Street Fighter Meditation

If there is a game that requires being in the present moment fully, it's street fighter. My friends have been handing me my ass to my (no)self for quite sometime. Gnarly statue in the background too. Speaking of that statue an ex girlfriend of mine has been traversing the high seas for school(something called semester at sea) and she visited thailand.

Meditation FAIL

My practice was pretty non-existent last week. I don't think I got up and meditated once.

I definitely feel the difference. I feel more anxious, judgmental, impatient.

Better luck next week... starting tomorrow morning.

Rock Garden

This is a photo I took at a zen garden in the Seattle area. One of the things that attracts me to Zen is its emphasis on the combination of work, mindfulness and creativity through art and labor. Whether you are doing something artistic, or your job, or both -- I appreciate that Zen reminds us that enlightenment is to be found in regular everyday activities.

Death? OK.

You... are going to die.

OK, I'm just kidding.

No, seriously... you're going to die.

Buddhism emphasizes being aware that you will die. In the zen-parable film Fight Club, Tyler Durden famously says:

"First you have to know... not fear, but KNOW... that someday, you are going to die. It's only once you have given up everything that you are free to do anything."

The Metallica Sutra

The seed for this post was planted a while back when reflecting on another members decision to stop listening to a certain style of music. I completely understand why one would make such a choice and it led me to investigate especially since I listen to some of that said music!
When you get down to the essence of music as with everything...it's empty. There is no eternal, independent existence of it...What the music is, is defined by the definer. "the eye of the beholder" haha. It's just the vibration of air that's caught by the ear which is turned into an electrical signal and processed.

Upaya

In my opinion, the doctrine of upaya is easily one of the greatest aspects of Buddhism.

To quote wikipedia: "Upaya-kaushalya is a concept which emphasizes that practitioners may use their own specific methods or techniques in order to cease suffering and introduce others to the dharma. The implication is that even if a technique, view, etc., is not ultimately "true" in the highest sense, it may still be an expedient practice to perform or view to hold; i.e., it may bring the practitioner closer to true realization anyway."

don't know much about tibet

From today's New York Times:

"... it was 50 years ago on Tuesday that 300,000 Tibetans surrounded the Dalai Lama’s palace in Lhasa, the start of a failed uprising against Chinese rule that resonates to this day."

From Wikipedia:

"The 1959 Tibetan uprising, or 1959 Tibetan Rebellion began on 10 March 1959, when an anti-Chinese and anti-Communist revolt erupted in Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, which had been under the reign of the Communist Party of China since the Invasion of Tibet in 1950."

Vegetarianism

Vegetarianism: The practice of subsisting on a diet composed primarily or wholly of vegetables, grains, fruits, nuts, and seeds, with or without eggs and dairy products.

Hi,

Hope you are well, I want to share my observations on "Vegetarianism" since as a Buddhist I too have been confronted with this thought of completely quitting meat, Ironically I live in a country where Non-Vegetarian food is cheaper compared to Vegetarian food.

A Buddha buys some groceries

I am a part time cashier at a grocery store. This exchanged happened yesterday:

Me: Your Total is $74.89
Customer: Wow, I just spent 74 dollars on nothing

Internal realization: I suppose you spent nothing on nothing.

People don't realize how far a long they really are.

The Lazy Guide

The Lazy Little Guide to Enlightenment

Re-Birth?

Rebirth: A second or new birth; reincarnation.

Yes, I know that I existed centuries ago.........in a land.....far away...where all were in peace...everyone was happy..there was plenty for all.....yet for some reason I searched for something I felt was missing in my life....I never found it......my search ended with my life ..............but my desire to continue searching brought me to a state of repeated birth & death! ......sigh!........:(


http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=55128694511&h=T3oqd&u=n-Z6D

Impermanent

A coworker got laid off last week, her cubicle is empty.

My father walks with a cane now.

While driving I noticed that one of my ex-wife's favorite restaurants was demolished.

The Bush years are over.

Life is constant change, all things are impermanent.

Gangsta Rap

I like gangster rap. Listening to it makes me feel good. Although, it's not necessarily a positive kind of good, and that's the problem.

Gangster rap can be artistic. It's filled with clever wordplay and track samples from old school funk, rock, and RnB songs. It conveys a sense of noir-ish realism and determined self-reliance, and since the mid-1980's has served as a voice for social and political commentary from a group that had few such outlets.

But... gangster rap is also often overwhelmingly negative. Among other things, it is usually extremely misogynist, while also glorifying violence and materialism.