Happy Independence Day,
While Most of the Country is celebrating freedom, or Americanism, or BBQ and fireworks, I thought I'd write to my friends.
Just to say Hi, and celebrate our Interdependence.
Although, I can't say exactly how we are all connected, there is a different thread for each one of us, and when one of us twitches, the others can feel it, however indirectly.
I recently found an old friend on line, and he appears to be a lot crazier than he was when we roomed together in college. Technically, I think he fits the diagnostic category of Paranoid-Schizophrenic. However, he is lucid enough to remember shared experiences, and wish me well.
I don't really want to be too specific about his delusions, but in his perception, a series of small coincidences in his life reveal a pattern of monstrous evil unfolding in the world -- and of course much of it has been directed towards him, as a kind of punishment for seeing that such evil exists.
I have looked at quite a few of his writings, and I don't want to share or pass on his fantasies, because they can be disturbing and even painful to read,
But I will tell you that I have felt something very much like what he describes, particularly after meditating on certain passages from the Bhagavad Gita (chapters 10 =11). My experience was more like bliss than what my friend describes.
I'm not certain if this is good dharma or not, but I ask that you say a little prayer for my friend Jim.
Many years ago, Allen Ginsburg visited Eckerd College, and taught poetry and meditation to a few classes. That evening a few hundred folks from around the community crowded into a small lecture hall to hear him read a few of his celebrated works.
There was one thing he said which really struck a chord in me:
If you see something Horrible don't hold on to it. let it go.
If you see something Beautiful don't hold on to it. let it go.
So, today we have two visions of America; one where each individuals pursuit of happiness overlaps to for a community of common nurture and goodwill, and another where our smallest cravings drive the collective engine of corporate greed.
Of course each of us has only a small sphere of influence individually, but we are connected and by our actions effect we effect each other. I know that it is only a small thing when I make some gesture of generosity towards a homeless person, or make an ecologically sensible purchase. Sometimes the very idea of helping seems like a futile sacrifice until I remember:
The relative good that each of us can do serves the larger aim of greater liberty and deeper happyness for all beings.
To me a prayer is like a vision of the outcome I would like to see, just the way an architect draws out his vision of the house he would like to build. Some of us pray to G*d, and others skip the deity and go right to the vision. I imagine things emerging from a well of limitless potential and infinite creativity.
Sometimes it seems to me that everyone I know shares a little bit of that awful inter-connected delusion that Jim suffers from.
Mine is real to me and yours is real to you. It is only when someone's nightmare is vividly different from our own that we think them crazy. I know that if I were suffering a little less, it would make it easier on the folks around us. That sounds selfish, but it's also true that if folks around me hurt a little less, (friends and enemies both,) my life might be a little easier.
I guess that what I'm asking is that you each take a little time today to liberate your self and those around you from the conceptual knots that hold you subject.
In short; Feel Free!
peace
w
While Most of the Country is celebrating freedom, or Americanism, or BBQ and fireworks, I thought I'd write to my friends.
Just to say Hi, and celebrate our Interdependence.
Although, I can't say exactly how we are all connected, there is a different thread for each one of us, and when one of us twitches, the others can feel it, however indirectly.
I recently found an old friend on line, and he appears to be a lot crazier than he was when we roomed together in college. Technically, I think he fits the diagnostic category of Paranoid-Schizophrenic. However, he is lucid enough to remember shared experiences, and wish me well.
I don't really want to be too specific about his delusions, but in his perception, a series of small coincidences in his life reveal a pattern of monstrous evil unfolding in the world -- and of course much of it has been directed towards him, as a kind of punishment for seeing that such evil exists.
I have looked at quite a few of his writings, and I don't want to share or pass on his fantasies, because they can be disturbing and even painful to read,
But I will tell you that I have felt something very much like what he describes, particularly after meditating on certain passages from the Bhagavad Gita (chapters 10 =11). My experience was more like bliss than what my friend describes.
I'm not certain if this is good dharma or not, but I ask that you say a little prayer for my friend Jim.
Many years ago, Allen Ginsburg visited Eckerd College, and taught poetry and meditation to a few classes. That evening a few hundred folks from around the community crowded into a small lecture hall to hear him read a few of his celebrated works.
There was one thing he said which really struck a chord in me:
If you see something Horrible don't hold on to it. let it go.
If you see something Beautiful don't hold on to it. let it go.
So, today we have two visions of America; one where each individuals pursuit of happiness overlaps to for a community of common nurture and goodwill, and another where our smallest cravings drive the collective engine of corporate greed.
Of course each of us has only a small sphere of influence individually, but we are connected and by our actions effect we effect each other. I know that it is only a small thing when I make some gesture of generosity towards a homeless person, or make an ecologically sensible purchase. Sometimes the very idea of helping seems like a futile sacrifice until I remember:
The relative good that each of us can do serves the larger aim of greater liberty and deeper happyness for all beings.
To me a prayer is like a vision of the outcome I would like to see, just the way an architect draws out his vision of the house he would like to build. Some of us pray to G*d, and others skip the deity and go right to the vision. I imagine things emerging from a well of limitless potential and infinite creativity.
Sometimes it seems to me that everyone I know shares a little bit of that awful inter-connected delusion that Jim suffers from.
Mine is real to me and yours is real to you. It is only when someone's nightmare is vividly different from our own that we think them crazy. I know that if I were suffering a little less, it would make it easier on the folks around us. That sounds selfish, but it's also true that if folks around me hurt a little less, (friends and enemies both,) my life might be a little easier.
I guess that what I'm asking is that you each take a little time today to liberate your self and those around you from the conceptual knots that hold you subject.
In short; Feel Free!
peace
w
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment