Finding our way to The Way one situation at a time. I don't know how great it will be, but I expect it will be interesting, and I look forward to it going on past all reason because wonder is just that way. Are you coming or not?
American Crow — Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, North Carolina
Ken Burns says "All we do is argue." Jim Dollar says "Because we talk out of our heads all of the time. Talking out of our hearts-- out of our intuition-- disappears argument 'like that.'"
Talking out of our heads is talking about what we want and don't want, what we like and what we don't like, what we think about everything.
Opinions are all we have to talk about. Humans are the most opinionated species in existence. In my opinion. Because we are the only species that lives out of its head and not in accord with its intuition. Its heart. Its soul.
All we know is what we think we know-- and all we need to know is what we know.
Why don't we know what we know? Because what we know is the enemy to what we want.
We want, want, want all of the time. Take our wants away and there is nothing to us. What would we think about? What would we talk about? What would we do with our time? It would be soooooo boringgggggg!
And boring is the last thing anybody who aspires to be somebody would allow themselves to be.
Sitting in the right kind of emptiness, stillness, silence? BORINGGGGGGGG...
And how are we going to know what we know without sitting in the right kind of emptiness, stillness silence?
Intuition doesn't have a chance with wanting in the room.
The Slough By The Side Of The Road — Guilford County, North Carolina
We think it is about getting/having what we want.
But it is about doing what needs to be done, when/where/how it needs to be done for no other reason than because it needs to be done-- with the gifts of our original nature, our innate virtues and virtuosities (The things we do best and enjoy doing most), through the guidance/direction of our intrinsic intuition and our reliance upon the right kind of emptiness, stillness and silence where we are able to reflect on what our body is saying to us through its sensations and our nighttime dreams, trusting ourselves to know what's what and what is called for in each situation as it arises, and to respond appropriately in doing the right thing in the right way at the right time, the way flowers turn to the light and bees find the flowers, throughout the ages to right here, right now.
Seeing this slough, in this light, on the side of this road, we stop and take the picture.
Big Creek Cascade 2004 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Big Creek District, Waterville, North Carolina Access
I have taken up the project of creating business cards with images I've taken that I find to be satisfying, like this one, with the following inscription on the back:
I hand these out to people I have interaction with during the day whom I intuit to be capable of benefiting from time spent with the card, with the following instructions: "See what connections you can make between yourself, the photograph, and the terms. And explore those connections to see where they might lead."
I have printed sets of fifty different images, which amounts to my top 50 favorite photographs to date at work somewhere in the world. It comes down to my response to the instruction to "cast your bread upon the waters," and to "do your work and step back, let nature take its course."
Which I take to be better than letting them grow old on an external hard drive in a cardboard box on the bottom of the closet in my office.
The Slough By The Side Of The Road — Guilford County, North Carolina
Within the "normal and customary (read, "acceptable")range," there are a number of perspectives available for those seeking to express/serve their uniqueness as individual human beings throughout the broad sweep of their life.
Which begs the question: "How unique can we be?"
"Uniquely acceptable" has a "contradiction in terms" feel to it, and underscores the reality of "How different can we be and still be 'One'"?
Presenting "Out there," for those who have difficulty fitting in anywhere, even among themselves.
Requiring a considerable amount of latitude among all of us in coming to terms with the rest of us.
Making, "Where do we go for latitude?" an essential question for the entire spectrum of humanity.
With a broad range of people disinterested in either the question or its answer.
Leaving "Seeing what we can get by with," as the foundational art to be mastered in the game of human being-hood.
That has always been my shtick, and will continue to be so throughout what remains of the time left for living.
Catawba River Power Station Mirror 06 June 07, 2024 — Catawba River Access, Fort Mill, South Carolina
Organized religion has always denounced and despised expressions of our intrinsic intuition.
The early Gnostics were persecuted as heretics, hunted down, murdered, burned at the stake, tortured, and tormented because of their "secret knowledge."
They listened to their intuition and gave it equal status with revealed truth.
It should be given higher status, unless we understand "revealed truth" to be revealed to our intuition through meditation and reflection, or mere recognition and realization.
Is intuition God within, or is God our intuitive projection of the "Holy Other" without?
Spending time regularly with the silence, scanning our body for indications of need for our attention, listening for what might arise in the stillness, we signal our readiness to comply with what is called for, and position ourselves to deal with what's what in the spirit of those looking forward to what they do best.
The Sweep of the River Mirror 06/07/2024 — Catawba River, Fort Mill, South Carolina
There is wanting what we want to want, and there is wanting what we ought to want, and there is wanting what someone else wants us to want.
What variety of wanting is the wanting we want most of the time?
The spiritual life is linking our wanting with the wanting we ought to want via our intrinsic intuition.
Our intrinsic intuition wants us to want what we ought to want all of the time.
Like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, we serve a different idea most of the time.
That would be our idea of what is worth wanting.
Spirituality is all about aligning ourselves with the wanting of our intrinsic intuition -- or, as it is sometimes called, "God's will for our life."
"God" is experienced as intrinsic intuition.
Intrinsic intuition is experienced as "God with us" throughout our life.
When we live at one with our intrinsic intuition, we are living at one with "God." Or/and at one with the "Tao." Etc.
It doesn't matter if there is a Super Cosmic Intuition "out there," our intrinsic intuition is our link with all the intuition there may be.
Which is to say, when we are at one with our intrinsic intuition, we are at one with the intrinsic intuition of everyone who is at one with their intrinsic intuition.
Like ants at one with the entire mound of ants. Like bees at one with the entire hive of bees. Like birds at one with the entire flock of birds. Like fish at one with the entire school of fish...
You know, like that.
Intrinsic intuition connects us all with all of those who are capable of being connected with us through the experience of intrinsic intuition.
The catch is that the moment we begin doing what we want and not what we ought to want, we break the connection, and we are wandering through the wasteland on our own.
Such is the meaning of "Thy will, not mine be done."
To say that and mean it is to divest ourselves of doing what we want at the expense of what we ought to want all our life long.
To say that and mean is is to bring an immediate end to life as we know it throughout the world and the cosmos.
It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Of our intrinsic intuition).
Catawaba River Power Station Mirror 04 — Fort Mill, South Carolina
Fishing was an escape from a world I did not begin to comprehend.
Fishing allowed me to catch my breath, to breathe easy, without worrying about keeping up or lagging behind, or making someone happy, or knowing what I was doing or what I was going to be when I grew up.
I could step out of that world of stress beyond managing and fish.
That made stepping back into that world manageable until it became too much, then it was off to some lake to restore my soul and breathe.
All of that was unconscious, un-thought, unrecognized, but it is as though it were scripted into my late childhood to early adulthood years.
How does anyone do it without a get-away? I cannot imagine. I had to have something to balance the madness of my life, and it was fishing.
And then it was photography. I remember well the transition point. I was cleaning a fish for our family dinner, and realized I had cleaned enough fish. And that was that.
About that time--probably my junior year in college-- I was walking through the house and a made-for-TV movie was playing as I went into the room with a 35mm camera on a poolside table, and I fell in love with that camera on the spot.
I wish I had had a clearer understanding of what was happening, but it was like someone had pushed me into the pool, and I had to figure out how to swim my way into knowing what the camera was about.
Guidance would have been helpful, but my entire life lacked guidance. No one in my life knew much more than I did. So, I took what I could use wherever I found it and kept looking, mostly in books written by people who knew more than the people I knew. And I'm still doing that. And am glad to be able to.
Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy 