Sunday, January 07, 2007

Roundup for Jan 7, 2007

Grand Canyon

A portion of a photograph in a post titled "Impermanence" by Dharmasattva in the blog Dharmasattva's Meditations.

There is pain and there is beauty in the buddhoblogosphere. Here, some wild samples, some good ones, posted on Jan 6, plucked fresh from the Internet meadow with the dew still clinging.

Dharmasattva, of Dharmasattva's Meditations, shows us that the Grand Canyon demonstrates the Buddhist principle of impermanence. “Even the earth under our feet is dynamic and ever-changing.” [See a portion of one of Dharmasattva's photographs, at left.]

Dee, the ordinary immortal of Urban Mystic, writes to recommend a book, Life is ForEver. The book makes the case that the mind and brain are not the same. The book is important since those that believe that death brings oblivion are getting their case heard in Britain, while those that believe and have evidence for immortality are not being heard.

Joe Perez of Until has quit his job because of health issues. His situation, which he describes at some length, seems very serious. He is interested in recommendations readers of his blog might have on how to use meditation to deal with chronic pain. Blogmandu readers: Any knowledge about this, thoughts or ideas you could share with Joe?

Moose, The Contemporary Taoist, has been absent without leave from his blogging duties, with just a couple posts in the last couple months, but he is happy to report that past pieces in his column, called “The Contemporary Taoist,” in LivingNow hardcopy magazine will soon be available online. Moose should know; he’s in charge, re-vamping the magazine’s online presence.

Howdy Seven, S’long Six. Justin Whitaker welcomes in the new year in American Buddhist Perspective and then is visited by the Ghost of Blogging Past who takes him on an extended texty tap dance down the garden trail of a year gone by. One pithy bit of wisdom plucked from last June: “In life, what is needed is less map and more compass.”

C4’s fav wine merchant, Joshua Zader of Mudita Journal, is keen on an audio CD called “True Meditation” by Adyashanti. After meditating for twenty minutes following listening to the first hour of the 3 ½ hr. CD, Joshua has been in a fairly “perpetual state of witness consciousness” since.

whiskey of whiskey river posts A Triangle. It’s like a haiku that Escher might write, you think?

A Triangle of Thought

Our memories mellow time
As wine mellows memories
as time mellows the wine
- Linda Delayen

TMCG of the same-name blog was jazzed seeing a rockumentary on the Pixies called loudQUIETloud. She writes that the Pixies wrote the soundtrack of her generation such that “not a moment of the movie went by that I didn't have some memory associated with a bass line, howling vocal, swirl-grinding guitar or kick-pedal pound.”

Paul, A Blue Eyed Buddhist, writes, in a post titled “I love America,” “Is this a great country, or what?” The cause of his glee: New Muslim congressman Keith Ellison has his picture taken being sworn in by Speaker Nancy Polosi, using a two-volume Koran that had belonged to Thomas Jefferson. The scene has Paul wondering if Jefferson might have had a copy of the Lotus Sutra that might be held in the Library of Congress, somewhere.

A couple Buddhist blogs posted yesterday or today regarding a 50 min. video that is free online - A BBC/Discovery Channel co-production, The Life of the Buddha, found at Marcello’s E-Dharma blog, originally posted in November. Word is getting out. TMCG says the E-Dharma link is great. Bill of Integral Options Cafe says the film is "a good quality production, worthy of watching."

That's all for today, y'all. Happy blogging and blog reading to everyone!