mindfulness

Robert Wright (from meaningoflifetv etc)has written a new book; "Why Buddhism is true". (It is quite cheap to download as an e-book) He takes evolutionary psychology to explain his ideas, especially the theory of modules working in our brains. This theory, like Buddhas, don't need a self to be true. Different modules work side by side or compete.  Their task is to make us survive and to make children. So they make us afraid of foreigners, specially if they have other characteristics, as colors, than we have. They make us afraid of spiders, even in Sweden where we have no dangerous ones (for humans). They are what DNA uses to create feeling and feeling creates thoughts and thought can create ideologies and books or internet sites. Wright is not at all interested in religious stuff like karma or rebirth what he is into is mindfulness and retreats. Here is Wright discussing the book; So we are not in control of our feelings and thoughts. But with the help...

It can be the first of Buddhas sutras that was written down. And if it was it may be the one that we most can trust on. It's a dialog, as the ones Plato wrote. So he may not have had many listeners. And it's very radical. The main theme is to cool down every desire. Even the one to hold on to a view. So it's a bit paradoxical... The sage or wise man, Buddha says, should live in solitude but follow the middle way, so no asceticism. He should not eat so much and not sleep too much and of course no sex. (this must be before nuns where permitted) So he has passed the river to the other shore. And his reputation will be good (seems to be important for Guatama) He will be very peaceful, for him there will be no better or worse ethics and so on as he has passed dualistic thinking. Therefore the half smile. Let's ponder over what that will mean in our days. What could we gain if more of us behaved in that way? Nowadays it a lot hate on the internet...

As I have practiced mindfulness for about ten years now, I have noticed that it has helped more and more. It becomes a habit and I can do it now and then when I have opportunities for it. It can be when I go by bicycle; I can have an open mind to all that happens here and now and I will even be a safer biker. I can do it for some steps or longer when I walk. I can do it for some seconds when I open a door. In a day that can become an hour of meditation, if I end the day with some body scanning and mindful yoga. One of the useful things with short meditations is that I can do it when worries or accusatory thoughts pop up: If I for while concentrate on the breath they soon will disappear. They may come back but I then have a tool to not dwell in them. If you are deeply depressed you may need more treatment before to start meditation. And if you have a really stressful job, you may have to change the situation... But if you go on with mindfulness you sooner or later will...

All of us will, sooner or later, have sorrows. Some of us will fall very deep. Pills may help. Mindfulness may help. But its important to not let the sorrow stay just inside. Joanne Cacciatore tells about the days after she had lost a child. A priest with some followers came to her home. Her sorrow was to big, she just wept. And the only thing the priest said was, "we will pray for you". He never showed up again. What Cacciatore was people that stayed with her, could hold her and listen to her She is now works as a helper for grieving people. And her messing is ; listen and listen and speak. It takes tomes for the wounds to heal. But a lot of them do.... Even if some scares remain. She has written a book about her work; Here she is; We all have to find our own ways to go along with pain in the soul and body. in the long end we cannot avoid pain and death... But we can prepare ourselves. We can accept the facts. We can be with the ...

Some artists are better listeners than others. Maybe its more easy when they just have to listen to themselves  and the audience; Whoever visits Way Out West now in August should not miss Tash Sultana from Australia. A one-man band that samples own loops and can sound really big. She has played the guitar since the age of three, and now as a 22-year-old full-fledged but also mastered other instruments like trumpet. The song is not to complain about either, although it may probably be even more personal. She has just released some songs yet, but they have become noticeable. Not unexpectedly, she was discovered when she posted a video where she started the song "Jungle" at home. Sultana is already playing on Friday, on a smaller stage one can suppose. She is not a coming star, because I do not think she wants to be. She is the kind that lets the music speak. But she is already big and has sold out venues in Australia. It was not long since she was living like str...

But first; Maybe the best answer on why we see us as unified beings;                 We are all striving for happiness, but is it maybe not so good.  First of all happiness seems to be a side effect of other sings as, coming home after a long walk where we had lost our direction.  In meditation we don't strive for happiness but for a more subtle feeling of contentment.  We are satisfied with what is; the breath, the sounds around us, the air against our skin, to be alive, to live on earth...  we know that feelings come and go, that good and bed times come and go. We cling to neither of them.  We have an ego, but we don't cling to it too much.  We have friends, probably a home and other basic things but we have some warm distance to all that too.  We appreciate  it much as we no it can change.  We become friend with feelings of loneliness, as we no that we have to accept them as a p...

If we, or anything, havent got a intrinsic self, what is we then? What holds us together? Suggestions; other people, nature, food, an income, animals, insects, memories of other people, nature, food.... Maybe a will to live, maybe curiosity, maybe interests, maybe Love.... Maybe genes, maybe compassion.... Maybe we dont know. But it's not anything internal...                                                                                                                                MEMORIES OF SPRING                                HIDDEN IN MY HEART       ...