terça-feira, 5 de dezembro de 2017
Constantly Give Yourself This Retreat
"People look for retreats for themselves, in the country, by the coast, or in the hills; and you too are especially inclined to feel this desire. But this is altogether un-philosophical, when it is possible for you to retreat into yourself at any time you want. There is nowhere that a person can find a more peaceful and trouble-free retreat than in his own mind, especially if he has within himself the kind of thoughts that let him dip into them and so at once gain complete ease of mind; and by ease of mind, I mean nothing but having one’s own mind in good order. So constantly give yourself this retreat and renew yourself. You should have to hand concise and fundamental principles, which will be enough, as soon as you encounter them, to cleanse you from all distress and send you back without resentment at the activities to which you Return"
Marcus Aurelius - Meditations
sábado, 23 de setembro de 2017
Only the Loving
“Those that go searching for love only make manifest their own lovelessness, and the loveless never find love, only the loving find love, and they never have to seek for it.”
D.H. Lawrence
segunda-feira, 14 de agosto de 2017
Ozymandias
"I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away."
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away."
Percy Byshhe Shelley
sábado, 10 de junho de 2017
Take A Stand
"The environment is no longer just a rallying cause for the counterculture, but has come to the forefront as a major national and international concern.
(...)
Another major source of the global-warming effect is the wanton destruction and burning of our Central and South American rainforests. Rainforests account for an outstanding 80 percent of the Earth's vegetation, and are critical to our ecosystem.
Trees absorb the toxic gases of excess carbon dioxide that we release into the atmosphere, and convert it to breathable oxygen. Trees are our ultimate rejuvenators: without them, life on earth as we know it, could not exist. Rainforest trees also provide an environment for the largest diversity of animal and insect species in the world. By burning our rainforests, not only do we destroy the oxygen-producing vegetation and the environment in which the animals and plants live, but we release huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and hasten the deleterious global-warming effect.
With all their importance, why are the rainforests being cleared so relentlessly? The answer is simple matter of pain and pleasure: economics. Huge tax breaks have been given in these countries as incentives for ranchers to clear the land. Is it to make room for more housing? Of course not. It's to clear grazing land for cattle to be exported as beef... (...)
The inefficiency of the use of this land for grazing is one of the most destructive, short-term decisions that man can make. We're bulldozing the source of our survival. Do you realize that every time you buy a quarter pound burger using rainforest beef, it represents the destruction of fifty-five square feet of rainforest? Once destroyed, it can never be replaced. Further, the current rate of species extinction is 1000 per year due to the destruction of the rainforests - an unimaginable assault to our ecosystem.
What's the point of it all? It's solely for the purpose of cycling more meat through our bodies, which medical science has already established is directly related to the top killers in this nation: heart disease and cancer. (...) Ultimately, we can not destroy the external environment without destroying our own internal environment.
Do you want to stop the destruction of our rainforests? Do you want to help restore the delicate balance of our ecosystem? (...) the most powerful thing you can do is to link pain to any of your personal behaviours that perpetuate the ill use of our planet. Clearly, one step would be to reduce or eliminate the consumption of hamburger meat. (...) The earth itself is at stake. Know that the decisions you make about what to put on your dinner plate determine, in a small yet undeniable way, such things as how much carbon dioxide is released into our atmosphere and how many plant and animal species will die each day.
(...) It's been said that water will be the gold of the future. How can this be true, on a planet that is predominantly covered with water? The reason can be found in our incredibly poor management of this vital resource. Specifically, it's related to the meat industry. Consider this: the amount of water that is used to raise one single steer is enough to float an american destroyer.
(...)
Did you know it takes 5214 gallons of water to produce one pound of California beef? This means that you can save more water by not eating one pound of beef than you could by skipping showers for an entire year!
(...)
Did you know that more energy is consumed by the beef industry than any other single industry in the United States?
(...)
It would be wiser to drive your car to the restaurant down the block than if you walked there, fueled by the calories you consumed from a quarter-pound of beef or chicken raised by the energy-inefficient standard of the industry.
(...)
One final issue we're all concerned about is world hunger.
(...)
