Labels: Johnny Klein Lawrence Welk Benny Goodman, Peanuts Hucko
posted by johncgreen@gmail.com @ 7:39 AM
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G.I. Gurdjief talked about the internal disunity in people. He
said we are houses with many competing masters and that we need to
find a magnetic center that can be the big smart part of us that will
become the master of all the other smaller, dumber parts of us.
Robert S. DeRopp wrote a book about this challenge called The
Master Game
I have intuitively agreed that this must be true, but have never
developed a sophisticated understanding of the multitudes of
chatterers who inhabit my aging palace.
This afternoon when I went for a walk I thought about five of them.
One of them tries to be loved, and another regrets not being loved.
I've noticed that when the one who tries to be loved reaches out to
someone and is disappointed with the lack of a response, the other one
who regrets not being loved steps out and recites reminders of many
examples of similar rejections, and also brings along a bag of sadness
that would, if opened, contain countless other examples not yet
recalled in this episode.
The other three are all arguing about my employment options. One
of them, who should be called the proud one, doesn't think the work I
do gets enough respect and is constantly telling me I should stop
doing it. Another one, whom I will call the field rabbit, wants me to
keep doing that work because it is safe and secure, even if it is
nothing to be proud of. That field rabbit would be happy with just
about anything as long as it paid the bills somehow and kept me warm
and safe.
The third one is the eagle. This eagle wants to fly and has no
respect at all for the field rabbit. He doesn't even want to think
about pride or social standing. He's the big eagle and he's fine
without any social validation, thank you very much. He wants to step
outside all of that. He also wants us to get out of that safe little
bunny hole and fly everywhere looking and learning all about
everything while shrieking a brazen cry of defiance.
The field rabbit reminds the eagle of all the times he's been
batted back to the ground by big fearsome paddle nets that he couldn't
understand, when the big brave eagle was put in his place and forced
to crawl back into the bunny hole, trembling with pain and terror in a
way most unbecoming to an eagle.
While the eagle and the bunny are having this conversation, the
proud one has nothing to say. He's very very proud, but you'd never
know it to look at him because he's such a quiet meek little fellow
and shows no signs of any pride.
He secretly wants to sit on the eagle's back if the eagle can only
be brave enough just to get up and go in spite of everything, but he
doesn't want to say anything because he doesn't want to get blamed
when the eagle gets his feathers burned, He thinks that is bound to
happen sooner or later. He's proud, but he's been chastened and he
knows. He should know better than to be so proud, but denies the memory of being put in his place. Gurdjieff called this denial a "buffer."
posted by johncgreen@gmail.com @ 4:53 PM
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Labels: Frankie Carle Bob Ralston Lawrence Welk
posted by johncgreen@gmail.com @ 7:11 PM
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Excerpted from Gelek Rimpoche's Sunday Talk, March 16, 2008
Let's try to understand the current situation in Tibet. This has been going on for fifty years. The Communist Chinese have always been suspicious of monasteries and Buddhism. For example, in Drepung, the monastery where I was educated in Tibet, the Communists openly set up government-sanctioned committees, organizing people to spy on each other. You couldn't trust anybody - your teachers, friends, students, not even your parents. Kids were spying on their parents, students on their teachers, and disciplinary monk officials on their abbots. That is how it has been functioning for fifty years.
Close to two years ago, communist officials had the idea to ensure that the monks there didn't respect His Holiness the Dalai Lama. They made up a document that basically said: "The Dalai Lama is evil" and wanted everybody to agree by signing it. The monks refused to sign.They said their refusal had nothing to do with politics, but was purely for spiritual reasons.
The authorities arrested the monks who refused to sign and put them in jail and never released them. A few days ago, some Drepung monastery monks went into the market place to demonstrate their request for these monks to be released. They were beaten, tear gased and jailed. Turn by turn, each day following, monks from Sera, then Ganden monasteries also demonstrated, were beaten and jailed as well as nuns from various monasteries. The sound of their cries and screams were heard all over Lhasa. Everybody was crying. Eventually, some people got angry and started to throw molotow cocktails into Chinese owned shops, so there was a huge amount of destruction. The central government of China declared martial law at three am on March 14. . The whole city of Lhasa is now completely filled with soldiers and para-military that were trucked in and the Chinese government said they would violently suppress any demonstrations. The Chinese claim 10 people were killed. Tibetan sources say that more than 200 were killed -- quite a different picture.
It is very clear that the Chinese authorities have had complete control over Tibet for 50 years but failed to win the heart of the people. That is because their policies are not helping the people much. In particular the local government of Tibet is run by lesser educated officials, many of whom are relics of the Cultural Revolution. They are confused and don't understand the true situation. Their reports to the Central government in Beijing are confused and incorrect and that is why the Chinese authorities were taken by surprise by the events of the last weeks.
The local Chinese authorities also can never understand the relationship between the Dalai Lama and Buddhism. They can neither separate the two nor put them together. They are completely confused about the role of the Dalai Lama. Vilifying statements like "The Dalai Lama is nothing but a wolf covered by monk's robes, a demon with human face" clearly show the limit of knowledge and character of those making such statements.
This situation is indeed very, very sad. It really calls for international support. This can be done by people expressing their sympathy and feelings and also urging their representatives, senators and house representatives, as well as journalists in national and local media, to pay attention and try to find out the true situation.
posted by johncgreen@gmail.com @ 4:52 PM
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It is so sad to watch the BBC reports about the protests in Tibet and the Chinese crackdown on the protesters. I'm not an Olympics follower, but if I were I think I'd seriously consider boycotting the Beijing Olympics this summer. I'd consider that because of Chinese support for the Sudanese against the people of Darfur, because of the Chinese insistence that people in Tibet can't freely voice their objections to the Chinese cultural takeover of their land, because of the Chinese refusal to relinquish Taiwan and because of Chinese interference in Thailand. I like the industrial spirit of the Chinese, but I don't like the political repression.
The Buddhists, Nancy Pelosi and the Dalai Lama are showing me a side of Buddhist life I haven't known about. I've thought of monks and Buddhists as people who were not political. I've thought of them as people who considered human political affairs some kind of secular crust that is not important to a spiritual person seeking to cultivate inner understanding. I'm thinking now this view I've had has been wrong, naive and idealistic. The Buddhists can't be like that in the real world.
If the Buddhists have monasteries, traditions, land and social institutions, they will suffer incursions like all other people with visible assets. When they do, like all other people, they will try to oppose the incursions. If their spiritual traditions do not give them the tools for this opposition, and it seems that they do not, the Buddhists will join the other oppressed and defenseless classes of this world; they will be mercilessly ground down to a state of helpless social submission. Perhaps, after a few centuries, they'll recover and flourish again.
I'm just talking about the Buddhists in Tibet. Tibetan Buddhists in Chicago, Amsterdam and New York have tiny thriving cells that are not threatened directly now. Other kinds of Buddhists, such as the ones in Burma and Vietnam, also have political issues, but they are under far less pressure at the moment since they aren't sitting where a big world stage event is about to be held.
One can visualize a Buddhist universal spirit that always survives somewhere, but I'm not sure "Buddhist" is the best word for it. I think that perennial universal spirit is not limited to or defined by Buddhism, but will always show itself in some places with visible Buddhist influences.
I remember watching a video of J. Krishnamurti talking to the late Tibetan lama Chogyam Trungpa (1939-1987), author of Born in Tibet. Krishnamurti was so fiercely opposed to following leaders to get spiritual understanding! He believed you have to find it yourself, within yourself without bosses, books or guides. At least if you do that you don't have to protect assets!
posted by johncgreen@gmail.com @ 6:33 AM
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Labels: Thelonious Monk I Mean You
posted by johncgreen@gmail.com @ 8:32 AM
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