jimwdollar

November 05-A, 2022

Finding things to do that we enjoy doing is a high priority item in each stage of life. Reading, writing and photography have comforted/focused me through several stages over 60 years, and they remain my grounding/centering activities I coalesce around them, express myself through them, take refuge in them, and find in them my deepContinue reading “November 05-A, 2022”

November 04-B, 2022

Jesus was thrown to the wolves by the orthodoxy of his day. His disciples followed in quick succession: “Young John who trimmed the flapping sails, homeless in Patmos died, “Peter who hauled the teeming net, head-down was crucified” (William Alexander Percy). And the 13th disciple, Paul, met a similar fate in Rome. The “new thing”Continue reading “November 04-B, 2022”

November 04-A, 2022

We have to pick and choose among all of the things that are said in finding what we call truth, but who is to say if we are right or just making things up some more again? How do we know what we claim to know? “In my heart I know,” fuels all the gamblersContinue reading “November 04-A, 2022”

November 03-B, 2022

How’s your balance and harmony? Your stability and security? Your integrity and sincerity? The three pairs work together to ground and center you and send you into each day in search of what needs to be done in each situation as it arises to do it and to bring yourself forth in so doing toContinue reading “November 03-B, 2022”

November 03-A, 2022

How things are do not reflect my idea of how they ought to be very often for long-enough periods of time. I do not allow that to stop me from making the best of things to the fullest extent that I am able. I take it to be my duty to make the best ofContinue reading “November 03-A, 2022”

November 02-B, 2022

I hate every mistake, snafu, wrong turn, bad choice, etc. I have ever made, and there be many, yet, each one of them factored into who I am. Where would I be– who would I have become– without them? I am my adjustments/corrections/reversals/alterations. And you are yours. The way we have responded to the errorsContinue reading “November 02-B, 2022”

November 02-A, 2022

Do you think bears think of quitting? Or, considering their chances and thinking of folding up? Checking out? Because it’s just too much? Or pelicans? Chipmunks? Things aren’t going their way? Do you think they ever think about things not going their way? I think they just wake up and go meet the day, everyContinue reading “November 02-A, 2022”

November 01-C, 2022

What I know of monastic life consists of chants and prayers, sitting zazen, daily chores, eating and sleeping. It’s pretty much busy-work to keep their mind off their life in an “idle hands are the devil’s workshop” kind of way. How to fill the time is every teacher-master’s nightmare. There is only so much toContinue reading “November 01-C, 2022”

November 01-B, 2022

We live our life finding our life and living it. Seeking our life and settling into it. Coming to be who we are. This is the Tao at work in our life, getting us together with our life, over the time left for living. Teaching us the keys to balance and harmony, knowing when weContinue reading “November 01-B, 2022”

November 01-A, 2022

We keep hoping to find it, when it is all a matter of being it. We bring it forth. We do not stumble upon it, dig it out of the ground, find the buried treasure. We are the treasure. The treasure is buried in us! We have to turn the light around and get busyContinue reading “November 01-A, 2022”

November, 1st Week, 2022

It is never any more difficult than stepping into the day and doing what needs to be done there. We clutter things up with plans and agendas, willing this, wanting that, wondering “When is it going to be our turn?”– waiting for something to happen that will be like a gift from some fairy godmother,Continue reading “November, 1st Week, 2022”

October 31-B, 2022

There have been wrongs without reckoning throughout the history of the species. Bearing witness to injustice is all that is left to mark the occasions and call out the offenses of all crimes against humanity, from the beginning until now. It would take the rest of time, just naming them. There needs to be aContinue reading “October 31-B, 2022”