The amount if food produced on any prime acre of land is markedly reduced when that food is beef. The same acre of land that would produce 250 pounds of beef would produce 40000 pounds of potatoes- roughly the difference between feeding one person and 160 persons! The same resources that are used to produce one pound of beef can produce sixteen pounds of grain. The land required to feed one meat eater for a year is three and a quarter acres; for a lacto-ovo-vegetarian one-half acre; and one complete vegetarian one-sixth acre. In other words one acre can feed twenty times as many people if they eat a vegetarian diet.
(...)
What's more, if every american were to reduce his or her meat intake by just 10 percent, the number of people who could be fed using th resources that would be freed from growing livestock would be 100 million! Thid is enough to feed every single starving man, woman and child on earth - and have a surplus.
(...)
As John makes clear, the decision about what to put on your dinner plate tonight is one that has profound processional effects. It sets in motion a whole series of events and activities that are shaping the quality of life on earth. You may ask "how can one person hope to turn the tide of such an enormous challenge?" John maintains that this battle will be won not on Capitol Hill or in boardrooms, but by individuals: "the shopper in the supermarket stopping at the meat counter , picking up that chuck steak marked 3,98 a pound and realizing that they're holding in their hand a very costly illusion. Behind that little price sticker hides the forests that have been cut down, our children's food and water supply, our children's topsoil, their future environment. And we have to look at that steak and say "that costs too much". Real power lies in the decisions you make in the supermarket and in restaurants and in your kitchen.
TAKE A STAND
By taking a stand, you not only stop participating in the misuse of our resources, but you send a clear message to big businesses whose lifeblood is tied to hamburger. In recent years, food-service companies have begun to respond to changes in consumer tastes by featuring salads and other alternative foods. (...) As a consumer, use the skills that you've learned in this book to bring about positive change: know what you want, use your buying power as leverage to interrupt destructive patterns, cause the companies to look for alternatives, and then reinforce them for the desired behaviours by patronizing their products and services.
TEACH YOUR CHILDREN WELL - LEAD BY EXAMPLE
As with any challenge, our environmental issues require education and action to create change."
In Awaken the Giant Within by Anthony Robbins
(...)
Another major source of the global-warming effect is the wanton destruction and burning of our Central and South American rainforests. Rainforests account for an outstanding 80 percent of the Earth's vegetation, and are critical to our ecosystem.
Trees absorb the toxic gases of excess carbon dioxide that we release into the atmosphere, and convert it to breathable oxygen. Trees are our ultimate rejuvenators: without them, life on earth as we know it, could not exist. Rainforest trees also provide an environment for the largest diversity of animal and insect species in the world. By burning our rainforests, not only do we destroy the oxygen-producing vegetation and the environment in which the animals and plants live, but we release huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and hasten the deleterious global-warming effect.
With all their importance, why are the rainforests being cleared so relentlessly? The answer is simple matter of pain and pleasure: economics. Huge tax breaks have been given in these countries as incentives for ranchers to clear the land. Is it to make room for more housing? Of course not. It's to clear grazing land for cattle to be exported as beef... (...)
The inefficiency of the use of this land for grazing is one of the most destructive, short-term decisions that man can make. We're bulldozing the source of our survival. Do you realize that every time you buy a quarter pound burger using rainforest beef, it represents the destruction of fifty-five square feet of rainforest? Once destroyed, it can never be replaced. Further, the current rate of species extinction is 1000 per year due to the destruction of the rainforests - an unimaginable assault to our ecosystem.
What's the point of it all? It's solely for the purpose of cycling more meat through our bodies, which medical science has already established is directly related to the top killers in this nation: heart disease and cancer. (...) Ultimately, we can not destroy the external environment without destroying our own internal environment.
Do you want to stop the destruction of our rainforests? Do you want to help restore the delicate balance of our ecosystem? (...) the most powerful thing you can do is to link pain to any of your personal behaviours that perpetuate the ill use of our planet. Clearly, one step would be to reduce or eliminate the consumption of hamburger meat. (...) The earth itself is at stake. Know that the decisions you make about what to put on your dinner plate determine, in a small yet undeniable way, such things as how much carbon dioxide is released into our atmosphere and how many plant and animal species will die each day.
