Saturday, September 23, 2006

Undone

Everything has come undone.

Blogging will be sparse or nonexistent for the foreseeable future.

Last Week's Best Late-Night Humor

Here are the best jokes I missed because I was sleeping.

The Week's Best Late-Night Jokes

"In his speech, Bush said the United Nations is in danger of losing its credibility. And believe me, when it comes to international affairs, President Bush is an expert on losing credibility." --Jay Leno

"The president of Venezuela called President Bush the devil. His name is Hugo Chavez, or as Bush calls him, 'The fourth Dixie Chick.'" --Jay Leno

"Laura Bush is spending the weekend with Bill Clinton. She is the keynote speaker at the three-day Clinton Global Initiative. President Bush says he's OK with this, but we'll see how he feels when she comes back with her skirt on backwards and without that frozen smile." --Bill Maher

"Last week at Germany's University of Regensburg, which as you know is a safety school, Pope Benedict gave an address in which he discussed Islam's concept of jihad by quoting 14th century Byzantine emperor Manuel Paleologos II. You know if you're going to make a wholesale generalization, say it in German. It gives it that extra 'oomph.'" --Jon Stewart

"According to the latest poll, Bush's approval rating has rebounded to 44% -- the highest level in a year. The White House says it's thrilled that Bush has gone from an overwhelming dislike to a general dislike." --Conan O'Brien

"Oil has fallen to $60 a barrel. Experts predict it will continue to fall until exactly one minute after the polls close on November 7th." --Jay Leno

"You folks have any trouble with traffic today? It's because of the big opening of the U.N. General Assembly. You know who's here? The president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He's the president who can actually pronounce 'nuclear.'" --David Letterman

"It's hard to say you're sorry, especially when you're infallible. But by last weekend, Benedict offered these words of apology. He's sorry that people felt bad. That's known in Vatican terminology as a 'me-a-kinda.' It's a time-honored tradition in the Catholic Church dating back to the Inquisition when Pope Innocent IV said, 'We deeply regret the fact that so many non-believers happen to be flammable.'" --Jon Stewart

"In the West Bank a group calling itself the Lions of Monotheism fire bombed four churches, telling the Associated Press the attacks were carried out to protest the Pope's remarks linking Islam and violence. The irony of the statement, and this is often the case we find, was lost on them." --Jon Stewart

"It's rumored in Washington that Condoleezza Rice has a new boyfriend. Allegedly, he's Canada's Foreign Minister, Peter MacKay. Since he's a diplomat and he visits her at the White House, he has to have a Secret Service code name. Do you know what his Secret Service code name is? 'Captain Kirk.' You know why they call him that? Because he's going where no man has gone before." --Jay Leno

"General Colin Powell shocked a lot of people in Washington by speaking out against President Bush's policies, saying that the world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism. That's what I think he said -- it was hard to hear him because he was being hustled out of the room to his cell in Guantanamo Bay." --Jay Leno

"There've been huge protests in the Muslim world over anti-Muslim comments made by the new Pope, Pope Benedict. Today the Pope apologized, saying he never should have gone drinking with Mel Gibson." --Jay Leno

"This week, President Bush said he has no plans to invade North Korea. Bush said, 'This time, Rumsfeld and I are going to wing it.'" --Conan O'Brien

"Picture your family dead. Just for a second. Are you picturing it? Now go vote." --Jon Stewart, summarizing President Bush's interview with NBC's Matt Lauer

"Robert Novak does not watch The Daily Show or myself. Not surprising, I keep reading all these articles about how The Daily Show is big amongst the 125-year-old vampire demons." --Jon Stewart (Read Stewart's full rant against Novak)

Poem: William Butler Yeats

[Sailing To Byzantium]

Sailing To Byzantium

I

That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
- Those dying generations - at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.

II

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.

III

O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.

IV

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

Parable: The Tamarind Tree

[a tamarind tree]

I found this nice teaching story at Once Upon a Time.

The Tamarind Tree

One bright and cool summer day the Buddha took a walk along the forest path, simply enjoying the beauty of the earth. At a cross road, he saw a man in grief praying earnestly.

The man recognized the Buddha and fell on his knees. He cried, "Lord Buddha, life is indeed bitter and painful! I was once a man with great wealth, living a life of ease and happiness. By trikery and deceit, those I trusted and loved took everything from me. I am now a wretched man with noone to turn to. How many more times must I be reborn into this world of suffering before I can be librated?"

Pointing to the mango tree by the road, the Buddha said, "Do you see that mango tree? You must be reborn as many times as the number of mangoes on that tree before you know the bliss of liberation from the sufferings of this fleeting world."

