Gentleman is playing Golf on a rare day off, but is distracted by his phone ringing, unnecessary conversations, 'I'll call you tomorrow..' so he loses track of where he is... he sees a young lady a short distance away, and approaches closer, asking, "Excuse me, sorry... I'm afraid I've lost track...what hole are we on?" She smiles and replies, "I'm about to hit hole 8, you're hole 7, so you're a hole behind me..."
He thanks her, and continues with his game.
After a while,he begins to think that she's quite nice.. and her golf swing isn't bad, so...
"Hi... yeah... sorry... me again.. you're now on hole...?"
"...13. That puts you on hole 12. Still a hole behind!"
He thanks her again, makes small chat about golf, then asks if she would care for a drink, once back at the ClubHouse... she accepts...
Later on, both sat at the bar, he asks her what she does...
"Well, promise you won't laugh (he puts his hand on his heart), but... I'm actually the CEO and MD of a company that makes feminine sanitary products..."
The man is serious for a moment, but bursts out laughing.
"Hey, come on, you promised!" She responds, a little irritated.
"Oh, no,I'm not laughing at you! It just that I run a toilet paper company, so I'm STILL a hole behind you!"
Walking meditation is misrepresented!
Sitting is the absolute favourite, no doubt. People associate meditation to the cushion, not to walking. But it is such a powerful practice.
This morning, early, I felt like meditating and began walking in shashu. I noticed the same though I felt less agitated and uncomfortable than sitting. I guess the walking does soothe a bit the mental fantasy and the discomfort it faces when you need to remain still.
What is your experience? Any advice?
Skillful means is a term that Buddhists sometimes use to describe Dharmic teachings that are offered when a listener is actually ready to receive them.
Unskillful means are those attempted dharmic transmissions that are so bound up in our own egos that what is really being transmitted is our own underlying egotism.
With the average ego being such a slippery beast in daily life, it is a pretty big practicing challenge to get enough of yourself out of the way to know what is truly skillful compared to that which is not.
Sometimes you'll get it right, other times you won't, but I think the more important factor is
a real time examination of whether your offering of unsolicited advise results in a reduction or softening of the ego or does it result in an increasing or solidifying of it.
Example... at least3/4 of what I potentially write on NB never makes it to print because I am not sure if it is more beneficial than it is not..
If you make it clear you are just passing on your thoughts on a situation, by saying, my thinking on this is… or, I believe that… then very few people will take offence. But I only do this rarely. It’s not a good idea to become a fountain of unwanted advice, but offering your thoughts “for the conversation” is a relatively normal thing to do.
When I really want people to take note, I’ll usually say something like, don’t take this the wrong way, but I have some life experience that you could use to your advantage. I’ve found that with both of these formulations people will often at least consider what you say. But even then whether people will take it on board is very hit and miss.
So I’d say giving unwanted advice is not the worst habit, if you bring it with respect.
Jim Palmer, writes:
"As you know, I once was an evangelical megachurch pastor and my pastoral career stretched over many years. Eventually, I could no longer teach my Christian doctrine with a good conscience and realized this teaching was not truly changing people’s lives… and so I walked away from the whole enchilada.
Below are 14 things that the misguided religious establishment doesn't want you to know. Speaking for myself and my personal experience, I was not able to see or admit these things to myself. I truly got into ministry initially because I wanted to make a difference and help people, and I relied upon the belief-system I learned as the proper framework to achieve this. It took a lot of post-religion reflection to see the ways this belief-system was hurting people.
I offer the below list in hopes that you might disentangle yourself from harmful beliefs and attitudes impacting your life.
14 things the misguided religious establishment doesn’t want you to know:
1. Toxic religion is rooted in fear, especially fear about the afterlife. It leverages the false doctrine of hell to win converts and demand holiness. The fear of God's disapproval, rejection, abandonment and punishment is another hallmark of toxic religion.
Clergy have no innate authority. Holding a church leadership position or having a theological degree does not imbue a person with special divine authority or superiority. The terms "anointed", "called", or "chosen" or titles such as "pastor", "priest", "bishop", "elder", "evangelist" or "apostle" do not confer any innate authority on an individual or group.
We hold sacred what we are taught to hold sacred, which is why what is sacred to one community is not sacred to another.
