Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy

Everyone needs help
finding their life
and living it.

Finding the way
to living their life.

Some guidance.
Some direction.
Some encouragement.
Some support.
Some purpose.

Who are we?
How did we get here?
Why are we here?
What are we supposed to be doing
with the time left for living?
What is life for?

We are lost and alone
without a support system
to take us under their care
and listen us along the way.

Listening is the key.
Too many of our support systems
take it to be their place
to tell us what to do,
just as their support systems
told them what to do.

Support systems need to be trained
to do their job.
But who will do the training?
No one knows what is going on.
And one person's opinion
is no better than another's.

But, listening to one another
opens us to the adventure 
of being alive,
and guides us through all of the
transition points
by enabling us to listen to ourselves.

And when we listen to ourselves,
we are listening to the experience
of the species,
and more than the species,
of life itself.

Native Americans
and all indigenous peoples
know the importance of listening
to life in all forms of life.

Life is speaking to us all of the time.
Who is listening to what life has to say?

We listen by opening ourselves
to the emptiness, stillness and silence,
being present with what is present with us there,
and waiting for what arises/emerges/appears
to meet us.

Engaging it by listening,
wondering,
experiencing,
reflecting,
realizing,
following,
aligning,
being,
becoming,
feeling,
sensing,
knowing what we know
and how much we don't know.

The emptiness/stillness/silence
creates within us
"the condition of receptivity,"
enabling us to be attuned to,
aligned with,
that which knows what's what
and how to live in response
in each situation as it arises,
knowing beyond knowledge,
beyond understanding,
beyond being able to explain
what we know and how we know it,
but responding as dancers to the dance,
to the music,
to the moment,
in doing what needs to be done,
spontaneously,
in accord with time and place,
time after time.

All because we know how to listen.
To ourselves,
to the species,
to all of life.

–0–

Having what we want
when we want it
the way we want it
for as long as we want it
is out of the question.

This realization,
when accepted and implemented,
is called "growing up."

It implies changing our mind
about what is important.

This kind of growing up
transforms our relationship
with our world
and transforms our world.

If we want to change the world,
we only have to grow up.

Again and again.

–0–

If you aren't aware of another of my sites on WordPress, 
you might click on this link to take you there:
https://jimwdollar.wordpress.com/2024/01/11/january-11-2024/

Conversation from the heart
about things that matter to the heart
are among the most sacred
of our life experiences.

And I am dismayed at the astounding absence
of that from our lives.

Why don't we talk with each other
about the things that matter?

About the deep things that challenge us
to find words to say what cannot be said?

Poets do it all the time
with their poems and their books,
and I hope in conversation with each other
at poet conventions,
or just over coffee down the street.

Songwriters do it.
Artists do it.
Musicians do it.
Children at play do it.
Home decorators do it. 
...
It is being done.
But not consciously, deliberately,
by all of us
all of the time. 

I do not know why this kind of conversation
is not encouraged
and enabled
throughout culture and society.
It is life itself
dying to be expressed
and experienced
throughout the world
and all the other worlds there may be.

–0–

Look.
Listen.
Pay attention
to what you are seeing
and hearing.

Particularly, 
to what is coming from within you.

Where do you get the ideas
that are your ideas?
From the outside?
Or from the inside?

How do you decide what's so is so?

Who tells you what to think/do?

How do you know they know
what they are talking about?

Especially if it is you, you are listening to!

How do you know whom to trust
about what's what?

I regret that no one in my life
was asking me these questions
from birth to now!

Where did my ideas of how things are
and ought to be come from?
Mostly from people who did not know
any more than I did!

Where did their ideas come from?
From people just like them!

And how much reflection did they apply
to what they were seeing/hearing?
How much examination?
Inspection?
Exploration?

How many questions were they asking
regarding statements that were made
as the absolute truth?

Who played the role of the Grand Inquisitor
in their life?
In your life?
In my life?

Without a Grand Inquisitor 
instructing us on how 
to be a Grand Inquisitor ourselves,
what kind of chance did/do we have
of finding our way
to seeing/hearing/understanding/knowing/being/doing?

