16 Lessons

I have been thinking about the 16 lessons. Today in the shower it really struck me. These lessons we are to learn as we walk through this life. It is said that each of us has our lessons to learn. As we walk along our path a lesson will appear before us much like a stone in the path. We pick up the stone, examine it, see it, absorb it into our beings. It is still a stone. We can drop that stone and learn from it or we can carry it around with us or we can cast that stone so we come across it again in the future. Thus sometimes we come to that same lesson over and over in our lives until we learn what it is we need from that lesson and can move on to the next.
It is said there are 16 lessons. Four lessons in each of the four directions. In each of the four stages of life. So there are really 64 lessons. More on this and the walking to come.

Daily Meditation:

If you live the sacred and despise the ordinary, you are still bobbing in the ocean of delusion. - Lin-Chi

This is a good extension of the wonderment of the ordinary. Looking closely at those things that are overlooked and small and ordinary we do see the delight the wonder the universe within them unfolding.

Reminded of the flower. Looking at the flower we see the flower. We see what we have been taught to perceive about the flower, then it is not really the flower we are seeing. It is said we have to removed from ourselves the perception or the idea of the flower and see it fresh and whole for the first time. See the wonder of smallest of things. Easy for me to dismiss the flower. To see it but not see it. Too miss the beauty in everyday life.

It is the ordinary that is sacred. Where is that saying, the sacred and the profane?

Daily Meditation:

Your life has the potential to be a wondrous journey, filled with exciting moments and astonishing experiences. It can be a thrilling ride if you are open to exploring all that is available to you. Adventure is the result of your willingness to live with a spirit of enthusiasm. - C. Carter-Scott

Life is a grand adventure. I forget that sometimes. Actually, I think maybe I did not know that for a very long time. Life just has been. Walking through. I think that may be why Life seems somewhat ordinary. Life as adventure is a thrill, a moment to moment slide on the ice. Life as life makes me wonder but allows for little other then the ordinary. And so changing my approach to life. Adventure. grand and new every day. Not that Hans Gurber will come into life everyday and create a new adventure but certainly even the smallest daily acts can lead to a life more interesting.

Sunday

Well, on waking today the drift of dreams and sleep was strong. memories return. Dreams have returned. Vague dreams but they are here again.
Wandering through my mind. The question. Thank you for bringing it forth again.
Would you rather have loved and lost then never have loved at all?
Lost love and the learning and growth. Loving completely in that moment. loving completely and not being aware of the loss. Waking up to the loss of love. Would rather not go through that again. But the loving is worth every moment. The life gained so wonderful.
Peace

Momentum

I can't remember the name of the band. Momentum was great. chilly willy in the hanger but fantastic. Good art. lots of people. Great company.

Thank you OVAC for making art in OKC so great.

On again

Well, I am on again at the house. Connection reestablished. Surfing the superhighway. Wondering.
I have been couped up for a while due to the ice and roads. It is good to have this again. a week of no school has been taxing. Waiting. Had one known it would have been a great week for a cruise.

some revelations. nothing dramatic. More to come.

Daily Meditation:

It is not for us to search but to remain still, to achieve Immobility not Action. - Fingers Pointing Toward the Moon by Wei Wu Wei

Wu Wei - when nothing is done, nothing is left undone. This is interesting on many levels. Adding to it on this day is the not doing. Not searching. Look around. look around. Where did I put my keys, my wallet, that $20, my mind, my center, my calm, my peace, Where did that elusive go? Looking and searching outside the self for those things that are within just not ready to be exposed.

I think we are busy all the time. Running and doing and driving and thinking and eating and manipulating and controlling and trolling and praying and meditating and exercising and studying and reading and thinking and crying and laughing and... When do we not? When do we let go and just be? When do we sit still and let the spirit enter into us into our lives. Let ourselves go if only for a moment to allow stillness, not searching. Just be if only for a moment. How to just be?

Daily Meditation:

But if you do not find an intelligent companion, a wise and well-behaved person going the same way as yourself, then go on your way alone, like a king abandoning a conquered kingdom, or like a great elephant in the deep forest. - Buddha

And so it is. Drifting through life. Walking alone on occasion. Walking with others on occasion. Looking being, sharing time with another to have direction and guidance, friendship, companionship along the way. I give thanks to the many friends and family that have walked along side me for so long. Thank you also for knowing when I needed to walk alone along the way.

Happiness

I speak on happiness on occasion here. I found the 43 Folders website discussing Life Hacks - ways to change, improve the experience of living. They do have a nice page on hacking happiness... http://wiki.43folders.com/index.php/Happiness
Check it out

Daily Meditation:

Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play. - Heraclitus

Interesting that this one arrives again. I think it is reminding me to give up my adult constraints. Give up the need to control. Trust in the spirit with the faith of a child. I think that we put our trust in God. We put ourselves in God. Bad things happen, good things happen. We lose are trust in god. We lose are belief. Maybe not lose but why would god do this to me? to them? Release the pain, the shame, the questioning.

Even when you lose, don't lose the lesson. Same goes for winning.

Daily Meditation:

There I was, poised in space, a disembodied eye, invisible, incorporeal, seeing but not seen. - R. Gordon Wasson, 1957

Transcendence. To rise up. Every once in a while a glimpse of what is possible is given and then pursued. The moment of leaving the body. Connected and yet disconnected. Free again.

I have enjoyed a description of enlightenment used in Judica. I thought the enlightenment of the Buddha is one that once it comes it is forever there. A state of being that is enlightened. I heard then that enlightenment comes and goes. There is a state that is achieved and then it dissipates and normal living continues until next time enlightenment arrives. This is much better for me to grasp. It also gives hope in that I have had those moments of enlightenment. Moments of clarity. The blinders removed and the way clear.

There are shortcuts to enlightenment.

Read "Be Here Now" by Baba Ram Das. This book will transport you to that place with it's wisdom. Being there it is good. but we have done little work to get to that place. We have bypassed the learning along the way of the journey. It is really not the destination. It is the learning that takes place along the route to the destination. All to often we are wanting to arrive, to get to that place. We forget about the process of getting there.

And the Wheel turns round.