Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy

Dharma and Tao mean the same thing:
"The way things ought to be."

Hinduism attempts to adhere to the Dharma
through custom and law,
imposing the ought-to-be-ness of things
inorganically, 
corporately, 
from the top down
and the outside in.

Taoism achieves the same outcome
through a "felt-sense" of balance and harmony,
sincerity/integrity/grace/
spirit/energy/vitality
organically,
personally-individually,
from the bottom up
and the inside out.

Hinduism would say,
"Do what we tell you--
when/where/how!"

Taoism would say, 
"Live in accord with the Tao,
align yourself with the flow
of life and being!
And do not do what anyone tells you to do,
because "the path that can be discerned
as the path
is not a reliable path!"

When we "follow our bliss,"
in Joseph Campbell's words--
our sense of vitality/enthusiasm/urgency
in aligning ourselves with and doing
what we know to be called for here/now,
we are in sync with the Tao,
"on the beam"
(Campbell also said, "We know 
when we are on the beam
and when we are off it")
and in the center of our life's will for us.

There is no better place to be.

Listen to your body,
to your heart,
and do what you know/feel to be right for you
here/now,
and let the outcome be the outcome.

–0–

We can only do what needs to be done
with the tools we have available to us,
within us,
as best we can
in each situation as it arises
and let that be that,
because there is not much time
between situations.

It helps to take all things 
with no more seriousness
than they deserve,
have no opinions,
judgments,
expectations,
plans or agendas,
meet the moment as it comes
and do what is called for
to the extent that is possible,
with no more anxiety than is 
appropriate to the occasion.

Every day, 
I'm glad I don't have a cow
I have to take care of
along with everything that
comes with a cow.

Everything is worse with a cow.
Sisyphus with his stone
would be out of his mind
with a cow to take care of 
in addition to the rock.

Think about that
the next time you're 
singing the blues. 

–0–

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

How would we go about changing
how we see what we look at?

Asking, "What makes it easy for me
to look at things the way I do?"
might be a start.

Pausing to look at how we are looking
at things, might help.

Being intently curious about everything--
particularly at how we look at things--
could make a difference.

Taking a walk-a-bout around how we see
what we look at,
and how we think about what we think about,
would provide some separation 
between our looking and thinking
and the things we look at and think about.

Anything we can do to slow down 
the rush to judgment,
which hinders both our seeing and our thinking,
will be an aid in seeing and thinking.

And anything that helps us see and think
with greater clarity and understanding
will help us on our way though the sea
with its heaving waves and clashing rocks.

And that would be a good thing.

–0–

Death is the final solution, of course,
there when we need it,
having run out of options,
and no possibility of life on our terms
ever again.

What kind of life 
would life on someone else's terms be?

Patrick Henry nailed it with his,
"Give me liberty, or give me death!"

The liberty to chose  
the life that has chosen us,
and live it as it needs to be lived
all the way to the point
of no choices left to choose
is the proper prelude
to death as the final solution.

Which leaves us with,
"How does our life need us to live it?"

We don't give that much thought.
It is all about what we want
and how we can get it--
which only works
if our wanting is aligned
with our life's idea of itself,
so that it is a bona fide life we are living,
and not a counterfeit life
in which we do what we feel like doing
without ever being possessed 
by anything that needs us to do it--
by the life that needs us to live it--
all our life long.

"Whatever" is not what Patrick Henry
had in mind.

The liberty to do what needs to be done
and needs us to do it
with the gifts of our original nature
and the innate virtues/characteristics/
specialties
that are ours from birth
is what we need to discover
what we need to do
as zeal for the task
that we know to be our task
in a "It's the pirate's life for me, Gibbs.
I have no say in the matter,"
kind of way.

And death, at last,
when we have run out
of better things to do,
is a proper ending
to a life well-lived.

–0–

The only thing fascism is good for 
is fueling resistance to fascism.

Resistance doesn't care what its chances are--
it knows what its purpose is:

Liberty!
Justice!
Equality!
Truth!

Fascists are totalitarian,
oppressive/repressive,
despotic,
absolutist,
evil.

Republicans are fascists
saying, "Oh, my goodness, no,
we are not fascists!"

Do not listen to anything they say,
see what they do.

Vote as though the future of 
Liberty!
Justice!
Equality!
Truth!
is in your hands.

As though you are democracy's only hope.

Vote for the Democrat--
vote against the Republican--
in all races great and small,
forever.

–0–

We have an adversarial relationship
with our circumstances.
We step into them 
looking for ways to turn them 
to our advantage,
to wrest what we want from them,
to make them serve us 
and our idea of how things ought to be.

We never step into one
saying, "Well, well, what have we here?
What seems to be happening?
What is called for 
in service of the true good
of the circumstances as a whole?
What needs to happen here?
How can I help with the gifts
I have to offer--
my original nature
and my innate virtues/characteristics/
specialties/interests?
How can I make things here better
by the way I respond to them here/now?"

But, here we are, now.
And nothing says
we can't turn things around
and begin looking at every circumstance
as an opportunity to live there
in ways that are good for the people
who share it with us.

No?

–0–

I think all living things have similar experiences
with being alive.
The more conscious we are 
of what we are experiencing,
the more alive we are--
alive to the moment,
to the here/now,
of our experience,
is to be alive to that moment.
The less consciously aware we are,
the less alive we are.

Experiencing our experience
includes experiencing our reaction
to our experience.

Consciousness is wasted on a lot of people.
They may as well be rocks,
or toads.
Toads may be more consciously alive
than a lot of people.

Don't be one of those people.
Practice being aware here/now.
Awake to what is happening,
to what needs to be done in response,
to what our response is
to what we are doing about our response,
to what is happening here/now...