Seeing that there are at least dozens of mangoes hanging on the tree, the man gasped, "But Lord! I have lived a righteous life in accord with the precepts! Why am I condemned to suffer so much longer?"

The Buddha sighed. "That is the way it must be." And he continued his walk.

He came across another man praying by the road and this man too, fell on his knees and cried, "Lord Buddha, life is indeed bitter and painful. I have lost all those I loved to the king of death. I am now forlorn and lonely. Life is full of anguish. How many more times must I be reborn into this world of suffering before I know the bliss of liberation?"

The Buddha pointed to the field of wild flowers along the road and said, "Before you know the bliss of liberation from the sufferings of this fleeting world, you must be reborn as many times as the number of flowers in that field."

Seeing so many hundreds of flowers in the field, the man cried, "But Lord! I have done many good deeds and have followed you teachings by heart. Why must I endure so much more suffering?"

The Buddha sighed, "That is how it must be." And he continued on his way.

When he came across a tamarind tree, another man fell down on his knees and cried before him, "Oh Lord! Life is full of suffering! During the days I toiled like a slave under the scathing sun; at night I have nothing to sleep on except a pile of grass on the cold, damped earth. Life is nothing but hunger, thirst and loneliness! How many more times must I be reborn into this world of suffering before I know the bliss of liberation?"

The Buddha looked up to the tamarind tree--each branch of it bearing many stems and each stem has dozens of leaves. The Buddha said, "Look at that tamarind tree. Before you know the bliss of liberation from the sufferings of this fleeting world, you must be reborn as many times as the number of leaves on that tamarind tree."

As the man looked up at the tamarind tree and its thousands of leaves, his eyes filled with tears of gratitude and joy. "How merciful!" he said as he prostrated to the ground at the Buddha's feet.

To this day the tamarind's seeds are the symbol of faithfulness and forbearance.

Human Drama: My Skin

One of my favorite bands from my emo era.

Friday, September 22, 2006

I'm pleased to announce additions to Elegant Thorn Review.

~Two Photos: John Craig

~ Birth of a Poet: Third Meditation

As always, I am seeking quality poetry, photography, and flash fiction with a spiritual "feel" to it. You can find the guidelines here.

Poem: Wislawa Szymborska

By request from a friend at Zaadz:

[Life and Death]

On Death, without Exaggeration

It can't take a joke,
find a star, make a bridge.
It knows nothing about weaving, mining, farming,
building ships, or baking cakes.

In our planning for tomorrow,
it has the final word,
which is always beside the point.

It can't even get the things done
that are part of its trade:
dig a grave,
make a coffin,
clean up after itself.

Preoccupied with killing,
it does the job awkwardly,
without system or skill.
As though each of us were its first kill.

Oh, it has its triumphs,
but look at its countless defeats,
missed blows,
and repeat attempts!

Sometimes it isn't strong enough
to swat a fly from the air.
Many are the caterpillars
that have outcrawled it.

All those bulbs, pods,
tentacles, fins, tracheae,
nuptial plumage, and winter fur
show that it has fallen behind
with its halfhearted work.

Ill will won't help
and even our lending a hand with wars and coups d'etat
is so far not enough.

Hearts beat inside eggs.
Babies' skeletons grow.
Seeds, hard at work, sprout their first tiny pair of leaves
and sometimes even tall trees fall away.

Whoever claims that it's omnipotent
is himself living proof
that it's not.

There's no life
that couldn't be immortal
if only for a moment.

Death
always arrives by that very moment too late.

In vain it tugs at the knob
of the invisible door.
As far as you've come
can't be undone.

~ By Wislawa Szymborska
From "The People on the Bridge", 1986
Translated by S. Baranczak & C. Cavanagh

Speedlinking 9/22/06

Morning image is from National Geographic, a photo of Trinidad, Cuba (1999) by David Alan Harvey.

Good morning and happy Friday.

~ National Geographic reports that Saturn has a new ring, which I take to mean one that hasn't been identified before rather than a new ring that has popped up in the last year or so.

~ The Environmental News Network is reporting that Richard Branson will donate $3 billion, yes billion, to combat global warming over the next 10 years, or all of the profits from his airline and rail businesses. That's pretty damn cool.

~ Deepak Chopra posts about The Body's Wisdom on his Intent blog. It's all good as far as I can tell, except for the vegetarian suggestion, which is number one on his list. Anyone looking for optimal health should avoid vegetarianism if at all possible. For those who refuse to eat meat on moral grounds, well, that's a whole other argument.

