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  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 10:18 am on January 3, 2016 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , resolution   

    New Year Resolution: Get Religion—Quickly… 

    I only have a few years on this planet—we all do—what with mortality and all that jazz, inevitability and all that rap, just a few seasons to sow and reap and sock away the harvest, for somebody’s grandkids, if not our own, making hay while the sun shines, making love while the sap rises, win or lose or learn how to draw; and the question always arises, especially at this time of year: what have we accomplished? What have we done? What does it all mean, if anything, when the scores have been tallied and the races all run?

    If you’re like me, then maybe you’re too often thinking: not much. But should it? Is anyone keeping score? The Eternal Now human contingent likes to maintain that life is not meant for meaning, anyway—tautology noted—but for enjoyment: constant eternal infinite bliss. Sounds good, but is it really any more accurate? It might just depend fundamentally on whether you’re a rationalist or an empiricist, a thinker or a doer, Latino or Germanic, tranquilo or a bit manic… (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 7:43 am on December 26, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism,   

    Buddhist in training… 

    When you start ENJOYING meditation, rather than struggling with it, then I think you’re getting somewhere…

     
    • Sven Johnson's avatar

      Sven Johnson 10:43 am on December 26, 2015 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Hardie,
      I have been a couple of times to the Farang Buddhist meditation meetings here in Chiang Rai. Nice people and a great place. But I found out after a couple of times, hearing the discussions about suffering etc etc that I am probably too happy to be able to get something from this meditation. We will see, maybe try it ater a couple of years. Merry Christmas and have a Great New Year!

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 11:47 am on December 26, 2015 Permalink | Reply

        There are worse problems to have than that, Sven, to be one of the lucky ones… 🙂

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 10:31 am on December 13, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, ,   

    The Perfect Religion: 10 Commandments, 8-fold Path, 5 Pillars, 4 Noble Truths, 1 Creator 

    036

    Christian church in Ethiopia

    Okay, so back to the grind: creating, or let’s say ‘distilling’, the perfect religion. After all, we’re not trying to create something from scratch, quite the opposite, in fact, we’re trying to reconcile religions—all religions—and science, too. Contradictions, in my view, are only apparent, not real.

    If we all love our kids, then we all love God, however that’s defined. All religions have central tenets, and articles of faith, of course, and so does my hypothetically perfect one, as previously noted, and most of them gleaned from the major religions.

    The Five Pillars of Islam are: faith, prayer, alms-giving, fasting, and pilgrimage, all pretty basic, of which pilgrimage to Mecca might be discarded for our general use as too cult-specific, non-general, and non-attainable. Visas to Saudi Arabia are hard to come by, even for Muslims. (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 8:32 am on November 22, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , , , Paris   

    In Memoriam: We Are All One, Like it or Not… 

     

    IMG_1443

    Spires In Thailand

    “If you love your life, you will lose it…If you give it up in this world, you will be given eternal life.”

    –John 12:25

    For some reason, that sentiment resonates with me, and many others, I think, that the rewards of this earthly existence are transient and ephemeral, and that there are bigger and better things to do here than getting and spending and counting our money. This is but a brief interlude, by any measure, and it’s a real shame to waste it in mindless murder—or even mindless multiplication. But we’re only human; that’s what we do. We possess. We accumulate. We go forth and multiply… all of which is fine, as long as we don’t get too attached to it, or even worse: ‘fall in love’ with it.

    The events of Paris last week are a good example. Now that the dust has settled and some scores have been settled over the ownership of the land that was settled by our progenitors, it’s not hard to see the vicious circuitry to it all, the battle for one-up-man-ship that pervades all human interactions from the seminal act of sex to the terminal act of death, the jockeying for position and the positioning of jockeys for maximum exposure and maximum penetration. Pounds of flesh have been demanded as retribution and paid in kind over centuries, but nothing has really changed, has it? (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 8:03 am on November 8, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: alcohol, Buddhism, , ,   

    Building the Perfect Religion: Humility, Moderation and Sobriety? Ouch… 

    Well, I guess sex is no big deal, after all, in my perfect hypothetical religion, basically just: cover your genitals, please. And don’t do it in public. And hide it from the kids. Dress moderately. Homosexuality is okay, as long as you don’t demand the right to march down Market Street in only your jockstrap. Abortion is a horrible thing, but ultimately a woman’s right to choose, for lack of better options. I would only say to women who see this issue as only an issue of women’s health: we’re talking about a human life here, okay? At some point it becomes murder, which is not okay… what else?

    Like sex, most religions don’t deal with issues of sobriety directly, but many do, being prohibited outright in some. Once again I see no clear path either way, but it has certainly been an object of contention over the years. To this day, many counties and cities in the USA are ‘dry’, not allowing any sales of alcohol; and many others are so restrictive that they accomplish much the same purpose, allowing mixed drinks only in eating establishments, for instance, the only stand-alone bars limited to beer.

    But mention Christianity or the West to much of the world, and the first image that comes to many foreigners’ minds is alcohol—and drunkenness. It’s pretty accurate, really. Historical scuttlebutt is that the Celts invaded the Roman Empire looking for wine, long after they themselves had had a reputation for beer, from which the Spanish word for it—cerveza—comes, apparently. They likely invented wheels and pivoting axles, too, so the buzz is not necessarily bad, just disgusting for a lot of people, it seems. I concur. It’s messy. There are cleaner highs, if you just gotta… (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 9:26 am on October 18, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, ,   

    Modern Religion: Waiting for Godot, or ET, or the Eternal NOW… 

    Buddhist Temple in Laos

    Buddhist Temple in Laos

    I’ve always marveled at how certain songs just feel good, regardless of whatever words are being sung, while other songs are sad for the same reason, something about minor keys, I think. Words are the same way, it seems, especially when you’re trying to get all philosophical. I mean: nobody really wants to hear about categorical moral imperatives—borrrring. But everybody loves to hear about the ETERNAL NOW, philosophy in a spray-can, shake well before using, get in touch with your energy, etc. Why are such words and ideas attractive?

    Simple, dahling: because it feels so good, and it can’t be proven or dis-proven—nice touch. We Western Europeans used to exult in our rationality, our Age of Reason, beyond superstition and the dictates of the Mother Church. And it worked fantastically—up to a point. We still love the fruits of such labor, but not the labor itself, and the discipline that achieved it in the first place. Now we want all that and superstition, too, but without the church, thank you. That means New Age fad religions and pop psychology and life-coaching: people who can’t run their own lives will try to tell you how to run yours. Isn’t it wonderful to be alive in 2015 with so many options? (More …)

     
    • mary's avatar

      mary 11:19 am on October 18, 2015 Permalink | Reply

      serendipidy, now that is a good word, joe powers told me what it means, i still miss him.

      • hardie karges's avatar

        hardie karges 11:33 am on October 18, 2015 Permalink | Reply

        Tales of Serendib, ancient Sri Lanka, world’s oldest continuously Buddhist country… .

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:08 am on October 11, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , , ,   

    Building the Perfect Religion: Buddhist Middle Path and the Pride of Sin… 

    In Spires In Thailand

    In Spires In Thailand

    Now I’m not sure exactly what the Scottish rock band Franz Ferdinand had in mind when they sang about “right thoughts right words right action”, but I suspect that at least one of the blokes has some interest in Buddhism, because that little trifecta of meaning pretty much sums up the Buddhist ‘Middle Path’.

    And if avoidance of excess is one of the cornerstones of our hypothetical perfect religion—akin to the Buddhist Middle Path—then humility would have to be the second cornerstone. Note the similarity—and difference—to and from the related concept of humiliation. This is where the Middle Path comes in again. Humility, aka ‘humbleness’ is a very good thing, while humiliation is not, whether on the ends of giving or receiving…

    Pride is its opposite, of course, and well-known as one of the Christian sins, and probably one of the least-respected and most-abused. After all, what father is not proud of his son, and less deserving of it? It’s as though fathers and mothers see their sons’ and daughters’ actions and accomplishments as direct reflections on themselves, as though their offspring are hired hands with scripted roles to play. Sounds like a recipe for disaster… salt to taste… (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 8:41 am on October 4, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism   

    Time for a New Religion, One that Looks a Lot Like Buddhism… 

    IMG_1559You can split the atom, you can go to the moon, you can build 100-story skyscrapers, or you can talk on iPhones, and still you’ve accomplished nothing—not really. Populate the earth with ten billion people and what have you got? Nine billion wretches living in makeshift trenches slurping Campbell soup with Saltine crackers, war surplus rations and Bimbo Bread…

    But I get the feeling that the Buddhists already know that—have ALWAYS known that, in fact, just standing there watching, maybe cracking a little smile, though not much of one, and rolling with the punches as the Franks came and conquered and dictated terms to unwilling participants, the only refuge in temples and bedrooms and assorted cracks in the matrix-like display… (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 9:55 am on September 20, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , , , , , Michelangelo   

    Pictures of God—Faces and Places… 

    Michelangelo’s God…

    God’s face is a concept best left in the textbooks, suggesting as it does Michelangelo’s Charlton Heston, mugging for the cameras and getting all wrathful, railing at the Ishmaelites and rooting for the Jews; it’s better to talk about Nature, and Love, and Heaven up above, than God-heads with silver hair and yellow teeth…

    So I can understand why people are put off by the pictures of God, early on depicted by Renaissance painters as harsh and warlike, playing headlong into the notion of ‘God-fearingness’ as the proper basis of religion, AND…

    …even later depictions of Jesus with the bedroom eyes and the doe-like gaze do little to mitigate the sneaking feeling that, in effect, we’re doing exactly what the Bible enjoins against, i.e. worshiping graven images, whether graven in stone, oil pigments, silver nitrate, or bits and bytes, BUT… (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 10:43 am on September 13, 2015 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Buddhism, , Elon Musk, Protestantism, Richard Branson   

    Religio-Politics 101: Buddhism and Bizniz, best to leave your trump card unplayed… 

    Buddhist shrine in Sri Lanka

    Buddhist shrine in Sri Lanka

    I hate to get all holier-than-thou, but I may just be getting all holier-than-me, my transient former self, at least. It’s scary. I think maybe I’ve had an epiphany, a revelation, a religious whatchamacallit, in which I may have actually enhanced my status as a spiritual being, while hopefully not sacrificing too much as a human in this material world.

    That is: I’m finding it difficult to talk sh*t on people, this in a social-media era in which to tell-all is a paramount virtue, often the nastier the better, and in intimate detail—what you were wearing when you said what you said as you did something else in the middle of the Event Horizon. There’s only one problem: I can’t do it. (More …)

     

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