"Love. You can learn all the math in the 'verse... but you take a boat in the air that you don't love... she'll shake you off just as sure as the turn of the worlds. Love keeps her in the air when she ought to fall down... tells you she's hurting before she keels. Makes her a home."

"Storms getting worse."

"We'll pass through it soon enough."

Recently I've discovered a comedian named Louis CK, whom I find to be truly brilliant. He is a 40+ divorced overweight self depricating man with a great sense of humor. More importantly, I find myself learning great life lessons when I think about his routines ( Read more... )

I love simple, one-liners that convey something powerful. Sometimes they are movie quotes, and other times they are tidbits I extract from books. I had two good ones hit me in the past day ( Read more... )

I was recently asked how I reconcile the concept of drawing down (voluntary controlled possession by deity) with my Buddhist practice and philosophy. I realize there are many approaches to this question. I will just touch on a few ( Read more... )

Sitting on the beach this morning, I was impressed by the incredible beauty I was looking at. The sun rising on the horizon, lighting the miles of pristine beach being caressed by waves gently washing up. And it occurred to me that my perception of this beauty is relatively untarnished. On the other hand, when I sit at home and look at the local ( Read more... )

I have nothing profound to say this morning. I am writing this purely for the experience of writing it, putting it into a recorded place, to remind myself I am alive. I've felt a bit lost the past few days. Not in a way that has me at all concerned, but more in a way that makes me wonder what found feels like ( Read more... )

I've been running across a lot of writings lately talking about how mindfulness is not really Buddhism. I want to explore this for a moment, mostly because it amuses me. First, I must say that I don't define myself as a Buddhist. The concept of taking a spiritual journey, and beginning it by defining myself and thereby setting up mental boundaries ( Read more... )

A young man went off to war, leaving his pregnant wife behind. Two years later, he was able to return home, and the young woman went with their young son to meet her husband. They cried together out of joy. In Vietnam... when an event of this kind takes place, it has to be announced to the ancestors. So the young father asked his wife to go to the ( Read more... )

People do not really understand what meditation is. Meditation is the one human activity that has no purpose. Buddhists who are supposed to have attained everything are invariably shown sitting in some meditation posture. Why should they meditate anymore? Because that just happens to be the way a Buddhist sits. When he sits, he sits. When he walks ( Read more... )

Finding balance is an extremely tricky thing to do. Especially as a parent. The first thing for me to realize is that to find balance, there must be at least two opposing focal points and a fulcrum. For example, I want my son to have a sense of playful freedom, and yet I want him to take personal responsibility for things. So I have the opposing ( Read more... )