click title below...

Can Rory Stewart Fix Afghanistan?

In 2002 Rory Stewart walked across war-torn Afghanistan, alone and in winter.
In 2004 he served as deputy governor to a province in southern Iraq. Now
Stewart has returned with a heroic charge: Save the Old City of Kabul from
destruction and remind a nation of its former glory.  
Text by Paul Kvinta   Photograph by Aaron Huey

His book is titled THE PLACES IN BETWEEN

Live the teachings

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HA!

I had a pretty great childhood.
I had parents that loved me and alot of cousins to play with.
I believed in being a Mouseketeer and ran home from St. Joseph's Catholic School
to watch them everyday.





I believed Mighty Mouse would come to save the day.




That Circus Boy was good entertainment



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and that Ed Sullivan really did have a friend named Topo Gigo.




I believed that if I was good, the nuns would like me,
 so for Halloween in 4th grade I became one.




but reality hit at age 11 and I grew up.

Now I believe that nothing is real, and there's nothing to get hung about...
Strawberry Fields Forever.

<For those of you that like that pin, I just found it on ebay!>

Some cool & happy people here from The Democratic National Convention...

Looking At The Left Day One


and Yesterday from the Republican National Convention...
Democracy Now's Amy Goodman, Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar
were arrested by the Minneapolis Police Department. Charged with conspiracy to riot.
 Footage from Rick Rowley and Brandon Jourdan




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Recently, Change...

"If you don't get what you want, you suffer; if you get what you don't want, you suffer; even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold on to it forever. Your mind is your predicament. It wants to be free of change. Free of pain, free of the obligations of life and death. But change is a law, and no amount of pretending will alter that reality."

~ Dan Millman, 21st century philosopher from The Way of the Peaceful Warrior
How true is that?
Change: it's one of the few things we can always count on.
Why not embrace it?

Brian Reads.... Think Arete
#191 Dan Millman: Change

I've posted this story before, but deleted it last year, so here it is again...


It's not the last coincidence, but it's the most predominant that's happened to me.
In January 1970 I hitchhiked from New Jersey to California. In St. Louis I was picked up by a VW bus full of hippies going to Denver. We spent a very cold night with no heat in the bus driving through the night. When we stopped for breakfast in the morning, I snapped this photo of the group. On we went to Denver, we parted and
I had the photo to keep.

3 years pass and I'm off overland to India. In Afghanistan I met a man that was from New Jersey. I saw him numerous times on our journey in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. Usually at restaurants or chai houses where tourists congregated.
We shared addresses and kept in touch.

When we were back in NJ, we got together for a brief visit to share stories of our trip to Asia. He said he was going to school in Albuquerque, New Mexico and gave me his phone number. I was heading back to California in a few weeks.
I got to Alburquerque and he picked me up at the bus station and took me to his house to spend the night and visit.

I walked in and who are his roommates? The hippies that had picked me up hitchhiking 3 years before! I recognized them immediately because I had that photo!

What a coinky dink!

A friend recently sent me the book Murshid, A personal memoir of Sufi Sam.

I have been slowly reading & enjoying this, as it has some stories of
an old friend of mine and many people I knew back in the 1970's.

Today I found these quotes which have helped me deal with my pruning here.

The holding of impression is called creating samskaras in the Hindu teachings.
All holding of impressions or samskaras produce further skadhas (attributes of personality)
as they are called in sanskrit.
Man, to be free, must become free both from the web of the skandhas
and from his own adding to them.
This is done by various means of practicing the presence of God.
(Murshid's Commentary on Everyday Life page 51)

Meditation is theoretically practiced so that one can select his own impressions.
Breathing practice and esoteric exercises are given so that one can reject those samakaras
which do not serve a purpose.
(Murshid's Commentary on Insight page 58)

The more one listens, so to speak, to impression and inner response, the more one will
find the truth within them which can lead to greater comprehension of the Divine Wisdom
both in the seen and unseen. 
(Murshid's Commentary on Superstitions, Customs & Beliefs  page 62)


Words of wisdom.

This shake up at Gaia has my head reeling.
I never expected it and it's left me shaky.

I've deleted people, blog posts, photos, just wanting to clean up & start over again.

Coming to Zaadz was great,
Brian selling to Gaiam was understandable, I rolled with it.
But having friends lose their jobs & status here in the network that we have created has left me in tears.

I'm a Gaia cheerleader.
I'm the one that is always saying Keep On The Sunny Side.
Accentuate The Positive.

I want to participate, engage & share fully.
To not be cliquish.
But there is a hole in the network. 
WTF. Kelly! ~C4! Jake!

Attachment and Impermanence is a real motherf**ker.

Midakba one of many phonetic English representations of the Tibetan word for impermanence.

Impermanence is a Buddhist concept.  The lives of all beings are transitory. 

Diamond Way Buddhism

My candidate took on the DNC with an inspiring presidental like speech.
I cried through 1/2 of it, what a speech it was.
Invoking the Suffragette movement, "No way. No how. No McCain", & unity for the Democrats.

Hillary made me & Maya Angelou very proud tonight to be a women.

Now we move on.

Sisters are truly doing it for themselves. Blogher





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