knowing
We All Know We Don’t Know
I enjoy doing yoga on the beach because I can easily pause to look seaward and skyward to soak in eternity, or glance closer in to bond with my friends, all the sand flies and seagulls around me. Today I got to thinking how small and insignificant we are—they and me. Then I thought, they […]
Continue reading…Who are you? (Part IV)
The social qualities present during our ancestral hunter-gatherer era (1) just happen to parallel the core spiritual qualities that the world’s religions promote. That’s no coincidence. Indeed, those innate qualities of harmony we now seek are the very ones we lost when we left the old way for the alluring material benefits and security civilization […]
Continue reading…“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 […]
Continue reading…Alleviating the Hoarding Disorder
Google [Seeking Help For Hoarding] for a brief yet telling report on hoarding. Here is a brief excerpt: At some point I got a lot of stuff,” said Joanne Garland. “I kept too much paper. I kept too many books. I kept too many clothes.” Too much of everything! Garland’s Greenfield, Mass., home is packed […]
Continue reading…Cultivating Character
I find some people in Taoist circles have passionate ideals about cultivating character. Seen from a symptoms point of view, passion arises from fear—the mother of need. The visceral fear arising from feeling one has little control over life drives a need to do something… like cultivate character. Chapter 54 has the only reference relating […]
Continue reading…Necessity is the Mother
If you’re unfamiliar with the neuroscience behind the illusion of free will, YouTube [Sam Harris on “Free Will”]. He does a good job of addressing the idea of free will, and points out enough compelling evidence to prove that free will is an illusion. Next, please YouTube [Sam Harris on His Debate with Daniel Dennett […]
Continue reading…Ancient Signs Of Modern Behavior
The gravest existential issue that ancient man’s thoughts confronted was death. Humanity lost “Eden” when symbolic thought supplanted the spontaneous conscious experience that other animals benefit from. Once we acquired an objective sense of past and future, we could worry about death and other possible misfortunes awaiting us in the near and distant future. Simply […]
Continue reading…Alone with Thought
Two Science News reports touch on what is probably humanity’s most serious problem. As chapter 71 puts it, “Realizing I don’t’ know is better; not knowing this knowing is disease.” Google [Hallinan Kidding Ourselves] for a rational anthropological view of self-deception. Also, google [People will take pain over being left alone with their thoughts] for […]
Continue reading…Where does the fault lie?
“The fault lies not in the stars but in ourselves”. That bit of Shakespeare speaks to our modern paradigm. By modern, I mean the epoch beginning with the Renaissance (14th century) that followed the fall of Rome, i.e., the so-called Dark Ages. Notice how these labels bias the view of cultural progress right away in […]
Continue reading…Flow Triggers
The Flow Genome Project researches Flow, which Steven Kotler describes as when performance sharply increases. Google [How to open up the next level of human performance], [How To Get Into The Flow State], and [The Science of Maximizing Human Potential]. Anyone familiar with the Zen(1) point of view will recognize Flow right off. Steven rephrases […]
Continue reading…BRAIN
President Obama’s BRAIN Initiative (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies) seeks to decipher how the brain’s circuitry produces thought and behavior. The Science News Brain Shot reports on this initiative. This is an excerpt. Ambitious goals: While the BRAIN Initiative’s objectives are hard to express in concrete terms, the project is full of visionary promise. […]
Continue reading…Natural Happiness
‘To like what I do rather than do what I like’ is a straightforward path to happiness. This motto helps prevent my expectations from dictating my life’s direction. No doubt, scripture (Buddhist, Hindu, Taoist, Biblical, etc.) first got me considering life this way, and life experience has since verified its truth (1). The previous post, […]
Continue reading…You are Immortal!
Preface: Our mind irresistibly seeks out stories to fill its cognitive space. Taken to heart, this story may help nurture what chapter 16 alludes to as The way therefore long enduring, nearly rising beyond oneself. The idea of immortality arises from our self’s keen sense of mortality, so I’ll begin by addressing this side of […]
Continue reading…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 […]
Continue reading…Earn It to Learn It
Knowing, in the Taoist sense of the word, is not knowledge, per se. As chapter 15 puts it, Of old, the adept student was minutely subtle, open and deep beyond knowledge. As chapter 56 notes, Knowing doesn’t speak; speaking doesn’t know. Times are different now. Our modern electrified pace of life is continuously updating every […]
Continue reading…Buddha’s Work
I review Buddha’s Four Noble Truths (p.604) during my yoga headstand every morning. Today, the fourth truth stood out, although not in a profound way, more in a “Well, duh” kind of way. First, though, here is the fourth truth: The Fourth Noble Truth is the Middle Path that leads to the cessation of suffering. […]
Continue reading…Insatiably Curious at 70?
In the book, The Ravenous Brain(1), the author Daniel Bor refers to my age group. He argues that consciousness is a “chronic mental hunger.” That has certainly been my experience. He also says, “During aging, the insatiable brain becomes less so. We are less ravenous for new jewels of wisdom, and our entire existence, examined […]
Continue reading…The Why Of It
Probing into the why of it feels like jumping into a bottomless well of mystery. This is certainly the epitome of quixotic quests. However, there is the survival reward of seeing life as close to its actuality as humanly possible. Exploring the why of it promises a glimpse into nature’s secrets. This is one of […]
Continue reading…Networks of Networks of….
The Science News report, When Networks Network, is striking in its implications so you may want to read it first. Go to, Networks-of-Network.pdf. This research hints at humanity’s gradual cognitive evolution toward what I would call a small ‘t’ Taoist (p.154) point of view. Research like this, along with quantum theory, nudges secular common sense […]
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