Monday, November 10, 2014
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Where to Train
Heaven is right where you are standing, and that is the place to train.
-- Morihei Ueshiba, Founder of Aikido
-- Morihei Ueshiba, Founder of Aikido
Monday, October 20, 2014
Seeing Through: Connecting the Dots
Dot A: Each of us lives in and as a manufactured existence. We literally make ourselves up. We name ourselves. We label ourselves. We limit ourselves. We idealize ourselves.
Dot B: We are our favorite product. We kiss ourselves on our lips. We are absorbed in our own manufacture.
Dot C: Dots A and B are not wrong or bad. Dots A and B are part of who we are. Part.
Dot D: It is possible to see through our manufactured existence.
Dot E: Seeing through our manufactured existence allows seeing through our material existence.
Dot F: Not only have some of our ancestors (and contemporaries) that we categorize as "spiritual" seen through the material world and the manufactured world, some of those we categorize as warriors or martial artists have done the same.
Dot G: This seeing through by martial artists can be seen in their writings and in their lives (the way they move and stand and talk). They are embodyings of the soul and spirit of the universe itself.
Dot H: The martial arts and its artists are an example of the capability of “seeing through.” Seeing through can and does occur in many other practices.
Dot I: Seeing through, in the way I am using it here, means deliberately allowing the frame of mind of manufactured existence one habitually entertains to dissolve, to dissipate, to vanish.
Dot J: This is not an intellectual exercise. It requires one's whole being. Nothing held in reserve.
Dot K: Do it.
Dot B: We are our favorite product. We kiss ourselves on our lips. We are absorbed in our own manufacture.
Dot C: Dots A and B are not wrong or bad. Dots A and B are part of who we are. Part.
Dot D: It is possible to see through our manufactured existence.
Dot E: Seeing through our manufactured existence allows seeing through our material existence.
Dot F: Not only have some of our ancestors (and contemporaries) that we categorize as "spiritual" seen through the material world and the manufactured world, some of those we categorize as warriors or martial artists have done the same.
Dot G: This seeing through by martial artists can be seen in their writings and in their lives (the way they move and stand and talk). They are embodyings of the soul and spirit of the universe itself.
Dot H: The martial arts and its artists are an example of the capability of “seeing through.” Seeing through can and does occur in many other practices.
Dot I: Seeing through, in the way I am using it here, means deliberately allowing the frame of mind of manufactured existence one habitually entertains to dissolve, to dissipate, to vanish.
Dot J: This is not an intellectual exercise. It requires one's whole being. Nothing held in reserve.
Dot K: Do it.
Definition of Warrior of Spirit
On “Warrior of Spirit.” I reclaim and use the term “warrior” in a specific way. A warrior of spirit, of the life force, of the ongoing and energizing Light at the core of our Being, is one who moves in accord with the life force, not against it. A warrior of spirit is one who faces and deals with the momentum of each moment in an interflowing manner. Merge is the practice: m-erg-e, me with a unit of power (erg) in my middle, at my core.
A warrior of spirit operates from this core and opens to all around in a 360 degree manner. As a result, a warrior of spirit is a sphere of influence whose quality extends outward in all directions without limit. No pushover, the warrior of spirit lets her inner Light shine. This shining has great power and transforms the world.
A warrior of spirit operates from this core and opens to all around in a 360 degree manner. As a result, a warrior of spirit is a sphere of influence whose quality extends outward in all directions without limit. No pushover, the warrior of spirit lets her inner Light shine. This shining has great power and transforms the world.
Sunday, October 19, 2014
Monday, September 8, 2014
Friday, September 5, 2014
Thursday, September 4, 2014
Story
For the clarity of my own thinking, I am now substituting STORY for RELIGION, for SCIENCE, and for all other positional assumptions about the origin and process of life. STORY is neither true nor false; that dichotomy does not hold here. STORY is simply STORY. Each STORY can be entered (and left) as with any other physical or social domain.
STORY is an imaginal realm and imaginal is real. Imagine a snake and you will have a visceral reaction. Imagine a hot slab of cherry pie with vanilla ice cream and you will have another. The body understands deeply the reality of the IMAGINAL.
STORY is like a virtual reality helmet. One can put a STORY on and take it off. Scorners and scoffers of STORY other than their own (whether RELIGION, SCIENCE, or MYTH) appear to have their helmet firmly welded to their head.
Is it possible to go outside all STORY? My affirmative answer is based upon experience which when described becomes another STORY. A subset of Zen practitioners, contemplators, and mindful folk will understand this. Those who do not wish to admit such a possibility, that a STORYless space exists, can perhaps consider that one's mind, one's awareness, can move from one STORY to another, can adopt at least temporarily a STORY other than one's DEFAULT STORY. (Ewert Cousins has called this STORY adoption ability "shamanistic epistemology.")
I find adopting the view that all views are STORY, as is this view itself, rids one of scorn, scoff, prejudice, hierarchical rankings and general negativity when regarding anyone's STORY. One is pleased to be converted to that STORY for a moment or many moments, delight in its nuance and its adventuresomeness and move on, always able to come back for another and no doubt deeper telling.
STORY is an imaginal realm and imaginal is real. Imagine a snake and you will have a visceral reaction. Imagine a hot slab of cherry pie with vanilla ice cream and you will have another. The body understands deeply the reality of the IMAGINAL.
STORY is like a virtual reality helmet. One can put a STORY on and take it off. Scorners and scoffers of STORY other than their own (whether RELIGION, SCIENCE, or MYTH) appear to have their helmet firmly welded to their head.
Is it possible to go outside all STORY? My affirmative answer is based upon experience which when described becomes another STORY. A subset of Zen practitioners, contemplators, and mindful folk will understand this. Those who do not wish to admit such a possibility, that a STORYless space exists, can perhaps consider that one's mind, one's awareness, can move from one STORY to another, can adopt at least temporarily a STORY other than one's DEFAULT STORY. (Ewert Cousins has called this STORY adoption ability "shamanistic epistemology.")
I find adopting the view that all views are STORY, as is this view itself, rids one of scorn, scoff, prejudice, hierarchical rankings and general negativity when regarding anyone's STORY. One is pleased to be converted to that STORY for a moment or many moments, delight in its nuance and its adventuresomeness and move on, always able to come back for another and no doubt deeper telling.
Definition: Shamanistic Epistemology
Shamanistic Epistemology: A term coined by Ewert Cousins in which one converts to (has a phenomenological experience of) each spiritual path that one studies without disowning one's previous experiences or one's root experience.
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