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“Right state of peaceful mind”

While living in Thailand in the early 1960’s, I bought a book on Buddha published by the Buddhist Society of Ceylon, as I recall. Recently I wanted to find a copy. I finally found a translation by Paul Carus, The Gospel of Buddha Paperback, that matched my version of Buddha’s four noble truths word-for-word so […]

Laws as Symptoms, not Solutions

Google [TED Is The Law Making Us Less Free] for how law affects society. Briefly, the speaker, Philip Howard, says, “There’s this fetish with rules that has kind of replaced morality. And it works both in a gotcha sort of way, and it works in an avoidance of responsibility sort of way.” In reality, I […]

Mind Over Milkshake

I quit smoking a few decades ago and quickly gained 40 pounds. Not wishing to lug all that extra baggage around, I decided to eat less. Actually, I would have quit eating altogether if I could get away with it. The more I lost, the less I needed to eat to maintain whatever weight I […]

The Pendulum Swings

The Syrian war illustrates our intrinsic tendency to swing from one extreme to the opposite. In wondering why, chapter 64 came to mind, Its peace easily manages… and so on. D.C. Lau translates this view more clearly, e.g., It is easy to maintain a situation while it is still secure. Interestingly, the adage, “a stitch […]

Just like Us, Just like Them

Have you noticed how much we compare ourselves to other animals to see what extent they are like us? That’s all quite normal, of course. All animals judge other animals to some extent, although I should say size up, gauge, or perceive, rather than judge. Passing judgment is closely tied to thinking and we’re the […]

Who says chickens are stupid?

Who says chickens are stupid? Ignorant people, I assume. While this research reported in Science News isn’t about chickens per se, it probably would apply to chickens. I mean how much smarter is a pigeon going to be than a chicken? (Google [Pigeons match monkeys in abstract counting skills].) How much true difference is there […]

Guilt, Shame and the Name Game

I touched on guilt and shame in the post, I am foolish of human mind also? (p.276). Nevertheless, I feel our practice of naming such emotional experiences deserves its own post, so here goes, beginning with a personal example… Up until thirty years ago, I had never experienced depression… or so I didn’t think. Following […]

Imagining a Better Way

Human imagination is both a valuable survival asset and the source of lingering anxieties. Ironically, imagination also promises us ways to quell these anxieties. I say promises because fulfillment can’t truly be possible. This peculiar dynamic reminds me of the Möbius like geometry of Escher’s Waterfall. We can imagine a better something and so we […]

Be Careful What You Wish

“Be careful what you wish for”, followed by “it might just come true” is an ironic maxim concerning the perils of wishing without grasping unintended consequences. First, we need to stipulate that wishing for something is relatively synonymous with desiring, expecting, hoping and praying for something. Next, is there a fundamental source for all these […]

Jack of All Trades, Master of None?

Is there any true difference between a generalist “jack of all trades” and a master? After all, isn’t a “jack of all trades” simply a master generalist? I’ve been doing several activities for many years: yoga (~55 years), tai chi (~45 years), shakuhachi sui Zen (~40 years), gardening (~35 years) and, I have various other […]

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