Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; It is thinking that makes what we read ours.
~ John Locke
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Thinking →
Meditation →
If I were forced to choose—in some trolley-car, false dichotomy, morality scenario—whether to give up meditation or journaling, I’m pretty sure I’d give up journaling before meditation. Or at least, that’s the lie I’d tell you. One’s meditation practice will inevitably settle into some specific physical form. The stillness is one of the keys. I was once sat (in the “having something done to you” sense) in a particular position, in the vein of a particular tradition, and now after 25 years meditating there, that’s the position I will forever assume. Still, even now for me it’s an uncommon position, it’s an uncommon point of view, and it’s an uncommon intention. Frankly, in the beginning it was simply physical agony. Now, it doesn’t make sense to not do it. Which is right, then or now?
A lot of people said meditation is like jogging or like lying in the sun on the beach. This shows a huge misunderstanding about what meditation is. Meditation is a way to go within, all the way within to the deepest level of life, the transcendence, the absolute, the totality and reality, and experience that. The human being is built for it.
~ David Lynch from, David Llynch: “Stories Should Have The Suffering”
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The more I read, the more I’m certain that the “now” is right.
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Mysterious →
The world […] is indeed a strange and deeply mysterious place, forever changing and remaking itself anew. But this is not a novel condition, our world hasn’t only recently become bizarre and temporary, it has been so ever since its inception, and it will continue to be such until its end—mystifying and forever in a state of flux.
~ Nick Cave
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The interlude →
On a random rainy day, I sat in seiza on the concrete, barefoot, gazing into our back yard. Everything was uniformly 53 degrees as I sat down with a mug of steaming broth. I sat under cover of the patio, but open otherwise to the sound of light rain, the gurgle of water in the downspouts, and the occasional drafts of cool air. Previous sunny days, and the current inch of rain had create an entire world of verdant green before me. The world looks different when your eyes are closer to the ground. Time passed. Some light came in.
There, in the Zen-like supremacy of the moment, on the road and adrift in this world, the nicotine would enter my bloodstream and with a blissful rush of pure meaning God would declare Himself to me – just as He did to you, Dee, on your balcony, at 21.49, on that rainy evening in Rosario, Argentina. That five minute interlude, puffing on a cigarette, in the deranged chaos of our lives – you on your balcony and me in some alley in some foreign city – was, to paraphrase Leonard Cohen, the crack where the light came in.
~ Nick Cave from, The Red Hand Files | Issue № 37
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For countless eons, all of our kind have wondered about, sought firsthand and then shared, experiences of such interludes. Are they experiences of the divine? Self-hypnosis? Enlightenment? Semi-sleeping states? Spirituality? Meditation? …and does it actually matter what we each call them? I simply hope you have your own occasional interludes.
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May 05, 2024 — #83 →
Reading time: About 3 minutes, 600 words.
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This issue is https://7forsunday.com/83
Nobody →
I’m a brooder. Ruminating on one’s problems can be good, if one is actually trying to understand the situation and is seeking solutions. But brooding, that’s just ruminating without the potential for change. Brooding is simply going around and around on the same old thoughts.
Nobody else needs to endure my negative thoughts.
~ Nate Dickson from, The Life-Changing Power of Shutting Up
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It’s not enough to simply shut up. One also has to change one’s thinking.
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One →
One day at a time. It sounds so simple. It actually is simple but it isn’t easy: It requires incredible support and fastidious structuring.
~ Russell Brand
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Slow down →
Lately, I’ve been going too fast. Which is odd, because I don’t generally walk fast, or drive fast… and sure, I can talk fast, but not always. But my thoughts go too fast. I go from one thing to the next too quickly. There’s simply too much of: I do this, then I do that, then I can go do that other thing, and then this next thing, and then…
Short answer: Interdependence.
~ Cierra Martin from, What We Can Learn from a Village Postman
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Another thing we can learn from a village postman is to do one thing, and do it well. That village postman didn’t also run the general store and the post office itself and the grocery and the church and …
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Amateurs →
That’s all of us are: Amateurs. We don’t live long enough to be anything else.
~ Charlie Chaplin
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Constraints →
There are two roads to my destination: Addition or subtraction. If I imagine something I want to achieve, my habit and instinct is to imagine what I’m going to do to get there. That’s the additive approach. But sometimes it would be easier—in fact, sometimes it is only possible—to get there by removing impediments.
I love that question to ask yourself when you’re troubleshooting failed attempts at personal change: Why am I not doing this thing already?
~ Brett McKay from, Why Aren’t You Doing It Already?
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It’s quite startling, but that question works. Always. (And that question is closely related to: It is not a priority.)
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