Awareness is all practice.
What's happening?
What is called for?
What are we doing?
Now what's happening?
What is called for?
What are we doing?
...

Being aware of being present 
with/in the moment,
and what the moment is calling for,
and what we are doing about it
moves us into the position 
of observing our experience
and our response to our experience--
and out of the position 
of being robots going through 
the motions of being alive
while being mostly dead.

–0–

Emergency room personnel have it down,
doing what needs to be done
with whatever comes through the door.

It is their business to meet all circumstances
with what is called for
without allowing their emotional reactions
to get in the way.

We would do well to train ourselves
to deal with all of our circumstances
in the same way.

If we spill the milk,
we clean up the milk.
If the car has a flat
we take the appropriate measures
to get the flat fixed
or a new tire purchased.
Etc. all day every day
for the rest of our life.

Just deal with it
with no editorial embellishment.

No expectations.
No opinions.
Only: See! Do!

Each situation that arises
has its source in the circumstances
that produce it.

It is ridiculous to take personally
anything that crops up,
much less everything.

Be the emergency room physician,
nurse,
technician,
dealing professionally with the moment
in every moment--
without being emotionally involved,
upset,
reactive.

Get up and do what needs to be done,
and be ready to do it again
in the next moment.

Live as though you have nothing at stake
in your life.

Think about it.
What do you have at stake in your life?
Nothing means anything
we don't permit it to mean.

So what if the flood waters wash away
our possessions?
We begin the task of putting things together
with our best effort to meet 
the demands of the day
from day to day.
It is a grim task, to be sure,
but it means nothing to us personally,
only logistically and financially.

Be the emergency room physician,
nurse,
technician,
doing what the circumstances call for
without being undone by things we don't control.

Situation by situation
all our life long.

–0–

I take silence seriously,
and solitude,
and emptiness.

Everything flows from there,
and leads to there,
like the tide going out
and coming in.

I take humor seriously.
Balancing opposites.
Harmonizing discordances.
Inner with outer,
yes with no,
Yin with Yang...

Letting everything be what it is,
as it is,
because it is,
and watching/seeing how things fall out
around/with everything else.

I hate crowds and noise,
and keep my distance
as much as possible,
and accommodate/acquiesce
when required by circumstances.

I love circumstances.
The source of everything,
The end of everything,
though nothing ever ends
actually,
only apparently so,
spinning on eternally--
a part of circumstances
impacting circumstances,
creating circumstances,
noise,
complexity,
drama,
trauma,
seeking the peace
of emptiness,
stillness,
silence
of the AUM
at the heart of it all,
in the dance of life and being,
light and darkness,
realization and laughter,
all without end,
the loop of infinity
being infinite.

What a party to be a part of,
hating parties,
loving parties,
discordant harmonies,
seeking AUM...

And the dance goes on.
There is only the dance (Eliot).

–0–

Our circumstances are always asking/requiring/demanding
something of us.

We are always locked into an eternal and everlasting
struggle with our circumstances,
trying to impose our way on the way things are.

It doesn't have to be this way.

We can be at war with our circumstances,
or, we can dance with our circumstances.

The choice is ours,
one circumstance at a time.

–0–

There is what we do to earn a living,
and there is what we live to do.

Too many of us get earning a living down
without having anything to live for,
and fall into the pit
of drugs, sex, alcohol, money, or some other addiction,
immersing ourselves in attractive
distractions, diversions, and entertaining pastimes,
with nothing of interest to do--
and walk past hordes of people like us every day.

Living lost in the wasteland of discontent,
with no idea of what to do with themselves
or what they might be here for
and drinking beer for breakfast
to ease their way into the day.

This could be a country song.

It is certainly the basis of countless
country songs,
written about other people
by people who live to write songs
about the people who have nothing better to do
than listen to songs about themselves
sung by people who, for the most part,
are not like them.

How do we stop the action
and get this all sorted out,
with truck drivers driving trucks,
and auto mechanics wrenching their way
through the days,
and shoe salespersons selling shoes,
teachers teaching,
scientists sciencing,
and politicians mucking things up for everyone?

(The thing about politicians 
is that they are not in the business
of making things the way they think things ought to be,
but of making things the way they ought to be.
There is no agreement among us about how things ought to be.
And no way to get there, it seems,
so there is no wonder that things are the way they are.
We don't know how things ought to be,
except to say they ought NOT be like this!)

How do we get from here to there?
Particularly when no one is listening to anyone?

Each of us has to take it upon ourselves
to sit down, shut up, be still and quiet
until the dawning comes.

Until then, when people ask us what we are doing,
we tell them we are waiting for the dawning to come,
and go back to being still and quiet, waiting.

If you have a better idea,
by all means, 
hop to it!

–0–

Our place is to be who we are,
where we are,
when we are,
in ways that are true to our original nature
and our innate virtues/characteristics
in each situation as it arises.

We have all we need to do this,
and it only requires the proper portion
of emptiness, stillness and silence
to know what we know,
be aware of what is happening
and what is called for in response,
do the right thing,
at the right time
in the right place
and in the right way,
with the gifts that are ours to offer.

Babies come into the world
knowing how to do that,
but things interfere with our
ability to remember it over time.

Jesus came to remind us with his,
"Unless you turn and become like children,
you will never get to 'the still point
of the turning world' (TS Eliot), were
you can know what you know
and do what needs to be done about it,
through all that comes your way."

Everything we need is always
right here right now
if we empty ourselves 
of all that is distracting our attention
and enter the silent stillness,
waiting to see what calls our name
urging us to action in rising to the occasion,
meeting our circumstances
and dancing with what must be danced with
through all that remains of time.

–0–