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SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  3/10/22
DESCRIPTION:  \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \n  \nMarch 10\, 2022 \n  \nY’know how when you read a really good book\, you want all your friends to read it? That’s the idea here. \n  \nI asked some friends (at the last minute) to write about some of their favorite books—books they read recently\, or a long time ago\, books that changed the way they see or experience or understand the world\, books that they’ve read many times: their favorite books! \n  \nThis can be a conversation between people outside and inside prison walls. Our next issue (March 24th) will feature some of the favorite books of friends who are “on the inside.” If you are an Insider\, please write to me about some of your favorite books. And if you would like to read any of the books that are talked about here\, let me know which books you’d like to read\, and we should be able to send them to you. \n  \nKim was the first to reply to my email. He wrote: \n  \nWhen I was seven years old\, on a second-grade field trip to a local church\, I stole a hand-sized New Testament someone had left on the pew where I sat in the back. The cover was black\, pretend leather. I liked the feel of it in my fingers. The owner’s name was written on pale blue paper on the inside cover. I tore off the blue paper bit by bit until the book was mine. My own book. It fit in my pocket. I couldn’t read it yet\, but I knew it was important. I knew my grandmother would love it. Her minister husband had died\, but she still prayed sometimes. What I didn’t know was how to share it with anyone\, show it to anyone. It had to be my secret until I was old enough to know what was inside. \n  \n—Kim Stafford \n* \n  \nHey Johnny; \n  \nFun! \nHere is my top 10. What’s yours? \n  \n10) Between the World and Me by Ta-nehisi Coates  \n9) Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol  \n8) The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion \n7) Spring by Ali Smith \n6) The Lonely City by Olivia Laing \n5) No one belongs here more than you by Miranda July \n4) Townie by Andre Dubus III \n3) Zone One by Colson Whitehead  \n2) The Powerbroker by Robert Caro  \n1) Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishigurio \n  \n—Pat (The Dad) Walsh \n* \n  \nA wonderful\, thrillingly great book that is relatively under-read is INDEPENDENT PEOPLE by Haldor Laxness of Iceland. It weaves the development of Icelandic society into a story of hate and love between a daughter and a father. It is an intimate epic\, good enough to hurt your heart\, and then to heal it\, but not without leaving a scar. \n  \n—Ken Margolis \n* \n  \nOh\, so many books. How can I even choose? But of course I will\, and then regret what has been left out. But such is life. \n  \nCurrent faves: \n  \n1. Circe by Madeline Miller \nI just finished Circe\, a retelling of the Greek goddess\, mostly known as someone who captured and loved Ulysses on his way home. This new story of her life is monumental\, mythic and utterly real. Years and aeons merge into one another\, the stories are told from the women’s point of view\, sidelined characters are given full lives and we find ourselves alive in a world of magic and beauty. I can’t even begin to say how much I loved it. When I finished Circe it wasn’t even possible to start a new book…how could I step out of this world of enchantment? Buy it\, borrow it\, read it–you too can participate in this meditation on the meaning of mortality and divinity. \n  \n 2. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr  \nAll the Light We Cannot See creates a world deeply immersed in the one we live in and yet somehow it expands and deepens our knowledge of another world. It is the story of two children\, one from Paris and one from Germany\, during WWII. The quiet details in their interwoven stories lead into a world where people are haunted\, as are we\, by both love and violence. Long after finishing the book these characters will live with you\, tell you stories\, unveil secrets. \n  \n 3. An American Sunrise; Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings–both by Joy Harjo \nHarjo is the current Poet Laureate of the United States\, the first Native American woman to hold that position. Her wild\, direct\, illusive poems speak from another world to us\, and they continue to stand firmly on the ground of the country’s original inhabitants. And yet she is utterly modern and relevant\, creating poems you only wish you could write.  \n  \n4. New and Collected Poems by Czeslaw Milosz \nMilosz won the Nobel Prize for Literature for his enormous and profound body of work. From a childhood in rural Lithuania through Nazi occupation\, World War II\, Soviet rule\, and eventual exile and career as a professor in California\, Milosz saw himself as a conduit for all the silenced voices he knew\, and he recreated world upon world\, all the time pondering the reasons behind what he experienced. Monumental and touching\, this is a book you can never finish. \n  \n—xxoxo Deb Buchanan \n* \n  \nPretty short notice! So if I don’t have synopses and astute commentary on any or all of them\, it’s because of…pretty short notice! \n  \nThe numbering is not in any particular order of best to last. \n  \n1. Go\, Went\, Gone by Jenny Erpenbeck.  The novel tells the tale of Richard\, a retired classics professor who lives in Berlin. His wife has died\, and he lives a routine existence until one day he spies some African refugees staging a hunger strike in Alexanderplatz. Curiosity turns into compassion and an inner transformation\, as he visits their shelter\, interviews them\, and becomes embroiled in their harrowing fates. Go\, Went\, Gone is a scathing indictment of Western policy toward the European refugee crisis\, but also a touching portrait of a man who finds he has more in common with the Africans than he realizes. \n  \n2. Becoming Duchess Goldblatt by Anonymous is a nonfiction\, ongoing story of a person who has had relative success in a career but has a difficult family past\, including a mentally ill older brother and a father who cannot disavow his son\, no matter how he hurts other members of the family. The protagonist also experiences a wrenching divorce with child issues\, which lead her/him to seek out community on Twitter. Let’s call her ‘she\,’ although that is never clarified. She finds that her difficult personal life translates unwittingly into a compassionate Twitter figure\, and she develops a following who look to her for solace and advice. Her gentleness\, wit\, and compassion for others draws people from all over\, including Lyle Lovett. This is all true!  MUST READ!!! \n  \n3.  The True American by Anand Giridharadas  (nonfiction).  Days after 9/11\, an avowed “American terrorist” named Mark Stroman\, seeking revenge\, walks into a Dallas mini-mart and shoots Raisuddin Bhuiyan\, a Bangladeshi immigrant\, maiming and nearly killing him. Ten years after the shooting\, Bhuiyan wages a campaign against the State of Texas to have his attacker spared from the death penalty. The True American is a rich\, colorful\, profoundly moving exploration of the American dream in its many dimensions.  \n  \n4.  Resurrection by Leo Tolstoy novel    A Russian nobleman takes advantage of a young woman\, gets her pregnant and then deserts her. He forgets about her until years later when he discovers that she is in court for stealing\, and she has become a vagrant and wastrel of a figure. He has a change of heart\, mind and soul\, and determines to save her by devoting his life to that purpose. His persistence and her resistance take them into uncharted waters.  \n  \n5.  Tortilla Curtain by T. C. Boyle.  An upper middle class Southern California couple encounters a Mexican undocumented man living in the arroyos near their gated house. The story deals with the husband’s run ins with the Mexican while on his (the husband’s) ‘nature walks.’  At first aghast and  uncomfortable\, then curious\, then understanding\, and finally compassionate and a life saver\, the husband finds his world changed. \n  \n6.  A Gentleman in Moscow  by Amor Towles  (fiction) \n  \n7.  Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown  (nonfiction) \n  \n8.  The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan  (nonfiction) \n  \n9.  Nicholas and Alexandra\, Peter the Great\, Catherine the Great all by Robert Massie.  The most readable and fascinating history writing\, from one who has always had difficulty reading history. \n    \n—Jude Russell \n* \n  \nHere are five books that had high impact on me\, \n  \nThe Sacred Pipe\, Black Elk—One of the first books that showed me how some people live a totally spiritual life without a distinct religion. \n  \nThe Naked Ape by Desmond Morris—This was the first book that helped me understand our animal origins. \n  \nLao Tzu—Still a faithful companion\, one that doesn’t waste words but covers Life pretty completely. \n  \nOn The Road\, by Jack Kerouac—This put into words what a lot of us were starting to sense about life in modern America. \n  \nIshmael\, by Daniel Quinn—A broad perspective on how our human history has developed over the last few millennia\, forging delusions of separateness and mastery and privilege in us.            \n  \nThis brief list perforce needs to omit Mad magazine\, the great Russian novelists\, and many other wonderful writers like Shakespeare and Tolkien who have influenced or entertained me over the years\, but these five are books I find myself still thinking about years after reading them. \n  \nlove and peace\,      \n  \n—Bill Faricy \n* \n  \nGreat question on books.  