(...) It's been said that water will be the gold of the future. How can this be true, on a planet that is predominantly covered with water? The reason can be found in our incredibly poor management of this vital resource. Specifically, it's related to the meat industry. Consider this: the amount of water that is used to raise one single steer is enough to float an american destroyer.
(...)
Did you know it takes 5214 gallons of water to produce one pound of California beef? This means that you can save more water by not eating one pound of beef than you could by skipping showers for an entire year!
(...)
Did you know that more energy is consumed by the beef industry than any other single industry in the United States?
(...)
It would be wiser to drive your car to the restaurant down the block than if you walked there, fueled by the calories you consumed from a quarter-pound of beef or chicken raised by the energy-inefficient standard of the industry.
(...)
One final issue we're all concerned about is world hunger.
(...)
The amount if food produced on any prime acre of land is markedly reduced when that food is beef. The same acre of land that would produce 250 pounds of beef would produce 40000 pounds of potatoes- roughly the difference between feeding one person and 160 persons! The same resources that are used to produce one pound of beef can produce sixteen pounds of grain. The land required to feed one meat eater for a year is three and a quarter acres; for a lacto-ovo-vegetarian one-half acre; and one complete vegetarian one-sixth acre. In other words one acre can feed twenty times as many people if they eat a vegetarian diet.
(...)
What's more, if every american were to reduce his or her meat intake by just 10 percent, the number of people who could be fed using th resources that would be freed from growing livestock would be 100 million! Thid is enough to feed every single starving man, woman and child on earth - and have a surplus.
(...)
As John makes clear, the decision about what to put on your dinner plate tonight is one that has profound processional effects. It sets in motion a whole series of events and activities that are shaping the quality of life on earth. You may ask "how can one person hope to turn the tide of such an enormous challenge?" John maintains that this battle will be won not on Capitol Hill or in boardrooms, but by individuals: "the shopper in the supermarket stopping at the meat counter , picking up that chuck steak marked 3,98 a pound and realizing that they're holding in their hand a very costly illusion. Behind that little price sticker hides the forests that have been cut down, our children's food and water supply, our children's topsoil, their future environment. And we have to look at that steak and say "that costs too much". Real power lies in the decisions you make in the supermarket and in restaurants and in your kitchen.
TAKE A STAND
By taking a stand, you not only stop participating in the misuse of our resources, but you send a clear message to big businesses whose lifeblood is tied to hamburger. In recent years, food-service companies have begun to respond to changes in consumer tastes by featuring salads and other alternative foods. (...) As a consumer, use the skills that you've learned in this book to bring about positive change: know what you want, use your buying power as leverage to interrupt destructive patterns, cause the companies to look for alternatives, and then reinforce them for the desired behaviours by patronizing their products and services.
TEACH YOUR CHILDREN WELL - LEAD BY EXAMPLE
As with any challenge, our environmental issues require education and action to create change."
In Awaken the Giant Within by Anthony Robbins
terça-feira, 30 de maio de 2017
The Guest House
"This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.
Be grateful for whatever comes.
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond."
Rumi
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.
Be grateful for whatever comes.
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond."
Rumi
quarta-feira, 10 de maio de 2017
Exchanging the Essences
“The drug of love was no escape, for in its coils lie latent dreams of greatness which awaken when men and women fecundate each other deeply. Something is always born of man and woman lying together and exchanging the essences of their lives. Some seed is always carried and opened in the soil of passion. The fumes of desire are the womb of man's birth and often in the drunkeness of caresses history is made, and science, and philosophy. For a woman, as she sews, cooks, embraces, covers, warms, also dreams that the man taking her will be more than a man, will be the mythological figure of her dreams, the hero, the discoverer, the builder....Unless she is the anonymous whore, no man enters woman with impunity, for where the seed of man and woman mingle, within the drops of blood exchanged, the changes that take place are the same as those of great flowing rivers of inheritance, which carry traits of character from father to son to grandson, traits of character as well as physical traits. Memories of experience are transmitted by the same cells which repeated the design of a nose, a hand, the tone of a voice, the color of an eye. These great flowing rivers of inheritance transmitted traits and carried dreams from port to port until fulfillment, and gave birth to selves never born before....No man and woman know what will be born in the darkness of their intermingling; so much besides children, so many invisible births, exchanges of soul and character, blossoming of unknown selves, liberation of hidden treasures, buried fantasies...”
