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?
Goodale State Park 03 BW — Adams Mill Pond, Camden, South Carolina
The source of hatred is beyond redemption. And it is a hate-driven world. All the talk is love, love, love, and gratitude. Yet, it is a hate-driven world.
Russia and Ukraine. Israel and Palestinians. White people and people of color. White people and immigrants. White people and Woke white people.
Republicans hate everybody not like them.
If I could, I would give everybody an extended time out. No social media. No media of any kind. No human interaction of any kind.
Everybody would spend their days alone with a zazen cushion observing their thoughts and their emotions-- without attachment to their thoughts or emotions.
With a long-enough time out, there may be some shifts in attitudes and points of view.
Ain't gonna happen.
It is a hate-driven world.
I have withdrawn from it as far as I can. That is my recommendation for everybody.
Neil’s Harbor Lighthouse — Cape Breton Highlands, Nova Scotia
What keeps you in the kind of work you're in? What would prefer to do instead? What do you wish you had done with your life? How close can you come to that in the time left for living?
What would be your ideal life? How close can you come to that in the time left for living?
When you think of yourself, what image comes to mind? What do you not have enough of in your life? If you were to hand me an object or an image that would adequately symbolize your life to this point, what would it be?
What do you wish you had known earlier?
What needs redemption or atonement about your life? In what ways are you living to do that?
What needs you to do it right now in your life?
Who do you have to talk with about these things?
What is keeping you from writing about them if you have no one to talk to who is interested in what you have to say?
Para Sailing — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Pamlico Sound, Hatteras Island, Outer Banks, North Carolina
The world is a mess beyond correction, but. That means there is always something we can do to make things better here/now wherever/whenever we are.
And it is our place to do what needs to be done anyway, nevertheless even so, no matter what, when it needs to be done, where it needs to be done, how it needs to be done, because it needs to be done, and needs us to do it, with the gifts we have to offer from our original nature, our intrinsic virtues/virtuosites (The things we do best and love to do most), our inherent intuition, our spirit, vitality, and knack for this kind of thing.
And don't give me the drift about how it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter that it doesn't matter! We are here to give our best to the moment even if it is our last moment! Or, our next to last moment!
We have a life to live even so, even yet, even now, and it would not be right to not live it all the way to the end of the line.
Let To The End Of The Line be your mantra for the days, weeks, months, years left to us. And live like you mean it every day! And mean it. Every day!
We are as close to Jesus and the Buddha as some people will ever get.
We bring as much of God to life in our life as some people will ever experience.
If we aren't doing it as it ought to be done moment to moment in each situation as it arises, why not?
If we aren't doing the things that need to be done, saying the things that need to be said, asking the questions that need to be asked, being whom the times need us to be, why not?
Lake Haigler 2014 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina
Why do we see things the way we see them and not some other way instead?
How many different ways of seeing/experiencing/ evaluating/interpreting/understanding/ comprehending/thinking about/believing in/... things are there?
And yet, and yet...
Those who know, know the same things. No?
What is the difference between seeing and knowing?
Between thinking and knowing?
Between believing and knowing?
It is the difference between being connected with our intrinsic intuition and being told what is so and not so.
The main difference between groups of people is not what they know to be so but what they have been told is so.
Religion is the foundation of our major differences of opinion worldwide.
We go to war over what we have been told is so. As in Israel and the Palestinians.
They don't hate each other over what they know to be so. They hate each other over what they have been told is so, over what they believe is so, over what they think is so, over their opinions about what is so.
Here is how to know what is so.
Take this list of words:
Original nature innate virtues/virtuosities (The things we do best and enjoy doing most) intrinsic intuition, imagination, balance and harmony, integrity, sincerity, vitality, spontaneity, emptiness, stillness, silence.
And reflect on the connection between each word and you.
On how they relate to you, and you to them.
On what they mean to you out of your own experience.
On what your experience of each word/term is.
As you do this exercise repeatedly over time, you will come to know what these words mean-- and no one will have told you so.
We are as close to Jesus and the Buddha as some people will ever get.
We bring as much of God to life in our life as some people will ever experience.
If we aren't doing it as it ought to be done moment to moment in each situation as it arises, why not?
If we aren't doing the things that need to be done, saying the things that need to be said, asking the questions that need to be asked, being whom the times need us to be, why not?
When "the world is too much with us, late and soon" (William Wordsworth), or life is, we need a place to go to lay our burdens down.