I decided to list those that\, after several book purges\, are still on my shelves and ones that I come back to over and over:   \n  \nTrickster Makes This World   Lewis Hyde \nMemories\, Dreams\, Reflections   Carl Jung \nThe Water of Life   Michael Meade \nIrish Fairy Tales  James Stephens \nCoyote Was Going There   Jarold Ramsey \nThe Red Haired Girl from the Bog   Patricia Monaghan \nGood Poems    Edited by Garrison Keillor \nThe Woman Warrior  Maxine Hong Kingston \nGo Down Moses      William Faulkner \nIrish Folk Tales   Edited by Henry Glassie \nReturning to Earth    Jim Harrison \nThe Nutmeg’s Curse  Amitav Ghosh (I just read but it\,  but it will be on my shelves a long time.) \n  \nThanks for doing this\, Johnny.   \n  \n—Will Hornyak \n* \n  \nThe two books that I have read/listened to on Audible are both by Isabel Wilkerson: The Warmth of Other Suns\, which travels with the Great Migration from the South and highlights/follows the lives of three people who made the migration. While I intellectually had an understanding of Jim Crow\, Wilkerson provided an emotional understanding in a very moving way. I also valued her later book Caste\, which looks at how caste systems provide a powerful framework for understanding race and other social issues. This work is less personal than the earlier book but the tandem is quite compelling. \n  \nCheers\, \n  \n—Jeffrey Sher \n* \n  \nI’ve recommended Of Water and the Spirit by Malidoma Somé to lots of my friends. When we think about different cultures\, we have the idea that they do things a little differently than we do\, they speak different languages\, and they have different beliefs. But Malidoma’s Somé’s book gave me the feeling that he lives in an entirely different world than I do. He has seen things that I’ve never seen\, and never will see. Even if I went to his village\, I couldn’t see them. Each one of us lives in our own world—the world as we imagine it\, as we describe it and explain it to ourselves. His book\, more than any other book I know\, shows me that there is not just one “reality”—there are as many realities as there are human beings. (And that doesn’t take into account the realities of moles\, goldfinches\, dogs\, lizards\, elephants\, gnats\, whales\, et cetera.) A different culture is a different way of being in the world. \n  \nWalt Whitman’s “Song of Myself” is a poem\, not a book. Although it’s long for a poem (56 pages in my Signet edition of Leaves of Grass)\, I’ve memorized most of it. It changed my life\, changed the way I see the world\, changed the way I imagine who I am. It is\, I think\, the strongest expression in the world’s literature of the mystic’s feeling of being one with everything. Because it’s a poem\, and not a lecture or an essay\, it has the power to alter our sensibilities. It has made me a more joyful person\, made me more free\, given me the feeling of limitless love for everyone and every thing. The poem is a corrective to the ascetic and life-denying aspects of much religious literature. What saint or yogi would say?: \n  \n“I believe in the flesh and the appetites\, \nSeeing\, hearing\, feeling\, are miracles\, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.” \n  \nBut he doesn’t stop there. He goes on to say: \n  \n“Divine am I inside and out\, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touch’d from\, \nThe scent of these arm-pits aroma finer than prayer\, \nThis head more than churches\, bibles\, and all the creeds.” \n  \nWalt abolishes dualities\, like body and soul\, that are characteristic not just of most spirituality\, but of thought and language. It is a giant YES! to Life. And to Death. And everything in between. \n  \nMy two favorite short stories are Dream of a Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostoevsky and Tenth of December by George Saunders. I read the first one a long time ago\, and realized that the narrator had the same ridiculous dream that I have—the dream that we could all love each other. I’ve performed a version of this story from time to time. Jason Beito recommended the George Saunders story to me. Thank you\, Jason! \n  \nI’m always reading more than one book at a time. At the beginning of each day\, I usually read from certain inspirational texts. These are books that I read again and again. When I get to the end\, I start at the beginning. My current repertoire includes Zen in English Literature and Oriental Classics by R. H. Blyth\, A Year With Hafiz by Daniel Ladinsky\, The Poetical Works and Centuries of Meditations by Thomas Traherne. Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh and The Only Revolution by J. Krishnamurti. Alan Watts is another stalwart early morning companion. I’m currently reading Eastern Wisdom\, Modern Life: Collected Talks 1960-1969. \n  \nI love to re-read Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass from time to time. And Huckleberry Finn. \n  \nI learned a lot from Woman and Nature by Susan Griffin\, and For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Childrearing and the Roots of Violence by Alice Miller\, and Magical Child and Evolution’s End by Joseph Chilton Pearce\, and from many books by Ken Wilber. Joseph Campbell is a personal favorite. I like his lectures best\, especially as audio books. \n  \nWilliam Shakespeare is my favorite writer. He’s the greatest poet in the English language\, and the greatest playwright in any language. Endless delight! My favorite companion volume to the works of Shakespeare is Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being by Ted Hughes. \n  \nThree of my favorite novels: The Storyteller by Mario Vargas Llosa\, The Zoo Where You’re Fed to God by Michael Ventura\, and Borgel by Daniel Pinkwater. \n  \nAlthough Ralph Waldo Emerson and William Blake are wondering why I left them out\, that’s enough for now! \n  \n—Johnny
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-3-10-22/
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SUMMARY:Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue  3/15/22
DESCRIPTION:“There is One Holy Book\, the sacred manuscript of nature\,\nthe only scripture which can enlighten the reader.” ~ Hazrat Inayat Khan \n  \n  \nOpen Road Meditation & Mindfulness Dialogue \n  \n March 15\, 2022 \n  \n(These are some excerpts from Michel’s meditation journal. The numbers refer to sections from Your True Home by Thich Nhat Hanh.) (JS) \n  \nFebruary 15\, 2022  #239  Peace Permeates \n  \nIt’s true! Whatever we cultivate in mindfulness will permeate the life and body. It is also true that physical states (feelings) can affect the mindfulness. This is why I believe there is value in any type of mindfulness practice. Currently I strive to practice during moments on the exercise bike\, and do nothing else while I sit there. Maybe formal sitting isn’t for everyone—(it is the easiest and quickest path I’ve learned)—but learning to find some idle time to focus on the breath\, while not attending to every thought whim arising each moment\, can be helpful. Lately\, I’ve referenced recollections of childhood: those times on sunny summer days\, laying on a lawn beach\, etc.\, watching clouds pass by. Thoughts can become the clouds. Let them go on. \n  \nFebruary 16\, 2022  #240  Rest Naturally \n  \nI would take Thây’s allusion one step further. I would imagine myself as that pebble sitting down to rest in sleep. These images sound like a very restful contemplation for meditation practice\, or sleep—which can be a form of meditation\, I’ve heard. \n  \nThe beauty of this image\, to me\, is the pebble does nothing. It is acted upon\, and eventually comes to a state of rest\, all without any self effort. Once at rest\, more nothing; it still doesn’t do. It just is.  I like allowing thoughts to be like water\, flowing by with no affect or input. I think emulating the small stone is valuable. \n  \nI wonder: how far this allusion-metaphor-image can be interpreted and applied before the analogy breaks down? Still\, I like this idea of imagining myself (my mind?) as the small stone resting as clouds\, air\, rain\, water\, a river\, living beings (various forms of thought?) simply pass by\, while I continue to rest unaffected by all the passersby\, or the melee of thoughts passes on without my interaction or attachment. \n  \nFebruary 23\, 2022  #245  The Sangha Body of Peace \n  \nIt has been over two years since we last gathered\, here at TRCI\, for our weekly dialogues and since we’ve been able to function for each other as a sangha. We’ve been doing so remotely. In this two years\, several have moved on to their next phase\, whatever and wherever that may be. All of us\, I’m guessing\, look forward to meeting with those of us remaining\, and for our dialogues to resume. I wonder what this may be likened to and how we\, the remnant or those departed\, may feel about being where we are when that happens. Will everyone experience unity of sangha\, or some\, maybe? I don’t know; it’s a personal experience. \n  \nI trust if we remember Thây’s teaching on mindfulness—“I am here for you”—and apply it to be mindfully present wherever we are at the reunification of our weekly “love feat\,” then those present (and hopefully those afar\, lending their light) will give/receive the most from that meeting of our sangha again. I look forward to that day myself. \n  \nWith love\, be well! \n  \n—Michel Deforge \n* \n  \nin my old age \ni have become a connoisseur \nof perfect moments \n  \nSome people say\, “No one’s perfect\,” or “Nothing is perfect\,” but\, if you look at it a certain way\, everyone is perfect and every thing is perfect. We’ve all drunk a lot of water in our life\, but sometimes we stop and notice that the glass of water in our hand is the most beautiful thing we have ever seen. We are amazed by water. It’s impossible. It’s wet. We are made of