It isn't too late!
Examine everything!
Question everything!
Challenge everything!
Notably from people who know everything!
Including you!

–0–

There is what we do,
and there is how we feel 
about what we do.

Refusing to allow our feelings 
to get in the way
of what needs to be done--
and being able to make 
an accurate assessment
of how well we are doing it--
are crucial to maintaining
a healthy attitude
regarding doing what needs to be done.

There is the way things are,
and there is how we feel about
the way things are.
And how we feel
is were we can get to work
changing what needs to be changed
in order to do what needs to be done
and letting that be that.

When our feelings determine,
limit,
restrict
our action,
we have a problem.

What we do and how we do it
cannot be two things--
they must be one thing.

We are to do what needs to be done
the way it needs to be done,
when and where it needs to be done,
and we cannot allow our feelings
to get in the way of that.

If we are actors
playing our role
in a scene,
we cannot allow our feelings
to interfere with the quality
of our performance 
in the scene.

How we feel is irrelevant
to our performance.
We have to act as though
we mean it
in each situation as it arises
with a rendition 
worthy of an academy award.

Here's one for you:
We are actors playing our role
in a scene
moment-by-moment,
day-by-day,
doing what is called for
the way it is called for
all our life long.

–0–

We go meet the day
trusting that we have what we need
to find what we need
to do what needs to be done.

With emptiness, stillness and silence
as traveling companions
we have what it takes to 
keep showing up
for our date with the day.

And the day keeps showing up
for its date with us.

Until, like that we are led through our days
in the best company,
and the surest guides imaginable.

And the wonders are without bounds--
all done without striving,
or forcing our way,
just dancing with the day,
without an agenda,
or plan,
only watching and waiting,
and when the door opens,
walking through.

It is a natural way of getting things done
without doing anything,
letting the day happen
but not making it happen.

Best reserved for weekends,
vacation
and retirement, perhaps,
but always in the background of every day
looking for the right time
to be applied to the situation at hand.

In the service of balance and harmony,
rhythm and flow,
and in the presence of wonder
reminding us of what is always right there,
the way showing us the way to the way.

Always out of sight,
always right here,
right now.

–0–

We keep going 
in service to what needs us
and what needs to be done.

We meet the moment
the way the moment needs to be met
with the gifts of our original nature
and the innate virtues/attributes
at our disposal.

We take who we are in one hand
and what needs to be done in the other
and get the two hands together
in ways conducive to the good
of each situation as it arises.

"Without hope,
without witness,
without reward.
Virtue is only virtue in extremis.
Only in darkness are we revealed.
Goodness is not goodness that seeks advantage.
Good is good in the final hour,
in the deepest pit"
(Nardole in Doctor Who,Season 1001 Ep 6 Extremis,
written by Steven Moffat).

Good does what is good
whether it does any good or not.
Good doesn't care what its chances are.
It is not in it for the outcome,
but for the quality of its expression,
for the joy of doing it
anyway, nevertheless, even so,
and the satisfaction of having done
what needs to be done
when/where/how it needs to be done,
time after time
no matter what,
as long as life shall last.

–0–

Where do you go 
for solace and consolation?

The company of flowers is always
a good place for me to be.

And the company of people 
who are like flowers
in that they lighten any room
and bring a presence of wellbeing
to life wherever they go.

There is a psychic sense of peace
and pleasure available to us
in a number of places.

Horses do it for a lot of us,
and dogs,
and cats.

I like water in practically 
any form,
and nature as a whole--
nature seems always 
to know what it is doing.

And the natural people
who are just themselves,
like the Buddha,
"As one thus come,"
just as they are
anywhere they are.

We all carry psychic presence 
with us,
and those of us who are 
most comfortable with ourselves
will naturally be most comfortable
for other people to be around.

Who provides solace and consolation
for you?
Who would say you provide it for them?
Ask around.
You may be surprised to discover
how comforting you are.

