Including the potential manifestations of our abstract thinking.
Remembering 9/11 and thinking about how we might act going forward to foster peace. That requires, I think, facing and responding and balancing some hard truths about ourselves.
Yes, I am speaking about myself, not just society at large.
When I paused to photograph this marker on a DC sidewalk yesterday, I wondered how many hundreds of people have walked past it–once or hundreds of times–without noticing it at all. I connected this sense of acute awareness with a conversation I had with Douglas Brooks in India, in which he said to me that he guaranteed that at that moment he was seeing more than I was seeing. He had experienced the place before, studied it extensively and intensively, and was still open to seeing. I did not take offense and none was meant. I am one who notices, but it is a given that study and experience, if one retains an openness to new understanding, maximizes the opportunity to witness.
Paul Muller-Ortega describes the expanding ability to see and understand in terms of the essential interrelationship between jnana and vijnana–book knowledge and experiential knowledge. One without the other does not permit for complete understanding. The two together, with ever-expanding and present openness is what leads to wisdom.
Thus, though I am one who tends to notice much of what is in my field of vision, I could not, on my first visit, possibly have seen as much in the immediate landscape as one who has devoted much of his life both to studying and experiencing it.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
I went to see Julie and Julia because I, like most other Americans of a certain age who like food, have a history with Julia Child. Seeing the movie brought back an episode from junior high school. By seventh grade, I was pretty competent cooking, cleaning, babysitting, and doing needlework. Being a feminist in training, I wanted to take shop. Mr. Murphy, my ancient (OK who knows how old he was, but he was gray and bald and had leathery skin, so he was likely over 50 at the time) guidance counselor refused: “shop is for boys; home economics is for girls.” I expected my mother to back me up, but for some reason she did not.
I had no interest in making rice crispy treats, which was not the kind of thing we cooked at home and was the kind of thing they taught in home economics. Part way through the year, when we were told to cook a whole dinner at home and then bring in a report, I decided to cook from Julia Child. I am sure the meal was perfectly delightful, but the motive on my part was not to make a delicious dinner for the family, but to show my guidance counselor and parents that I should have been allowed to learn something that I did not know how to do and could not learn from a book (woodworking and other “shop” skills).
I enjoyed the movie (it’s a pleasant couple of hours and Meryl Streep is wonderful), but the interesting after thought for me was the difference in the happiness of an individual depending on motivation in life choices. Is something done for joy (with recognition being delightful, but somewhat incidental) or is it being done because one needs recognition and then feels satisfied on getting it? From a yoga perspective, is it “actionless action” (see Bhagavad Gita) or is it acting out of a need to fulfill the ego, which inevitably binds one in the fierce dichotomy and inner tug or war of the opposites of longing and gratification, pain and pleasure?
How do you plan your return home from a retreat or vacation? Do you come home at the very last minute, so that the travel is exhausting and the first day back at work is a struggle? Or do you plan to have a day — or at least several hours — to unpack, make sure you have fresh food to eat, and have brought the feeling of vacation back into your home life before getting back to work?
When I was studying on retreat in Arizona, Paul Muller-Ortega took particular pains to emphasize the importance of doing savasana for at least a few minutes after sitting for meditation for a “slow re-entry.” Without the resting time in between practicing/adventuring/celebrating/retreating and working, it is like eating a loaf of bread right out of the oven, rather than giving it at least 10-15 minutes to rest. Right out of the oven, the is too hot and the texture is not right, and we cannot taste how good it is. Give it a chance to rest, and it is exquisitely hot and fresh and perfect.
We need to rest, to reintegrate, to settle or we can feel like there is no point in going on vacation. How many people do you know (perhaps you have said this yourself) who say there is no point in going on vacation because it just makes work harder on return? When I take a shorter vacation/rest/retreat to account for reintegration time, and then fully reintegrate, the rejuvenating properties of getting away definitely last longer.
I returned very late Sunday night. Yesterday I practiced at home, did my laundry, cleaned the yoga room, petted the cats, had a massage, did a little reading, cooked delicious food (homemade granola, kitcheree, greens from the garden), and went to sleep early. Now I am off to work, seeking to bring what I learned into my day.
I went to a Lenten service for ceasefire that was led in front of the White House today. First there was a Catholic Mass and then an ecumenical service.
I sometimes participate in religious rituals outside of my own, as a way of honoring our shared and diverse experience of being.
This is the first time I have gone to a Christian service on Ash Wednesday. No ashes for me. I was willing to, however, to participate in the invitation to participate in a call and response. The speaker listed the heinous atrocities that our tax dollars are funding, and the response was the acknowledgment that “I have blood on my hands.”
I’m still complicit even if I am letting those with power know that I do not agree, although that is better than being silent. One of the religious speakers suggested that repentance does not mean regret. It means acknowledgement and a change of behavior.