water. Without air\, without water\, without the sun\, there could be no life on this planet. Without our body\, without our eyes and brain and skin and nervous system we couldn’t see or touch or taste water. We couldn’t know or imagine. When I was young\, I knew everything. The older I get\, the more bewildered I’ve become. I’m dumbfounded by the beauty and unlikelihood of absolutely everything. \n  \n(After writing the above\, I asked Mr. Google: “What percentage of the human body is water?” Here is the reply:) \n  \n60% \n  \nUp to 60% of the human adult body is water. According to H.H. Mitchell\, Journal of Biological Chemistry 158\, the brain and heart are composed of 73% water\, and the lungs are about 83% water. The skin contains 64% water\, muscles and kidneys are 79%\, and even the bones are watery: 31%. \n  \n(From the U.S. Geological Survey website article: “The Water in You: Water and the Human Body.” The article is highly entertaining. Here’s the link:) \n  \nhttps://www.usgs.gov/special-topics/water-science-school/science/water-you-water-and-human-body \n  \n—Johnny Stallings \n* \n  \n#302  No Ideas \n  \n“When we look deeply\, we see that all our ideas about our body and about our mind are inaccurate. We have to practice no ideas…” \n“When we can stop every idea in our mind…” \n“When we can see the emptiness of each thing…” \n  \nBut aren’t ‘looking deeply’ and ‘when we can see’ just other ways of saying ‘thinking\,’ and having ideas about? Isn’t the very practice of “practicing no ideas” an idea? An act of thinking? A conscious process of the mind? Do you acknowledge that it’s an idea to “practice no idea\,” and that it is a necessary step to get beyond to get to emptiness?  \n  \nWe might use a mantra in order to go beyond no idea? But the derivation of mantra goes back to Sanskrit – sacred counsel\, formula; and back to Latin – mens: mind. From manyate: he thinks. Hmmm\, that sure sounds like mind>thinking>idea to me… \n  \nAm I overthinking this no idea/emptiness…idea? Sheesh. I have no idea….Hey! I think I’m getting somewhere with this.  \n  \n—Jude Russell \n* \n  \nIn life I have done things that were detestable. And in life we have all at times been faced with choosing the path. But which path do we take—not knowing where any of them lead? I had been lost for so long\, and lost so much\, and so many of those things can never be replaced. But some of them will never fail\, and that is the love I have for them—lost and found and kept. Unconditional love is there for those that need it. People are the real treasure in love\, and those relationships are what is most important. Love is free and we should always freely give love unconditionally. It is a simple seed and if it is allowed to grow unchecked it is gladly evasive. \n  \n—Rocky Hutchinson \n* \n  \nOld Spruce Sets the Clock \n  \nI’ve been running daylight saving time \nsince I was a sprig\, a sprout\, a sapling \nhoarding every filament of illumination \nthat made it through these shadows \nto find my reaching hands open wide. \nDon’t ask me about frenzy–I’ve been \nslow-timing for a hundred years\, and \nlook where that has got me\, rooted \ndeeper\, yearning higher\, greener\, \nolder\, thick and sturdy\, easy with \nroot and bud\, snow and starlight.  \nIn this war\, one could do worse. \n  \n—Kim Stafford \n* \n  \nMy meditation lately consists of viewing what I look like by someone else’s eyes and mind. How do I act\, talk\, walk\, sit\, eat? How do I treat others? This gives me self awareness. It is sometimes uncomfortable to view myself outside of myself\, but it does bring me perspective. Thanks everyone for your thoughts and writings. \n  \n—Brandon Gillespie \n* \n  \nFor a joyous and heart opening experience\, spend a few breaths looking closely at these spirals (on page 1) of nature’s energy unfolding.  \n  \nMarch has many celebrations—International Women’s Day\, Spring Equinox\, Earth Day\, Candlemas and Nancy Scharbach’s Birthday! \n  \nAs Spring approaches I am delighted by the polka dots of nature—soft rain drops on the pavement\, along with pink petals from the cherry trees. Pussy willows in bud\, raindrops clinging to the leafless twigs after a rain. But there is also the spiral when I look closely at the ferns sending out their new shoots. \n  \nIt is also the time of Fasting after a last winter Feast. “Carnival” means going without meat\, or food in general\, until the gardens are producing once again. Through eons and within all cultures and religions\, the need for Lent (or sacrifice\, and changing one’s habits to survive) has been a Spring ritual. Blessing the Earth for sustenance. \n  \nIn Buddhist practice\, rather than a forty day fast\, the Five Precepts are recited once a week\, to help change unkind and unhealthy elements of our “habit energy\,” as Thay calls it\, with the intent to live a happier and ethical life. \n  \nRather than