The Wonderful Paintings of Leonid Afremov

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Quanzhen Daoism: free pdf ebooks:

Cultivating Pefection: Mysticism and Self-Transfmormation in Early Quanzhen Daoism

The Teachings and Practices of the Early Quanzhen Taoism Masters

Nobody Knows Anything

Ladies and gentlemen: Nobody knows sh%t. That's right, folks. Anyone who has ever said they know something is full of it.

You cannot know anything at all. The idea of knowing something is a linguistic illusion. It requires two things: a knower and the known.

The only true knowledge is that of simply being. What is, simply is.

There is nothing else you can say about it. You can try. But it doesn't make what is anymore than what it already is.

When people talk to me about karma, I say to them, "Well, I suppose you think the millions of people slaughtered by the Nazis had it coming then."

Karma is the way people explain away the terrifying reality of all things being a mystery.

And so is religious mythology, for that matter.

Beyond all of this is the fact that the body is going to die. Get with that truth. Stay with it. Put mind on it. Dwell there and watch what magically happens: you become nicer.

Solitude: The Straight Path

Most people are afraid of being alone for an extended period of time. Not speaking to or seeing anyone for a few days is not even an idea worth considering.

Yet solitude is a way to get to the heart of life. As our minds chat away in the world like up and down Pez dispenser heads, the reality of life is always flowing gracefully underneath, flowing as a deep and genuine intelligence at the heart of all existence. We miss it all the time because we are chat chat chatting away.

Conversations are perfect ego boosters, for they reinforce our ideas of ourselves and our ideas of the world. We look for agreement about what we are saying, so we can feel validated and feel as though we have somehow found REALITY, and that we are therefore in POSSESSION of something OTHERS don't have. The sheer ridiculousness of this process is seen quite clearly after one undertakes a block of solitude.

My first experience with solitude began in youth, as most children find moments when they are alone and have only their imaginations to play with. Then I became a farmhand for a farm in Northern California, where the owner of the farm would go away for weeks at a time and leave me alone on the remote property to caretake. And this is where I discovered the merits of being alone and not speaking with others for a large amount of time.

I went back to the city and smaller town life, and eventually the craving to experience even longer bouts of solitude overcame me, and I gave away all of my things and walked into the redwood forest for two months. I slept in a camp I set up high up on a ridge, about a 4 mile hike into the isolated woods, not a single person around to hear any shouts or screams. Just me and the woods.

This was fantastic. And two years later, I went back for a 5 month stint alone in the woods. This took me beyond thunder dome.

5 months in the woods alone is like wiping the windshield after a rain has passed. Sunny, clear, all is obvious.

Now I'm preparing to do a sabbatical of sorts and try a few years alone in the wilderness. Everything you let go in solitude makes you a greater gift to the world in general. Truth is all that matters, and this truth is life.

So, if you find yourself afraid of things like solitude or death or whatever, just go ahead and do some solitude. You'll find many things that were holding you back will fall away easily, such as the need for approval from others. You will take yourself out of the herd mind that Einstein spoke of, and no longer will you be at the mercy of public opinion and mass propaganda.

Knowing is being. But being is missed, so long as we're yap yap yapping.

I'll post more on solitude and potential places to disappear from civilization soon. Thanks for reading, now shut the fuck up and be.

It's Okay to Abandon Everything

You're never stuck.

See, stuck is a state of mind only. So is attachment. In fact, they are both the same thing.

We fear leaving our job, because we fear losing our house or our wives and husbands or our status or our career.

Yet we always have the choice to simplify our lives. We can begin to shed more and more of the outside needs and wants, and get down to the absolute essentials.

I know a young man who left behind his frozen and stuck lifestyle and gave away all of his things. He kept only what fits in a backpack, a small backpack.

His items included only 2 changes of clothes, thin and easy to roll-up and pack. He walks the Earth at this very moment, and has done so for years, living as a nomad, doing minor computer work as he roams about the planet.

He's happy. He could have remained in one place, and he'd still be happy, so long as he kept only what fits into a backpack.

None of us are stuck. But people who imagine that they are stuck sometimes end up taking their own lives, because they believe what they imagine and see no way out of it.

If you think you are stuck, let go of whatever it is that you think makes you stuck. Let go of the thought, first. Let go of the need to fit in. Let go of the society. Let go of the rules. Let go of approval from your parents. Let go of having to please others and lovers and friends. Let go of the fear of being free like a dignified animal of nature.

And just go. Go in, and move outward. Be with yourself. If you are afraid to be alone, then go off on your own into the forest for a month or two alone. If you are afraid of death, then do as Ramana Maharshi, and lay still on the ground, and think about death for the whole day. Feel your body dying. Face the psychological fears surrounding the avoidance of squarely facing your own inevitable demise.

It's too short, this life. Might as well enjoy it. Oddly enough, this is the greatest gift you can give to the world. Equally odd is the fact that only those who have simplified and released their attachments can see that this is so.

Attachments are blinders. Release them and see. Life is an adventure, and like it or not, you are an adventurer.

Urugayan President: The Leader Who Leads By Example

A Nobel Peace Prize for the World's "Poorest" President?

By MANUEL RUEDA (@ruedareport)

March 15, 2013

A Dutch NGO called the Drugs Peace Institute recently made a bold proposal to Uruguayan President José Mujica.

The organization is pushing for a Nobel Peace Prize nomination for the 76-year-old head of state, on account of his efforts to legalize marijuana in the South American country.

"We have come to Uruguay to ask for [Mujica's] permission to campaign on his behalf," said Frans Bronkhorst of the Drug Peace Institute.

"We believe that he has made a proposal…that aims to end this [global] drug war, which has done nothing but serve the interests of obscure parties," Bronkhorst told Uruguayan newspaper El Observador in an interview published on March 13th.

In mid 2012, Mujica promoted a bill that would legalize the consumption of Marijuana in Uruguay, and regulate the production and sale of the plant.

The proposal, known to Uruguayans as the marijuana law, was tabled by Mujica at the end of last year after polls showed that most Uruguayans did not approve of legalizing marijuana. Regardless, Mujica continues to support the marijuana law, and it could be approved later this year if congressmen in Uruguay garner more public support for the initiative.

The Uruguayan president has not yet made any statements about the Nobel campaign proposal presented to his advisers by the Drug Peace Institute.

Bronkhorst said that his organization would gather "the voices of victims of the drug war" in its campaign to get a Nobel Peace Prize nomination for Mujica. He said organizations that campaign against prohibitionist drug policies currently lack a global symbol or a famous spokesman, and added that Mujica could fill this void. "He could be the Bob Marley of the 21st century," Bronkhorst joked with El Observador.

Every year in September, the Nobel Peace Prize committee sends out nomination ballots to some 300 academics, former prize winners and government representatives around the world.

To be nominated for the peace prize, Mujica would have to secure the support of one of the people receiving a ballot. Winning the prize is far more difficult, as Mujica would have to defeat hundreds of worthy nominees from all over the world.

Bronkhorst argued that the Uruguayan president was a strong candidate for the peace prize, not just because of his efforts to change drug policy but because of his personal background.

"He is a former [left-wing] guerrilla, who abandoned weapons, and became president through the ballot box in a democratic process," Bronkhorst said.

Mujica currently donates 90 percent of his salary to charitable causes, and leads a simple lifestyle which has earned him the nickname "the world's poorest president."

If he were to win the nobel peace prize, Mujica would become the first person to receive this honor for tackling prohibitionist drug policies.

ARTICLE REPOSTED FROM: Univision

"This Is What Is" by Lisa Cairns

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