tariki Posted March 30 Share Posted March 30 Everything progresses even as it stays the same. One eminent philosopher said that reality is a "constant advance into novelty" and so it is! We stay with our "selves" at our peril. Very much an admirer of Alan Watts and his work at the moment (along with Candy Crush Soda Saga, for which I can proudly claim to be at level 4445) He had his problems with drink but hey, we all have our problems. Fix your own. Reading his "The Way of Zen" at the moment. This from his introduction:- Western thought has changed so rapidly in this century that we are in a state of considerable confusion. Not only are there serious difficulties of communication between the intellectual and the general public, but the course of our thinking and of our very history has seriously undermined the common-sense assumptions which lie at the roots of our social conventions and institutions. Familiar concepts of space, time, and motion, of nature and natural law, of history and social change, and of human personality itself have dissolved, and we find ourselves adrift without landmarks in a universe which more and more resembles the Buddhist principle of the “Great Void.” The void! Positive or negative. Some fear the void, some embrace it. Alan Watts then goes on to quote an old zen saying:- Above, not a tile to cover the head; below, not an inch of ground for the foot. He then says that such language should not actually be so unfamiliar to us, were we truly prepared to accept the meaning of “the foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head.” Nowhere to lay our heads! Most prefer "beliefs", even to the point of claiming that their own set the parameters of an "only way". Quite tragic. Is there an "only way" set in stone, found in a book, that can actually set us free? Gives us the "peace that passes understanding"? More often than not the peace I see in others is all too understandable! As Thomas Merton once said, the only way is in fact "no way at all", a "way" where we in fact become as good as lost. But - as he says again - such a way is not a way out! Well, I waffle. An image found at random on Google. I like it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tariki Posted April 21 Author Share Posted April 21 Maybe time to get back to my roots, i.e. a sequence of quotes strung together by a loose assembly of stray thought perhaps totally irrelevant. How to sum up how I see/understand/live things.... "Love is why there is something rather than nothing" (Source unknown, but then, who cares?) Those aghast at our world's suffering will find that difficult to square with the reality they inhabit, but there you go. "Love had no why" (Meister Eckhart) Maybe "conclusions" and ardent beliefs can mess us up? Hang loose. As far as Reality, in our relationships, then the key word is "mercy". "When I speak well of myself and ill of others, the autumn wind chills my lips" (Buson) When the autumn wind blows then, as Krishnamurti would say, "it is over". When seen, it is over. As Merton once wrote:- The spiritual life is something that people worry about when they are so busy with something else they think they ought to be spiritual. Spiritual life is guilt. Up here in the woods is seen the New Testament: that is to say, the wind comes through the trees and you breathe it. (from "Day of a Stranger") So, love is why there is "something" rather than nothing; love has no why; and the key to life with others is Mercy. Merton again:- The Cross is the sign of contradiction - destroying the seriousness of the Law, of the Empire, of the armies, of blood sacrifice, and of obsession. But the magicians keep turning the Cross to their own purpose. Yes, it is for them too a sign of contradiction: the awful blasphemy of the religious magician who makes the Cross contradict mercy. This of course is the ultimate temptation of Christianity. To say that Christ has locked all doors, has given one answer, settled everything and departed, leaving all life enclosed in the frightful consistency of a system outside of which there is seriousness and damnation, inside of which there is the intolerable flippancy of the saved - while nowhere is there any place left for the mystery of the freedom of divine mercy which alone is truly serious, and worthy of being taken seriously. A final word from Rumi:- "Silence is the language of God, all else is poor translation" So be merciful towards my own translation. How do we get to SEE? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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