I have arranged three landscape stones on my book case as an imaginary link to the Wailing Wall.
I take grief that is too much to bear to my Wailing Wall Link and deposit it there (All in my imagination) to take its place with the grief and mourning of the ages.
And when it is time for another round with it, I go back to stand before my bookcase and remember the losses and sorrows. When I have had enough for a while, I leave them there to return again by and by.
The Wailing Wall and all of our links to it bear all of the pain of the world-- of the cosmos, and keeps it in good stead for us until we are ready for another round of remembrance and agony.
A very present help in time of trouble, enabling us to face what must be faced in our own time and our own way, and face it again, in that it is always near at hand, never to be out-grown or left behind.
West Prong Bridge — Chimneys Picnic Area, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, Tennessee
Focusing's foundational question, "Except for what is everything just fine?" is trumped by the realization, "It's all useless, hopeless, pointless, futile, stupid, ludicrous and absurd-- and coming to a very bad end (We are all going to die). But other than that, it's all great."
Which itself is negated by the counter-realization, "How do we know the end is actually the end or all that bad? It could be the opening to wonders beyond imagining!"
And, "All of our reasons for giving up, caving in, rolling over and calling it quits, are themselves trumped by the simple shift in perspective which asks, "So what if it is all useless, etc.? What difference does it make if nothing makes a difference? Who cares if nobody cares? Why not give it our best effort, even if it does no good?"
And, dedicating ourselves to the eternal service of the good of the moment beginning right here, right now, doing what is called for, when, where and how it is called for, anyway, nevertheless, even so-- moment after moment, time after time, for the joy of doing it and the satisfaction of having done it, always and forever, Amen!
Fidelity to the good of the here/now, with fealty, filial loyalty and unwavering devotion, is the solution to all of our troubles, now and always.
And is the sacred ground at the heart of Focusing in all times and places.
Getting up and doing what needs to be done, when, where and how it needs to be done, no matter what, forever, restores us to our soul, and our soul to us, day after day.
Four Mile Creek 03 — Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte/Mecklenburg Parks and Recreation, Charlotte, North Carolina
Walter Brueggermann wrote The Prophetic Imagination, in 1978 about the wonder of Old Testament prophets being able to imagine a world different from the one they lived in, and the courage they displayed to call the people of Israel to live in that world.
"The prophetic imagination" is always calling us beyond this here/now into the next here/now-- the one we are capable of living into existence by following the lead of our imaginative intuition, which is always on the cusp, on the threshold of "The Old has passed away! Behold the New has come!"
The new world beckons from beyond this world's ideas for itself, directing us to find our way to it by listening to our intuitive guide and doing what is called for in each situation as it arises, allowing the simple act of doing what needs to be done, when, where and how it needs to be done, to lead us into "all things new"-- which we could not foresee, but are able to bring forth, just by doing what is called for in each moment at hand.
If you are looking for a calling, you cannot find a better one than doing what is called for here/now and allowing that to carry us into the next here/now and all that are to come!
Live Oak at Melrose Plantation — Cane River National Heritage Trail, Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana
There is a psychic energy "feel" to bars, restaurants, air ports, school reunions, etc.
Everywhere people gather has its own "sense of being." A DMV waiting room has a special kind of "Get Me Out Of Here Now!" feel to it' because no one wants to be there, especially the people who work there.
What is being emitted to create the "feel" of place?
How is it being received/known?
We know/sense if we belong where we are, if it is a "good fit," if we are "home."
Or not.
Whatever the "atmosphere," we know whether it is conducive to our spirit, or not.
If the "vibes" aren't right, we are better off being somewhere else.
The hermits/introverts among us think we are better off being alone-- and make being alone a high-priority item because we can be separated from our own experiencing by noise/complexity/drama/trauma, lose our orientation and our internal guidance and be overwhelmed by the intrusion a boisterous WE.
The Dairy Barn 02 B — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina
Opinions, plans and adgendas interfere with our ability to read the signs of the times, know what's what and what's called for in response out of our original nature and intrinsic virtues/virtuosites (The things we do best and love doing most), when/where/how it needs to be done in each situation as it arises no matter what all our life long.
Which is to say that living in the service of what we desire/want to happen keeps us from living in the service of what is called for here/now and doing what needs to be done.
We prevent from happening what needs to happen in living to serve our opinions, plans and agendas.
We block our life from being what it could by insisting on what we desire/want at the expense of all other things.
And we can turn things around like that (snaps fingers), just by changing our mind about what's important.
Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy 