Jul 31 2008
There are many theories about Resnais’ “Last Year in Marienbad”. I figure it is about Emptiness and the Bardo after dying. So strange, just listening to the monologues and the bits of dialogue and the music that carries the entire film. I do remember how unsettling it is to watch. Regrets that this is now no longer possible. But I can point it out.
Jul 31 2008
Garab Dorje’s “Three Statements That Strike the Fundamental Point (Garab (”joyful”) Dorje’s Last Testament)
NAMO GURUVE!
Homage to that confidence deriving from understanding one’s own state of immediate intrinsic Awareness!
This state of immediate intrisic Awareness (called rig-pa) is uncreated and self-existing. Its mode of being represents the essence that is the primordial Base. Everywhere the manner in which it arises in response to external appearances, which are themselves diverse, is uninterrupted and unobstructed. Moreover, all the phenomena that appear and that exist, arise (spontaneously self-perfected) within the field of the Dharmakaya. Whatever appearences may manifest therein are directly liberated after their arising due to the presence of one’s own state of immediate Awareness (rig-pa).
As for the real meaning of this: All of the enlightened states, which consist of non-dual knowledge that is, primordial awareness (ye-shes), present within the hears of all the Sugatas are, in fact, encompassed within this single unique state of immediate intrinsic Awareness found within every individual sentient being.
Jul 31 2008
Transmission of the lineage is a desire in the student as it is in the teacher. Transmission is never static, but flows, as transaction of transformation, between practitioners who are all somewhere on the path, even though there is still much travel ahead. It is not as if transition is bestowed on students from the high seat. Teacher and student need each other for transition to be complete: the moment of transmission is one in which teachers and students are fully engaged. When Longchenpa transmits the Longchen Nyingthig to Jigme Lingpa, he prays: “May the transmission of the words that express be completed. May it be completed! And Jigme Lingpa prays: “Know this, O omniscient Dharma King. Know this, O omniscient Dharma King!” This is how it is for teachers and students in the Mantra tradition: they are on the hook together and the teacher promises to stay there, with the student, until liberation is attained.
Jul 30 2008
A discussion at flickr’s “utata” startled me. It was about photographing in hospital waiting rooms and such, and I remembered how I shot everything, frantically, obsessively when I was in hospital in 2006/7. That resulted in a pretty large archive of files, which I’ve carefully archived and stored, but I show those photographs to no one. My relationship to them hasn’t changed: I started pondering whether I felt differently towards them, but no, I still don’t want them to be exposed. I need to know they are there, though, stored safely, yet I also know the only safe storage is either a negative or a print. Utata’s discussion also reminded me of the fact that this has very much been my life for the last couple of years. A regular, someone who frequents hospitals a lot. Part of what my life is about and increasingly so. It’s why I relish being in the sun, so to speak, whenever I have the opportunity. Grab the moment, because it will not come around again.
Jul 29 2008
At last, at last, the buzz is about peak oil, energy descent and sustainable (and might I add “inclusive”) design and planning. When the Transition Town movement was founded, well over a year ago, their struggle for attention was something of an uphill battle. But no longer: although it will take some time before the mainstream realizes that it’s not global warming that is our biggest, immediate challenge but energy descent, Transition Towns and their initiatives are really making inroads. So what is a Transition Town?
A Transition Initiative is a community working together to look Peak Oil and Climate Change squarely in the eye and address this BIG question:
“for all those aspects of life that this community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how do we significantly increase resilience (to mitigate the effects of Peak Oil) and drastically reduce carbon emissions (to mitigate the effects of Climate Change)?”
The resulting coordinated range of projects across all these areas of life leads to a collectively designed energy descent pathway.
Resilience is a matter of seeing abundance and making it work for you. It is about having more than one iron in the fire. So, to harvest energy, you make use of many sources, instead of trying to harness one dominant source, while losing sight of alternative possibilities. Spiritually, such wisdom in planning is a matter of being open to circumstances, is a measure of acceptance of inevitable facts.
The Transition Network’s primer can be found here.