The fact that these methods are so prevelant means that few of us have made contact with the "guide" within, so we project that archetype of our psyche onto an external person or group. A fellow blogger, Jay, has recently written on the need for spiritual seekers to find the guru within as a way to avoid abuse by "teachers."That aloneness is the source of wisdom, the quiet that allows the "still small voice" to be heard. Other decks, such as the Tarot of the Old Path (pictured above: The Wise One), refer to this card in terms of the wisdom the Hermit possesses. Some decks simply call the card Wisdom. All of this is in recognition that we can only access our wise higher self in isolation from the world.Loneliness is a negative state. You are feeling that it would have been better if the other were there - your friend, your wife, your mother, your beloved, your husband. It would have been good if the other were there, but the other is not. Loneliness is absence of the other.
Aloneness is the presence of oneself. Aloneness is very positive. It is a presence, overflowing presence. You are so full of presence that you can fill the whole universe with your presence and there is no need for anybody.
I must acknowledge that real shamans are not very fond of us westerners calling them shamans, a word that actually comes from a Siberian tribe (the Tungus) and is not found anywhere else. But Mircea Eliade, among others, made the word a universal name for spiritual traditions that involve ecstatic experiences of alternate realities.
Using the Spiral Dynamics model, only a person who has reached second tier consciousness (Yellow or higher) is qualified to be a meta-shaman. Those who are in any of the first tier Memes (Beige through Green) are incapable of seeing any reality outside of their own Meme, and therefore are incapable of navigating the Spiral. Ideally, the meta-shaman would be Turquoise or beyond.
Traditional shamanism remains largely unchanged in the present day among those cultures that have not been exterminated. Neo-shamanism (as in New Age circles) is a regressive attempt to re-ensoul a world that has been stripped of meaning through the flatland dominance of the hard sciences (the right hand side of Wilber's four-quadrant map of the Kosmos). Neo-shamanism suffers the classic trap of the pre/trans fallacy (as first identified by Wilber), in that it mistakes a previous level for an advanced level. In a world that has been stripped of soul and Spirit, anything that feels like soul or Spirit, even if it is from an earlier period of human evolution (the spirits and gods of the Purple Meme, for example), is elevated to the level of the transcendent. The Romanticist longing for simpler times (return to Eden or childhood innocence) as a higher state of being is a classic example.
You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait. Do not even wait, be quite still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked. It will roll in ecstasy at your feet.
~ Franz Kafka
Still, what I am left with is the awareness that my illness, physical as it was, might also have been something I needed in order to launch the next stage of my growth. My brain says, "Naw, bad food causes food poisoning. I didn't do this to myself."
The word axial in the phrase Axial Age means pivotal. The name comes from the German word Achse, which means both "axis" and "pivot". Due to a mistranslation, the term axial has become standard.
The term axial or pivotal is appropriate as ancient Greek philosophy which grounds the politics of the West and additionally via the Platonic strain is with the Bible one of the legs on which Christian theology stands flourished during this era. Rome which, of course, has had a large impact on the West took the Greece of this era as a model. Buddhism which had and has a large impact on world history was founded by Siddhartha Guatama who lived during this period. Confucianism, too, arose during this era. Confucianism was the dominant Chinese worldview until the advent of Communism and arguably still is.
A pagan approached a Rabbi and said, "I will convert to your religion if you can state the entire teachings of your faith while standing on one foot." The Rabbi stood on one foot and said, "What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. This is the whole Torah; all the rest is commentary."The Golden Rule. It's that simple, says Armstrong.
Let us dig in our gardens and not be elsewhere;
Let us take long walks in the open air . . .
Let us bathe in the rivers and lakes . . .
Let us indulge in games . . .
Let us be more simple: simple and true in our gestures, in our words, and simple and true in our minds above all. Let us be ourselves.
Ah, yes, men . . . .Men's Rules
1. Learn to work the toilet seat.
You're a big girl. If it's up, put it down. We need it up, you need it down. You don't hear us complaining about you leaving it down.
1. Sunday sports, no, driving range trips.
It's like the full moon or the changing of the tides. Just let it be.
1. Shopping is NOT a sport.
And no, we are never going to think of it that way.
1. Crying is blackmail.
1. Ask for what you want.
Let us be clear on this one:
Subtle hints do not work!
Strong hints do not work!
Obvious hints do not work!
Just say it!
1. Yes and No are perfectly acceptable answers to almost every question. That's what we do. Sympathy is what your girlfriends are for.
1. Come to us with a problem only if you want help solving it.
1. A headache that lasts for 17 months is a problem.
See a doctor.
1. Anything we said 6 months ago is inadmissible in an argument.
In fact, all comments become null and void after 7 days.
1. If you think you're fat, you probably are.
Don't ask us.
1. If something we said can be interpreted two ways and one of the ways makes you sad or angry, we meant the other one.
1. You can either ask us to do something or tell us how you want it done.
Not both. If you already know best how to do it, just do it yourself.
1. Whenever possible, please say whatever you have to say during commercials.
1. Christopher Columbus did not need directions and neither do we.
1. ALL men see in only 16 colors, like Windows default settings.
Peach, for example, is a fruit, not a color. Pumpkin is also a fruit. We have no idea what mauve is.
1. If it itches, it will be scratched.
We do that.
1. If we ask what is wrong and you say "nothing," we will act like nothing's wrong.
We know you are lying, but it is just not worth the hassle.
1. If you ask a question you don't want an answer to, expect an answer you don't want to hear.
1. When we have to go somewhere, absolutely anything you wear is
fine...Really.
1. Don't ask us what we're thinking about unless you are prepared to discuss such topics as baseball, guns and ballistics, or monster trucks.
1. You have enough clothes.
1. You have too many shoes.
1. I am in shape.
Round is a shape.
Thank you for reading this. Yes, I know, I have to sleep on the couch tonight; but did you know men really don't mind that? It's like camping.
After all, the heartland has no claim to moral authority. The states whose voters are most obsessed with “moral values” have the highest divorce and teen pregnancy rates. The country’s highest murder rates are in the South and the lowest are in New England. The five states with the best-ranked public schools in the country—Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Jersey and Wisconsin—are all progressive redoubts. The five states with the worst—New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, Mississippi and Louisiana—all went for Bush.Please read the whole article and then let's discuss it in the comments.
The canard that the culture wars are a fight between “elites” versus “regular Americans” belies a profound split between different kinds of ordinary Americans, all feeling threatened by the others’ baffling and alien values. Ironically, however, by buying into right-wing elite-baiting, liberals start thinking like out-of-touch elites. Rather than reflecting on what kind of policies would make their own lives better, what kind of country they want to live in, and who they want to represent them—and then figuring out how to win others to their vision—progressives flail about for ideas and symbols that they hope will appeal to some imaginary heartland rube. That is condescending.
Otherwisefrom Otherwise, 1996
I got out of bed
on two strong legs.
It might have been
otherwise. I ate
cereal, sweet
milk, ripe, flawless
peach. It might
have been otherwise.
I took the dog uphill
to the birch wood.
All morning I did
the work I love.
At noon I lay down
with my mate. It might
have been otherwise.
We ate dinner together
at a table with silver
candlesticks. It might
have been otherwise.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the walls, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.
Before becoming a mostly full-time Buddhist, I was heavily involved in shamanic studies, Wicca's twin brother, so to speak. I think of both areas of study as essentially pagan (pagan mostly meaning non-Christian to many folks).
Regarding this: Thats pretty much a litmus test for a pre/trans theory of wicca - was it created, or was it 'passed down'?
I would argue that the real test is different:
1) Does the belief system rely on a pre-rational belief that spells and incantations can change manifest reality? Does the system worship gods and goddesses as individual entities existing in time and space? If so, prerational or prepersonal.
2) Does the belief system see “magic” and other forms of devotional acitivies as methods of affecting interior change, i.e., reprogramming the psyche in some way? Does the system view gods and goddesses as manifestations of interior states, of human traits writ large? If so, rational or personal.