making these sound like commandments\, Thich Nhat Hanh over the years has rewritten the precepts so they help us focus on practicing awareness and kindness\, for ourselves\, for others\, and for the planet. \n  \nHere are Thay’s latest rendition with his commentary. You may want to take one to heart for a week or two\, then reflect on your own habit energy\, and what changes you might see from paying attention. Maybe there is something you want to give up and you would like your community to support. \n  \nIn peace and love\,  \n  \n—Katie Radditz \n  \nThe Five Mindfulness Trainings are one of the most concrete ways to practice mindfulness. They are nonsectarian\, and their nature is universal. They are true practices of compassion and understanding. All spiritual traditions have their equivalent to the Five Mindfulness Trainings. \n  \nThe first training is to protect life\, to decrease violence in oneself\, in the family and in society. The second training is to practice social justice\, generosity\, not stealing and not exploiting other living beings. The third is the practice of responsible sexual behavior in order to protect individuals\, couples\, families and children. The fourth is the practice of deep listening and loving speech to restore communication and reconcile. The fifth is about mindful consumption\, to help us not bring toxins and poisons into our body or mind. \n  \nThe Five Mindfulness Trainings are based on the precepts developed during the time of the Buddha to be the foundation of practice for the entire lay practice community.  \n  \nI have translated these precepts for modern times\, because mindfulness is at the foundation of each one of them. With mindfulness\, we  are modern times\, because mindfulness is at the foundation of each one of them. With mindfulness\, we are aware of what is going on in our bodies\, our feelings\, our minds and the world\, and we avoid doing harm to ourselves and others. Mindfulness protects us\, our families and our society. When we are mindful\, we can see that by refraining from doing one thing\, we can prevent another thing from happening. We arrive at our own unique insight. It is not something imposed on us by an outside authority. Practicing the mindfulness trainings\, therefore\, helps us be more calm and concentrated\, and brings more insight and enlightenment. \n  \nThe Five Mindfulness Trainings \n  \nThe Five Mindfulness Trainings represent the Buddhist vision for a global spirituality and ethic. They are a concrete expression of the Buddha’s teachings on the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path\, the path of right understanding and true love\, leading to healing\, transformation\, and happiness for ourselves and for the world. To practice the Five Mindfulness Trainings is to cultivate the insight of interbeing\, or Right View\, which can remove all discrimination\, intolerance\, anger\, fear\, and despair. If we live according to the Five Mindfulness Trainings\, we are already on the path of a bodhisattva. Knowing we are on that path\, we are not lost in confusion about our life in the present or in fears about the future. \n  \nReverence For Life \n  \nAware of the suffering caused by the destruction of life\, I am committed to cultivating the insight of interbeing and compassion and learning ways to protect the lives of people\, animals\, plants\, and minerals. I am determined not to kill\, not to let others kill\, and not to support any act of killing in the world\, in my thinking\, or in my way of life. Seeing that harmful actions arise from anger\, fear\, greed\, and intolerance\, which in turn come from dualistic and discriminative thinking\, I will cultivate openness\, non-discrimination\, and non-attachment to views in order to transform violence\, fanaticism\, and dogmatism in myself and in the world. \n  \nTrue Happiness\n \n  \nAware of the suffering caused by exploitation\, social injustice\, stealing\, and oppression\, I am committed to practicing generosity in my thinking\, speaking\, and acting. I am determined not to steal and not to possess anything that should belong to others; and I will share my time\, energy\, and material resources with those who are in need. I will practice looking deeply to see that the happiness and suffering of others are not separate from my own happiness and suffering; that true happiness is not possible without understanding and compassion; and that running after wealth\, fame\, power and sensual pleasures can bring much suffering and despair. I am aware that happiness depends on my mental attitude and not on external conditions\, and that I can live happily in the present moment simply by remembering that I already have more than enough conditions to be happy. I am committed to practicing Right Livelihood so that I can help reduce the suffering of living beings on Earth and stop contributing to climate