~ You can listen to a lecture by the Ven. Geshe Ngawang Dakpa on Mind Training: Eight Verses on Thought Transformation. Here's a description:

To explore the challenges in our daily life, Ven. Geshe Ngawang Dakpa gives commentary on the classical text, Eight Verses of Thought Transformation. This mind training (lojong) text goes back over 800 years following the introduction of the Kadampa School by Atisha when Geshe Langri Tangpa set down these extremely profound teachings in brief form. Sharing his profound joy and wisdom, Geshe Dakpa offers us insight into the development of loving kindness, compassion, caring and commitment. Geshe Dakpa offers practical advice on how to stimulate inner reflection, deepen our wisdom and compassion, understand the true nature of our minds and ultimately achieve a greater degree of inner peace.

~ Stuart Davis gets in touch with his inner Vajra Sword while on tour in Europe. This is an example of Big Mind process in action, or more correctly, Voice Dialogue, as designed by Hal and Sidra Stone (credit where credit is due).

~ Will at Think Buddha is looking at whether there is an authentic self to be found beneath all the learned and conditioned responses that comprise our sense of self. It's a good article, so I won't tell you what he concludes.

~ Joe Perez at Until argues against the Great Books proposals. He bases his objections in some quotes by Alasdair MacIntyre, a neo-Thomist philosophy professor at the University of Notre Dame. But Joe isn't done there, he later posts a rebuttal to Matthew Dallman's recent article at The Woodshed on "The Humanities as the Integral Tradition."

~ Nick at The Lotus & the Magnolia notes in University of Buffalo -- Student Opinion that some students weren't thrilled with a visit by the Dalai Lama.

~ P2P Foundation posts on an effort to make a peer-to-peer movie.

Okay then, on to some less fun news:

~ Robert Kennedy is in Rolling Stone again, with a much needed warning about electronic voting machines and the possibility (I'd say probability) of another stolen election.

~ On a similar topic, The Nation has a piece on the lack of a Constitutionally guaranteed right to vote, and the lack of a nationally standardized voting criteria. This allows local folks to run elections however they want, often with serious flaws in the system.

~ The Financial Times of London reported that the reason most of the "secret" CIA prisons were closed is because the CIA was refusing to use the interrogation tactics the Bush administration wanted in fear of being prosecuted for violating Common Article Three of the Geneva Conventions. Brings into perspective the president's insistence on legalixzed torture and exemption of agents from war crime charges.

~ Meanwhile, Bill Clinton weighed in on the torture law and finds it problematic.

~ David Ignatius at the WaPo argues that the Bush administration didn't make an effort to protect the CIA until it was too late. It took three years to get a DOJ report on the legality of the techniques they were being asked to use, and by then everything was becoming public knowledge.

~ Also from the WaPo, Dan Froomkin looks at Bush's disconnect from reality in Iraq, and Michael Kinsley looks at Bush's reverse narrative on Iraq, starting with "Mission Accomplished" in 2003 to the "it will be long, tough war" approach we hear now.

And that's a wrap.

Thursday, September 21, 2006

WOOO HOOO!

You Have Fantastic Karma

You are a kind, sensitive, and giving person.
And all your good deeds will pay off - if they haven't already.
But you're not so concerned with what you get in return anyway.
You have an innate caring nature - and nothing can change that!

How's Your Karma?

SDi at the Clinton Global Initiative

This messaage from Don Beck appeared in this morning's list serve:

This afternoon, I think around 3 PM New York Time, Mark Drewell, an executive with Barlowworld from Johannesburg, is making a presentation at the Clinton Global Initiative/2006 Annual meeting. His topic is within the Bridging Differences in Embattled Societies stream. You might be able to listen to him live on the Internet. Mark was a friend and colleague in South Africa during the transformational process, and played a major role in Middelburg (with Middelburg Steel & Alloys) in dealing with a major conflict in the town involving the conservative Town Council and "radical" Comrades from the township. This was a signal event in the history of South Africa since it was probably the very first such "forum" that brought elements together across the apartheid divide. Several people had been killed in the township. Tension was high. There were threats of a general boycott in the town. There were rumours that the army would be called out. But something quite unique and unexpected happened.

I had worked with MS&A for several years, saturating the entire company with an understanding of value systems. The executive team was trained in the use of Value Engineering/Value Management processes. When the crisis hit, the young lads responded in a courageous, visionary, and caring fashion to move into the conflict, defuse it, establish a tradition of joint problem solving, and transformed the entire community out of a danger zone and into one of the first "integral" experiences. I did a full day workshop bringing together the "radical" Comrades and the South African Police in the same session at the same time. And that was unheard of during the heyday of apartheid. Conditions came together for an extraordinary success, even to the point that Desmond Tutu came by just to sit in on one of the sessions, and starting crying, saying: "I never in my life believed this sort of thing would happen in South Africa."

