King Sahura c.2487-2475 B.C.E.
This morning lightning struck. I got a great ideal for a book. Even so, it is a book I’ll never write. Still, I have a provocative working title, Why Man Is King, or perhaps, Why Man is King, is God. I’m not even keen on writing a post addressing this, or at least addressing all of ‘this’. As it turns out, the end of the book would dovetail right into a recent post Ant Are Us, so I just have to say something, otherwise this will haunt me for the rest of the day.
Up until now, civilization has done everything possible to put Man at the top, and Woman at the bottom of culture’s hierarchical structure. I always attributed this to simple social zoology where the ‘alpha male’ heads the group. That may still be a major reason for the main origins of human cultural biases. However, I realized another source as I was pondering the dynamics of male-female relationships… what keeps them either working or leads to their demise. Continue reading ‘Why Man is King’
While discussing life with a friend the other day the word evil came. He sees America as an “evil empire” that commits acts of torture that surpass anything al-Qaeda has done. I think he was referring to all the bombs dropped over the last 100 years. In any case, this provided grist for my mind’s mill. For starters, the idea of evil immediately brings to mind the Tao Te Ching chapter two: “The whole world recognizes the good as the good, yet this is only the bad”. ( Ha! No wonder Taoist thought has never caught on.)
When I look around me, I see no evil or ugliness in nature. Nature is just self right as the Chinese ziran (自然) puts it. Continue reading ‘See No Evil’
Which path leads where?
A few months ago a new member Dan asked me, “So, I’d like to ask, do you have any life advice for a man approaching 30″?
One problem with that question was too many things came to mind. So I turned the question over to my subconscious. Oddly, I find not thinking about tricky issues is the best way to resolve them. Of course “not thinking about” doesn’t mean disregarding. I suppose the ‘not thinking about’ phase helps the mind get through its blind spot.
Finally, up bubbled something worthy of the question. Overall, nothing feels more important to me than understanding. While stressing the importance of understanding seems obvious, it may not be as simple as it sounds. Continue reading ‘So, I’d like to ask…’
I was struck recently by a comment the Pope made on suffering (see: Pope Benedict stumped by Japanese girl’s question about suffering). Briefly, a young girl asked him, “Why do children have to be so sad?” Benedict admitted: “I also have the same questions: why is it this way? Why do you have to suffer so much while others live in ease?”
This exemplifies the shaky foundation of the Christian world view. How does a believer reconcile the deep disconnect between a God that favors us (Adam and Eve, Noah, Jesus dying for our sins, etc.) and the ruthless reality of nature. Not surprisingly, Christians can’t bridge this gap, and must always fall back on ‘faith’. I imagine some of the evangelic fever seen in the Judeo-Christian-Islamic path is symptomatic of this underlying reality (i.e., Subconsciously, they doth protest too much, methinks).
Continue reading ‘It’s Simply Nature’s Way’
This recent “Fast Draw” segment, The Truth about Lies (on CBS Sunday Morning) demonstrates why many things most people believe turn out not to be true. Also interesting are the two comments at the end. It is sobering and humbling to see how blind and deaf we can be. Oh how the power of belief walks all over clear and irrefutable evidence. What accounts for belief’s power(1)?
From a symptoms point of view, I would have to say we hold so tightly to belief because we need to. Well, duh, you say? Truth be told, drilling down into what appears obvious can be enlightening. So I ask, what hunger do we feel so deeply that belief helps satiate? Continue reading ‘The Truth About Lies’
Jungle church in Malaya
Well, why not! But seriously, this is a question I have not heard asked much… if at all(1) Debates mostly focus on whose God is best, the nature of God, or does God even existence. Asking “why do we believe in God” is more of a zoological approach to this issue. That is the place to begin; after all, we are animals first.
I’ve long see the God idea as an emergent property of our social need for leadership, i.e., ‘alpha male’, the decider. All social primate groups have some individual serving this unifying role. Being a thinking ape, it is natural that we would image the existence of a super-leader in a super-home (heaven). Being social apes, it is also nature that we’d enjoy gathering to share the experience. A recent article in Science News, Connected at church, happy with life, offered some support for the why of it all. Continue reading ‘Why God?’
Last Sunday’s 60 Minutes’ segment, Tucson: Descent Into Madness, on the recent shooting in Arizona airs an interview of two friends of Jared Loughner.
Their observations offer deeper insight into Jared Loughner. I’ll quote their main recollections below in case that link above doesn’t work.
What caught my attention was when they said how “Jared literally believes in nothing, nothingness”, and that “He was obsessed with how words were meaningless”. That comes awfully close to how I’d describe a Taoist. Indeed, that describes me, albeit without that worrisome “literally believes in nothing” and “obsessed with how words were meaningless”. Continue reading ‘Belief in Nothing is Dangerous’
While twisting myself in the odd yoga shapes the morning I thought, this is nuts! No normal animal on the planet would do this. In fact, no other animal can be found doing most of the things our species does. Working, resting, and engaging in the basic biological functions is all that we have in common with other species. And we even go out of our way to embellishing those aspects. Just consider the fancy bathrooms we have (photo below).
The common view is to see all this as being what makes us unique, special, superior, advanced… “higher beings” no less. Looking at this from a symptoms point of view helps me avoid such a “pat myself on the back” biases. Continue reading ‘The Nutty Things We Do’
It this weirdly ugly or awesomely beautiful?
My mind’s eye has now thoroughly switched over to a symptom’s point of view. I almost feel I should capitalize the words, or perhaps write it like this: symptom’s-point-of-view. What is so special about it? On the surface, nothing I suppose. Deeper down is another story.
The symptom’s-point-of-view is really about how I make judgments in the world I experience. As I see it, the normal way of judging the world simply mirrors the needs and fears of the person judging. Of course this all occurs sub cognitively. People aren’t generally self conscious when they pass judgment on the world out there. For example, if I’m afraid of snakes, I’m more likely to judge snaky things as weird, ugly, bad, or even (on a positive note) awesome and beautiful! Continue reading ‘A Symptom’s Point Of View’
(this is the working title and draft cover)
I wrote this Yoga manual[1] in 1979. While it still holds up well, I decided it’s worth updating. As part of this, I am attempting to sum up the Principles (the “spirit of yoga”) as I see it today.
Yoga is a process, not a destination. So many folks think of yoga as something you need flexibility for. Just the opposite. If anything, the more flexible you are, the harder yoga becomes. Again, unlike most secular things in life, yoga isn’t about the destination. It is about the journey…the way. Continue reading ‘The Spirit of Yoga’
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