Rebellion

"The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion."--Albert Camus

Fear

Fear is the enemy.

We are born with it. The system exacerbates it. Exploits it. Intensifies it.

If you want to escape fear, you must find a way to realize that you are part of something that is infinitely meaningful and that your destiny cannot be undertaken by anyone but you.

It is self-realization that opens the door to a life that is free from fear.

Do not wait. Seek the truth for the answer lies within you.

Ignorance

The devil has us by the balls of ignorance.

(Ladies, you get the point.)

The Way of Tea

The Japanese tea ceremony developed as a "transformative practice", and began to evolve its own aesthetic, in particular that of "wabi-sabi".

"Wabi" represents the inner, or spiritual, experiences of human lives. Its original meaning indicated quiet or sober refinement, or subdued taste "characterized by humility, restraint, simplicity, naturalism, profundity, imperfection, and asymmetry, emphasizing simple, unadorned objects and architectural space, and celebrating the mellow beauty that time and care impart to materials."

"Sabi," on the other hand, represents the outer, or material side of life. Originally, it meant "worn," "weathered," or "decayed." Particularly among the nobility, understanding emptiness was considered the most effective means to spiritual awakening, while embracing imperfection was honored as a healthy reminder to cherish our unpolished selves, here and now, just as we are - the first step to "satori" or enlightenment.--Source: Wikipedia

The Japanese tea ceremony reminds me of two important spiritual truths concerning Zen practice:

1. It takes time to realize that no time is required. As we strive to realize our true being in practice, time imparts a beautiful patina to our lives (Wabi) that we express on each moment.

2. Emptiness is always present in our lives. Because we accept ourselves as we are in this moment, we discover reality in our very imperfections (Sabi).

Poets

Where are our poets? Where is the next Whitman who knows how to beat a drum on behalf of humanity?

Animals

I think I could turn and live with animals, they are so placid and

         self-contain'd,

I stand and look at them long and long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition,

They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,

They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,

Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of

         owning things,

Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of

         years ago,

Not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth.

So they show their relations to me and I accept them,

They bring me tokens of myself, they evince them plainly in their

         possession.

I wonder where they get those tokens,

Did I pass that way huge times ago and negligently drop them?

                                                 --Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

Zorba the Greek

To live passionately without being ruled by your passions is a fundamental law of radical Christianity.

Saint Paul knew this truth:

Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.--Philippians 4:11-12

Christ was the original Zorba the Greek. He did not fear Reality so He alone knew the fullness of life.

The religious leaders of His time wore long faces and acted out a pious charade. They inspired no one and were kith and kin of the fundamentalist leaders of today.

Turn the Other Cheek

According to Wikipedia, "turning the other cheek is a phrase in Christian doctrine that refers to responding to an aggressor without violence." The intended result is to blunt the aggression of your adversary.

It has been my experience that this doctrine is patently false which probably explains while so few Christians actually put this teaching into practice.

It is not just that violence is often necessary to stop violence--no amount of preaching or reasoning would have convinced Hitler to call for an end to his Blitzkrieg.

Rather, as Eric Hoffer noted, it is because when others have a just grievance against us, we have a more potent reason for hating them. It is a guilty conscience that drives us to mistreat others.

An aggressor will attempt to silence his guilty conscience by insisting that those he has harmed were worthy of the abuse. The inevitable result is that more violence will be aimed at the non-violent in a desperate effort to shift the blame and to prove this perverse theory.

In hindsight, it is easy to see that when Christ turned the other cheek, He almost guaranteed his own crucifixion.

Faith

If you have faith in God, it is impossible not to have faith in humanity.

Paradise Lost

 Death is really not the tragedy most people make it out to be:

“That’s what it was like to be alive. To move about in a cloud of ignorance; to go up and down trampling on the feelings of those...of those about you. To spend and waste time as though you had a million years. To be always at the mercy of one self-centered passion, or another. Now you know- that’s the happy existence you wanted to go back to. Ignorance and blindness” - Simon Stimson in Our Town by Thornton Wilder

Every once in a while we need to be reminded that we really are not happy. It is the awareness of our misery that encourages us to awaken our real, way-seeking mind.

A Plan for Life

"We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us."--E.M. Forster

Prejudice

Prejudice springs from the refusal to recognize God in man.

Angelic Vision

What misery to always see your own wretchedness in others—better had the angel in you seen the angel in them.