Nelson Mandela and other national leaders deserve all of the credit they have received for the transformation, but the real work was done at the coal face with people like Mark Drewell. And, the business sector was instrumental in the shifts yet, alas, has not received the acclaim they earned. I'm so pleased Mark received the invitation to speak at such an event and there many other South Africans who have a lot to say. One of our purposes will be to bring them into the present context around cultural integration and confluence since we appear to lack an understanding of models and processes that actually work. Those same Comrades, an one was named Doctor Selala because he had "stitched" several people ie cut their throats. He and his Comrade mates were also transformed by people like Mark and the steel company into a profit center where the company used the excess chrome from the production lines to make Pots for Africa...owned by the Comrades who became salesmen up into Africa, but supported by MS&A. The talk was translated into a positive walk.

You can watch the entire presentation, starting at 1:30 EDT, with Drewell scheduled to go on at around 3:05.

Mitigating Religious and Ethnic Conflict: Meeting the Challenge of Coexistence: Living in Integrated Communities

Sogyal Rinpoche on Tonglen

[image source]

I blogged yesterday on tonglen, at least in part, and so today's Rigpa Glimpse of the Day is on tonglen. Fittingly. Wisdom comes when you need it.

The holy secret of the practice of Tonglen is one that the mystic masters and saints of every tradition know; and living it and embodying it, with the abandon and fervor of true wisdom and true compassion, is what fills their lives with joy. One modern figure who has dedicated her life to serving the sick and dying and who radiates this joy of giving and receiving is Mother Teresa. I know of no more inspiring statement of the spiritual essence of Tonglen than these words of hers:

We all long for heaven where God is, but we have it in our power to be in heaven with Him at this very moment. But being happy with Him now means:
Loving as He loves,
Helping as He helps,
Giving as He gives,
Serving as He serves,
Rescuing as He rescues,
Being with Him twenty-four hours,
Touching Him in his distressing disguise.

~ Sogyal Rinpoche

Bill Clinton on the Daily Show

Big Bill hangs with Jon Stewart.

Speedlinking 9/21/06

Morning image is "contemplate" by Gilad Benari.

I'm short on time, so these will be very speedy links.

~ Today is The International Day of Peace. If you can't make it to one of the events, please mark the day by trying to create an aura of peaceful acceptance wherever you go today. That's my goal for today.

~ National Geographic reports on the recent dicovery of "Lucy's baby," the first intact child found in a dig. You can see some pictures here.

~ Aeh at Pongsathorn's Blog takes a look at Thai Socio-cultural Center of Gravity: Traditional over Modern. Sample:

I see this evidence has a high correlation with the findings in my PhD research which show that Thai societal system is dominated by agricultural mode of subsistence over the industrial one. According to Lenski's Ecological-Evolutionary Theory, the agricultural technology is correlated with the traditional culture and the industrial technology is correlated with the modern culture.

If you want to get a sense for what is going on in that country right now, give this a read.

~ Jay at The Zero Boss is seeking advice on workplace crack etiquette. Please help him out -- crack is a terrible thing to see.

~ Joe Perez at Until has posted part one of a series, King and tyrants, blessings and admonitions, a look at Robert Moore's book on Jungian archetypes in men, King, Warrior, Magician, Lover. I was into Moore's work when I was a Jungian, but haven't thought about it in years. I think if we could see these archetypes as having level's of development, we might be in an even better place to understand how they function.

~ There is a new article by Chandra Alexandre, She's Everywhere: Exploring an Integral Women's Spirituality, over at Integrative Spirituality.

~ Edward Berge at Open Integral takes a look at Postmetaphysical Thinking in light of Wilber and Habermas, using comments by Alan Kazlev as a jumping off point.

~ Ken Wilber's blog has posted his forward to The Common Heart—An Experience of Inter-Religious Dialogue.

~ Mark Edwards at Open Integral examines The political manipulation of islamic fundamentalism.

More from the world outside of integral and Buddhism:

~ Katie Couric sucks, and she seems to have a political agenda (which we all knew already).

~ Bill Frist, Rick Santorum, and Conrad Burns top the list of corrupt polticians as determined by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

~ The story of the Canadian who was tortured in Syria on behalf of the CIA is getting a lot of attention, and so is the effectiveness of torture (or the lack thereof) and another story of extraordinary rendition is being covered by Mother Jones. Salon takes a critical look at where Bush's push for legalized torture has gotten him.

~ Political analysts think that where you shop is a better indication of how you'll vote than race, economic status, and just about anything else. Seems Target shoppers are swing voters.

~ Finally, Robert Samuelson thinks the internet has turned Americans (and the Western world for that matter) into exhibitionists. I think he has a point, but developmentally, it may be seen as regressive or transformative, depending on where an individual started, so it may not be all bad.

That's it for now. Have a great day.

Integral Options Cafe

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