Anais Nin in The Four-Chambered Heart
sábado, 4 de fevereiro de 2017
Tao: The Pathless Path
"The Way has no map, the Way is not charted, the Way is not such that you can follow somebody and find it. The Way is not like a super highway, the Way is more like a bird flying in the sky - it leaves no marks behind. The bird has flown but no marks are left. So the Way is a pathless path. It is a path, but it is a pathless path. It is not ready made, available, you can not decide to walk on it, you will have to find it. And you will have to find it in your own way, nobody else's is going to function. Buddha has walked, Lao Tzu has walked, Jesus has walked, but those ways ar not going to help you because you are not Jesus, you are not Lao Tzu, you are not Lieh Tzu. You are you, a unique individual. Only by walking, only by living your life will you find the Way. This is something of great value.
That's why Taoism is not an organised religion. It can not be. It is an organic religion, but not an organised religion. You can be a taoist if you simply live your life authentically, spontaneously; if you have the courage to go into the unknown on your own, individual, not leaning on anybody, not following anybody, simply going into the dark night not knowing wether you will arrive anywhere or you will be lost. If you have courage, that risk is there - it is risky, it is adventurous.
Christianity, Hinduism, Mohammedanism are super-highways: you need not to risk anything, you simply follow the crowd. you go with the mob. With tao you have to go alone, you have to be alone. Tao respects the individual and not the society. Tao respects the unique and not the crowd. Tao respects freedom and not conformity. Tao has no tradition. Tao is rebellion and the greatest rebellion possible.
That's why I call Tao the pathless path. It is a path, but not like other paths. It has a very different quality to it, the quality of freedom, the quality of anarchy, the quality of chaos. Tao says that if you impose a discipline on yourself you will be a slave. The discipline has to arise out of your awareness, then you will be a Master. If you impose an order on your life this will just be a pretension: the disorder will remain deep in the very core of your being; the order will be on the surface, at the center there will be disorder. This is not going to help. The real order arises not from the outside, but from the innermost core of your being. Allow disorder, don't repress it. Face it, take the challenge of disorder - and by taking the challenge of disorder and living it, living dangerously, an order arises in your being."
"Of course, freedom is dangerous because there is no security in it, no safety in it. There is great safety when you are following the crowd; the crowd protects you. There is great safety when you are fooling the crowd; because of the vey presence of so many people you feel that you are not alone - you can not be lost. Because of this security you are lost. Because of this security you never search and you never seek and you never enquire. And truth can not be found unless you have enquired, unless you have enquired on your own. If you take borrowed truths you become knowledgeable, but to be knowledgeable is not to know.
Tao is very much against knowledge. Tao says that even if you're ignorant and the ignorance is yours, it is good, at least is yours. And it has an innocence to it. But if you are burdened with accumulated knowledge, scripture, tradition, then you are living a false, pseudo life. Then you are not really living, you are just pretending that you are living. You are making impotente gestures, empty gestures. Your life has not the intensity, the passion - can not have the passion. That passion arises only when you move on your own, alone, into the vast sky of existence.
Why can't you move alone? Because you don't trust life. (...)
Man has created these ideologies just to hide the fact that he does not know, to hide the fact that he is ignorant. Man is cunning and he can create rationalisations, but these rationalisations are bogus - you can not move with them into the truth. You will have to drop them. Tao says that ignorance is not the barrier against truth - knowledge is the barrier."
"So the difference between the poet and the mystic is not much. The poet is coming closer, the mystic has arrived. For the poet, there are only glimpses of truth; for the mystic, truth has become his very life. The poet is only transported to the world of truth and then falls back again. For the mystic, truth has become his abode: he lives there, he lives as truth."