change. \n  \nTrue Love\n \n  \nAware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct\, I am committed to cultivating responsibility and learning ways to protect the safety and integrity of individuals\, couples\, families\, and society. Knowing that sexual desire is not love\, and that sexual activity motivated by craving always harms myself as well as others\, I am determined not to engage in sexual relations without true love and a deep\, long-term commitment made known to my family and friends. I will do everything in my power to protect children from sexual abuse and to prevent couples and families from being broken by sexual misconduct. Seeing that body and mind are one\, I am committed to learning appropriate ways to take care of my sexual energy and cultivating loving kindness\, compassion\, joy and inclusiveness – which are the four basic elements of true love – for my greater happiness and the greater happiness of others. Practicing true love\, we know that we will continue beautifully into the future. \n  \nLoving Speech and Deep Listening\n \n  \nAware of the suffering caused by unmindful speech and the inability to listen to others\, I am committed to cultivating loving speech and compassionate listening in order to relieve suffering and to promote reconciliation and peace in myself and among other people\, ethnic and religious groups\, and nations. Knowing that words can create happiness or suffering\, I am committed to speaking truthfully using words that inspire confidence\, joy\, and hope. When anger is manifesting in me\, I am determined not to speak. I will practice mindful breathing and walking in order to recognize and to look deeply into my anger. I know that the roots of anger can be found in my wrong perceptions and lack of understanding of the suffering in myself and in the other person. I will speak and listen in a way that can help myself and the other person to transform suffering and see the way out of difficult situations. I am determined not to spread news that I do not know to be certain and not to utter words that can cause division or discord. I will practice Right Diligence to nourish my capacity for understanding\, love\, joy\, and inclusiveness\, and gradually transform anger\, violence\, and fear that lie deep in my consciousness. \n  \nNourishment and Healing\n \n  \nAware of the suffering caused by unmindful consumption\, I am committed to cultivating good health\, both physical and mental\, for myself\, my family\, and my society by practicing mindful eating\, drinking\, and consuming. I will practice looking deeply into how I consume the Four Kinds of Nutriments\, namely edible foods\, sense impressions\, volition\, and consciousness. I am determined not to gamble\, or to use alcohol\, drugs\, or any other products which contain toxins\, such as certain websites\, electronic games\, TV programs\, films\, magazines\, books\, and conversations. I will practice coming back to the present moment to be in touch with the refreshing\, healing and nourishing elements in me and around me\, not letting regrets and sorrow drag me back into the past nor letting anxieties\, fear\, or craving pull me out of the present moment. I am determined not to try to cover up loneliness\, anxiety\, or other suffering by losing myself in consumption. I will contemplate interbeing and consume in a way that preserves peace\, joy\, and well-being in my body and consciousness\, and in the collective body and consciousness of my family\, my society and the Earth. \n  \n—from Happiness: Essential Mindfulness Practices by Thich Nhat Hanh (pp. 35-38) \n* \n  \nSome quotes on Jeff K’s mind lately: \n  \n’’Be patient\, your future will come to you and lie down at your feet like a dog who knows and loves you no matter what you are” \n  \n—Ted Chiang Stories of Your Life and Others\, p. 278 \n  \n”Found a dollar and had a slice of pizza… One day closer to death’’  \n& \n”We come into this world alone… Then we die alone… But\, in the meantime… Snacks.’’ \n  \n—Adult Swim \n  \nOur universe might have slid into equilibrium emitting nothing more than a quiet hiss. The fact that it spawned such plenitude is a miracle\, one that is matched only by your universe giving rise to you. Though I am long dead as you read this\, explorer\, I offer to you a valediction. Contemplate the marvel that is existence\, and rejoice that you are able to do so. I feel I have the right to tell you this because\, as I am inscribing these words\, I am doing the same.  \n  \n—Ted Chiang\,  Exhalation\, p. 57 \n  \n”Artists are magical helpers. Evoking symbols and motifs that connect us to our deeper selves\, they can help us along the heroic journey of our own lives.”  \n  \n—Joseph Campbell \n  \n—Jeff Kuehner
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/meditation-mindfulness-dialogue-3-15-22/
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