Roundup for Oct 7, 2006

This time in the Roundup, Synchronicity and a bountiful harvest.

Synchronicity, Somewhat

Detail from photo in My Zen Life. One of John's less prefered places to sit.

At 7:53am Pacific Time, yesterday, whiskey of whiskey river posted a quote that begins “There was also another reason why it was now possible to paint. …” Twenty-one minutes later, John of My Zen Life posted a picture of the bathroom in the house his family had recently moved into and put up an entry titled “day-glow lime green.” He writes, “can you believe the previous owners actually did this to the downstairs bathroom??” Of course, John may not be using paint so much as a sledge hammer.

Detail from graphic in ~C4Chaos. A frame from the evolving film "I AM."

At 2:54pm Pacific Time, C4 of ~C4Chaos's post hit the electron highway regarding an online film project called “I AM.” C4 writes, “It's a free movie. What makes this film especially cool, aside from its very meaningful message, is that it's also probably ‘the first major open-source film project in history’ wherein everyone is invited to co-create the film. I'll look forward on how this film would evolve over time.” Sixteen minutes later, Mike Doe of Doe-Do put up his post “Learning to be me!!” It his wonderful long thoughtful post, Mike writes, “Over the last few months I have been working a lot on letting go of various beliefs about myself – mostly negative but also some positive. The beliefs about me are not who I am. They are constraining things that paint a false picture.”

Blog Harvest

This is a great find: Bill of the IOC recommends a Buddhist pop-culture ezine, the worst horse. I checked it out – as Bill suggests – and found it chockablock with interesting stuff. I hadn’t heard of it; apparently it’s been around since February. Though parts of it are written in diary/blog fashion there is no RSS feed, unhappily – but I will be sure to bookmark it.

First off, the site recommends several wonderful blogs very familiar to frequent B’du readers: TMcG, Big Red Buddha ["Buddhism gets its Onion”], My Zen Life, The Buddhist Blog and Tyson Williams. Others blogs mentioned that are active – that B’du will be sure to pursue as a collector of beautiful buddhoblogs -- are Moonpointer, Monkey Mind, ok smile, Ottmar Liebert, and Living Tonglin.

I am especially happy to learn from the worst horse of Monkey Mind, a new blog written by James Ishmael Ford, who recently mentioned B’du reporter and something he wrote in a sermon, "Mindful Politics," he gave in front of the First Unitarian Society in Massachusetts where he is senior minister. Btw, James mentions four blogs he expecially likes in a recent post in Monkey Mind. He doesn’t provide links, so here they are: Hardcore Zen [by Brad Warner]; Philocrites [by Chris Walton, blogging as Philocrites]; Zen Blog of the Vimala Sangha [by Lew Richmond, et al]; and The Everyday Zen Foundation Blog [by Zoketsu Norman Fischer]

Mark of Zen Filter has had a spurt of activity this new month with five recommendations thus far – including the Zen Blog of the Vimala Sangha [which has an “interesting discussion on bowing”]; a post from the blog of the Savitri Era Learning Forum [“As if meditation were a debt”]; and a link to a post about Dogen and the Game of Go in the blog Numenware.

Also, Digitalzen of Digital Dharma recommends the venerated 'toon website Dharma the Cat. And B'du recommends Tao Diary, blogged by Crash. Crash is taking his spirituality in a new direction. He writes, "I have turned to Buddhism because it has a concrete method of doing things. ... The Buddha ... operationally defined what he meant by compassion, and gave a concrete plan of how to achieve a state of loving-kindness. Not only that, but there is good evidence (which will come in later posts) that the advice the Buddhists offer squares almost perfectly with modern psychological studies."

Since it is Friday, both Will of thinkBuddha and Mike of Unknowing Mind have written bodacious Scribe Jamborees. [Both blogs are part of the elite Daily Scribe network which asks its membership to have a linkfest on Fridays.] Among the many links in each blog's jamboree post, Will honors Mike's post "encouraging us to go where there is no path," and Mike honors a post of Will's on Mindfulness and the Enigma of Life.

tinythinker of peaceful turmoil informs us that there are no longer any Buddhist blogs in Beliefnet's haven of great spiritual blogs, Blog Heaven. Paper Frog got punted at the time blogger Christopher Baskind mothballed PF for other endeavors; WoodMoor Village Zendo got dropped more recently -- though Nacho's blog continues in operation at full force. Writes tiny, "I have no idea why Woodmoor would be removed, but it and/or one or two of several other blogs (Danny Fisher, Lotus in the Mud, Green Clouds, The Buddhist Blog, etc, just to name a few) would also be right at home in the list. I guess we'll see what happens (as always)."