"Tao means to exist on the Way and to exist in such a way that the Way and you are not two. This existence is one - we are not separate from it. The separation, the idea of separation is very illusory. We are joined together, we are one whole. We are not islands, we are one continent. You are in me, I am in you. The trees are in you, you are in the trees. It is an interconnected whole.
The whole is one - separation is not possible. The very idea of separation is the barrier. The idea of separation is what we call the ego. If you are with the ego, you are not on the path, you are not in Tao. When the ego is dropped, you are in Tao. Tao means an egoless existence, living as part of this infinite whole, not living as a separate entity."
Osho - Tao The Pathless Path Volume I
That's why Taoism is not an organised religion. It can not be. It is an organic religion, but not an organised religion. You can be a taoist if you simply live your life authentically, spontaneously; if you have the courage to go into the unknown on your own, individual, not leaning on anybody, not following anybody, simply going into the dark night not knowing wether you will arrive anywhere or you will be lost. If you have courage, that risk is there - it is risky, it is adventurous.
Christianity, Hinduism, Mohammedanism are super-highways: you need not to risk anything, you simply follow the crowd. you go with the mob. With tao you have to go alone, you have to be alone. Tao respects the individual and not the society. Tao respects the unique and not the crowd. Tao respects freedom and not conformity. Tao has no tradition. Tao is rebellion and the greatest rebellion possible.
That's why I call Tao the pathless path. It is a path, but not like other paths. It has a very different quality to it, the quality of freedom, the quality of anarchy, the quality of chaos. Tao says that if you impose a discipline on yourself you will be a slave. The discipline has to arise out of your awareness, then you will be a Master. If you impose an order on your life this will just be a pretension: the disorder will remain deep in the very core of your being; the order will be on the surface, at the center there will be disorder. This is not going to help. The real order arises not from the outside, but from the innermost core of your being. Allow disorder, don't repress it. Face it, take the challenge of disorder - and by taking the challenge of disorder and living it, living dangerously, an order arises in your being."
"Of course, freedom is dangerous because there is no security in it, no safety in it. There is great safety when you are following the crowd; the crowd protects you. There is great safety when you are fooling the crowd; because of the vey presence of so many people you feel that you are not alone - you can not be lost. Because of this security you are lost. Because of this security you never search and you never seek and you never enquire. And truth can not be found unless you have enquired, unless you have enquired on your own. If you take borrowed truths you become knowledgeable, but to be knowledgeable is not to know.
Tao is very much against knowledge. Tao says that even if you're ignorant and the ignorance is yours, it is good, at least is yours. And it has an innocence to it. But if you are burdened with accumulated knowledge, scripture, tradition, then you are living a false, pseudo life. Then you are not really living, you are just pretending that you are living. You are making impotente gestures, empty gestures. Your life has not the intensity, the passion - can not have the passion. That passion arises only when you move on your own, alone, into the vast sky of existence.
Why can't you move alone? Because you don't trust life. (...)
Man has created these ideologies just to hide the fact that he does not know, to hide the fact that he is ignorant. Man is cunning and he can create rationalisations, but these rationalisations are bogus - you can not move with them into the truth. You will have to drop them. Tao says that ignorance is not the barrier against truth - knowledge is the barrier."
"So the difference between the poet and the mystic is not much. The poet is coming closer, the mystic has arrived. For the poet, there are only glimpses of truth; for the mystic, truth has become his very life. The poet is only transported to the world of truth and then falls back again. For the mystic, truth has become his abode: he lives there, he lives as truth."
"Tao means to exist on the Way and to exist in such a way that the Way and you are not two. This existence is one - we are not separate from it. The separation, the idea of separation is very illusory. We are joined together, we are one whole. We are not islands, we are one continent. You are in me, I am in you. The trees are in you, you are in the trees. It is an interconnected whole.
The whole is one - separation is not possible. The very idea of separation is the barrier. The idea of separation is what we call the ego. If you are with the ego, you are not on the path, you are not in Tao. When the ego is dropped, you are in Tao. Tao means an egoless existence, living as part of this infinite whole, not living as a separate entity."
Osho - Tao The Pathless Path Volume I
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