Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy

Carl Jung had Philemon,
I have Jake,
as an alter-ego/ever-present companion/guide.

My role is to get out of the way
with my plans/agendas/goals/expectations/
knowledge/desires/timetables/wishes/wants/etc.
and let Jake do it
what/when/where/how it needs to be done.

"IT" is like grass growing,
flowers blooming,
fruit ripening,
chicks hatching,
birds migrating,
the tide coming and going...

Everything in the natural world
happens in its own time,
in its own way.

Jake is my contact point/person
with the natural world.

I didn't make Jake up.
Jake appeared in a dream,
laughing at me for taking things 
so seriously.

Jesus and the Buddha
could have used Jake in their life.
They would have had a better outcome,
and laughed a lot more.

Jake is with me to remind me 
to wait it out
in an "everything has its own time"
kind of way.

People take their own lives
because they don't believe in
waiting it out.

"Just relax into it," says Jake.
"Trust me to work it out,
when, where and how
it needs to be worked out."

I don't have any responsibility
in the matter
beyond relaxing into the present,
and no say in the matter at all.

I let Jake do it.

Now that you know about Jake and Philemon,
relax into your dreams
and see who meets you there,
smiling and laughing,
winking and saying,
"I'm here. I have you covered.
Let me do it."

Listen to her/him.
Relax and enjoy the wonder
of the ride.

–0–

The search for the Holy Grail
is the search for the enlivening elixir
that will restore life to the land--
to the wasteland--
to the land of inauthenticy,
the land of sterility,
the land of pretension,
duplicity,
deception
and lie.

Joseph Campbell describes the wasteland as
"A land of people who do simply
what they are supposed to do,
or what is thought by the society
to be well to do--
people professing beliefs
because they have to,
holding jobs they have been handed,
not earned...
a land of zombies, you might say."

A land of people going through the motions,
doing what they think will make them happy,
yet nothing makes them happy,
or brings them to life,
or fills them with the radiance 
and wonder of being alive.

To go on the search for the Holy Grail,
you have to not know what you are looking for,
to not know what you are doing,
and to take your clues and your cues
from your unconscious,
and chance happenings/encounters
along the way--
allowing the trail to unfold before you
a trail that is not a trail at all,
because that would be to go where someone else
has gone,
and to continue in the spirit of the wasteland,
but you have to go into the woods
where it is darkest and most uninviting,
following Campbell's directive:
"That which you seek lies far back
in the darkest corner
of the cave you most don't want to enter."

You are looking for your own identity,
for your own heart,
your own soul,
for the grounding,
anchoring,
realization
of who you are
and what you are about,
so that you can say,
along with Ulysses,
"I will persevere and endure!
And when the heaving sea
has shaken my raft to pieces,
then I will swim!"
(Homer, in The Odyssey).

What calls you forth in that way?
So that you know beyond doubt,
"This is who I am!
This is who I must be!
Here I stand and here I will fall!
'Without hope,
without witness,
without reward!' (Steven Moffat)."

There is the Grail!
The cup of life,
and light
and being.

It is the realization,
awakening,
enlightenment 
of the Buddha
and the Christ,
requiring us to honor it
with fealty,
liege loyalty
and filial devotion
in doing what needs to be done
the way only we can do it,
when and where and how it needs to be done
in each situation as it arises
throughout the time left for living.

–0–

God doesn't play favorites. Doesn't have favorites.

From the beginning until now,
God's Chosen people don't come off
any better than the reprobates and scoundrels.

Even the Bible is straightforward about it:
"Time and chance happen to us all."
"It rains on the just and the unjust alike."

But we seek the advantage above all else,
and sermons through the ages
have played up the "Give To Get" line
to squeeze pennies from the poor
hoping for blessings and grace from on high.

"Give To Get" is the foundation 
of all the sacrificial and votive offerings
through the ages,
across time and place.

The idea of God needing something God cannot get
for him/her/itself
undermines the very idea of God
as infinite, eternal and almighty,
in complete control of history
and of all that happens throughout the universe.

A God who cannot be pleased
without someone pleasing him/her/it
constantly, eternally,
is no God at all. 

God as a partner with us 
in the service of the good
is a valid and lasting quality
of That Which Has Always Been Called God,
but.

It is not an absolute good,
but a temporal and impermanent good--
a cup of cold water,
a loaf of bread,
food for the hungry,
visiting the sick
and those in prison,
sandals and clothes against the elements...

Temporary good is the only kind of good
that is not offset by evil.

What is good for the lion
is evil for the antelope.
Too much sugar
works against those who consume it.

We seek the middle road,
to live in the center of the bell-shaped 
normal distribution curve,
the reasonable and customary range 
between extremes,
between Yin and Yang,
in all things.

There we find the blessing sans curse,
the good that is fully good,
but not totally good,
provisional and not everlasting.

A benefit of the way
that is truly the way,
and keeps us going for another day. 

–0–

We think thinking is the living end.
That all it takes is explaining things
in ways they can be understood.
With enough of the right kind
of information
we all come together in complete agreement,
seeing the same things
in the same way,
achieving peace and harmony at last.

Reason,
logic,
analytics,
calculus,
methodology,
and The Grand Final Theory
are all we need
for everyone to be in tune,
in step
and on the way.

Let me explain.

We see things differently.
We think different things 
are important.
We like different things.
We are on different wavelengths
with different points of view
and different values,
and different tastes,
and different interests,
and are at odds with ourselves even
over what matters most
and what that means for us
at any point in our life
and we are never going to be in agreement--
within or without--
about much of anything at all.

So, forget agreement,
and dedicate yourself to the work
of "just getting along,"
as best we can.

–0–

How we see what we look at
depends upon how we look at what we see. 

How do we look at liberals?
Conservatives?
Police?
People of Color?
Immigrants?
Orientals?
Trans-gender People?
Etc. through all the lists
of all there is to look at.

We have a pre-determined preference
for the way we look at practically everything.

Our mind is made up,
and we are clear about
what we are going to see
when we look.

The idea of an objective,
unbiased,
non-discriminatory
point of view 
belongs to the category 
of Happy Fantasies. 

We only see what we look for.
We only see what we expect to see.
We cannot see anything
we have no expectations regarding.
It is invisible.

In order to see the thing,
we have to be able to make 
some associations between
the unknown and the known.

We have to be able to categorize it,
label it,
name it
in order to know it.

If it is like ketchup,
and we don't like ketchup,
we don't like it.
If we love ketchup,
we love it.

Or, substitute single malt whiskey
for ketchup,
and the same thing applies.

If we look at anything 
the way we look at ketchup
or single malt whiskey,
we see something different
than we see if we look at it
the way we look at horses or dogs.

The way we look at what we see
determines everything that follows.

So, let's begin looking at everything
as though it is an optical illusion,
and watch it change as we look at it
because we aren't associating it 
with anything,
we are just curious
about what we might see if we look
with blank minds regarding
what we are looking at.

We are looking to see what it has
to show us.
At what it might reveal to us
about itself.

We are looking at a mystery.
At a secret.
At an unknown wonder.
Waiting to see 
what we might be shown.

Everything we look at
has a hidden side.
Has magical qualities
enabling it to become something
we have never seen.

If we keep looking
with a blank mind.

Emptiness,
stillness
and silence
are the path
to balance and harmony,
and all things new.

Waiting to show people
with eyes to see
what is concealed from,
and unknown by,
everyone else.

–0–