3) Does the belief system see ritual and other forms of devotional activities as methods of accessing archetypal energies, what Wilber might view as involutionary forms? Does the system view worship of archetypal forms (gods or goddesses) as ways to transcend ego consciousness and experience transpersonal states beyond the confines of ego and personal concerns. If so, post-rational or post-personal.
4) Does the belief system allow for the experience of all three? If so, then integral.
That's my first-pass take on this issue. Is this worth refining into a more coherent statement?
Six Kinds of LonelinessRead the rest here.
Pema Chödrön
To be without a reference point is the ultimate loneliness. It is also called enlightenment.
In the middle way, there is no reference point. The mind with no reference point does not resolve itself, does not fixate or grasp. How could we possibly have no reference point? To have no reference point would be to change a deep-seated habitual response to the world: wanting to make it work out one way or the other. If I can't go left or right, I will die! When we don't go left or right, we feel like we are in a detox center. We're alone, cold turkey with all the edginess that we've been trying to avoid by going left or right. That edginess can feel pretty heavy.
However, years and years of going to the left or right, going to yes or no, going to right or wrong has never really changed anything. Scrambling for security has never brought anything but momentary joy. It's like changing the position of our legs in meditation. Our legs hurt from sitting cross-legged, so we move them. And then we feel, "Phew! What a relief!" But two and a half minutes later, we want to move them again. We keep moving around seeking pleasure, seeking comfort, and the satisfaction that we get is very short-lived.
We hear a lot about the pain of samsara, and we also hear about liberation. But we don't hear much about how painful it is to go from being completely stuck to becoming unstuck. The process of becoming unstuck requires tremendous bravery, because basically we are completely changing our way of perceiving reality, like changing our DNA. We are undoing a pattern that is not just our pattern. It's the human pattern: we project onto the world a zillion possibilities of attaining resolution. We can have whiter teeth, a weed-free lawn, a strife-free life, a world without embarrassment. We can live happily every after. This pattern keeps us dissatisfied and causes us a lot of suffering.
As human beings, not only do we seek resolution, but we also feel that we deserve resolution. However, not only do we not deserve resolution, we suffer from resolution. We don't deserve resolution; we deserve something better than that. We deserve our birthright, which is the middle way, an open state of mind that can relax with paradox and ambiguity. To the degree that we've been avoiding uncertainty, we're naturally going to have withdrawal symptoms'withdrawal from always thinking that there's a problem and that someone, somewhere, needs to fix it.
The middle way is wide open, but it's tough going, because it goes against the grain of an ancient neurotic pattern that we all share. When we feel lonely, when we feel hopeless, what we want to do is move to the right or the left. We don't want to sit and feel what we feel. We don't want to go through the detox. Yet the middle way encourages us to do just that. It encourages us to awaken the bravery that exists in everyone without exception, including you and me.
It goes on from here. Read the rest.On Tuesday, May 9th, 2006, three women from Bayit Chadash, a spiritual community in Israel headed by Rabbi Marc Gafni, filed complaints of sexual misconduct against Gafni with the police. Upon reviewing relevant testimony, the steering committee of Bayit Chadash decided to remove Marc Gafni from the Bayit Chadash staff. (See below for the formal announcement.)
Subsequently, rumors have been rife. After long conversations with many of the concerned parties, I have come to the following conclusions. At this time, these are my personal opinions, and are open to immediate revision in light of any further evidence. Marc Gafni is a close friend of mine, but in circumstances like this, friendship decidedly takes a backseat to ethics and justice. In my opinion, the viewpoint that takes the most number of perspectives into account is the more likely to be the better moral judgment, with the Basic Moral Intuition the ultimate guide.
These are my conclusions at this time:
1. There is substantial truth to some of these allegations.2. This has caused something of a feeding frenzy for the mean green meme, which is understandable but I believe inexcusable. Frankly, some of these have reached pathetic portions.
3. Nonetheless, there is some truth to these allegations because of grave wrongdoing on Marc’s part, and I believe this wrongdoing is due not just to bad judgment on Marc’s part, but to a pathology or dysfunction affecting Marc.