The stories in our sacred books aren’t history, nor were they meant to be. The authors of these books weren’t historians but writers of historical fiction: they used history (or pseudo history) as a context or pretext for their own ideas. Reading sacred texts as history may yield some nuggets of the past, but the real gold is in seeing these stories as myth and parable, and trying to unpack the possible meanings these parables and myths may hold.
Prayer doesn’t work the way you think it does. You can’t bribe God, or change God’s mind through obedience, devotion, or groveling. The underlying theistic premises of prayer are untenable.
Anything you claim to know about God, even the notion that there is a God, is a projection of your psyche. What you say about God—who God is, what God cares about, who God rewards, and who God punishes—says less about God and more about you. If you believe in an unconditionally loving God, you probably value unconditional love. If you believe in a God who divides people into chosen and not chosen, believers and infidels, saved and damned, high cast or low caste, etc. you are likely someone who divides people into in–groups and out–groups with you and your group as the quintessential in-group. God may or may not exist, but your idea of God mirrors yourself and your values.
Nobody is born Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Catholic, Protestant, etc. All humans are born Homo spaiens on planet earth. Our evolving species and planet are not innately religious. We are conditioned by narratives of race, culture, religion, gender, ethnicity, and nationality. If you were born in Nepal you are Hindu, if you were born in Nashville you are Christian, if you were born in Nazareth you are Jewish. People don't necessarily choose their religious belief-system, they are conditioned or enculturated into it. Christianity is not a superior religion just because it's your religion and you were born in the Bible Belt.
Evangelical theology isn’t the free search for truth, but rather a defense of an already held position. Evangelical theology is really apologetics, explaining why a belief is true rather than seeking out the truth in and of itself. All theological reasoning is circular, inevitably “proving” the truth of its own presupposition.
Becoming more religious cannot save us. Religion is a human invention reflecting the best and worst of humanity; becoming more religious will simply allow us to perpetuate compassion and cruelty in the name of religion. Because religion always carries the danger of fanaticism, becoming more religious may only heighten the risk of us becoming more fanatical.
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Becoming less religious cannot save us. In fact, being against religion can become it’s own fanaticism. Becoming less religious will simply force us to perpetuate compassion and cruelty in the name of something else. Secular societies that actively suppress religion have proven no more just or compassionate than religious societies that suppress secularism or free thought. This is because neither religion nor the lack of religion solely nullifies our human potential to act out of ego, greed, fear, hostility, and hatred.
A healthy religion is one that helps us own and integrate the shadow side of human nature for the good of person and planet, something few clergy are trained to do. Clergy are trained to promote the religion they represent. They are apologists not liberators. If you want to be more just, compassionate, and loving, you must do the personal work within yourself, and free yourself from the conditions that lock you into injustice, cruelty, and hate, and this means you have to free yourself from all your narratives, including those you call “religious.”
Religious leaders claims that their particular understanding and interpretation of their sacred books should be universally accepted. Religious leaders often say, “My authority is the Bible.” It would be more accurate for them to say, “My authority is what they taught me at seminary the Bible means.” People start with flawed or false presuppositions about what the Bible is, such as: the Bible was meant to present a coherent theology about God or is a piece of doctrinal exposition; the Bible is the inerrant, infallible and sole message/"Word" of God to the world; the Bible is a blueprint for daily living. Too often religious leaders make God about having "correct theology." There are a lot of unhappy, broken, hurting, suffering, depressed, lonely people in church with church-approved theology.
If your livelihood depends on the success of your church as an organization, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that you will mostly define and reward Christianity as participation in church structures and programs. Christian living is mostly a decentralized reality or way of life, not a centralized or program-dependent phenomenon. Church attendance, tithing, membership, service, and devoted participation, become the hallmarks of Christian maturity.
You are capable of guiding your own spiritual path from the inside out and don't need to be told what to do. You naturally have the ability, capacity, tools and skills to guide and direct your life meaningfully, ethically and effectively. Through the use of your fundamental human faculties such as critical thinking, empathy, reason, conscience and intuition, you can capably lead your life. You have the choice to cultivate a spirituality that doesn’t require you to be inadequate, powerless, weak, and lacking, but one that empowers you toward strength, vitality, wholeness, and the fulfillment of your highest potentialities and possibilities.
I'll shut up now."
10 Days??? The local weather systems around here are so variable that the only weather forecast you can trust is the one you are presently looking at through your own window.
I’m trying my hand at ‘dusking’ which is a meditative observation of sunset and the arrival of dusk…