhi – outright or full edification – the domain of Lord Vishnu and Shiva which comes from the psyche of Lord Brahma.

1. Satya-loka – Abode of Truth or Samadhi. The most elevated condition of cognizant mindfulness and the domain in which atman and Brahman are brought together forever.

2. Tapa-loka – An unadulterated condition of awareness. From this state it is not difficult to get to Satya-Loka on the off chance that you are now completely illuminated, yet need a cognizant mindfulness in regular daily existence on Earth.

3. Jana-loka – This is a degree of brightening known as "God-cognizance". Individuals who arrive at this level today are commonly known as 'spiritualists' however are normally incredible healers or otherworldly instructors.

4. Mahar-loka – This is the domain of awareness that can be gotten to by the incredible legendary Rishis, for example, Bhrigu Muni and Markendeya. They have an unfathomable profundity of comprehension and can be considered devas or mythical beings.

5. Svar-loka – In Hindu fantasy, this domain is occupied by the 33 Vedic divine beings who speak to people that have dominated their feelings and have no connections in the actual domain. In western conventions, this is the domain known as Heaven, and in Islam it is called, Jannat. Here you find internal harmony.

6. Bhuvar-loka – The Bhuvar-loka are portrayed as being brought into the world in the natural domain, however emblematically speak to individuals that have discovered happiness and satisfaction in their life, yet in addition vibrate at a higher recurrence and have a higher-condition of cognizant mindfulness.

7. Bhur-loka – The Bhur-loka is the natural domain and is the condition of awareness for some, individuals, stirred or something else. Connections to material belongings or actual necessities are as yet present, however the start knows about themselves as well as other people.

7 lower lokas

The lower domains are lesser conditions of cognizance where the most elevated occupants appreciate a rich existence of realism, yet have next to no profound knowledge. The domains are portrayed in the Puranas as being dull planets without daylight – which is representative for illumination.

1. Atala-loka – This domain is controlled by Bala who makes three sorts of ladies; obstinate, lascivious and scandalous. Bala is the child of Maya, which to the antiquated copyists spoke to the universe of fancy where the Truth of the truth is covered underneath cognizant mindfulness. The ladies – representative of feelings that summon desires – beat the brain and make us childish, horny and voracious. People just don't know the inner self drives their longings.

2. Vitala-loka – The occupants of Vitala live in a condition of obliviousness. They are regularly effective individuals yet feel invulnerable to otherworldly advancement to the degree they don't trust it exists. Despite the fact that they know about the evil presences that abide in their own cognizance, they overlook them since they think they are too acceptable to even consider committing errors.

3. Sutala-loka – The planet Sutal is controlled by the big-hearted King Bali Maharaj, head of the asuras. The asuras are evil presences that battle against the devas and Gods. In this domain, individuals can gain from their slip-ups, consequently we discover Bali being honored by Lord Vishnu. Bali is comparable to Satan in western customs. Satan, or Lucifer – the light carrier – speaks to fallen man that has shortcomings, yet can defeat them by vowing to improve at whatever point they commit an error.

4. Talatala-loka – The universe of Talatala is the domain of the magician, Maya, which in a real sense implies fantasy. The occupants of the domain live in a condition of cognizance where the Truth of the truth is hidden on the grounds that it is past their extent of comprehension. While the individuals in the higher domains of the lower universes decide to disregard the hallucination, individuals that live in a talatala condition of cognizant mindfulness are so appended to the possibility of independence they accept each experience they have is the equivalent for everyone. As an outcome, they become stubborn, factious and resolute.

5. Mahatala-loka – The legendary domain of Mahatala is occupied by the Nagas, seven-headed snakes, some of whom were delightful princesses that would show up from the underground to kidnap attractive men. The representative importance here is the point at which you can't handle your desires and fall for enticement despite the fact that the voice in your mind from the higher domains is disclosing to you not to do it. Conquering feelings and yearnings in these circumstances empowers you to raise otherworldly mindfulness, which is the reason we additionally discover the naga in Hindu iconography floating over the tops of the Gods. The story recounting the introduction of Krishna in which a snake shields the infant from the downpour gives us knowledge uncovering the nagas are an approach to arrive at comprehension by monitoring our feelings and defeating them.

6. Rasatala-loka – Cruel devils rule the domain of Rasatala and are in direct clash with the divine beings. This is a condition of cognizance whereby people have practically zero power over their activities and do what they need, regardless of whether it is correct or wrong. You will see this domain in continually got out of hand youngsters and grown-ups who mindful they are fouling up, yet couldn't care less.

7. Patala-loka – Here we locate the most reduced domain of cognizance before an individual endeavors into a territory of Hell. The occupants here are loaded up with disdain, noxiousness and outrage. However now it isn't past the point where it is possible to gain from slip-ups and hopelessness.

https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-functions-of-each-of-the-14-lokas/answer/Netra-Bajaj 

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Samsara

Samsara is the endless experience of existence. We are all constantly passing through the realms of existence. These can be physical and mental states. There are realms that most can not see with their own senses. As mentioned earlier, these realms can be explored in their physical or metaphysical states using meditation practice. Many people are stuck in the endless cycle of these realms and are seeking liberation. Some people are stuck in hellish states of mind and are seeking liberation or need help escaping from a certain realm. When one is passing through the lower or hellish realms this is the best time for becoming liberated. This is where the dreadful darkness is to be transformed into the magnificent light.

The way out of this cycle is the appreciation of whatever state is arising at the moment. Come into the present and enjoy whatever realm one may be passing through. Acceptance and blissful kindness towards ourselves and all other beings. Liberation is realizing there is no escape and instead practicing acceptance in life. 

“If you know how to suffer, you suffer less”

• Thich Nhat Hanh

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Taoist self-cultivation Realms

Taoist self-cultivation process can be divided into four realms from bottom to top: 

Zhēnrén 真人 - Real person who has attained enlightenment or immortality

Xiánrén 賢人 - Sage

Shèngrén 圣人 - Saint

Súrén 俗人 - Layman

Taoist self-cultivation (the cultivation of self-authenticity) is a process of going from the Elementary Nature, namely, the softest physical self, as infants possessed, and finally reaching the Supreme Nature, i.e., the softest psychological self, which is the state with the Tao. Although the start point and the end point are both nature and soft self, individuals who achieved the realm of Zhēnrén 真人  have already experienced the transcendence of "seeing the mountain as the mountain, seeing the mountain not as the mountain, and seeing the mountain still as the mountain, " which is also in line with the aesthetic sentiment pursued by traditional Chinese artists following the Taoist norm.

Taoist cultivation

In Taoism and traditional Chinese culture, these concepts have the following distinctions and connotations:

Taoists: Focus on "the natural way" and "doing nothing but nothing is left undone". The core ideas are Tao Te Ching and Zhuangzi. The highest realm pursued by Taoists is the natural life state of "true men".  

Zhēnrén 真人 or True Man: Reach the highest level of practice, realize the unity with Tao, return to original simplicity, and achieve the infinite liberation of human nature. Transcend all relative theories and norms of the mundane world, and reach the ultimate ideal state of tranquility and inaction. This is the highest cultivation goal achieved by Taoists.

Xiánrén 賢人 or Sage: In ancient China, the title "sage" was used to refer to a person who has achieved great accomplishments and a lofty moral state. But the connotation of "sage" is more general than "true man". There are various standards for sages, not exclusive to Taoism.  

Shèngrén 圣人 or Worthy Person or Saint: Have reached a considerable level of knowledge and moral cultivation, respected by others, but still unable to achieve the highest cultivation realm of "returning to simplicity" and "inaction" like the "true men". "Worthy persons" are more rational and secular in relative terms. 

Súrén 俗人 or Worldly Person: Ordinary people who are still constrained by external norms and rational theories, unable to achieve the true inner freedom. This is relative to "true men" and "sages".   

Therefore, there is a hierarchical distinction between these concepts. True Man > Sage > Worthy Person > Worldly Person. True Man represents the highest cultivation realm, worldly person represents the ordinary state. These concepts reflect the traditional Chinese understanding of human cultivation and the spiritual realm.

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Tao Te Ching #41

第四十一章

上士闻道，勤而行之；中士闻道，若存若亡；

下士闻道，大笑之。不笑不足以为道。

故建言有之：明道若昧，进道若退，夷道若纇。

上德若谷；大白若辱；广德若不足；建德若偷；质真若渝。

大方无隅；大器晚成；大音希声；大象无形；道隐无名。

夫唯道，善贷且成。

(Sameness and difference)

Scholars of the highest class, when they hear about the Dao, earnestly carry it into practice. 

Scholars of the middle class, when they have heard about it, seem now to keep it and now to lose it. 

Scholars of the lowest class, when they have heard about it, laugh greatly at it. If it were not (thus) laughed at, it would not be fit to be the Dao.

Therefore the sentence-makers have thus expressed themselves:

'The Dao, when brightest seen, seems light to lack;

Who progress in it makes, seems drawing back;

It's even way is like a rugged track.

Its highest virtue from the vale doth rise;

Its greatest beauty seems to offend the eyes;

And he has most whose lot the least supplies.

Its firmest virtue seems but poor and low;

Its solid truth seems change to undergo;

Its largest square doth yet no corner show

A vessel great, it is the slowest made;

Loud is its sound, but never word it said;

A semblance great, the shadow of a shade.'

The Dao is hidden, and has no name; but it is the Dao which is skilful at imparting (to all things what they need) and making them complete.

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SuperPosition 

Superposition is a quantum principle that refers to a physical system that exists in multiple states simultaneously based on a specific set of solutions. The most commonly used set of solutions is all possible solutions, also known as Hilbert space. In quantum physics, the Hilbert space is the mathematical representation of all the possible states the system can take.

The Hadamard Operator allows us to take a qubit into a superposition of two states.

Circuit Diagram → ———H———

https://dokumen.pub/quantum-computing-an-applied-approach-9783030239213-9783030239220.html 

Within all of us is a deep darkness, sadness, loneliness and when we are confronted with this darkness it feels upsetting. But once we learn to embrace this darkness inside ourselves we suddenly realize this is also where our remarkable brightness stems from, the root. This is our root, the mother. So if you ever feel stuck in this darkness or sadness or loneliness, you can move past it only by embracing it. 

Superposition, both light and dark, on and off, good and bad. Waves and particles exist simultaneously. Inside a female's body it is totally dark but it is the only place where a baby can manifest and be brought into life. So the darkness we might experience inside ourselves is also where the brightest light can be seen. God’s Grace or Tao or Nirvana.

 “Let this that is dark become light” 

When in a superposition, a photon is both a wave and a particle simultaneously. When one makes an observation of this photon, it will suddenly collapse into a certain state of wave or particle and essentially become only one state. Coming to this realization, one can conclude that practicing mindfulness or coming into the present moment is a method for becoming the observer of these photons bouncing all around in our lives. Making the observation of the world around us allows this duality to collapse into a particular state (wave or particle, good or bad, yin or yang). One can then embrace whichever state it becomes by practicing acceptance and simply admiring the remarkable beauty in life.

Ài nǐ zìjǐ

爱你自己

Love Yourself

just the way you are. 

You are perfect in every way and a beautiful part of this magnificent creation.

The End