–0–

Having things in your life
like ideas,
or a stick that needs whittling,
or a cobbler that needs baking,
or eating...

Anything that siezes you
with a sense of urgency about it
and a vibrancy that throbs with
the rhythm of life,
sending you off on a mission
that must be done NOW,
is a very good thing,
and we need more of it in our day,
every day.

My sister, Susan, took her own life
for the lack of anything better to do.
She made out a living will
with "no tube feeding" in caps
and quit eating and drinking.
She died under hospice care
from a lack of verve, she did.

She also lacked an imagination
that could grab her by the neck
and throw her into life
with the passion of someone seeking
to serve a vision that has to be realized
like, to borrow a Zen image,
"A person with their hair on fire
seeks a swimming pool."

May we all have such an imagination!
May we need such a swimming pool
every day or two!

–0–

We find the way,
not by seeking what we want,
but by seeing what needs to be done
and what needs us to do it
in each situation as it arises.

Living out of the emptiness/stillness/silence
and incorporating Jon Kabat-Zinn's approach
to Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction
in our approach to the moment.

You can start your association with Jon Kabat-Zinn
by watching all of his YouTube videos 
(The shortest ones first)
and reading his book that started it all
in the seventies, 
"Wherever You Go, There You Are."

And practicing being where you are
in each situation as it arises.

That is as simple as it needs to be.

–0–

In any situation,
there is where life is to be found
and where there is nothing
but the dead and dying.
The difference lies in our
perception/perspective.

By the way we look at things,
we prescribe life or death.

In any situation,
there is what brings us to life
and there is what reduces
our chances at life to the level
of minus numbers.

How we see what we look at
makes all the difference.

People lived through the Depression
with much less than we have,
and we say, "Oh, woe, poor me, poor me."

Homer was a blind poet
who found life wherever he looked.
People live in the desert
and find life everywhere.

What are we looking for
that keeps us from seeing
what is there?

How do we turn the light around
in order to see what is before us
that we aren't seeing?

We have to become servants of life
in all situations
in every circumstance.
"Where is life hiding here?"
"What holds life for us now?"
"How can we live in the service of life
anyway, nevertheless, even so?"

Jesus raised the dead to life.
He wasn't doing anything we can't do.
If we can understand that,
we have all we need
to find what we need
to do what needs to be done.
Anyway, nevertheless, even so! 

–0–

Jesus did not know
whether he was coming or going--
and that's a good thing,
"maybe, the best of things"
(Stephen King).

He said as much himself:

"Don't let your left hand
know what your right hand is doing!"

"The Spirit is like the wind
that blows where it will,"
implying that not even the Spirit
knows what it will be doing next.

Jesus lays out examples of not knowing
what he is doing
all over the Gospels.

My favorite is the second commandment.
"Do unto others as you would have them
do unto you--love your neighbor
as you love yourself!"

And, in no time at all,
he is telling parables about an unjust
landowner paying his workers
the same wage for different amounts of work,
justifying the outrage by saying,
"Shall not he do what he wills with what is his?"

So much for "do unto others as you would have them
do unto you"!

Second commandment my turkey's gobble!

And he doubles down with the parable
of the wise and foolish bridesmaids:
"We didn't take you to raise,"
say the wise bridesmaids.
"You go back to town and get your own oil!"

The topper, of course, is his cursing the fig tree
for not having fruit out of season.
Killing it for innocently doing what it lived to do.

Jesus, himself, was like the wind,
not knowing what he would do next.

And he calls us to follow him.

We do that by throwing away the rules
and the rule books,
including the Bible and the books of doctrine,
and all of the hymnbooks
(which are doctrines set to music),
and find our own way through each day,
surprising ourselves with what we come up with,
wondering where that came from, and that.

Living out of the silence will do that.
And that.

Not knowing what we will do next
is allowing the circumstances to call us forth,
to show us here/now what is being asked of us,
and inviting us to create on the spot
a response appropriate to the occasion,
regardless of what our mother or father might think.

And living ourselves into focus day by day.

–0–